Lago Atitlan

Our last day in Guatemala we spent on the BEAUTIFUL Lago Atitlan.  Guatemala on the whole is an incredibly beautiful place and this certainly didn’t ruin our time in Guatemala, but the one downside we continuously ran into was cloudy, chilly weather.  God certainly answered our prayers for our Lake day—pure sun in the sky, clouds, turquoise and sparkling water, warm weather, in short, it was perfect.

The lake is surrounded by volcanoes, how sweet is that- a lake surrounded by volcanoes!  We had arranged a mini tour for our day trip to the lake so we had a boat, Glendy, to take us around to 4 different villages on the lake.  It was a fast trip and I would love to spend more time in each village, but it was the perfect way to spend a day on the lake because it gave us a lot of boat time on the actual lake, which in my opinion, is almost the best part. 

All aboard Glendy

We first took Glendy on a beautiful boat ride to San Juan de la Laguna.  Docking there was so pretty in the marsh/lagoon.  Trees and grass were sprouting out of the pristinely clear water through which I could see straight to the bottom.  San Jan was a very “earthy” town.  They had beautiful artwork and weaving.  The weaving here was different in that the woman worked in environmentally friendly and organic cooperatives, using natural dyes for their projects.  On whole the town was very organic.  During our walk around I enjoyed an organic honey stick treat and organic coffee with a lakeside view.  We also found a local church with a beautiful fruit altar. 

fruit altar...smelled so good.

Views from our coffee spot

San Juan de la Laguna

After San Juan we hopped aboard Glendy and rode to San Pedro.  San Pedro was a very hip and happening sort of town with a lot to do, entonces, MUST GO BACK.  We decided to spend our hour in San Pedro kayaking the lake.  It was great only 20 pretzels (Guatemalan money is called Quetzals, hence the pretzel nickname) or about 2.50 to kayak for an hour on the lake.  I had never solo kayaked before and am thrilled that I can say that my first solo kayak was in Guatemala on  Lago Atitlan, surrounded by volcanoes. 

black bass

Our next boat ride was a long and choppy one as the waves started picking up.  I had been dying to lie out in the front of the boat and so I was in bliss riding the waves, enjoying the sun, and marveling at the volcanoes as we passed marshes, islands, and saw Guatemalans canoeing around.  We then headed to Santiago where Lacey, Jess, Deirdre and I sought out a rooftop lunch.  We dined on a delicious meal of black bass from the lake.  So ricoooo. 

View from our margarita spot

Then we headed back to Panjachel to finish up our miraculous tour of the lake.  Our first stop was a lakeside margarita to cheers to the best day ever.  It was such a perfect day: boats, sun, kayaking, shopping, good food, lake, volcanoes….ahhhhhh.  We were just loving life. 

Cheers to the lago!

  I wish I could have spent another week just on the Lake.  It is seriously one of the most beautiful spots I’ve ever been to.  I couldn’t stop praising God for the opportunity to visit such a beautiful part of His creation.  I truly am so lucky.  Lago Atitlan, nos vemos pronto.

Marshmallows Roasting on a Volcanoooooo

Ready for volcano action

One of my life dreams has been to SEE a volcano, let alone climb one and roast marshmallows on top of one.   Luckily beautiful, active volcanoes surround Antigua, Guatemala.  On Wednesday we took a mini shuttle bus to climb an active volcano, Volcan Pacaya.  A windy, but lovely bus ride as it was on actual roads (step up from the Hondi) later we reached the bottom of the volcano.  We were immediately assaulted by children shouting “Estick! Estick!”  We all said pshhhh who needs a stick?!?!  Ha ha.  Little did we know we would be legit climbing a volcano in a few minutes.

Thus we began our summit of the volcano.  At first the hike was a little stressful as we all headed up a narrow path with the kids yelling “Estick!” and walking legit right next to horses with their owners constantly offering taxi rides.  I love horses, rode them for many years, but I’m not a huge fan of walking next to a horse in a confined space in which I could be kicked or pooped on, not by choice, but just by sheer proximity with no where to turn.  Plus with Katie’s recent horse bite, surprise surprise, walking next to horses wasn’t her cup of tea. 

Arbol de hormigas

The hike up was cloudy, but beautiful.  We passed trees and saw farms and every once in awhile we would pause at a scenic lookout point.  At one point we saw arboles de hormigas or Ant Trees (?)  I don’t know in English but those trees are the wood used to make marimbas, which is a traditional instrument here that’s like a xylophone. 

The hike up was an hour and half long, but totally worth as the trees began to thin out and the earth began to change from stone to forest pathway to volcanic ash.  Suddenly after hiking uphill for ever and ever the trees went away and all that was before us was one last uphill climb of volcanic rock.  After the last push up, we arrived at the top, and man, holy cow we were standing on a volcano.  In front of us was the very peak covered in fog and clouds and all around us was volcano. 

Approaching the volcano

ahhhh.... volcano

We then continued to hike up the volcano and around the volcano a bit more.  The volcano we hiked is an active volcano so in certain parts you could feel the heat coming from the Earth and the volcano.  At one area our tour guide was like all right, who’s ready for marshmallows?!!?!?!  He legit pulled out marshmallows and sticks and we roasted marshmallows in the various “hot pockets” of the volcano.  Let me tell you after an 1 ½ of hiking  up a volcano, roasting marshmallows in natural, Earth-made hot pockets of sorts produces the best marshmallows I’ve ever had.  An adorable father-daughter duo from the states that we hiked with were seasoned volcano-ers and they brought their leftover Italian lunch to heat up, clearly we had a lot to learn about the art of volcano-ing, but I’ll take the marshmallows.

hiking around

 roasting marshmallows 

Honduran lip point a volcano!!!!!

The volcano, by far, is one of the coolest things I’ve ever done.  I climbed, hiked, gawked at, and roasted marshmallows on a VOLCANO.  The whole time I was up there I was like, I. Am. On. A. Volcano.  A VOLCANO!  Totally worth the hike up.  Volcanoes might be my new favorite thing. 

Mayan Ruins, Hot Springs, and Horses

Semana Santa or Holy Week is a spring break of sorts for most of the people that live in work in Central America.  Most businesses and schools shut down for the week to celebrate and be with family and friends.  Us volunteers, well, we jumped on the opportunity to travel.  We began our Semana Santa travels by heading to Copan, Honduras. 

Sunday morning (Palm Sunday) our trusty Viktor bus showed up at the door, to drive us to Copan.  We were surprised to open the van doors to see about 15 other people from our Foundation in the van ready to go as well.  Makes sense, if a bus is going to Copan, might as well aprovechar and offer a mini-vacay to others.  So we began our 12 hour bus ride to Copan with Carlos and his family, yay spring break with a first grader, goodbye sleeping on the bus, Rolando (bus driver) and his family (2^nd grader), Tony and William (our trusty handymen), and two teachers from the Special Needs school, Nazareth. 

Monday morning we started the day off with the whole OAF gang at the Mayan ruins.  With our trusty guide, Mauricio, we dominated those Mayan ruins with our Spanglish and energy.  The Mayans are so cool.  Everything is so ancient and so well done and preserved.  Plus they think the world is ending in 2012, so I’m glad I made it to see them before then. 

We climbed the ruins and gawked at the beauty of Honduras.  Saw amphitheaters and explored Mayan tunnels.  Learned about the Mayan sport.  A ball game in which the ball cannot touch the ground so as not to wake the gods of the underworld and players try to score points by hitting hoops.  The Captain of the winning team would be sacrificed by decapitation to celebrate the win.  Way to go Mayans. 

OAF does the ruinas 

climbing the temples

We learned all about the Dieciocho Conejo or 18^th Rabbit king.  With each new ruler the Mayans would build on top of the previous structures.  The coolest of which was a long staircase type thing displaying the image of each Mayan king.  Oh and we met the dancing jaguars and sun god, which we obvi planked. 

kids are pretty great

planking the Mayan sun god

staircase

first graders are pretty snazzy

That afternoon we headed to some aguas termales or natural hot springs.  A rope bridge and short hike into the words we discovered several small pools of natural hot water.   I think after all our hard work this year, we deserved a spa sort of afternoon.

We started in the “mud massage pool.”  In this pool there was natural mud along the side to exfoliate and massage with.  Rolando’s mom gave us each a mud back massage, sooo rico.  Then we went to a foot massage pool and a back/neck massage waterfall.  But mostly, us girls, just reflected on life, this year, and the joy of being able to relax in the natural beauty of Honduras. 

We ended our afternoon playing with the kids and OAF in the pool.  Several Honduran acrobatic stunts ensued.  We also had some chicken fights, which I can proudly say that Deirdre and I the only girl-girl team won. 

The next day we had the morning left in Copan before heading to Guatemala so we decided to do one of my most favorite things in the world—Horseback riding!

beautiful farms

One of the happiest I’ve ever been in Honduras was sitting on the back of Princesa (my horse) watching coffee, corn, and plantain farms pass me my as I felt so at home on a horse and awed by the beauty of Honduras.  Katie also kept the 1 ½ hour trek up the mountain interesting with her comic relief as she was “terrified” of being on her horse. 

the school

When we reached the top we got to explore a little village community called “La Pintada.”  La Pintada is a very indigenous community towards the top of the mountain we were riding up.  We saw a few more Mayan ruins and explored the village area.  We even got to visit a microempresa where some women do some really cool weaving.  Another highlight was seeing the school where students in the village learn in Spanish and Quichean, which is a Mayan language (I think that’s how you spell it). 

Princesa y yo

horse time

The ride back down was more horseback riding bliss.  One of the reasons why I love horses so much is because of the personality of each.  Luckily, our group of horses was no exception.  Laura rode the lovely Chica Loca or Crazy Girl.  She insisted on being in the lead.  She was slow and stubborn and bit Princesa a couple times for trying to pass her.  On the way back Chica Loca once again was going the wrong way.  When she realized she didn’t turn to the left like everyone else, she angrily trotted over and tried to bite Katie’s horse for being in front of her…..but instead she missed and bit Katie’s leg.  Womp womp, poor Katie.  Katie claims that she will never get on a horse again, we’ll see.  I mean how can you deny the amusingness of horseback riding?

beautiful

  Horseback riding in Honduras and Mayan ruins, Copan, you were pretty great.