Bananas here we come

It's been a few good days in Xela, but now it's about time to head out in the jungle to pick some bananas and clear some forest. Have a lovely week, it's a shorter stay this time, next Monday it's back to Xela to spend a few days at the college for indigenous youth.

Take care, so long!

Xelaju Xelaju Xelaju

We spent a few more nice days in Livingston, met some Americans and went to Los Siete Altares with them. It is a serious of tiny waterbasins which supposedly should be surrounded by waterfalls, but considering it is the dry season, only one of the basins had water in them. We hiked the five kilometer from Livingston to the sight (a walk and tourist attraction which is supposedly notoriously dangerous and you should always get a police escorte, however we did not...) and at the end of the beach hit the jungle. Five hundred meters into the jungle these basins occured out of nowhere and it was just surreal. The Altar we went swimming in was freezing cold (Livingston and Belize have been so, so hot), so that was very refreshing and it started pouring down with rain so everything got soaked. But, it was interesting to see, and although it would have been nice to see the waterfalls the downpour created some tiny wannabe ones and it was worth the hike.

This morning we headed back to Xela. Caught the boat to Puerto Barrios and got a first class bus to Guatemala City. We got there and as always when you jump of a bus there is ten taxi drivers trying to get hold of you and your luggage. Transport in the capital is pretty stupid organised, each bus company in the country have a terminal and they are often far from each other. We asked one driver who said we had to go to Zona 1, another said Zona 8, one pointed at the bus next to us. In the end I got the lovely Lonely Planet Guide, called (my first phone call in Spanish) one of the bus companies, asked if they had a bus to Xela (buses run mostly in the morning, and are scarce if existent at all in the afternoon and evening) and we headed off there.

Now we have had dinner at McDonalds (first and last time) and I think we might just chill out the rest of the night. Someone in the group is constantly sick of something and at the moment it is Sara so we will go back to the hotel, watch Harry Potter and cheer her up. Have a lovely Sunday!

Lost laundry and back in Guatemala

After getting slightly sunburned at the beach yesterday we decided to head back to Punta Gorda to catch the boat back to Guatemala this morning. Charlotte had the day before handed her dirty laundry to cleaning and when we went to get it, we got told the lady had taken it to the neighbooring town to wash it. We missed our first boat trying to get it back, eventually got half of it back and jumped on a bus to P.G. that just happened to be there 38 minutes after scheduled time. We got to P.G., met an American who was looking for a hotel and hooked up with him.

We got up early this morning and caught the boat across. Blue skies and blue water is just fantastic. Now we're back in Livingston having lunch at Happy Fish and plan to spend the rest of the afternoon in a hammock, before eventually heading back to Xela.

Cheerio!

What a wonderful life

The beach is fantastic. There is nothing more to say.

So long!

Playing on the playa

It was awesome just relaxing a few days in Livingston, but we felt like seeing a new place so this morning Veronica, Charlotte, Kristin, Sara and me headed off to Belize. I did not feel much like it at 5.45am this morning when I woke up and started packing my backpack for the fourth day in a row (it's like playing tetris, everything fits, but only in one spot and if I do it wrong, there is no chance to close the lid). But we had a great boat trip across a small part of the Carribbean Ocean, the sun was shining, the water calm and it was hot. We came to Punta Gorda and thought about looking for a hotel until we came across the bus station and figured we should check out where we could go if we wanted to. An American couple said Placencia a bit further up the coast was beautiful. So we jumped on the first bus, got dropped off in the middle of nowhere and got told to keep walking down the road and we'd find a boat that would take us across a mangrove river. As said as done. Another fantastic boattrip and we got dropped off in, really, the middle of nowhere. Placencia has one of the best beaches in Belize and is a tiny town with only 600 inhabitants at the end of a 50 km long peninsula. You can either drive the dirt road all the way there or catch the boat over. We followed two Swiss guys who thought they knew where they were going and found a hotel. And then, what we had been waiting for, after days in muddy water in Livingston - pure turquoise water, a white beach and a sea breeze. It was so beautiful and absolutely worth the whole trip just to chill there all afternoon.

Now we've had a fantastic dinner at Purple Space Monkey Village, a little expensive compared to Guatemala, but the fish here even beat the one we had in Xela last week when we "celebrated" the firs finca stay. So far so good, we'll see what happens tomorrow, Charlotte and Veronica doesn't like staying more than a night at one place, so it might be back to Livingston, we'll see, we'll see!

Take care!

Chilling out in Livingston

This is such a cool place, we've had a few great days at the beach. It is extremely hot and humid, but as long as you only have to go swimming and eat ice cream, it's really not a problem! Nevertheless, it's about time to get some more stamps in the passport so tomorrow morning we'll head over to Belize, a former British colony which apparently has a great mix of people: Spanish, Creol, Garifuna, Chinese, Africans and so on, so that should be great.

Enjoy your Monday!

And check out the ATM, it can sometimes be a little hard to get cash...

Holiday at the Pacific Ocean...or the Atlantic?

Holiday!! Yess!! We had a meeting with SOS Children Village on Thursday which was really interesting. It was a beautiful large area in a suburb close to Xela city centre with 12 houses and 102 children. The children are free to go out and are guaranteed 9 years at school. When they turn 15 they move out with other teenagers and a "bigbrother" and they learn a trade and are helped getting jobs and a house. The cutest thing was four year old Andrea who came into the house we were visiting and grabbed Sara and gave her the biggest hug ever. Adorable!

Other than that we've arrived at the Atlantic (or Carribean) ocean after a rather long busride. We went from Xela west in the country to Antigua (in the middle), to Escuintla (very close to the Pacific Ocean, totally in the wrong direction from where we should go). We stayed there one night, caught a bus to Guatemala City, a rather long and sticky busride to Rio Dulce and a fantastic boat trip up the river to Livingston. The scenery was amazing, a bit like Daintree Forest north in Australia, but with far more bananapalms and coconut huts. Livingston is inhabited by black Spanish people, decendants from African slaves who escaped from the slave ships 400 years ago. It's very laid back (more than Australia) and very hot, but I think we'll have a few good days here.

Have a great Sunday!

Junglesafari

Home, sweet home! It's was absolutely fantastic to come back to Xela this afternoon! The last week has been long, it's been a lot of hard work, more pineapples have been planted, the area the size of MCG or ODD Stadion have been cleared for bushes and lots of cards have been played. But overall, a fantastic experience which has resulted in a few blisters. We carried 175 kilos of bananas over a very long distance (we were four people, two being under 13), so it's definitively physically challenging.

At the moment I just need to get some lunch, and relax a little, and a more detailed update and maybe some photos will come a little later.

Take care!

License to kill...I mean drive.

Just a very short update from the middle of nowhere. Happy International Women's Day to all the "mujeres" out there. It is also the reason we've escaped the jungle and get to spend a few hours close to a internet connection, La Bendicion has a female group that invited us to celebrate the day with them at a community house in Mazatenango, an hours drive from the finca. And here comes the issue with the chicken buses again, the drivers CAN NOT DRIVE! It is absolutely ridiculous, and every time I get off I think that was the worst driver ever, but no, next time will be worse.

Anyway, I am having an allright time at La Bendicion. I spent the first night throwing up all over my family's courtyard, but other than that it's been hot, sticky and hard work. I've planted a 1000 pineapple plants and cleaned areas the size of a footballfield for bananapalms. By all means, it is absolutely amazing, I've done stuff I never would dream about, tasted the weirdest fruit, and I just have to say, to give a bananatree one good wack with the machete and then see it fall over is one very good to get rid of any tension. But it's tough. I'm looking forward to come back to the big city and just relax. The days end at 8pm when the family goes to bed, and starts at 6am, which is not too bad for those who know me.

Have a lovely time til next week. Out coordinator Marte and assistant Elin (whose job I want) are coming up to the finca later today, so I'm guessing it will be stocking up on ice cream and heading back to the jungle.

Cheerio!