San Gregorio Spa Guatemala City

... to Susan)<br>¨Oh, oops, is that your girlfriend?¨ To which Teddy responded, ¨EW, no!<br>Sue´s like my sister.¨ Thanks, Ted, coulda done without the ew, but you<br>get the point. People have also asked us way more times than is normal<br>whether we are brother and sister. You might not think this is weird,<br>considering we probs act like it, but you have to consider the fact we<br>look nothing alike. Teddy is just shy of Hagrid-size and Susan is<br>legally a midget in several ...

... Although it was a cool day once we finally reached the top it was VERY hot. You could feel the heat oozing out of ground we were stepping on and the lava flows were awesome. <br><br>Coming down the volcano was a lot of fun because, as I said earlier, the ground was constantly shifting so it was sort of like skiing down a mountain (one without any snow and lots of jagged rocks). Once we got back to greenery both of us were so tired that we decided it would be best if we got on some ...

... time. The town is peaceful - tourists are not really hassled to go on tours, or to buy "authentic" Antiguan stuff and there are no uncomfortable stares. We got our maps and headed out to the streets for lunch.<br><br>We found a hole in the wall that we read about where all the food is in these huge clay pots out near the entrance and so you get the awesome smells of food. This food certainly looks more authentic than the pizza joint, pollo campero and irish ...

... chicken. Move over KFC, you have competition!<br><br>We head back to the hotel pack and head to the ferry. We split into two groups. The first group has no idea where are going. The second knows. This happens by accident of course. I am in the first group. We head to the ferry stop that we know about. We wait. And wait. And wait. No sign of the second group. Yep, you guessed it: wrong ferry stop. We grab our gear and ...

... ahead of time. They took us HORSE-BACK RIDING!!! It was amazing! The horses were very well-cared for, and healthy, and we rode them through a small village called ciudad viejo (old city). We rode them through a coffee plantation and on a trail where we had the view of the volcano Fuego (which was exploding black smoke in the distance). I loved it, and Matthew took to the horse very easily. He looked like the Lone Ranger on that stallion; galloping away ...

... this was probably all in the past, because Julio's pushing 60-65 I'm sure. He's a really nice guy, helping out with Spanish and even lending me a volume of the Remhi report (Catholic Church's report on the genocide/civil war), but he's quirky, just really quirky. Lester. I remember the first night I arrived, fumbling through Spanish, he tried out the little English he knows and clarified that Marta was asking if eggs for breakfast was fine ...

... to the Antigua. Ivan is a 42 year old Guatemalan man who has always lived in the city and had previously driven a local bus. I asumed he would know the way!!! He really made my day and we had a very good giggle about many thing. Thank goodness I speak Spanish as I could have been quite concern as he asked every police man the best route out of the city. It turned out that because of it being rush hour he just wanted to get ...

... a bus full of Americans is that it makes you feel intelligent. At least I got to sit next to Tom. On the way to the hot springs, we stopped at the weirdest shrine that I have ever been to. It was devoted to the Maya god of bad things: San Simon. The guy smokes, drinks and wears a cowboy hat. But the best thing about him is that you can offer him a prayer for bad things to happen. So if some terrible mishap befalls Wendy Kenway Smith ...

... happen in the first place. Basicamente, most victims of the 80s violence were indigenous (around 83%, I think) and Mayan burial rights are, to the Western mind, inconceivably important, tying to ancestral communication and the like. So long story short, the forensic lab in the City was a really profound and strange experience, but certainly invaluable to further understanding this complex country. From Guatemala City, we drove some 6 hours to El Estor. Stay tuned for the next episode.

After Mexico, the logical way (apart from when I was in Chetumal) was Guatemala. Local agencies in San Cristobal offer shuttle service direct to Antigua orf Panajachel, but it was not typical enough for me so I chose the independent way. The bus from San Cristobal to the border town of Cuauhtemoc was a first class four-hour ride, the ones I got used to in Mexico by now. This particular border crossing was uninteresting -you go through customs in Mexico, pay the non immigrant ...