An action packed time in Guatemala

We enjoyed Antigua very much. It had lots of churches and old buildings that had been ruined by a number of earthquakes which made it interesting to explore. While we were here we decided to venture up another volcano 'Volcan Pacaya' - an active one! This time it wasn't so steep or hot, but it was definitely treacherous! It started raining before we had even got out of the minibus and there were thick clouds making the walk up quite spooky as you could barely see the person in front of you. However; even though we were soaked to the bone we really enjoyed it, as you could really tell you were climbing a volcano with all the lava rocks underfoot. It was especially cool when our guide took us to some spots where you could feel the heat and he could light twigs just by holding them near it. At the top we could see down in to one of the holes where lava was burning! Sadly the copious amouts of rain meant that BOTH our cameras died (Lettys is still yet to be resurrected, but Coops' has just pulled through without the use of the flash! Boo!)

Antigua was quite a tourist hub. We had a fun night out in a little bar where they all seemed to congregate, where tequila shots may have been forced upon us! :-S
There was however a dark side, in the shape of a sleeping bag thief. They sprung whilst we were out in town and we can't work out if they were a fellow traveller or a freaky local who decided they needed a comfy (expensive!) sleeping bag of Coops' to make their own! The next thing to go was Bets' bra, which clearly a laundry woman decided she liked the look of, as it sadly never returned from our washing! And then to top it off Lettys small ring was also swiped from our bedside table! Damn them!

Our next stop was Coban for the pupose of visiting Semuc Chempey. This was an amazing set of rainwater pools that were turquoise blue, with a boisterous muddy river flowing underneath. We had a really fun guide who took us, a nice Aussie girl and adorable Canadian man through the pools; diving, jumping and sometimes sliding between them all (we won't mention that the really pants weather made it slightly less appealing). We also visited some more caves in a nearby town called Lanquin; where we befriended more bats. The nice people who were on our tour (including an Israeli couple) took us out for a meal that night at the 'best restaurant in town' which happened to be at our hostel. There was much excitement over the mouth watering desert selection. Coops had difficulty containing her joy and even moreso making her decision on what to have! Good times!

We had then planned a fairly pleasant and straight forward journey to the next town - Flores! HOWEVER - this did not go to plan! Due to the immense amount of rain, we were once again told 'computer says no' when trying to leave Coban. After going back and forth to the bus station we decided to wing it without really knowing where the bus was headed. After 10 minutes we were forced to stop, get out and walk as there was a demonstration blocking the road. Clearly strikes in Guatemala only last til 12pm; as just as we were walking through they started peacefully clearing up. We thought that this might be the reason for the earlier confusion but how very wrong we were. It turns out that at a lot of points along the road we had to travel, the rivers had overflowed. So we spent the next 6 hours having frequent intervals where we had to get out of one bus and clamber aboard some make-shift raft that was then half carried, half floated across to the other side. We were terrified that our backpacks would not survive, especially when one man decided to carry both of them on his head! Our faces were truly a picture of sheer terror and this didnt go away when we also had to cross again with our leggings rolled up, being laughed at by locals. Or the time we had to walk over a single plank of wood whilst others were marching towards us in the other direction! You will pleased to hear that we made it through in one piece and we now look upon this as an amusing dinner-party story!

We eventually made it to Flores, which was a cute town (on an island in a lake). From here we visited Tikal (famous mayan ruins). The temples and pyramids were amazing, and we exhausted ourselves trying to climb them. Tikal is set in a jungle so lots of animal sightings were had. We saw: howler and spider monkeys, toucans, more agoutis and coatis, a miniature guatemalan squirrel, a giant colourful bird (we don't know what it is!) and most horrendously a tarantula. Well Letty saw the devil's creature but Coops, at this point, was standing a safe distance away and banned Letty from taking any photos!

Coming up: Chilling on the beach.....it's a hard life!*

Lots of love, we are having some rum punches on your behalf! ;-)

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