For all of Renzo’s trying, he could not get me on a trip to Tikal that first weekend. I only have two weekends here and seeing the Mayan ruins were another reason I chose Guatemala for my excellent adventure. I hung out at the coffee shop that Friday and waited for the volunteers to come back from their day in the village. Aaron told me that several of them were going to Semuc Champey. Except I had no idea what actual words he said. Nor did I have any idea what was there. But I wasn’t going to miss my chance to go somewhere so he walked me over to a different outfitter and helped me sign up (Aaron and virtually everyone else could speak at least some Spanish. Most of the volunteers had taken High School Spanish and most of the volunteers were just out of High School. Aaron was 18.)
That night, we went out to the bars and walked back to the neighborhood where the host families live. At midnight, we were sitting on the street, waiting for a shuttle to arrive. At 12:20, it did and we were surprised to see another couple already inside. The nine of us piled into the van with our stuff and scrunched into ridiculously contorted positions to attempt to get some sleep during this seven hour journey. Josué (not José) informed us that he would have the music very loud so that he could stay awake during this drive. I would have probably been less grouchy about that if I knew then what I learned on the drive home — driving in middle Guatemala is trecherous. The country is made of mountains, range after range, and they have somehow opted to never build a single bridge. The roads are generally two lanes, clinging their way up and down mountains with hairpin turns and blind passes. Guard rails are few and far between.
My contortion trick was to sit on my bent legs, a shoe and water bottle on the floor and put my head on the seat with headphones blaring in my ears. Every 30 minutes a leg or hip would fall asleep and I would have to shift my butt to the other side. I did not really sleep. I couldn’t tell if Stephanie had it better or worse… she was laying down along the door with six or eight lumpy backpacks as a bed or torture devise, wasn’t sure.
At 7am, we hit dirt and all groggily looked out the window. We were above the clouds and the sun was rising. We drove along in silence and eventually wound our way down into the valley.
The hotel was included in our 540Q ($67) as was our transportation, guides and day of adventure. Let’s break those things down. The hotel was not what I call a hotel. If they would have said cabin, I would have had different expectations and had been pleasantly surprised. Instead we got two to a room, shared bathrooms with no water pressure or hot water and a giant scary spider. The local guide, who we sort of met a few miles back when he climbed on the TOP of the van was Chris, and he was 12 years old. Morgan, my roommate, successfully smashed him in the face when she opened the van door and he repaid her by hitting on her with older-than-12-year-old comments the whole day.
All I wanted to do was lay on the bed, but we had to be back at the van in 20 minutes to start our Day of Adventure. Since we psuedo-slept the whole way and no one had talked in 7 hours, I really didn’t know what a DOA was, but I am in Guatemala, so here we go!
We enjoy an awesome pancake breakfast (Guatemala has very delicious pancakes – denser than ours) in nice little village. Then we had to drive 10KM into the heart of the valley… by pick-up truck. We clambored in and stood along the rails that were designed to keep you in and picked our way through the bumpy dirt road. Josue told us about this plant that protects you from bug bites and sun burn and picked a pod mass off a tree as we drove. He broke it open and smeared the pasty orange gunk on each of our faces tribal-paint style.
We had been instructed to wear swimsuits under our clothes and tennis shoes. The van dropped us off and we passed two Mayan children selling chocolate cookies, “coco latie? coco latie?” We are instructed to strip down and the guys in a little hut take all of our belongings. You just gotta trust for the best. I figure out that we are about to go spelunking (caving) which I have done before in Mammoth Cave, KY. One critical difference, however, is that there is water in this cave. Right before I left, there was a Man vs. Wild episode filmed in Guatemala and one of the things Bear Grylls “demonstrated” was getting through and out of a water cave. I laughed to Jason, “I won’t be doing that. No way in hell.”
So, we are wading into the water cave. As we step in, we are each handed a 6″ candle. The guide gets in front of us and starts moving into the darkness. As we walk, the water rises up our legs, and then our bodies. Finally, it hits our chest and it is cold so we are gasping and screaming (besides Aaron, the rest of us are girls.) Then, we can’t touch bottom anymore and we are swimming, one hand holding a candle out of the water and one hand paddling for dear life.
As our lined-up troupe of warrior-painted thrill-seekers push forward in the echoing glow of candlelight, the guide encourages us to climb ladders to higher reaches as water rushes down the rungs. Sometimes he wants us to go under waterfalls or pick our way across potholed pools where one wrong step plunges you into water (in my case, two wrong steps and I suffered this startling event twice). The guide, by the way, is only speaking Spanish as my fellow adventurers understand it.
We get to a dark room and the guide wants us to climb up a rock wall to jump into the deep (I hope) pool in the middle. We take turns climbing, getting our feet positioned just right and taking the leap of faith into the spot on the water where the guide is shining his head lamp. This plunge from 10 feet up in a deep and deeply enclosed cave room was terrifying and exhilarating.
After an hour or more, we emerge. Next item on the Day of Adventure: an innertube float down the Cahabón River, lazy-river style. Apparently this idyllic river changes in perceptible color and on this day it was a stunning emerald green. Deeply cut into the lush valley, it was like being in a postcard. To make it even more magical, we drift past a Mayan family comprised of a watchful father, nude and playful children and bare-chested mother waist-high in water washing clothes on the riverbank. The indigenous Maya women are beautiful, whether clothed in their traditional and brightly colored traje or hanging out on river’s edge, au naturel.
But the day is not over yet. A lunch break at a little outdoor restaurant of sorts afforded one option on the menu – chicken, spaghetti, black refried beans and rice. We ate our very fresh chicken as more chickens who’s-day-has-not-yet-come fluttered and clucked around us.
After our quick energy boost, we had more climbing to do… this time the very steep Mirador path, 2000 feet up jungle-covered cliffs. Some sections offered steps or ladders, but sometimes a particularly difficult step would have a post stuck in the ground for you to grab onto and hoist yourself to the next level. While the ascent was shorter, it was leagues more challenging that climbing Pacaya. Chris was moving us at a very quick clip up the forested mountain, which when combined with little sleep, high altitude and high humidity, added to the difficulty and compounded the exhaustion we felt.
As with everything in Guatemala, the effort was worth it and we reached a look-out platform, clinging to the edge of the jungle mountain and overlooking the spectacular natural pools. These are a series of five cascading tiers of nature-made pools, flowing with translucent turquoise mountain spring water. After a long day of adventure, this was to be our last stop. We traversed down the other side of the mountain and excitedly stripped back down to our bathing suits. After picking our way across the painful tree roots that owned every inch of the bank, we took the plunge. Chris instructed us on how to semi-safely move down each level although slipping on algae-coated rock and landing on sharp rock was common. More fun was simply sun- and water-bathing in a comfortable spot, letting the fresh water soothe our aching and bruised bodies.
That night, after a shower, dinner and a couple Gallo cerveza, I slept deeply and gratefully.
Even though morning came, our Day of Adventure was not over. We had one more challenge ahead of us before we started our 7 hour journey back to Antigua. And this challenge required not only physical endurance (including another 1000 vertical feet; there isn’t a thing you can do in Guatemala that doesn’t require climbing), but mental strength as well.
We were going zip-lining.
This is crazy. I know that we need some gravity for this task but to be 1000/1200 feet up, looking at that wire stretching 1500 feet over a valley located in the heart of a third world country just screamed crazy. They only owned 10 harnesses and there were 9 of us so we only got one guide. After some instruction, in Spanish, he linked on and coasted to the other side, leaving us to figure it out how to follow his lead. Luckily Morgan had done this once before and helped each of us hook and go.
The worst part is stepping off that platform. But holy shit it is an amazing feeling, listening to that zinging-zipping sound, flying through the air with your feet kicking the tippy-tops of trees. You have to use your gloved had to slow down as you reach the other side and Deepa had the unfortunate experience of stopping too soon, dangling over air 40 feet from the ledge where we stood. She had to climb hand-over-hand until she got close enough for our guide to grab her. Once free from the line, she shook and trembled until it was time to link onto the next line and do it all over again. I felt terrible for her.
As we worked our way down in elevation, we moved from cliff ledges into tree canopies, standing on rickety metal platforms with our harnesses attached to a wire that wrapped around the tree. Somehow this was worse for me as I looked past my shoes through the grates and imagined the visage of the metal failing and ten bodies dropping and banging against the trunk.
However, as we got lower, we got more comfortable, no longer waiting for our guide and just keeping the flow of zipping, climbing, hooking, zipping. By the time we reached solid ground, my internal power and confidence had ascended to new heights. I can do just about anything.