After our recovery from bus/hiking hell to Coban, the landslide
I´ve just found out killed 15 people on a bus, we were ready to get back on the road but electing for a open back (with views 
) 4x4 direct door to door to Semuc Champey (and looks like someone lost a fight outside the hostel over night 
)...On arrival we spent the day floating day the river in innertubes, bridge jumping and caving.
Hilariously the caving was undertaken with a candle and involved swimming and waterfall climbing with said candle in hand...
The following day we went to the Semuc Champey lagoons, which were the main reason for being here, hard to explain but basically the river Champey passes under a 300ft limestone bridge and on the bridge are the colourful turquoise pools you can see in the pics. Lots of swimming, diving and even more bridge jumping fun was applied to the day.
Unfortunately to leave the beauty and tranquility of Semuc Champey we were faced with a 9 nine bus journey with 2 changes, and this was the expensive comfortable option, but finally lady luck was on our side and at our first change point we were lucky enough to find a gouge of Canadians that had paid for a 4x4 truck to go direct. And we were invited to sit in the back on wooden planks whiles locals jumped on and off, but reducing the journey to 6.5hrs, we stopped for view points, had a tasty lunch and even had a swim in a thermal waterfall.
And then we were at Rio Dulce, which is supposedly one of the safest yacht harbour in the Caribbean. And the following day we hopped on a boat for a day trip down the river to Livingston on the Caribbean coast, where we enjoyed the beauty of the surroundings, the general Caribbean vibe and an amazing Tapado soup
.
I now officially hate buses! Even after our bus hike hell situation only days ago, our journey to Flores was our most uncomfortable journey and thats even after 9 months on them on worse roads. Its amazing how important a seat is, even if its half a seat, or a floor, or a plank of wood, after 3 hours on our feet on a hot and sweaty bus surrounded by puking shitting kids (luckily kids don't cry in South and Central America) on their way to family and friends for Christmas, we were ready to scream maybe even pull some hair out. Thankfully I'm back to being a skin head, and Flores is a wonderfully relaxed and beautiful place on a island in lake Lake Petén Itzá. Where we had a room with a view and cable TV on which to watch Christmas movies and had a Christmas stash.
From Flores we visited the Maya site of Tikal. Which was much more impressive than the Copan ruins, with towering pyramids jutting from the jungle canopy giving it a magical and mystical feel. It has even featured in Star Wars...
Most of the pyramids have 80º stairs up the front, but since people have fallen to their deaths from these you now have to climb wooden staircases with hand rails up the back
, and the view from the tops are amazing.Even though we have seen Toucans all the way through our trip we finally managed to get our first picture, which even though blurry beyond use I'm proper chuffed with it
.The local Christmas tradition here is for the community to walk round in the evening in a precession with the virgin Mary and a massive wooden xylophone and drums playing trying to find space for her to stay the night, once they do she will stay there in someones front room for the next year.
Christmas eve also seems to be the bigger deal with midnight being marked with thousands upon thousands of low budget fireworks, most of which are set of by five year olds.
Our Christmas was very relaxed, helped by beer and wine, and a good fish dinner.
Love, festive cheer and hugs all round,
Tareq x
Oh, by the way, we have now decided to add Cuba to our itinerary...we´re flying out on the 5th of Jan
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