On the road...

Making tortillas for dinner..

The view from the top of the mountain overlooking Semuc Champey...

The little town of Lanquin..

The view from Lanquin in the morning.We´ve done a lot since we blogged last, so we will try to catch you up on our life on the road...

We left Flores where we hiked the Mayan ruins and took 2 days of Spanish school and headed for Lanquin, a small village up in the mountains about 4 hours away (we only saw about 6 other gringos the whole time we were there). 4 hours soon turned into 10 when we had to forge a river on a so called ferry with an 18 wheeler who forgot to set his parking break and went rolling backwards almost into the river. Then, we had to take what ended up being about a 4 hour detour because of some landslides the week before. All of this took place while we were 14 deep in a minivan for the whole ten hours. We survived the 7 km up a mountain that took 1.5 hours in the rain and fog and can honestly say that that was the scariest ¨road¨ we´ve ever been on. The van dropped us off with our packs on our back in the middle of town and pointed us in the direction of the nearest hotel. There were 7 of us all racing up the hill to get to the hotel first. Another backpacker beat us there and got the last of the rooms so we were out on the road again trying to figure out where we were and where we would be staying for the night. A local offered us a ride in the back of their truck to another hotel up the road...We ended up with a really nice hotel room with hot water (a big plus after a day like this).

Two days later we went on a day trip to Semuc Champey farther up in the mountains. We accidentaly got on the wrong bus to take us up there and ended up in the back of a pickup truck with 35 Mayans...we definately looked out of place. This place was beautiful with lots of pools and waterfalls. We hung out here for the day, hiked and swam. The Guatemalans say this is the most beautiful place in Guatemala...they might be right! We had another interesteing transportation situation on the way back when we got in a minivan that stopped to pick us up...ended up being a van full of Morman missionaries who had rented this van for a weekend excursion. We got preached to the whole way home, but we can´t really complain since they let us hitch the ride for free.

We left Lanquin for Antigua where we thought we would hang out for a couple of days before starting Spanish school. We were there for one afternoon, didn´t find much to do there, and ended up getting a better offer to meet Matt´s dad and brother to fish on the Pacific coast for 3 days..(see other blog).

After a few days getting spoiled, we hit the trails on Sunday and came to San Pedro La Laguna on Lake Atitlan. We are studying Spanish for 4 hours a day for this week and staying with a local family. For $130 were getting spanish school, 3 meals a day and a room to stay in...pretty good deal. Our spanish had to get better really fast last night when we (okay, I) locked us out of our room at the house. The lady we are staying with taught us how to make fresh corn tortillas...I dropped the first 2 on the floor...its a lot harder than you´d think. Ours were pretty imperfect, but still tasted good!

We will be here at the school until Friday...after that we will spend 2 days in another town on the lake before going back to coast to fish again....we will keep you posted on our latest adventures...maybe our next post will be in spanish! :)