Malacatan

Well although we are home in our winter wonderland...we thought we'd recap the last week so that we'd have a point of reference.
There apparently are lots of details I omitted from our mountain time...one being we got to experience Que-chi culture dress...8 metres of material later VL and I are all dressed up with traditional head dress, skirt, top etc. Although not my choice of fashion, there are certainly beautiful in the handiwork. We had a riot and Elizabeth from Bolivia joined us in the fun. How these beautiful women walk with all that material while balancing baskets of fruit, vegetables etc on their heads and children strapped to their back is beyond me...
Our week on the mountain ended with a tradtional shower of aromatic flower petals floating on us. What a wonderful good bye tradition!
Our trip down the mountain started with 40 minutes late departure and the realization that not all of us were going to fit in the rented van that was supposedly able to accommodate all of us with luggage. After conversing with our hired driver, a kind neighbour offered to take 3 stragglers down in his car so off went Andrew, Stacy and Benigno on a hair rising trip down the mountain while I held the middle front seat of our 15 passenger van between the driver and our tall visiting american! I managed to keep my cookies down, and we had an interesting trip heading into "sweatsville" with VL snapping pics like a madwoman in the back! haha
Malacatan is a happening place with over 800 000 people. It's close to the Mexican border and seems to have a variety of people.
It's lush with palm trees, humidity, banana trees, rubber trees, cocoa trees, water falls near by and of course the garbage finding it's way from the streets to the river. Right down the street from where we stayed is a huge market that more than doubles in size on the weekends. Anything you want, you can find in there from fresh tortillas, clothes, veggies, meat, live animals...it's a maze through dark, dirty gutters to open air.
We made the daily trek with Ken and were his pack horses...it was lots of fun just watching and experiencing doing biz in the markets...so much entertainment!

Although Malacatan is extremly hot, we experienced heavy rains every day. The roof top had an amazing view of Santa Maria Volcano (one of the largest in CA), but it was a few days before it was clear enough to see. When it did clear, it wasn't long before it was clouded over, so had to be quick with the camera! The clouds didn't offer much relief from the heat though and the rains were a welcome change!
Our diet is made up of mostly beans and veggies...and let me tell you, entering the Harrison quarters was seriously taking your life in hand between father and son, but anyway we survived!

Guatemala!

So we´ve been out of internet service for the past week...currently we are roasting in Malacatan! But to back up a week....we arrived into Guatemala in true Central American style...late!
SnV were there waiting with big smiles...we were a little worried how they would fair, but they found a friend who spoke english and entertained them until we arrived. The airport in Guatemala is surprisingly nice!
Everything went well...we had a great night sleep in a hostel close to the airport and got a transfer to our bus heading into the highlands.
The 3 hour bus ride was pretty much a roller coaster ride all the way, but this country is so beautiful!!! We are constantly amazed at how green it is. I suppose that is one advantage to coming at the end of rainy season!
Archie and Pedro picked us up in Xela (shayla), a beautiful mountain town and took us to Pachaj (9000ft) to hang for a few days.
So far everything has been pretty uneventful in the sense that nothing crazy has happened. Great food, Great people, Great country!
The corn here makes Andrew look like a midget, so that tells you how lush everything is and how well things grow here. It reminds us a lot of Peru in the mountains with all the crop tiers, Qui-che culture and corn!
We are enjoying all the spicy options for topping on the food...turns bland into YUM!
Everyone here has a story, and it´s pretty cool to meet and hear them all.
In the highlands it´s primarily indian (Qui-che) culture and they are very industrious, wealthy people for this country. We are very surprised at how well these people do, we were certainly not expecting that.

We have even had hot showers!!! Heated by wood stove...well not exactly, but you´ll see what we mean when you see the pics.

We visited a man who has a cloth business. It was very interesting to see the looms and the beautiful silk cloth his business makes.
So we´ve spent a week here already and now we are up to more visiting etc here at malacatan which is a stark contrast with humidity and heat to the cool temps of the highlands. We feel like we should be moving on, but it has been insisted that we stay with the travelling band...
Currently we are bunked in with a man who has built what started out to possibly be hotel and is now used for annuales...I´m not sure there is a facility for this purpose quite like this one anywhere else. It is beautiful with huge rooms hotel style with ensuite bathrooms...there will be about 450 people here by the weekend...lots of room to accommodate everyone!
I think we´ll leave it here for now...this certainly isn´t like any other trip we´v had...and feel like our experiences aren´t really blog material!
Hope you are all well!
Buenas Tardes!

PS surprisingly our spanish is getting us by...óf course very basically, but we understand alot more than we thought we would and learning more every day!!!

Pre-Trip Mayhem...

It seems like the night before every trip, there's always a little drama...It always tranports me back in time to Hazelwood family vacations. I seem to recall nearly every time trying to get away and something challenging always happening...our AnK Harrison trips have been no different except as time goes on, I'm learning that what I used to find challenging is now simply a blip on the radar...like losing the visa we planned to take with us and use on our trip...no big deal, call it in and take the next 2 back ups! I mean really...we're all packed...I enjoyed a lovely dinner with a friend, my desk at work is actually cleared!!!! I mean literally you can see my nice gleaming desk top!!!!
So yeah, when I look at it that way, perhaps it was fitting that the visa would get lost!
Anyway, bags are ready at the door and we're off in the am!
Buenos Noches!

Olive Ridleys

The Olive Ridley turtle is fascinating and it is believed that the turtles will return to the beach they were born on.
The baby turtles mostly hatch at night time, and we are hoping we will see them. We were told there has been a big one sighted the last few nights but not until around 3 am. We are given red light and it is the only light we can use. It takes over an hour to get to La Flor Beach even though it is only 22 km, it looks like it's beautiful although we can only see a little with the moon. The reserve is committed to protecting the turtles and half of our excursion cost goes to the reserve.
They were 2 nests that had hatched near end of day and the reserve collected them in baskets likely in case there weren't any hatching that night, so we would still be able to see them...they did release them after we found two nests. It is the most incredible thing to see them coming up out of the sand and make their way to the ocean. It was a little scary too since we were afraid to step anywhere in case we stepped on one. OUr little red light was kind of dim, but Andrew named our turtle "YUrtle' and we followed him until he got to the sea. It was one of the coolest things I have ever seen! Our group found 4 nests altogether but we didn't see the big one. These turtles are on the endangered species list. I don't remember the exact stats, but so few of all these babies ever make it to adulthood.
We made it back to San Juan after 1 am. It was very informative and we had a great time. The cost was $30 per person with half going to the reserve through the Casa Oro...you could pay $12 and hitch a ride out to the reserve yourself. We had wanted to tent there, but with the mosquitos etc, we were glad at that point in the trip to just do the tour.

Chillin

Our ride back to Managua is pretty uneventful, except we got to have a mochachino in Chinandega. We've only been gone for a few days, but it's felt like weeks!
After washing up all our clothes in Managua we went to bed early!
When we woke up the next morning, I discovered my body was covered in bites. Andrew had a few mosquito bites, but I was covered and they were different than mosquito bites. Hopefully it's not to serious.

With it being New Years week, and nothing booked we're not sure where to go, but decide to go back to SAn Juan and if we can't find something, George has offered for us to tent out at his beach property.

We spent Sunday at George and Liay's and Andrew was stoked to get some fresh coffee.

We set off early down to San Juan. I think the lack of sleep got to me since my compassion for the Nicas ran out. I just got stressed with all the people, smells pushing shoving and deceitfulness. 5 different people told us 5 different places to catch the bus...where we had caught it previously, they said the bus no longer went from there.
So finally we get on a bus that is supposed to be an express that will take us direct to San Juan, but when we start stopping every 5 minutes shoving more and more people in, I suspect we've been had again. Sure enough we make it to a small town and they tell us we're on the wrong bus and we have to get off, this one is heading for the border.
They do take us to another bus and tell us there will be no charge and this one will for sure take us to San Juan. When we get on the bus of course they want more money, anyway we saw the guy pay him and Andrew stands ground and finally he gives up. We get to San Juan hungry, hot and I;m a little grumpy and worried we won't find a hostel.
Lunch takes almost 2 hours before we get our food, but we finally waddle off and try a few places only to discover everything is booked up. We end up at Hotel Isabella which is beautiful but really expensive for down here. Not caring at that point we book in for the night hoping we'll find a backpacker spot in the morning. It is beautiful hotel and for once we get a real good night sleep.

Hotel Isabella came with breakfast and it was fab! Fresh fruit local coffee and banana pancakes!! Yum
We went over to Casa Oro and Andrew booked in for surfing and I booked us into the turtle excursion. It's going to be a long day, but We're pumped for some rnr.

We took the truck out to Playa REmanso where Andrew had surf lessons and I vegged on the beach. Beautiful, and hot.
I hadn't paid much attention, but I started noticing a pack of locals wandering around eyeing us up, suddenly there were a couple of police with AK machine guns and they trailed them all afternoon. We found out later this beach is known for muggings at machete point. Anyway the police were all over it.
Met some cool people and made plans to hang out the next day at Maderas beach.
Our truck was supposed to pick us up at 6pm but it never showed until 6:30...so it was a mad dash when we got back to make it in time for our turtle bus. I grabbed some bread and nutella to make sandwiches for supper and we were off for the turtles.

El Obraje Cntd

If anyone is reading this...sorry we were out of internet for a bit and then ran out of time. We're actually home in the cold now but I'm going to continue where we left off.

We are up early again with breakfast of beans tortilla and cheese. I absolutely love the cheese here...We're in for another big day of hiking and visiting. The people here are very concerned for me...they think Archie and Benigno are barbaric for allowing me to tag along...es Largo they keep saying which in Nica means very far! Anyway we're geared up and off we go by 7:30am which is nice since it's somewhat cooler.
Flori is going with us some of the way today...we're going to see her sister and she wants us to meet her mom. We make 3 stops spanning likely 5 km before lunch and it is +40 by 10 am. We have run out of shade and any little bit we see along the trail we are all headed for it for a moment of cooler air. We arrive along a dusty trail to a river...I have NEVER been so excited to see water...it is actually a river here too...there are lots of barely there creeks that are called rivers here, but this one looks like a real one. As we geared up for crossing, I seriously considered swimming clothes gear and all, but we still have a lot of ground to cover, so it's a quick crossing. Flori is concerned for me and keeps trying to hold my hand...it's hilarious how fragile they think I am...They have never seen a white woman before, and I guess I'm quite a bit smaller than them. as a side note, I'm very surprised at how big the people here are...not overly tall, but many are quite chunky...I suppose it is all the carbs and sporatic eating...
Anyway we arrive at Flor's sister's house and We get cafe negre and some cookies...I'm getting great at ignoring the bugs etc in the food and drink and just swallow!
We go to Flori's mom's place and meet the bunch there...we find out one of the daughters husbands works in Costa Rica and sends money home which explains our treat of pop with ice, oreo cookie and a chocolate! We were so shocked and Archie confirmed this was the first time he has ever been served this in this area.

We hike back to our main stay home and drop Flori off and continue on to another place over the mountain. We hike straight up and get amazing views of the valleys all around. IT is hot and dry and gatorade has never tasted so good. We pass through sesame fields on the mountain side where they are stooking them...very interesting. I have a moment of elation when I think I see a orange tree, but it turns out to be a gourd tree that has no fruit value whatsoever...it grows on very infertile soil...we did find some wild papaya though...the first fruit we've seen here.
The home we arrive to seems much more industrious than any other we've seen so far. There is tile on the porch...everything is stacked neatly in the home...we have a visit while the chickens and pigs fight furiously the whole time...we're served some chicken and tortilla and off we go home.
The last part of trip home is in the dark on the trails, but it is blessedly cool!!!

We arrive back exhausted but the day isn't over yet...they are all waiting for us and nobody can believe that I'm still walking on my own! There seems to be a lot of people waiting. The people asked me to speak tonight...I;m not sure what exactly to tell them, but they have never heard from a white woman before...anyway the evening is wonderful and ends on a somewhat emotional note. They keep asking when we'll be back, we want to say a date, but the reality is we have no idea...we may never get back here again.

It is an amazing clear night and we find it hard to sleep mesmerized by looking up at the stars from our tent and talking about our trip so far.
Also I'm incensed by all the bugs in our tent. We've had to put our pack inside our tent during the day and I think all the creepy crawlies came in with it and multiplied.

We manage some sleep and are up at 4 am to hike out to catch our 6am bus.