tikal y belize

We moved on from Flores to a little town closer to Tikal so we could get an early start at the ruins. El Remate , wasn't really much of a town, but we ended up staying @ some little "hippie hut" on the side of a hill. Interesting place... to say the least. We met some nice French Canadians who were also staying there that we ended up hanging out with them that night and visited the ruins with them the next day.

We caught the bus for Tikal at 5:30 a.m. and literally were there for the National Park gates to open. The best part about the drive into the park was all the animal crossing signs on the road (turkey, jaguar, snakes, anteater, pizote, etc.) we thought this was really hilarious. Tikal was amazing, the temples were massive and we were able to climb up lots of them. The whole site was in the middle of jungle too, so we would be walking through the jungle and then another massive temple/site would appear. Pretty amazing. There was also tons of wild life in the park - monkeys, birds and other little creatures scurrying about. After about 8 hours there I was beat... after the park we headed back to Flores.

The next day I split paths with Micael, the Swiss guy I had been traveling with and headed to Belize and he headed towards Antigua. Belize has been great - I have spent all of my time on Caye Caulker, a beautiful little island about 45 minutes north of the city. I have basically spent all of my time here relaxing, partying with new friends, swimming, snorkeling and wandering around the island. It has been a really peaceful way to end my time in centroamerica. Tomorrow I am headed back to CO... I am not quite ready to leave let, but I am certain that I will be back to many of these places in the future!

copan y guatemala

I guess I was getting spoiled in San Jan del Sur, I forgot how tiring "backpacking" really is.

My last day in Utila I rented a bike and basically rode on every road in the whole island (maybe even twice). The island is so small, bikes are the best way to explore. My favorite part was watching the lizards and crabs scatter as I rode toward them. While on my ride I also decided that Utila really needs my brother... the bikes on the island are in the worst condition I have ever seen, I think my brother would have years of work trying to fix and maintain these bikes, I kept thinking that if he was on the island he would probably have preferred to walk than ride the rusted-out POS that I rode around the island. That evening I also took a couple hours of Spanish at the local Spanish school to practice pronunciation and other stuff.

We left Utila on the 6:20 a.m. the next day en route back to La Ceiba - the ferry was great expect for the all the crying children and barf bags - just what you need at the crack of dawn (also, for those who were wondering, we continued to have lots of aftershocks while on the island, there was even one more earthquake the next night that was strong enough to wake everyone in our room up).

From Ceiba we took a bus to San Pedro Sula and then caught another bus from there to Copan Ruinas. On one of our bus rides we passed over a bridge that had been demolished because of the earthquake - it was the same picture I had seen on the NYTimes Web site - pretty cool.

Copan Ruinas was a great little town - we were very happy to back in a place where they only spoke Espanol. The main thing to do in Copan was visit the ruins of course. We spend most of Sunday doing that - we also just happened to be visiting the ruins that same day that the President of Honduras was along with the President of Ecuador (monkey business... I think so). Just about wherever we went in the park these guys showed up with their entourage. It was quite entertaining to watch though with all the media and secret service wondering about. Aside from the circus, the ruins were great. I do have some great pics, to be posted soon. We also visited a nice museum in the town and hiked up to a mirador.

Yesterday, we made another epic journey from Copan Ruinas to Flores, Guatemala (where I am now). After taking a van (with 23 people, including 3 on the roof) to the boarder and having the easiest and friendliest boarder crossing, we took another bus to Chicimula, where we caught an 8ish hour bus to Flores. Flores is the staging point for most people who are going to Tikal - that is what we are doing tomorrow. We are staying on this tiny island in the middle of this massive lake - pretty cool setting here.

Probably one more update to come before I am back stateside on Sunday. Hope this finds you all well.

Salud!