Flores and Lanquin
GUATEMALA | Friday, 25 April 2008 | Views [488]
those bloody English get everywhere.
After a dusty drive from the border, we arrived in Flores. It´s a
pretty little town built on an island in the middle of a lake. We found
a hostel with a room, not that great, but a really nice roof deck with
stunning lake views, and hammocks! After chilling for a day, the next
morning our alarms went off at 3am in order to get the bus to Tikal. 2
hours later, following a drive and a 40 min hike in the dark, we were
climbing Temple 4. The sun rise viewed from the top of the temple is
supposed to be amazing but unfortunately the Mayan gods obviously had
other ideas and we got a magnificent view of steadily lightening grey
cloud and mist! After that anti-climax the rest of the tour was
amazing, the temples and structures are some of the highest in the
Mayan world and have also been very well restored. We climbed up Temple
5 (not something I´d recommend if you have vertigo!) and were treated
to some amazing views of the stone structures emerging out of the
jungle. We also saw toucans, howler and spider monkeys and as it was
cloudy avoided getting sunburnt!!
The next day we hopped on a
bus and headed south to Coban, however our bus mates managed to
persuade us that we ought to continue directly to Lanquin rather than
staying in Coban. So after a little bit of bus hopping, and a very
enjoyable chicken bus ride through the jungle-covered hills (machete
clad farmers, and 50kg bags of flour were our travelling companions),
we arrived at El Retiro in Lanquin. El Retiro is an "Eco Hostel" set on
a hillside by a river: the buildings are all natural materials; the
restaurant cooks really good vegetarian food (even Stuart admitted it
didn´t need meat!); the river was clear and perfect for cooling off in.
The only slight drawback was the "eco toilets" that we probably don´t
need to describe!
Just down the road from Lanquin is Semuc
Champey, one of the many natural parks in Guatemala, and we took a trip
there the day after we arrived. It started off with a little dip in the
river, off a rope swing you have to jump off as if you let the swing
come back you hit the bank... After that we went caving by candlelight,
complete with
climbing up waterfalls and squeezing through rock
crevices. It was a really surreal experience - I mean who thought up
trying to swim along an underground river whilst holding a candle!!
Next on the to-do list was a
quick (if you’re a mountain goat)
climb up to the mirador overlooking the limestone pools (where we also
saw a wild tarantula). These are naturally formed pools on a massive
limestone bridge over the main river. After the climb the pools were
wonderful to cool off in, then our ever-energetic guide Matteo unrolled
a rope ladder to allow the group to climb down the final waterfall and
dive off an 18 foot cliff. Anna summed the day up by saying it was like
completing an army assault course in a bikini!!
We decided to
stay in Lanquin for a few more days just chilling out. Our main
activities included reading, sleeping in hammocks, swimming in the
river, drinking licuardos and, if feeling very energetic, playing
volleyball! After 3 more days in paradise we had to move on, mainly in
case we ended up never leaving, but also as we had run out of cash (the
nearest ATM is a 6-hour round trip away). We took a somewhat eventful
shuttle bus to Antigua where we spent one night, then a couple of
chicken buses (brightly painted school buses originally from the
States)
on to Xela.
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