Losing days in San Pedro

It appears that my experience in San Pedro is not uncommon.  I came with the intention to stay 2 days, and I stayed 5.  Others come for a day, stay for a month, come for a month, stay for a year . . . and many just don´t leave.

It´s not for everyone.  It´s not a pretty city, particularly, but it has its own charm. The streets are cobblestone, but one walks through a mixture of those streets and alleys and cut-throughs to make it around town.  Although I learned my way around fairly quickly, I never did actually figure out the layout of the town, as it´s really NOT linear.  I couldn´t tell you, for the life of me, where north is.

I found San Pedro fascinating in some ways.  There are a lot of ex-pats (from all over) that have settled here, short or long term, and you can meet many of them just wandering down the ¨"Gringo Path" . . . the strip where all those restaurants are.  Once they have a little bit of spanish, basically enough to serve the occasional Guatemalan that comes in, they can get a job there - as most of the customers are english speaking travelers or other ex-pat residents.  There´s also a significant Israeli population, which I hadn´t expected.  Signs everywhere are in spanish, english and hebrew.

It is full of restaurants, vendors, spanish schools, more spanish schools, little tiendas, bars, net cafes . . . and did I mention spanish schools?  The party scene is definitely strong, and I have a new appreciation for how easy it is to drink regularly here.  Happy hours range from the usual 4 - 6 to 9am - midnight.  And happy hour means alcohol is almost cheaper than water.  Imagine 2 Cuba Libres for 2 dollars.  Seriously.  So I confess I indulged,  but for those that know me, that means that over my 5 days, I had less than 10 drinks.  A power drunk, I know. 

I also caught the expected cold shortly after my arrival, so I was forced to slow down, take siestas and do a lot of nothing.  Although rather resentful of the stuffy nose, I felt renewed justification in the pounds of vitamin c, echinacea and other health remedies that I brought with me.  I also recognized that it was an inevitable result of leaving Vancouver tired, and traveling for over 24 hours to get here.  Not so terrible really.

I moved after a few days into a room at the front of the hotel, facing the lake, and really enjoyed my two nights there.  I got to indulge in a king size bed, with many pillows, a view of the lake and the grand gardens, and the most amazing smell of the flowers as I came and went.  One bush of lilacs (I think that´s what they were) was particularly potent in the evening, and I stopped each night under it, just to inhale for a while. 
I also spent some quality time reading in a hammock chair surrounded by the flowers, facing the lake.  Rough life.

The cold, and enforced rest, provided me with some reflection time.   I found myself feeling a real dis-ease, and struggling with the question of "why am I here?" Not the existential question, but, why Guatemala?  Why am I traveling? What is that I want out of this trip?  How long am I staying?  Do I want to learn spanish first, or go to the meditation centre first?  What happens if I run out of money before I´m ready to leave?  . . . . and so on, and so on.  It´s a powerful weapon sometimes, the mind, and amazing the damage it can inflict when I´m not paying attention.

So, as I indulged my screaming mind, I wandered the town, looked at cheap places to live and tried to decide where I wanted to be.  I learned a fair bit, I think.  Among other things, I learned that a fridge is not a standard piece of equipment in a kitchen . . . one often needs to buy it oneself and bring it with, even in short-term rentals.  I gather that a lot of folks just don´t use it.  Eating out is so cheap, they do that, or they buy at the market the day of and prepare as needed. 

I also re-connected with my privileged existence as a Canadian, who takes clean water and hot water for granted.  Both things are commodities here.  Agua Pura is everywhere . . .but you pay for it.  I may complain about the taste of tap water in Canadian cities, and the chlorine . . . but there´s no risk of parasites or SERIOUS illness from our water, and a hot shower is fairly standard back home.  Here the hot water tap is generally disabled, and one gets cold water that comes through this electric heater thing before it lands, low pressure and luke warm on your head.  (If you´re lucky . ..  many don´t even have that).

I also have a new appreciation for how we handle garbage and recycling, as insufficient as our environmental awareness is at home . . . it´s almost an unknown here. Recycling is VERY minimal - most things can´t be recycled, and garbage and litter are everywhere.  I was having the most wonderful breakfast on the beach one morning, only to find myself suddenly inhaling smoke and slowly getting covered in ash from a garbage fire on the beach.  Nothing like a little burning plastic to enhance the eating experience. 

The highlights of my time in San Pedro were really La Piscina, the friends I made there, and the gardens at my hotel. Oh, and the lake.  The last three days I was in San Pedro, the lake was SO choppy.  The waves were crashing and roaring, it was really like being back on the ocean.  I found it so soothing to my spirit, and it also served to keep me in San Pedro that extra couple of days, as I just didn´t think the boat across to San Marcos was such a good idea with the water that rough

One of my new friends, Guyta, is another Canadian from Quebec, in San Pedro studying spanish.  I´m not sure how well my spanish is progressing, but I´ve discovered I´m far more conversant in french than I give myself credit for.  I´m starting to think I´m going to return home with my french vastly improved and my spanish not so much, as I keep connecting with Francophones.  oh well.  Guyta is lovely, and I´ve been enjoying her company a lot.  She challenges me to use what little spanish I have, and when that fails, we fall into Frenglish.  I´m enjoying it a lot.  We´ve decided to spend New Years together in San Marcos;  since I´m heading there a day ahead of her, I´ll scope us a place to stay, and meet her at the dock there on Thursday afternoon.

Next top, San Marcos La Laguna.

Merry Christmas in San Pedro

I arrived in San Pedro on Christmas afternoon, having decided that as lovely as Santa Cruz was, I just wasn´t up for a communal North American Christmas dinner that, of course, I couldn´t really eat.  (Gluten-free down here is EASY if I eat traditional Guatemalan food.  Where the Gringos converge for their usual fare, generally, I´m screwed.)

I was a little nervous about coming to San Pedro as I have heard such mixed reviews about it.  My dear friend Elinor told me how wonderful it was, and connected me with her friend Daniel, owner of the local pool.  On the other hand, most of the travelers I ran into said it was a big drug and party town, and that I wouldn´t get 10 feet without being offered every nature of mind-altering substance . . .and that the town itself was (to paraphrase) icky and uninspiring. 

On the launcha over, I reconnected with some of the friends I´d made on my eventful bus ride to the lake, and we chatted all the way over.  We wandered together in search of a hotel, before they abandoned the search in favour of a hike up the volcano.  I figured I was unlikely to see them again.  I ended up at what turns out to be the loveliest hotel in town:  Sak´Cari.   At 100Q a night, it´s considered Muy Caro - too expensive.  At a conversion of $13 a night, I decided to indulge for a few days. 

My room was a lovely single with a double bed, HOT water with fabulous pressure (a rarity here) and just outside the back gardens.  The birds nested in the tree outside my room have the most amazing calls, and the colours are spectacular.  There is free agua pura and I´m all set.  Once I settled into my room ,I donned by bathing suit and headed for the pool.  I´m excited at the prospect of a swim.  The weather has been really hot during the day, and chilly at night . . . but with the bloom on the lake, it´s not really safe to swim, at least that´s the perspective I´m going with.  That point is of great debate - some say it is, some say it isn´t . . . I put a foot in while in Santa Cruz, and psychosomatic or not, that foot was ITCHY for the next hour.  I think I´ll pass on the full-body experience.

So, off to La Piscina I went.  What a fabulous place.  The pool itself is not large, but the water is clean and inviting.  The bar has good music playing and the people are fun.  Daniel made me feel very welcome and before long I made friends at the bar.  I can see why this has become a regular hang-out/hub for many of the longer term gringos and for short term travelers alike.  Daniel is a modern-day, bar-tending Bodhisatva and makes sure a good time is had by all.  In my case, he made my Christmas day. 

After the sun went down and the pool closed, we went out for dinner at a local place, Ventana Blue, which has officially become my favourite restaurant in San Pedro.  The food was SOOO good!!  It wasn´t a terribly late evening . . . I was in bed by about 10 for much needed rest, but it was a GOOD Christmas. 

PS: Did I mention how much Guatemalans LOVE fireworks and other VERY noisy firecracker type things????

PPS: So far no drug offers or untoward anythings.  Folks have been friendly, and while partying appears to be easily available . . .things seem pretty chill.  Glad I didn´t let other folks bad press dissuade me from coming.

Journey to Lago Atitlan

After a full two days in Antigua, I was ready to head to Lago Atitlan. Created by the 3 volcanoes surrounding it, it is supposed to be one of the most beautiful lakes in the world. So I hustled back to my hotel from my morning of touring with Guy in order to make sure I didn´t miss my 12:30 shuttle.

I needn´t have worried. The shuttle arrived about 10 past 1, and after negotiating my mucho stuff into the back I climbed in, and then held on for dear life. We rattled through the streets in a tin can. It looked ok from the outside, really . . . but I seriously wondered if parts were going to fall off as it squeaked and rattled. It appears I wasn´t too far off. About 20 minutes outside town we broke down. Fortunately, I already had friends in the shuttle to chat with while we waited by the side of the road for a new bus to be sent for us. One of them was Alexandra, who I had met at the airport in Guat City and chatted with into Antigua. It was lovely to see her again. I also got chatting with the couple beside me and the woman behind us - all Gringos from the US.

After about a half hour wait, with children peering in, trying to sell us firewood, (what did they think a shuttle of tourists would do with it???) we were on our way again. The next two hours were a bit harrowing, but absolutely stunning. The grades on the roads are unbelievable. The shuttle we were in looked and sounded much newer when it picked us up, but it was sounding pretty rough a couple of hours later as we laboured up and down hills, and back and forth around hairpin turns. There were more than a few hold-on-and-pray moments . . . but at least this shuttle had seatbelts, for which I was quite grateful!

About 2 hours into the trip (and about 20 minutes from Panajachel, our destination), we blew a flat. So we had another 20 minutes to hang-out while the driver changed the tire. We were all quite pleasantly surprised (and deeply grateful) that he had a spare. Morale boosting was required at this point, so I pulled out my hoops, which had been the subject of some conversation en route, and a bunch of us hung out on the grass and hooped. I was informed that if I ran short on cash this trip, I should consider giving hoop lessons. We´ll see what happens!

After our brief stretch and shimmy break, we resumed our journey to Pana, continuing through hairpin turns, on immense grades, over single lane bridges, above an incredible canyon of trees and rocks and wow. I wish I could have taken pictures of this journey, but it just wasn´t possible through the windows of our little shuttle van. Finally we arrived in Pana and negotiated our way slowly through the market streets. Vendors everywhere . . . beautiful cloths and wares and stuff. I definitely want to go spend a day in Pana just wandering . . . but with my packs, this wasn´t the day.

At the bottom of the street, we were let off just above the docks where we were guided down to the launchas to take us to our respective towns on the lake. Some of the troops were heading for San Marcos, some for San Pedro; I and my new friend Rita headed for Santa Cruz La Laguna to check out the Iguana.