The Everchanging Guatemalan Highway

On the road again.  Saturday November 9, 2013.
San Pedro La Laguna to Lanquin.


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Final preparations before leaving... after sitting for a week Trevors rear tire was flat. A few pumps and it was good to go.

Group shot.  Damien is staying for another week of Spanish class.  Dan was at Flor de Maize as well and the three of us headed out together.  Dan is riding a BMW 650.

The day started off great, decent roads. Several hairy switch backs.

We climbed up into the hills. Loads of pine trees up there. 

We stopped for lunch in Cunen.  Fried chicken mmmm.  A group of shoe shinning boys came over.  We shared some of our food and hung out with them.  Unfortunately our riding boots are not the type that could be polished.  Far from the tourist trail.

Clouds and rain threatened....

As we approached San Cristebal Verapaz the road deteriorated.  First was the rock slides then the mud.  Rumor has it half the mountian came down covering the road.  Locals more or less cleared off one lane but the road is basically completely unkempt now.

Shortly after this section the road turned into rutted and wet mud.  We were focused on getting through we didnt get any photos.  It was far worse then the logging roads and cut lines back home in Alberta.

We reached civilization again.  Coban is a very large city and saw the first Mc donalds since the states!

The road was good again and the views spectacular.   Unfortunately it was starting to get dark....when the  road turned to mud for the last 12km to Lanquin.

Climbing a Volcano/ Fairwell Dinner

Friday 5:00am we (Kyle, Trevor and Damian) set off in the dark to climb a volcano. We took the local chicken bus which saved us 40 minutes of walking to the entrance. Thankfully there was a guide on the bus ready to show us where to go. We had all forgotten to bring a flashlight... whoops anyways the guide had one and off we went. 

The trail wasn't marked and wound its way up through coffee and corn fields.

The trail was about 4km up and took around 2.5 hrs.  It was quite vertical with lots of step like rocks. Basically the whole thing was switchbacks and stairs. The views from the top were worth it!

On the way down (after the hike portion) we took a tuk tuk down the road section.

We had our Spanish lessons again in the afternoon... it was a little hard to concentrate as we were quite tired. 

Later on in the evening we started preparing dinner. Making some fresh guacamole!

Dan (on the left) adding a bit of magic!?

Jose manning the grill. Burning hardwood!

Thanks for the great week everyone!

Thanks also to Dan and Damien for some of the great photos from San Pedro.

Yo Hablo Espanol San Pedro La Laguna, Lake Atitlan

Its Thursday night and we have been in Spanish school four days.  From here on the blog will be in Spanish.  Sorry all you English only readers.
On second thought....

Haviairs house, kitchen and bedrooms on the main floor.  Trevor's bedroom on the second and school area at the top.Haviair ran the school.

Haviar, his wife and 3 year old daughter Magda. Also Lolita which is not in the picture. This was the family Trevor lived with for the week. Spent many a hour playing with Magda and always felt rewarding when she would understand something you would say to her in Spanish. Rarely could I understand what she would say back but it was tons of fun.

 

Kyle stayed with a family approx 10 min walk away from the school.  They were great hosts.  They fed Kyle hearty traditional meals and helped him with Spanish.  They took Kyle to various basketball and soccer games as well as to visit relatives.

Kyle's room.

Trevor and his teacher Andrea. Good times learning!

Days consisted of school at 8:00am- 12:00 followed by lunch.  Later in the afternoon Trevor, Kyle, Dan, and Damien went kayaking one day and swimming a couple times. Watched some local fotball and basketball.

Great photo... taken after kayaking

Trevor taking an epic dive off the top of a tree into the lake!

We helped out for a bit peeling corn kernels off the cob by hand. We had competitions to see who could do a cob the fastest. Lolita the daughter of Havier won most of the time unless we cheated.  We ended up up with blisters on our thumbs! Also spent a few hours splitting bean pods..

One day we checked out some of the corn and coffee fields up in the hills.  Jose (one of the Spanish teachers) took us out there and showed us the area. We met two of his brothers working and saw a few kids carrying huge loads down the hill on their backs.  Jose was very patient and helped us constantly with our spanish. 

Coffee beans about 15 days away from harvest. They pick them when they are red.  Normal life stops and everyone heads to the hills.  Each bean is picked by hand!

San Pedro La Laguna

Saturday Nov 2, 2013.
Kyle was up at 6 feeling much better with 12hrs+ of sleep.

We hit the road and climbed and climbed.....  We both didn't realize Guatemala was so mountainous and jungle like.   We passed through several small towns up in the mountains.

We ended up missing our turn flying down the CA1 which is a beautifully paved road up, down and around mountains terrain. Took a scenic drive and after finally realizing our demise we turned around and made it to San Pedro! Got into town and nobody seemed to know about a school called Flor de Maize. Finally met a nice guy on a motorbike with his son and led us all over the city including some pedestrian walkways to just about every school except the one we were looking for. After a good while he found someone that had heard of the school and got set up with our host families.

San Pedro La Laguna.

We will be spending a week here learning Spanish.  Classes are for four hours every morning.  After class we spend our time exploring town, swimming in the lake and hanging out with our some of the other students at Flor de Maize.  

One of our classmates is Daniel, from California.  He is riding down to Argentina as well on a BMW 650.  We are all taking the Dec 6 boat in Panama.  Small world.We also met Moto Mike!
www.moto-mikey.com

www.placesbeyond.com

Before our classes started on Monday Eliezer one of the English/Spanish teachers in the area took us in his car to San Marcas where we explored the shores and found out it there were tons of hippies living there from all over the world. We stopped at a little shop that had matte tea which was a new experience for Kyle and Eliezar.

School starts tomorrow!!

Into Guatemala

Into Guatemala  Friday Nov 1, 2013

Headed to the border early.  We decided to go to the southern one instead of the main one near Tapacula.  Upon arrival we found out that there wasn't a national bank at this location (Banjercito).  A police officer instructed us that is was 100km away (into Mexico).  We needed to surrender our vehicle permits and get our $400 deposit back.   So we tried to head out of the border complex... We ended up getting fully searched while trying to re-enter Mexico...... Not sure what they were looking for as we never really left. haha. Waste of an hour.

 Butterflies!

After some confusion, traffic and construction we arrived at the Banjercito around noon. We had to get creative passing rows of cars and trucks due to the fact there were people blocking off the road trying to collect money from people to support a cause that was completely unknow to him. 

Next up was the torrential rain storm at the border. Then the relentless border helpers.  Including kids.

Mexico exit stamp..... 285 peso each.... or $20 if you dont have pesos left... When I asked about a receipt the $20 option was suddenly unavailable. We managed to frustrate the poor lady on the Guatemalan side and after 10-15 minutes she finally let us go through without the Exit stamp!!

During this time Kyle was feeling increasingly sick.  We grabbed a hotel room just a few km from the border.  For the first time on the trip we got separate rooms.  At ~$5 per room we could afford it.

Kyle's tacos from lunch didn't taste that great the second time in the wrong direction.....

Beach day in Tapachula / Day of the Dead

Thursday October 31
Slept in a bit and then made some phone calls ordering parts.  Got Trevor's muffler and Kyle's spokes figured out.  Hopefully Alex will be able to bring these parts with him to Honduras in November.

Headed out of town, after a couple wrong turns and endless banana fields we found what we were looking for.

Had a good swim

Messed around in the sand.

In the evening we wandered around town checking out the festivities. Tapachula is not a touristy place.  We definitaly stood out.  Probably didnt help that Kyle was wearing dreads.

Took in a costume contest.  The crowd was divided into sections to cheer, we were the "two gringo section."  Everyone was staring at us as per the norm.. haha


Into Guatemala tomorrow!

Canyon Carving and motorcycle bliss

Cuernavaca to Oaxaca (Wah-hawk-ah) Tuesday Oct 29  435km.
Roads in the state/province of Puebla were freshly paved and traffic was light.

The road followed the edge of the valley. Some decent views.

Stopped for lunch and a guy said it was 6 hrs to Oaxaca.  We did it in about 3.  Sometimes it is so much fun not to take the toll roads but you never know when you'll be held up for hours on end or get lost for hours..
Pulled into town in the rain and set out to find a bank that would accept our cards.  We got lucky with the second try.  Found a cheap hotel and then stumbled across a Chinese buffet.  It was nice to have something different.

 Wednesday October 30 Oaxaca to Tapachula 676km
Up early but it still took awhile to get packed and to find our way out of the city.  Once we were on the highway we stopped to oil our chains for the day.  A pair of BMWs 650's passed us and the circled back to make sure we were ok.  The two guys were from Germany doing a similar trip to ours but taking 11 months to do so.   We chatted for a bit then headed off together.  We stopped for gas, hoping to catch back up with them.   Never did see them again.  Hopefully they made it safely!

Well we thought yesterday was a day of unreal riding, today was even better.  A solid 200km of constant twisties.  It took nonstop concentration.

Turn after turn.

After all the twisties we made up some miles on a straight road just off the coast.  There was a extremely windy section, all the trees were growing sideways.  

We were stopped at a military checkpoint but managed to get through without any trouble.  No espanol.

Tomorrow we are going to take a day off before crossing into Guatemala.