The mystic lake

well its been a while since I've updated this thing, for some reason the hammock based distractions always managed to win.

School has taken a bit of a downturn since I last wrote, things seemed to be going so well in the first week, but then as the crew grew and discovered a few more bars there seemed to be more reasons to leave the homework until the morning. Looking back on it now I have learned hell of a lot thanks to Julio, 5 tenses dialed (even learning the English names for some of them was a first!) but now just need a bit more practice as I go along to get all the vocab down, so shouldn't feel too bad really; but its concerning when your teacher laughs at you every time you rock in to school in the morning...

the kids have really been growing on me, despite stealing all our shoes we had a great game of marbles even though it seemed like the rules changed each turn and this little dude preferred eating them rather than playing with them


After much bad Spanish I eventually persuaded Julio to be our guide up the local volcano, with promised spectacular sunrise views over the entire lake. Official permits are never a problem when your brother/ cousin/ grandfather works in the relevant office, so running slightly late and some far more prepared (strangely preferring beer and guitars rather than tents or sleeping bags) for a night on a mountain than others we set off for one of the toughest climbs yet.


getting to the top of the hill and realising that not much firewood grows on the tops of mountains at 3800m Julio had an inspired idea

which was lucky as it managed to keep us warm all night and despite a good helping of local cake we managed to rustle up a pretty decent BBQ whilst team B-rad provided the entertainment.

A night somehow came and went without any of us developing hypothermia or falling off the cliff, and keeping in running with my sunrise luck we were provided with the 'spectacular' view we had trekked all that way for...

oh well. sod the views tho, overrated, the party is where its at. And getting down is far more painful than going up!

The next week was the start of Semana Santa (or Easter as its known elsewhere) so despite Granny's expert tortilla tuition

it was time to leave the 24hr happy-clappy-evangelical world of the family and move into one of the pimpest penthouses in the whole of San Pedro with complete lake views without even having to move from the bed

and with all the partying in full swing I was the time to step outside San Pedro for the first time in three weeks for Maximons (a sort of saint deity worshiped in Guatemala, usually chilling in someones house smoking a cigar and drinking whiskey, yes, they do actually believe he drinks it) procession across Santiago town. The procession is quite a big deal as having Maximon visit your house brings you luck, money, power, dancing girls and pretty much anything else you could want for.

Luckily the tropical storms that have rolled in for the last few evenings held off for one of the most important nights of semana santa; the laying of the alfombra. Over night teams worked until the morning laying coloured sawdust, flowers, fruit and leaves to literally pave the streets in one giant patchwork quilt.

then later on when the procession gets in full swing, giant shoulder carried jesus'/ jesuses/ jessi?, and his accompaniment of rather morbid looking angles, make their very slow wobbling way around them.



The rest of the weekend was spent on a traditional Easter beach outing with my teacher and his family, it was sad to say goodbye to them all as they have been great help (anyone going to San Pedro in a few months time should definately go and check out Julio's new pimp hostel with fully equipped learning centre for 24hr spanish imersion!)

before eventually managing to resist the lure of the lake and moving on down in to bandit country...