Thank you, Guatemala

This lifestyle is hard. And there are times (rare, but they happen) when I have a longing to go home. Where things are easier. Where I have consistent access to a toilet, HOT showers, and any food I want delivered to my door. Where I can communicate the things I want or need without a language barrier. Where I don’t have to constantly track every dollar we spend to ensure we stay within our limited budget. Where things are familiar. Where I know where I’ll be sleeping every night. You get the gist. But there are also times when I can’t stop smiling. Like to the point that my cheeks hurt and I need a break to stretch out my jaw because I can’t handle the amount of smiling and laughter. Zach told me just a few days ago that one of the best things about this trip for him is seeing how happy I am. And I am- truly. This lifestyle is hard, yes, but it is SO rewarding. And Guatemala has been such a refreshing reminder of that.

We decided to cross from Mexico, through Belize, and into Guatemala in one day so we spent our last day in Mexico to get ready to cross the borders. We opted to skip Belize for a few reasons: 1) it is expensive relative to surrounding countries, 2) we had had our fill of Caribbean beaches in Mexico, 3) by skipping Belize meant we had more time in Guatemala.

Side note: we met an Israeli couple briefly on our 2nd to last day in Mexico that have been overlanding for NINE YEARS(!) and when asking for advice they told us that they were "professional skippers." Meaning you have to pick and choose where to spend your time because you really can’t see it all. That mindset sort of gave us permission to feel OK with our decision to skip Belize, despite everyone telling us we HAD to go there. So I guess now, we’re professional skippers too!

We had a lot on our list that final day in MX: copies of all of our necessary documents (vehicle registration, vehicle title, passports, drivers licenses, etc.), Miles’ health certificate, groceries, laundry, switch our phone plans to Google Fi, etc. With all that done we were ready to hit the road! We started early the next morning and had relatively smooth crossings at both the Belizean and Guatemalan borders and a SUPER interesting drive in Belize. Just after crossing the border into Belize, we saw a hitchhiker who happened to also be the guy who lent us his pen when we were going through customs just before that. So we stopped. His name was Yan, he was from Shanghai, and has been traveling the last 3 years, hitchhiking for the last 2, and has been to all 7 continents! He was such an interesting kid and we had a great time swapping stories as we took him as close as we could to his destination before continuing on our way.

Yan from Shanghai! The Hitchhiker :)

Once across the border, we found a campsite right on Lago Petén Itzá for 5QTZ($0.65USD)/person where we had access to the beautiful lake, cold showers, and a toilet. At that point it had been a full 7 days since I had washed my hair so a cold shower was more than welcomed! It was nice to be on such a beautiful lake after a busy couple of days.

Happy Place

Getting ready to dive in!

Lago Petén Itzá: View from the dock.

After skipping Chichen Itzá in Yucatan, MX, we knew we wanted to go to Tikal. Well OK, I knew I wanted to go to Tikal and Zach was lukewarm on the idea of spending the day away from the lake where he could swim (I swear, he’s addicted to swimming) to walk around the sights and ruins that the Mayans once inhabited. The bummer of spending the day at Tikal, however, was that we were going to have to leave Miles behind since no dogs are allowed in the park. But luckily, we came across this wonderful couple, Jorge & Maldani, on the app we use to find campsites, iOverlander. They have a house and a lot of land just 5 minutes outside of the Tikal entrance where they charge just over $5USD to camp/park for the night AND they will watch guests’ dogs while they explore the ruins. SCORE. But the even bigger surprise when we got there was just how warm and welcoming they would be. We spoke with them EXCLUSIVELY in español for hours (OK, Zach did most of the speaking, but I was able to follow most of what was being said!), Maldani gave us some of their farm fresh eggs and homemade salsa, and they walked with us through the neighborhood to buy the freshest tortillas I’ve ever had- 20 of them for 5QTZ/$0.65USD. Oh and they had 4 day old baby goats!! We felt super comfortable leaving Miles with them while we left to explore the ruins.

Sunset from our view at Jorge and Maldani's.

Campsite for the night.

Their house on the right.

We weren’t even 5 minutes into the park when we went wandering through the jungle- admittedly a little lost- and were totally on our own. No tours, no people, only us & monkeys! When we finally made our way out of the thick jungle we were spit out right into one of sites where residence quarters were once held. And as soon as we entered the site, a howler monkey, clearly startled by our presence, began protesting loudly. It was the coolest/scariest experience to be completely on our own, surrounded by jungle and ancient ruins, and wildlife. We even saw a spider monkey family swinging in the trees above us, babies and all! It was so worth getting up early to enter the park at 6AM when it opened. It tends to get really busy we're told.

Zach is such a ruinas fan now.

A little lost in the jungle.

But don't really care.

Residences.

Main Plaza.

Tikal selfie all by ourselves.

While we were at the lake before the ruins, an ex-pat sold us some carrot bread and after chatting with him for a bit he told us about some sulfur hot spring waterfalls a bit further south so obviously we had to go. I’ll do pretty much anything for hot springs, but hot spring falls? I’d never experienced anything like it. So we went. Well, we tried to go. But we got lost. And we met a family on vacation. Jason is from Virginia, and his wife, Sandra, is from Guatemla- a small village just outside of Los Amates and about an hour from where we met them. She left Guatemala 16 years ago and 2 kids and one husband later, is in the process of finalizing her US citizenship. She pointed us in the right direction of the falls and invited us to come park at her home if we wanted. So we exchanged contact information & parted ways. We contemplated if we should take Sandra up on her offer. We didn’t want to intrude on their family vacation and again, be those weird people that showed up living in their van. So while we thought about our options and the timing of it all, we went to the falls. They were INCREDIBLE! And my first hot "shower" since Tulum (10 days ago)! The pool beneath it was cool and the falls themselves were hot enough to turn my skin red after standing underneath them. It was unlike anything I’ve ever seen before & I loved it.

Sulfer springs.

Started to get a little busy around 30 mins after we got there.

Finca Paraíso

Best hot shower ever.

Hot spring selfie.

Happy :)

Afterwards, about 15 kids swarmed our van. We were warned they would do so as we were in a pretty poor community. Some kids were selling things, some begging for money, some offering help when we wanted some change for our 100QTZ bill, and one asked if we had a pen for his school. It’s such a strange thing because you want to just give these children (most with no shoes) all of your money, but you also don’t want to condone begging and not working for the money they are given. So we bought banana pancakes from one of the girls, we gave one of the boys a pen for his school and we gave 1QTZ each to those who helped us get some change from our larger bill. All in all, it cost us a whopping $1USD and a pen but what we gained in return was priceless. We spent nearly 30 minutes with these kids. Their smiles and curiosity when engaging with us were so heartwarming. At one point I had about 7 of them in our van admiring our tiny home and making jokes about how our house had wheels and Zach gave them a full on tour in español.

They're so tiny compared to Zach!

The cutest.

During our time with the kids it became evident we wanted more experiences with the locals, like we had with Jorge and Maldani up in Tikal, and this time we had an invitation to go to a village that we would have never known to go to. So we took Sandra up on her offer and went. We showed up in our van, we parked in front of their house, and we stayed for 3 days. We had a big feast the first night we were there complete with the traditional Guatemalan dish, churrasco. It is made up of tortillas with a layer of mayonnaise, a sort of coleslaw, grilled meat, avocado, and salsa. WOW. The best part of being there was feeling like we were a small part of Sandra’s family for a few days. Next door she had an uncle, across the street was her cousin, the next house down- another cousin, etc. The whole village was basically her entire family. One of her younger cousins, 13 yr old Marie-Fer, was the absolute sweetest. She wanted to practice English and I Spanish so we spent hours having basic conversations in both languages and teaching each other words. At the end of the few days, she told me in half English, half Spanish, "Ahora eres mi cousin. I love you." (Now you are my cousin, I love you). And my heart melted right then and there. She told me her sister lives in San Francisco and she wants to visit so bad. But she would never be able to get a visa. That’s just he nature of being a citizen of Central America at this point in time- no tourist visas are being given from the US to that part of the world. You can’t go to the States legally. You can’t even claim asylum. If it was a matter of money, I’d sponsor Marie-Fer’s visa in a heart beat when we got back to San Francisco- so she could visit her sister and I could visit with my new little cousin. But maybe one day things will change but for now we can stay connected via Instagram :)
 

The street to Sandra's house.

 

Sandra's house & ours for a few days.

Sandra's entrance gate.

The common space with a bathroom straight ahead and two bedrooms on the left.

Sandra dressed up our first meal of churrasco.

YUM.

Feasting with Sandra's cousin, Jason's mom, Jason & Sandra.

My new little cousin, Marie-Fer :)

Hanging out with Miles in the hammocks at their house.

Super comfy.

During our time in their village we also had sprung a small leak in our roof right where our fan was and only noticed as it had been raining off an on for a few days. We told Sandra that we’d have to go to the hardware store in town and work on getting it fixed. 10 minutes later, we were down the street at her cousin Junior’s place where he runs motorcycle mechanic business as well as a car wash. He had a large car park tall enough to fit Fran under to shield her from the rain so we could take a look at the roof. I was changing my clothes in the van and when I got out, Junior was already on the roof, drying things off and had a flashlight and sealant ready to seal any cracks. I hopped up there with him and it was fixed in no time & when we asked how much we owed him, he laughed at us. The hospitality we were shown was just unlike anything we could have dreamed of.

Up on the roof with Junior.

Our set up to fix our leaky roof.

OK, now to talk about Sandra. Sandra grew up in the village we were staying in until the age of 12 when her parents split up. It was then her mom had to get a job and she got that job at the banana plantation packing bananas ready to be shipped around the world. Because of that job, they were able to move to the village located on the banana plantation (which she took us to visit & we saw her childhood home!) and they were doing pretty well. They were able to buy a refrigerator and a TV and then one year a massive storm hit and wiped out a lot of the plantation. When there are no bananas to pack, there are no jobs for banana packers. So her mom made the tough decision to cross into the states & Sandra really had no choice. They didn’t have enough money for food much less housing and going to the US to join other family was their only hope. So they crossed over via Coyote and remained undocumented for years. She shared some of her experiences with us- like the time she was working and started to show during her first pregnancy and was fired on the spot. Or when her son was extremely sick in the hospital and her employer told her she was distracted and clearly cared more about him than work and was fired from that job too. What was she going to do without papers? She hated America and her mom for making her leave Guatemala for a long time, and then she met Jason while she was working in a diner in Virginia. 12 years later they have a beautiful daughter and son and are happily married. The hatred that Sandra once felt has been replaced with gratitude for the opportunities that the US has afforded her. So much gratitude that she does everything she can to give back to families that are struggling  in a level of poverty unlike anything in the US. Struggling like her family once was. Each year, she raises funds to build 3-4 houses for families in need in the surrounding villages of her Guatemalan home. She donates food and toys and appliances and is sort of a celebrity in Guatemala. We felt so privileged to get to know her and hear her stories & we hope we cross paths again in the future.

We also visited ruins near Sandra's village. This is a tunnel that goes all the way to Honduras!

Standing next to a big Ceiba tree, the national tree of Guatemala.

Pretty Ceiba Tree.

Ruinas.

Eating lunch with Sandra, Jason and Sandra cousins.

Lunch of Churrasco, with a thick flour tortilla this time!

The banana plantation we visited.

After we left Sandra’s, we made our way over to Volcán de Acetenango where we did a big overnight trek! The night before the trek we camped outside of our guide’s house and ate dinner with his family. We walked around the village and played with some of the local kids who were fascinated by Zach. We even let them play a bit with our camera and they got a kick out of filming each other. After a peaceful night of sleep and some breakfast the next morning, we began the trek. It was 4.5 miles one way with 5,300 ft of elevation gain to base camp where we sat at 13,000ft. Brutal! It was about 5 hours straight up hill but once we were there we had a gorgeous view of Volcán de Fuego- an almost always active volcano. We sat and stared at it for hours, in complete awe as lava spilled over the sides all night long. The summit began the next morning and according to our guide it was the most difficult part of the hike, so Miles and I stayed nestled in our warm sleeping bags while Zach did the summit :) After our 3 hour decent down, we were exhausted. And Miles you might be wondering? TROOPER. He out performed all of us  as per usual haha.

Zach playing with some of the neighborhood kids.

They got a kick out of our camera.

Dinner of this chicken tomato stew & rice.

Breakfast of frijoles rifritos, arroz & juevos.

View from base camp on Volcán de Acatenango of Volcán de Fuego.

 

It was so loud every time it erupted!

Acatenango selfie.

Had to get a photo of Miles- he made it to the top!

  

Such a trooper.

View at night! It went off all night long.

Sunrise summit.

Sunrise summit.

The best part of the timing of this hike was that we were coming off the mountain on Christmas Eve & we had booked a room in a guest house in Antigua, Guatemala, for the 24th-26th with HOT showers, a big king sized bed and a huge kitchen for us to use. We spent a solid two days doing absolutely nothing (mostly because we couldn’t walk after that hike HA) but cooking and catching up with family.  Christmas was weird this year. We did all we could to get into the Christmas spirit. We decorated the van, we downloaded Christmas movies & music, we booked a hotel and cooked a big Christmas dinner & even my mom’s breakfast casserole to keep up with tradition. And we did all this in anticipation of feeling sad given we’d be missing Christmas with our families. But we just weren’t. We missed them, yes. But we weren’t sad. I joked about a week prior that it felt like this year Christmas just wouldn’t exist and aside from lovely catch ups with family, it truly felt like any other day. Oh, except for the fireworks. Non-stop bombas!

Decorating for Christmas!

Complete with garland, lights and a tree :)

   

Finished product :)

Christmas photo 2019

Family photo, even though Miles was snoring :)

Mom's egg caserole.

Antigua, Guatemala.

After Antigua we had one more stop to make in Guatemala- Lago Atitlan. It is surrounded by volcanos and nestled at about 5,000 ft above sea level which keeps the weather nice and cool year round. It really is stunning, and the surrounding towns are pretty great as well. We chose to visit Panajachel and the vibe was perfect for us- a little back-packerish and much less of a party scene than San Pedro. But as we got there, we had zero energy. The road from Antigua was riddled with pot holes and we were just tired. On a deadline to get to El Salvador for our next visitor (yay!!) we were trying to fit in everything we wanted to do and as a result, we were just exhausted. So we relaxed in the van near the water most of the time we were there, but did manage to go on a couple walks and find ourselves a gringo bar one evening. Zach wanted to catch the first round of the college football playoffs so we figured a gringo bar was the way to go. We chatted with the ex-pats that live in the area and even managed to snag some more textiles for our future home! In hind site, we should have just stayed in Antigua for another couple nights to combat the exhaustion that long drives can bring on. But it's just another example of how we're learning a little more about this lifestyle each and every day.

Lago Atitlan

View from the drive down to the lake.

Atitlan selfie.

Looking back on our time in Guatemala I can't help but feel just so extremely lucky. I know a lot of people say that but I think this is the first time in my life I can truly say I've felt the emotion of gratitude to an unprecedented level. Lucky to have been born in the country I was. Lucky to have been able to afford the experiences I'm having now. Lucky to have such an incredible partner to share this journey with. Lucky to have enough courage to push myself as far as I have. Lucky to have the best support system throughout it all. And lucky for so much more. And the thing about this feeling of gratitude that Guatemala brought me wasn’t necessarily Guatemala at all. It was the countless individuals we met that made our experiences in Guatemala special. It’s consistently the people that make this trip better than we could have ever expected. And it’s the people that had me smiling so much my poor jaw was in pain.