San Pedro and some Lanquin

The ride to San Pedro was pretty standard for the most part, but on the descent into San Pedro, we had a beautiful view of Lago Atitlan. It kinda reminded me of the Shuswaps in BC, where it´s a huge lake, just surrounded by huge mountains.
We ended up in quite the dump of a hotel that night, as we weren´t exactly up for looking around too much.. at least we had real matresses there. That night we headed out to look for a p`lace to eat with some guys from the states we met. We ended up booking a horseback riding trip and having the guy escort us to a little hole in the wall restaurant. The food there was not only very good but surprisingly cheap. A little under three dollars for the first meal in a while that actually filled me up.
After a hearty breakfeast of two meals each, Pat and I met up with the machete totting americains and headed off for our riding. It started off a little slow, but after a bit, we were on our way to a beach a little more then a hour away that was only reachable by horse trail. The ride was through some pretty thick jungle and we gotta see some pretty cool animals, even a snake. After stopping off at a viewpoint, whcih was spectacular, we jumped off our horses and hiked down to the beach. We met some locals here who were making a stew from the crabs and fish they caught in the lake, and one of them liked one of our firends shorts so much that he made a quite impressive attempt to buy them off of him. Our ride back proved to be an experience. Our horses got ahead of the guide, and by the time we were on an open trail, we went from a little trot to galloping. I had an absolute blast, i never knew how muhc fun riding horses could be. Pat, who was a little skeptical of the horseriding, had a great time as well... quite the experience for a first time riding a horse.
The rest of the day consisted of wandering the city and laying in our hammacks eating the oranges and peeling the limes growing in our hostels yard because it was ranning.
The next morning we rented some motorcycles and headed off to ride aroudn the lake. It was pretty early so there wasn´t much traffic to deal with and the chance of robbery was much lower, as that route has been known to be frequented by theives. The views were awesome and the motocycles made me want to buy one when i get home. They weren´t as powerful as i hoped, but im slightly glad it´s over as Im done worrying about getting into an accident or breaking something as I usually end up doing. The rest of our day consisted of a little more then ten hours of driving and me arguing with our shuttle driver who didn´t feel like driving us the whole way and wanted us to stay at the hostel he was associated with. He finally realized we were set on going, so we ended up in Lanquin/Semuc Champey that night, which is reached by a solid hour of bumpy driving on a very iffy road.
We headed out the next morning for our tour in the back of a pickup, which took a good half hour of offroading to get us to the destination. We went caving first, which was alot different then the last time i did it. The water level is much higher now, because the wet season is further along, and the caves required alot more swimming and tightspaces then last time. It still was an awesome experience, as it was pitchblack in there and we all only had a little candle for light, which made swimming a little more difficult.
We jumped off the rope swing into the river after that... where i managed a perfect backflop, which instantly gave me the feeling of a terrible red hot sunburn on my back. Oh well, it adds character right? Then we tubed down the river, which looked like something youd see in a jungle movie. Then after jumping off a decently high bridge we headed off to lunch.
Using the small hike as a workout, we turned the hour and fifteen minute hike into a fifteen minute run, with a small break for pictures. We then took advantage of the beautiful pools of semuc shampey and cooled off in those. The pools are essentially a shelve, which a small amount of the river water runs over, and the rest of the water runs under it. We got to see where the majority of the water runs under, and its was a little intimidating. Some serious rapids which then disapear into the darkness under the shelve.
Since then, weve been relaxing at our little hostel, wandering out in the town for meals, swimming in the river, which has an impresively strong current and just hanging out.
The plan is to leave tomorrow to Rio Dulce, whcih is almost on the east coast, and take our trip from there. Possibly just day trips or some sailing perhaps.
I also am starting to realize im on the last leg of my trip. My camera is as close to broken as it can get, with onyl the power and the takepicture buttons working. My footwear is down to some running shoes holding on for dear life and my clothes no longer pass the smell test.

Lava

So we took the hike up to Pacaya Volcano, there was a thunder storm but it wasn't so bad but it was real foggy up there. When we got there, we saw big rocks whcih were red hot tumbling down the mountain. This rocks wound up quite close to us, and if you touched almost any rock in the area, it was quite hot. Then we walked over all this black ropck, which felt hollow and therefor very sketchy. In between these rocks, you could see the red hot lava, but not too much of it flowing. Then we hiked a little higher and got to come real close to the flowing lave. WOW it was hot.. the bottom of our shoes were becoming real hot and you could smell the plastic of your jacket starting to melt. It was too hot to stay around for too long becasue it felt like our leg hair was actually burning off. So after running off for a bit to cool down, we came back adn enojyed some marshmellows which were cooked overtop of the lava.
One really weird thing there was the sound lava makes, its like a mix between glass bottles hitting eachother and popcorn popping. The hike down proved to be slightly more challenging because it was as the sun was going down adn by the time we reached the bottom, it was pitch black... a perfect recipe for rolling your ankle. Another thing was the kids of the town, as soon as you got out of the van, they would absolutely rush and surround you, trying to sell you walking sticks, ponchos, and marshmellows... i mean these kids were pretty vicous, knocking eachoter around to get infront of you. And when you get back, they all try to steal the sticks back from you.
All in all it was an awesome experiecne, and today PAt and i are headed off to San Pedro on lago Atitlan for a couple days where well do soe swiiming relax and maybe csome more climbing.
THats it for now

Alright i;ll try to jam as much info into this entry as possible with the little time i have.
I met up with Patrick, my friend from Red Deer, last tuesday and we;ve gotten quite a bit done since. The first day we took it pretty easy, i showed him around the city and allowed him to stay in the "safari suite" in my host family;s house. Its not really a suite though, it has a bed, wooden table, and a couple pages from a safari magazin up on the concrete walls. The next morning, we set off to hike the Santa Maria volcano.
We decided to take an alternative route to climbing the volcano compared to most other people... to do it without a guide. Overall the Trail was pretty easy to follow, and we only managed to get lost twice. The only thing I was concerned about was getting robbed on the hike, which has happened to many travelers before.
The first part of the hike was pretty easy with a nice and open trail. But the second half proved to be quite the demoralizing experience. Every single turn leads you to a trail which appears to be the top, only to turn that corner and see another trail. So for the last hour of hiking, we thought that we had reached the top only to see another tree line further up. The trails weren't anything crazy but the altitude proved to be one of the more difficult aspects of the climb. Patrick noticed it alot more then i did, where he found breathing to be a little difficult coming from a very low city in alberta to nearly 4000m ontop of a mountain in around 24 hours. Nevertheless, we did reach the top, which was clear of most vegetation and just one big rocky plato. We layed down and had some snacks then got ready for the descent. We were in the middle of the clouds up there, and it took us a little time to find the trail we came up on. With the weather, altitude and lack of food and water, our patience was running a little thin for finding this little trail. We ran down most of the mountain, and ended up cutting an almost two hours off the expected descent time. We got home, had breakfeast with the host family, then headed straight to a pizza place to fill the restr f our stomachs.
That night, i introduced patrick to the wonderful world of Cantenas= a hole in the wall with plastic chairs/tables and cheapest booze available. The gautemalateca we met there that night had a particular disliking towards mexicains... lets say my slang vocabulary expanded once again.
We decided to head towards the coast right away, and take a break before anymore hiking, so we went to the black sand beaches of Monterrico. We stayed in a dorm room in one of the nicest hostels on the beach for around 5 bucks a night. This place reminided me of an all inclusive resort without the drinsk and food. It was a nice change from my recent lifestyle. Those four days consisted of lots of seafood, nice weather whihc caused the black sand to becom boiling hot and relaxing on the beach. The waves there were huge! they also crashed very close to the shore. It was fun playig around in but you had to be really careful andn we received many warnings about the power of the undertow and the waves, whcih really would knock you around, filling your nose ears and what ekse with sand. But on our final sday there, 4 people passed away about a km away in the waves. I also managed to give myself a nice cut over my left eyebrow which probably couldve used a couple sticthes. Alcohol was not a factor in the injury, although it was used a mild painkiller later on. A little polysporn and alot of bandaids/tape and my head was good as new. Most our days consisted of walking into the town to find places to eat with some people we meet there and sitting on the beach just watching how powerful the waves were. Jus by playing in the surf, they would knock you over, and flip you around. Our last nght, there was a big party on the beach in front of our place, where we got to observe the drunks staggering and the kids playing dodgeball with everythign from coconuts, glass bottles and live crabs. This was one of the most enjoyable places ive been in Guate.
We got a shuttle to Antigua with some other people we meet there, which was a little adventure i itslef. We managed to get passed by some sort of porsche touring group, with over ten of them flying by us at well over 200km/h. We switched drivers half way through, and our second driver insisted on doing no more then 30km/h on all the roads, no matter what the speed lmimt was. I think Pat was angry enough for all us passengers.
We got into Antigua yesterday were we clebrated my birthday. As i got to pick our restaurant, we found a place that sold all types of fast food eats, like burgers or hot dogs for a little under a dollar each... we ate our hearts out... and i thinkg the man who was serving us was quite disgusted. The large amounts of alcohol in our systems may have saved us from food poising, because the food ooked a little sketchy, but i dont' think much would be able to survive in the alchohol rich envirmoents of our stomachs.
I don't have muhc time left, as Pat and I are heading off the climb a volcano where wel get to roast marshmellows over flowing lava. Ill try to add some more stories and maybe pictuyres later.

boats n .....

I´ve got some time on my hands for the next couple days because i am finished with my classes and am not waiting on the arrival of my friend patrick. Im juts going to be doing some little day trips because i don´t wanna do anything to big then go do it again when patrick gets here.

So last night was my graduation party. I was presented with a little certificate and had to do a mini aceptance speech. Well we hung around the school for a while.. had some beer pong games then went out to some salsa bar. Come to think about it, around this time last year, i was abusing alcohol after my graduation... maybe im falling into a habit. After hanging out with everyone at the bar, said bye to some other friends and some teachers as they stumbled away. It´s usually a good idea to walk home in a group in guatemala after dark but i haven´t had any trouble until last night. Ha although it wasn´t much trouble really. A very inibriated man asked me for permission to rob me. Well i didn´t agree, i did chose to chat with him... and discovered he wanted my money, and my phone if i had one. Armed with a little rock and alot of alcohol in his system... his mugging didn´t pass my standards. At that point I asked him very nmicely to leave, where then he apologized for the atempted robbery. I´m guessing he wasn´t too experienced in this and in exchange for some experience, i got a funny story.

After the first day of sleeping in since i got here, me and some others went to a small town called Zunil, where there is a well know following of a character named Saint Simon. This saint is a manaquin dressed up who smokes and drinks, believe it or not. The manaquin itself changes places every year, so when you get to Zunil, you need to ask some locals where he is, kinda like a scavenger hunt. We finally found him in a a big cement room. With tons of candles, bottles of alchool, tabaco and even cowboy boots before him as offerings, this looked somewhat like a type of shrine. We watched some person undergo a ritual in front of the maniquen and was drenched in alcohol and some sort of oil. They were even spat on by the leader of the ceremony. This was one of the most awkward things i have ever witnessed. Bare in mind, that this is a manaqaquin with a smoke in his mouth that is taken out every now and then so people can pour alchohol down his throat. I was pretty speachless the whole time as the people were very attentive to the ceremony, while others were yelling right beside them, listening to the soccer ground and spitting all over the ground in the room. I was continually baffaled by all the aspect of this ¨religious following¨ with a beer cooler in the coner and pictures of half naked girls on the walls..... sounds like my kind of place. After the ceremony we took our turn of feeding Saint Simon the cheapest booze we could find. It was quite the experience all and all. Ill try to put some better pictures up when i get them from the other peoepl i went with.

Update

So it looks like i know have a life plan that extends farther then tomorrow. I´m trying to get a rough draft of what Patrick ( friend from Red Deer who´s coming to meet me) and I will do. I´m guessing we won´t ahve too mjuch planned out just a couple things we wanna get done. I think we´ll stay around the highlands for a bit and do some hiking, maybe to the highest mountaion in C.A. and to many others where yu can watch the lava flow. After that, maye head down to the coast and get our burn on and maybe pick up surfing for a couple days. That´s about as far as I want to think ahead. Maybe head towards the East coast after that and maybe Belice and Honduras.

Im finishing up my last week of school, and feel like I´m raedy for it to be over. I saw this trip as a chance to relax from school, but i chose to ignore the fact that i chose to go to a school for this chance to relax. Not exactly what i hpèd for, but it was an awesome experience to say the least.

This weekend i took it pretty easy ebcause i wasn´t feeling 100%, but then again, eating in a plce liek this, you can´`t expect much less. Me and my host family went to a local hot springs for around 75 cents each. We got acess to 3 ssoccer feilds, a small zoo, a large steaming pool and several small cooler pools for the day. Let´s say i stuck out like a sore thumb. Out of the 200 or 300 peoeple there, me and Hong(host sister from chinA) were the only non-guatemaleans... and we can agree, that she might not stick out as well as i did. But we had an awesome day and bbqéd our lunch there and went swimming.

Don´t have much else to talk about at the moment but i´ll put some pictures up... most of which i hope you can figure out the story behind wihtout explaination