29th December Lago de Atitlán

After a lovely breakfast of fresh fruit, toast and banana bread we set of on our tour to 3 villages around Lago de Atitlán which is a lake in a caldera. Our guide explained that 3 years ago a freak weather event had caused the lake to rise 4 metres but the earthquake last year caused it to drop by 1 metre. The result is that there are many buildings that were waterfront properties that are now under water. The first village was San Juan La Laguna where we visited a women's textile cooperative where they use natural materials to dye the locally grown cotton and silk imported from Asia.

Back on the boat the water was getting a little rough as we traveled to San Pedro La Leguna to have some of the best coffee in Guatemala. Because of the right altitude, soil and shade the plants receive the coffee grown in this region is reportedly the best. We also managed to do a little shopping. The last stop was Santiago Atitlán where we caught tuktuks up to the church where the religion is a mixture of Catholic and Mayan. A lady out the front gave us a demonstration of how they wear their hats, a belt weighing 1kg that they wrap around and around. The church was lined with statues covered in smocks and neck ties! We walked through the markets and had lunch before heading back to Panajachel in very rough water.

 

At 4:30pm we were taken to San Jorge La Leguna for our home stay. Jo, Robert and Lorna and John decided to stay in a hotel in Panajachel instead. We stayed with Mercedes and her family. We had a great time communicating and were very lucky that her daughter could speak a little English to help with our little Spanish knowledge. We had a lovely dinner and we both helped to make a few tortillas.

26th to 28th December San Cristobal de Las Casas

The 26th we spent traveling from Palenque to San Cristobal in a van rather than a bus. This gave us the opportunity to stop off at Agua Azul, a series of cascades. They were lovely and Catriona even had a quick dip in one of the pools while David paddled with Sharon.

It took the rest of the afternoon to drive to San Cristobal de Las Casas where we checked into our hotel then went for a quick walk up to Cerro de Guadelope, a church perched on a hill with a great view over the town. As with most of the churches we have seen it was decked out in all it's Christmas decorations with a huge nativity scene at the front and a black Jesus on a cross.

 

We had dinner with Chris and Sharon at a restaurant serving local cuisine and Catriona had her first Tequila sunrise in Mexico. After dinner we had a look through the supermercado where we found some David coffee, and David bought a "tasty treat". Christiana bought a bottle of Tequila which we all helped her finish in the courtyard of the hotel along with the limes Chris bought, before retiring for the night.

In the morning we set off to find a place for breakfast. The restaurant we ended up in was very efficient with the waiters almost running Breakfast was delicious and filling.We went back to the hotel to drop off our diaries we had brought to write up over breakfast. David started to not feel well but decided to set out to enjoy the town anyway. We first walked up a wide stairway to a church, Iglesia El Cerrillo which had a running waterfall in it's nativity scene. Then on to the markets which were full of fresh food and clothing stalls also many of the stalls were selling fireworks. Once again, just like in Peru Catriona was like a giant next to the locals.

We also dropped in to Tempo Santo Domingo which had walls covered in intricate carvings painted in gold with niches for pictures and statues. The outside was also carved but from stone not wood. David was not feeling very well so headed back to the hotel and Catriona continued the walk by herself with the next stop being Templo de la Caridad which seemed to be a church where Catholicism and the local Mayan religion were mixed. There was a Shaman blessing a young child being held by her mother, he was lighting candles and chanting. Next was a walk down the pedestrian shopping mall to the Plaza 31 de Marzo and a visit to the Cathedral. Catriona met up with John and Lorna in the Cathedral who were visiting the same sites but in the opposite direction. Then it was on to a chocolateria to have a hot chocolate made from ground cacao beans with Chris and Sharon. The three then headed passed Templo San Francisco which was closed and on up the many steps to Cerro de San Cristobal.

Catriona went back to the hotel to check on David who was feeling better so we set out together again. We stopped for lunch at a restaurant full of holidaying Mexicans. Catriona ordered a salad and David decided to give it a miss. Before the salad arrived David took a turn for the worst and headed back to the hotel. Catriona ate lunch by herself then headed back to the hotel as well and not long after also became ill. Both of us were up and down all night to the bathroom. We were up at 5:30am as we had to leave at 6:30am. In the morning we found more than 1/2 of the group were sick so we did not have a very pleasant travel day. We were in a 30 seater bus to the Mexican boarder which took around 4 hours and we were at the boarder for about 1 1/2 hours before being driven to the Guatemalan boarder. The process to enter Guatemala was much quicker and we traveled in a 14 seater van the rest of the way to Panajachel, arriving at 7pm. We tried to call Chris for his birthday with no luck so just left a message.

Lunch in Santiago

Enjoying our tour of the lake

24th & 25th December, Palenque

As we had to be ready to leave the hotel at 7:45am it didn't leave much time to see Merida. We did a quick walk to the main square and also visited the Cathedral San Ildefonso which was open. The Cathedral is one of the oldest in the Americas built in 1599. The bus trip was not too bad however the driver must have wanted to be home in time for Christmas as he drove very fast and we made it to Palenque in 8 1/2 hours not the 10 we were expecting. We checked into the hotel and called Bernie and Chris to say Merry Christmas using face time on Bernie's iphone. We also spoke to Bernie's Mum and Dad. David then called his Mum & Roger but it was a very bad connection using skype to her phone so he had to use the headset. We then called Megan also using facetime and spoke to Catriona's Mum and a couple of other family members.

In the evening after dinner the group met on the roof top balcony of the hotel to celebrate Joey's 30th birthday and Christmas eve. Lorna and John had bought a piñata and Joey had a hard job trying to break it open as he only had a plastic table leg to hit it with. We drank the bottle of Havana Club we bought at the airport, John and Lorna had bought 3litre bottles of coke and sprite and others had bought 1.2L bottles of Victoria and Corona 'mega' beer. We ended up going to bed at around 11:30pm as we knew we had a big day at the ruins on Christmas day.

It was a short drive from the hotel to the Palenque Arqueologica zone where we had a 2 hour guided tour through the ruins. We walked around, up and in many of the ruins on our tour and then after by ourselves. We also walked through the jungle and found as yet to be excavated ruins and heard the scary howler monkeys in the trees above us. We had a fantastic day and ended up with very tired legs from all the climbing.

We went out as a group to a restaurant close to the ruins. There were many hippies there and we found out there had been 65000 at Palanque for the end of the world. They were expecting space ships to come and take them away! The ones left were probably those that couldn't affort to get back to where they came from, or maybe they lived at Palenque.

23 December, Cancun to Merida via Chichen Itza

Today was the day that we would realise our dream of seeing all 7 wonders of the world. We had an early start to the day checking out of the Hotel and walking the couple of blocks to the bus station. It was now that we were happy to be traveling light with just carry on luggage that had wheels as it was so easy to get around.

We had a 3 hour coach ride from Cancun to Chichen Itza on mainly straight and flat A1 quality highway.  Tourist traffic was high in this part of the country. There was a traffic jam at the park entrance, with huge numbers of people visiting in the middle of the day. We ran the gauntlet of local stall persons trying to sell anything they could that had some remote relationship with Chichen Itza.

We had a quick lunch then about three hours (two hours with a very informative guide)  looking around taking photos and soaking up the amazing sights that make up Chichen Itza.

We met the rest of the group outside the site and waited for the bus to Merida. e arrived at Merida and checked in to the hotel and headed out for dinner at 8.30pm. It was quite late by the time we finished dinner so we just had a quick walk to the square where the cathedral was to go to a nearby shop to buy food for our long bus trip to Palenque.

22 December, Cancun

We met Chris and Sharon at breakfast in the hotel lobby. They were not in the best on moods as their bag got lost but thankfully they arrived just as we were going to enquire about it. We went for a look in a local supermarket to see all the local produce then we caught the R1 bus from Cancun Central to the area called Zona Hotelera. We passed by huge resorts, shopping malls and golf courses which have been built for the American market, it reminding us of Vegas but we were by the sea. To get to most of the amazing beaches you need to pass through the resort foyers as the massive resorts butt up to each other but we did manage to stop the bus at a public beach.

 

We walked to the water to get our feet wet, the water wasn't cold even though it was winter at the moment.

We visited the cultural heritage museum INAH Mexico to get information on the Mayan culture/history. We saw pottery, jewelry, funeral masks and some recreated Mayan ruins.

 

In the afternoon we enjoyed two for the price of one margarita's and were asked by 4 random guys if we wanted to buy roses for our better halves. We met our fellow travelers in the evening over dinner - Robert from Wollongong, Jo from Canberra, Stephanie and Christiane from Germany, also John and Lorna had arrived from Havana and we were with Chris and Sharon. Our Leader was Smokie from Belize. A couple from US called Joey and Chasta were still to arrive.