Tikal!!!!

Last weekend, a group of friends and I headed north to Tikal, the most famous, most photographed, and as it turns out, most HUMID of all the destinations in Guatemala. It's a bunch of old Mayan ruins set in the jungle - a great way to spend an afternoon, and definitely worth the effort.

Of course, getting there wasn't pan comido (a Guatemalan expression that, loosely translated, is equal to 'cake walk'). I had been planning on traveling alone, or MAYBE with one or two friends, but this somehow exploded into a ten-person trip with me at the helm. The organization alone was exhausting, but finally everyone had bus tickets on the nice, first class tourist bus to Tikal (because it's 10 hours away, the best way to get there (other than flying) is via overnight tourist bus). We got picked up by a shuttle Friday night (the bus leaves from Guatemala City), but when we got dropped off at the bus terminal, the tourist bus wasn't there .... and we learned that our tickets were in fact for the (much cheaper) public bus. Luckily, we had seats, although not all together - there were five or six guys with tickets without seats, and they had to ride 10 hours sitting on overturned buckets in the middle of the aisle! My friend Jane took pictures (for when we returned to the travel agency to complain), so I'll try to get those posted eventually ... for now, it's sufficient to say that it was NOT the first class tourist bus we'd expected. It was good enough, and certainly safe, but it would have been nice if there weren't half a dozen Guatemaltecos sleeping in front of the bathroom ...

But we arrived in once piece, made it to the hotel, and were luckily allowed to check in REALLY early (at like 7:00 in the morning). Some people slept, but I went to eat a very slow, and very delicious, breakfast at one of the few restaurants in town. We were staying in a sleepy place called El Remate, the closest town to Tikal (still a 45 minute drive), and service for six of us (all eating scrambled eggs) took over an hour, but that's the beauty of Guatemala time ... I'm slowly becoming accustomed.

Afterwards, we had to decide how we were traveling back to Antigua the next day - bus tickets have to be purchased 24 hours in advance, and in a town 45 minutes away. There was another drawn out, dramatic conversation wherein people refused to do things because they were too expensive, without there being ANY OTHER OPTION (e.g., "No, I don't want to take a private shuttle, because it costs too much! But no, I don't want to go into town for a bus ticket, because it costs too much!"), but eventually we booked a private door-to-door shuttle, owned by the guy who runs the hotel, as a faster, safer and more comfortable alternative to whichever bus we would have otherwise wound up on.

And FINALLY, after all this drama, it was time to head for Tikal! The best time, we'd heard, was sunrise, but as that didn't really fit into our schedule, we decided to head in around lunchtime and stay for the sunset. Of course, we didn't account for the overwhelming humidity, or our inability to walk around the park for six hours straight ... We saw a LOT of great monuments, even more trees, some monkeys and lizards and disgusting spiders, and then it was 3:30 and we were all ready to head home. It was okay, we told ourselves, because the monuments face the wrong way for the sunset anyway!

We headed back to the hotel, took (totally pointless) showers, and then headed out for dinner. There was a great, tiny restaurant across the street, run by an old guy with one arm, where all the food was homemade, delicious, and really cheap! Some people complained, of course, because there wasn't a menu to choose from (two main courses only), and then because the service was slow (the guy only had one arm!!!), but I thought the food was great, and since we had cards to keep us busy until the food came, it was no problem for me! :) Afterwards, we were planning on heading out for a drink or two, but all of El Remate closes down at 9:00, so instead we all just headed back to the hotel and crashed early.