Paris

We arrived in Paris after bingeing on Starbucks to stay awake in order to get our internal clocks onto Paris time.
After 5 hours of a small child kicking me in the back, and an upclose and personal look at my buried temper, I realized some sleep was in order and nothing like a quaint hotel in an artsy village of Montmartre to forget all the annoyances of coach travelling!
Montmartre is not for everyone, but we have to say it was right up our alley. Built on the hill in Paris, it was fantastic. We checked in and went for a walk on the cobblestone streets and had a feast of Crepes! Welcome to Paris!
It is so amazing to look around and be in awe of every building!
We had a great sleep in our "large" hotel room. Everything is small and condensed here, so we felt lucky to have some room to walk around our bed and we actually had our own bathroom!
So cool to look out our balcony and see the lights of Paris! Fantastic.
Started our first day in Paris with a visit out to the Versaille Palace where Louis the 14 lived. Completely over the top and incredibly beautiful.
Next was a stop off at the famed Eiffel Tower and yes it is worth it and yes it is cooler than you think! It was incredibly cold and snowy, so we could only go to the first level unfortunately, so an excuse to come back!
We finished out the evening with the viewing of the Arc de Triomphe and some high class shopping on Champs de Elysses where Mcdonalds is not MCDonalds but McCafe!

Day 2 found us at the Sacre Coeur up where we stayed in Montmartre and as we got to the top of the steps, a man was playing our wedding song on a harp...couldnàt get more romantic if Andrew planned it himself!
Next we were off to the Notre Dame Cathedrale...we of course do not have the vocabulary to describe it all, and we are just blown away by the architechture of Europe...it is truly far more stunning than we ever imagined. Pictures just do not do justice to it all.
As a side note, this is by far one of the most stress free vacations we have had, with transit being so easy to use and completely efficient.
Since our train to Nice was not leaving until late, we spent the rest of the day wandering through latin quarter, exploring districts, eating croissants, drinking espresso in cafes, hitting the shopping districts and ending the evening at the Louvre. Since we are not the most cultured folk around, we have to admit we were far more impressed with the actual building itself than the art it contained...all the same a fantastic evening spent before we headed off to the train!

Vive La France!

I have to start with a huge Thank you to Scott and Shawna for moving to France in order that our little mini trip could take place 20 years ahead of plan! There is nothing like the possibility of visiting good friends to expediate a getaway.
So tomorrow is the big departure date and we have been patiently waiting for it since the fall through planning and dozens of emails to Shawna. It seemed so far away and now it is right here!
Cheese, croissants, chocolate, crepes...old castles, ruins, shopping...So pumped to explore an ancient world new to us!
Our plan is to start with a couple of days in the city of lights, head to seaside of Nice to hang with Scott & Shawna for 2 days, off to italy for 5 and then back to Nice for the weekend. So as you can well imagine it is not nearly long enough, but we are always of the mindset to take whatever days we can and enjoy every moment we have while we're there!
With so much to see, we're seriously pumped about not just enjoying it together, but getting to expereince it for a short time through the eyes of our now "local" friends!

Vive La France!

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.