MAYA-HO! _{Guatemala, Easter 2003}

Monday 28 April 2003

Maureen's much better, though still weak and queasy and not up to anything resembling a real Gringa breakfast. We walk slowly, majestically, down to Pana's south jetties, dicker uselessly over boat fares (they won't budge) and finally board (not so majestically) a lancha (20-foot motor launch) for quiet roadless San Marcos village - except that the boat's going instead to San Pedro (much more traffic) and it just drops us off at the the north Pana jetties, where we wait another 1/2 hour or more for the north shore local. Waiting for lanchas here is like walking a cat - a great way to learn patience.

With a full load on the small-but-enclosed water taxi, we set forth, packs and little Mayan chicas pressing against my legs. We talk a great deal with an an Old Gringo. Here is his story:

Into Santa Cruz

La lancha stops at the Santa Cruz village pier - a half-dozen Mayas and a couple backpackers get off - a few Mayas board, including a man carrying an Olivetti executive typewriter in a T'zut (carrying cloth) of Sololá apron material. We launch again into the warm hazy morning, splashes of spray keeping our heads cool at our positions just behind the bow, just under cover. Hamlets and villas and groves and rocks slide by - oops, we missed Jaibalito.

Jettys and farms and resorts and new residences line the shore, while the villages are all set on cliffs and ledges high above. Why? There's no tide here. Why?

Well, what with variable rainfall and diversion and leakage, the lake's surface "varies curiously" - like, by 75 feet over the years. Live high, work low, eh? But maybe the active meditators at San Marcos, Guatemala's premier NewAge center, can change that - channel the vortex, divert or absorb the energy flow, whatever. It's worth a try, eh?

Into San Marcos

The lancha lands at San Marcos' rickety resort jetty - the Old Gringo screams futilely at the boat handlers to let him off at the village dock - now he'll have to haul his load of supplies an extra few hundred meters. On his back. Ouch.

We disembark with a few Mayas and a half-dozen other wayfarers, a few others board the lancha for the next villages. We brush off the would-be guides and follow the walkway through rocks and brush and sand and trees and over precarious piers towards the nearest accommodations.

The most visible (and famous) is Los Pyrámides which upon closer inspection proves to be set in dead air in the jungle, nothing to view but your own (and your Gringo neighbor's) navel. Not planning to take their meditation-channeling-yoga-regression-fasting courses, we move on.

We look closely at solar-powered Posada Schumann - some nice stone bungalows (the downstairs are a bit musty) with nice lake views - at around US$30 per night, this is a distinct POSSIBILITY for an extended quiet stay. Nice lake views. Quiet. Maybe in a couple weels.

We spy the Unicornio Lodge but can't gain access, and it's in a viewless jungle cove just like Los Pyrámides only smaller. Other local hostelries are aloing the path to the village, all inland and viewless, so we bug out and head back to the dock. We've read that the village and resorts are peacefully segregated - not sure how we'd deal with that.

The San Pedro lancha arrives, two PoliTur (Tourist Police) cops disembark with their mountain bikes to patrol the local trails (hikers have been attacked and robbed on these trails) - wayfarers get off, others get on - and we're motoring for the BIG CITY hereabouts, San Pedro la Laguna, Guatemala's new center for language schools and ultra-cheap living.

Into San Pedro

We slowly, ponderously, climb the steep stone roadway past the first restaurant-bars, stagger along the first level concrete-block crossroad to a storefront marked TOURIST INFO and are directed to a clean cheap hotel. We try to follow those directions, find ourselves on dirt trails winding through fenced plots and trashy orchards and crumbling shacks, past a huge 4-store office block marked BETHEL EVANGELICAL COLLEGE with gospel music blasting out, through more mazes with signs for language schools and hot springs and Jesus.

We soon abandon our search for the Hotelito El Amanecer Sakcari, abandon any thought of staying in San Pedro, and ask directions to a landmark, the main Catholic church on the town square. We climb steep hot walled town paths, very much like the Amalfi villages but much grungier. Incredibly kind and friendly people help us on our quest, asking if we need help, smilingly pointing the way through the maze. One little old fellow says "follow me!" and leads us in the right direction.

We're trudging slowly - it's hot and humid, the terrain is vertical, Maureen is VERY tired and overheated but is doing amazing well, considering...

We finally reach the town center level - here's the bus stand, the mercado, and the church is around the corner. Maureen stops and rests, I explore as far as the church's front steps. Evangelical slogans are painted all over town. Catholics must be nearly extinct here.

We walk around to the front of the church plaza - and there's a huge statue of that saint with his chicken! Just like in the Antigua processions! Must learn more...

We wind downhill on village streets, JESUS IS LORD painted next to Mickey Mouse, plots of coffee beans laid out in the street to dry, neat stacks of firewood under tin roof shelters, some bamboo walls amongst all the painted concrete and stone. We'd appreciate it all more but we're just too hot and tired and grubby. San Pedro may be a great place for young cheap international wanderers and language students, but it's not quite what we old gringos want for a relaxing retreat.

Down to a cafe beautifully overlooking the lake for rest and rehydration and guacamole, then onto the launch for Pana. There's a delay getting away and we talk extensively with two girls from Vancouver Island who've spent 4 months in Central America, mostly in Costa Rica and the Guatemalan lowlands. They left Canada in January - very smart - and will return in May. They extolled Costa Rica, and Guatamala's Verapaces and Rio Dulce.

Again in Pana

Back to Pana's north jetty, we slowly stroll back to the Regis, rest a bit, then walk out slowly for some nearby shopping - good stuff for family and friends. (You know who you are!)

We have lunch at Las Chinitas. Ling prescribes a papaya liquada (smoothie) and mild miso soup for Maureen's tender gut, and that works perfectly. The great fresh clean food, cool quiet calm ambience, combine for healing. "I almost feel like a person again!" Doing VERY well, for having been OUT two days before.

Then more slow walking. (You'll notice I use the word 'slow' a lot.) The Canadian girls are off to wherever. The vendors are still crying for our trade. Basta ya! Enough already!

Evening - I find a compatible InterNet cafe, post the journal and handle some email, read some news. I haven't been paying attention to news much lately. Here's what's happening: 1) In Iraq, nobody's found either Saddam Hussein or any WMDs (Weapons of Mass Destruction). You remember WMDs, the original justification for the invasion? Tony Blair sez, "It's early, give us time." 2) Nobody's nuked anyone lately. India, Pakistan, North Korea are still simmering. 3) Mary B's daughter KC had a daughter, KE. Congratulations!

Now it's late, I find a nearby comedar (Deli #1) with tolerable pasta pesto, their stereo playing light classical music and romantic movie soundtracks that must be TOTALLY alien to the Mayan staff. Ah, culture shock. Return to Regis, shower, collapse, snore.

Tuesday 29 April 2003

A kick-back day, sorta. Over to Las Chinitas for a healing breakfast. A slow walk up Santander, stop in a travel shop (TOLIMAN EXCURSIONS, ) to arrange transport and lodging for Chichi Thursday through Sunday, then slowly back down the street. The Canadian girls see us, we exchange greetings, continue. Some minor stall-shopping as we perambulate to the Playa.

Across the beach-top walkways to the Rio Pana, past stalls and comedars catering to Central American partyers, and looking down at docksful of boats. We swing around the faded midweek partyland. It's getting warm now. We stop at LOS PUMPAS, a weird open Mayan tiki bar, for dark beer and fresh air, only a few vendors attacking us. A jeep with BIG steer horns on the hood is outside. Inside, in front of the canned marimba music playing national tunes, are dioramas involving wildlife, Chicken Buses, various saints, and leaping fish.

Back down the playa walks, so much sun, so many blooms and greens, so much lake haze. We haven't seen a volcano in days, except those chunky fragments in front of San Pedro. Up into the SUNSET CAFE, a pseudo-paleo-Mexican resort for nachos and veggie fajitas and more good dark beer, MOZA, aaahhh... We're transported to other times and places, talking. Bright birds flit about the bright flowers and dark foliage. Wind-choppy waves whisper against the light volcanic sand and push the ghostly caldera crags up and out, looming over us like mesozoic memories.

Tuesday midday

Back to the Regis for a rest, then I'm out stomping again. Over to Calle Principal near Pana;s north entrance where the checkpoint is no more. Past the weedy lot where horses and a burro now graze, but no llama. Past the circus, now being dismantled; still no llama, but a spider monkey is running around. I want to SPIT BACK at that llama!

Up into Old Town Pana, through the village maze, over side streets and alleys (calles y callejons) towards the precipitous north edge of town, to find barrios and tiendas (tiny stores) and hospidajes (rooms to let) and schools and luxury hotels and tellars (workshops) and hovels. Past the plain but impressive Catholic Church - inside, one of the chapels is occupied by a shiny new bicycle and helmet, prizes in the current fundraiser.

Then thru the shabby but lively and friendly mercado, a permanent mercado, always jumping. Out more tiny roads twisting eastward to hills and canyon. Then south over a long dusty calle past yet more continuous construction, to the banks of the Rio Pana a couple klicks from the lake.

On the mile or so of pebbly floodplain below me I see dozens of small crews of workers shoveling stones, gravel, sand into bags and barrows and buckets and beds of small pickup trucks. The riverbed is being excavated by hand, then shaped into the plethora of homes and hotels and shops rising all around Pana, and into those concrete blocks that pave the roads and alleys and trails.

I stomp back into the old village's teeming streets, then Gringotenango's lines of shops and eateries and hostelries. All the bustle looks vivid and open, but just like the plain but colorful walls of Antigua, the real town is hidden behind. Behind what's visible are hotels, govt offices, gardens, warehouses, apartment warrens, office blocks, workshops, a radio station surround by low orchards. Nothing is quite as it seems, except to aerial surveillance.

Tuesday evening

I hit an InterNet cafe to check email and BBC news online. The latest: Osama bin Laden (ObL) has won! His goal of overthrowing the secular regime of Saddam Hussein has been accomplished. His greater goal of driving infidels from the homeland of the sacred cities of Mecca and Medina is now at hand - the US announced it's pulling all troops out of Saudi Arabia. What's next? Well, Dubya's dad works for ObL's dad, so anything's possible.

Back to the Regis, then Maureen and I navigate side roads down to the Pana playa to catch the shadowy evening breeze. All the jettys are bare - where do the boats go for the night? Someplace cheap, no doubt. Not like us, nope.

Wednesday 30 April 2003

Early morning, thunder-lightning-rain during the night, birds are shouting at our window, bells are ringing in the old village. 'Tis our last full day in Pana. What to do? At 8AM tomorrow we shuttle off to CHICHI (Chichicastenango) where we've booked three nights at an unknown lodge (El Hotel Chugüilá), sight unseen, at the tour agency's recommendation and because our first choice (Posada el Arco) is full for the entire month of May. Wow, must be a good place!

Thursday and Sunday are Chichi's much-attended market days, a reputedly fabulous market that attracts people and tour operators from all over Central America. We'll nose around a bit at the haps tomorrow, but the main event is Sunday, which may also occasion Catholic+pagan religious processions around town. In between we'll observe the village and its reputedly beautiful locale.

On the 4th (Sunday) we may split for more high country in Xela after market's over, or we may extend in Chichi a day or so if it looks good. Quien sabe?

Keep in mind that here in Pana we're at 1560 meters (5150 feet), and generally sweltering. Chichi is at 2030 meters (6700 feet). Xela is at 2335 meters (7705 feet). Locals complain that Xela is cold, but they're running around here in woolies while we're dripping sweat in shorts and tees, so the highlands should be just about right for us. Relief!

Wednesday midday

Fairly cool this morning, maybe 70°f, and clearer due to the overnight weather. We rushed down to the playa before breakfast and hot damn! Volcanoes can be dimly seen! After eating we strolled up into the old village - I showed Maureen many of the lanes and scenes I'd encountered yesterday and before - and Volcan San Pedro remained visible.

Now it's warming, so we've retired back to Cafe Sunset for lunch and Cerveza Moza and fresh take air and thatched shade; and a dim volcanic outline in the returning haze as we laze contentedly. As for you peasants: SUFFER!

OK, so we're just getting lubed prior to packing. Book a one-night room at the Regis for our return in three weeks; stuff all the extras in that new Mayan duffle; store the duffle in the Regis' vault; head off into a glorious Phase IV of this glamorous adventure.