Luckily we had good weather unlike other groups who were up to their knees in mud and sliding back down the hills as fast as they were climbing them.
After about 5 hours of walking a day you arrive at the surprisingly developed refuge (where someone had actually carried a pool table 2 days into the jungle) to hang your hammock before trying to work out how to sleep in it without waking up with your feet around your ears in the morning.

After a few days though you eventually get the hang of it, or are just so tired you pass out anyway.

WARNING: PARENTS AND FUTURE EMPLOYERS MIGHT NOT WANT TO READ THE NEXT BIT
One of the optional extras you can do no the way to the lost city is to visit a ´cocaine factory´; obviously not the real thing as they are on a much larger scale, but blatant enough for them to have to of been paying off the right people in order to get away with it.
Walking deeper into the jungle past some none too subtle coca plantations

you arrive at the lab, which is little more than a few plastic containers of differing sizes.

What you see next is enough to put off even the most street hardened crack-head, as starting from a handful of coca leaves he adds Jamie Oliver style quantities of petrol, sulphuric acid, caustic soda and nail polish remover and with a bit of filtering and sedimentation in the middle ends up with something that pretty much resembles what Colombia is so famous for.

From a purely scientific perspective the process is beautifully refined, having gone from an everyday herb that the indigenous people used to chew to offset altitude sickness and fatigue 1000´s of years ago, to being crafted into the modern version of cocaine in a secret CIA laboratory (if you believe the conspiracy theories) by some obviously quite skilled people, then for it to be transformed out of the lab into the middle of the jungle using readily available household chemicals, so as demonstrated anyone can make cocaine.

OK YOU CAN START READING AGAIN NOW
The last day of the hike up to the lost city itself was the hardest, having to ford the river 7 times with a full pack as the mules weren´t joining us for this bit,

before climbing the 1000+ steps to the top of the mountain

where the city opens above you as if it had just been built yesterday despite being 2500 years old (well the foundations anyway, as the housing was just temporary structures made out of wood).

Getting up early in the morning after a rather cozy nights sleep with 35 people in the hut designed for 20, to walk around the site alone presented some stunning views we hadn´t seen the evening before,

and an opportunity to chat with the young soldiers stationed there for a month apiece

and have a play with their slightly scary guns. (or maybe it is just the person holiding the gun that is scarey)

The journey back down the valley was even more fun, as we stopped in to some secluded indigeonous settlements where the people pretty much stay for their whole lives, only making trips to ´civilisation´ to barter for goods

where the most beautiful but feral children I have ever seen live that still seem supprised at the sight of westerners.

as the rains had eventually come, so the rivers had risen considerably by this point meaning anyone trying to cross them on foot would be swept away, prompting some Indian Jones style river crossing

and some rather drenched but happy campers that were that point too tired to care.

Lost in the lost city remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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A few hours along the coast is the ´beach resort´ of Santa Marta, although it is hard to see the attraction with the biggest container port in Colombia at the end of the beach. However just a 15 minute hop over the hill is a completely different matter, the beautiful coved town of Taganga surrounded by mountains that make it look like something out of Captain Corelli´s Mandolin.

With one of the nicest hostels so far perched half way up the hill, perfect for chilling in a hammock on the patio watching the sunset

and enjoying one of the very fine sandwiches from down the road (I think I tried pretty much the whole menu, and they even deliver for only 200m away).
The town itself has been converted into a little Israeli Butlins, with most of the signs and menu´s written in Hebrew (not quite sure why they can´t learn Spanish like the rest of us); a despite some really nice diving nearby

the shops themselves are a little cowboy, churning out ´advanced´ divers without them even having opened the theory book.

Further along the coast you get to the Tayrona national park, made famous by the book Gringo Trail where
after treking through the jungle for a few hours (allbeit on a properly made path now, a change from the self machetted one in the book) you get to Arecifies beach where the book has its ending, not to ruin the story, but you really shouldn´t swim here...

Another hour walk along the beach and you get to Cabo San Juan, a beautiful little cove with one of the greatest penthouses in the world perched on top on a rocky outcrop.


where you wake up in your hamock looking over the bay.

which is the perfect to while away several days if you have brought enough insect repellent, cans of tuna, and a good camera to take adventage of the sunsets and local boudlers

The start of the Gringo Trail remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Setting off out of the harbour the next morning it was sad to think that that would be the last time I would set foot on mainland central America this trip, but with the big blue sea ahead of us it was time for the start of a new adventure. Stopping off at Isla Grande for a bit of snorkeling

and lunch lounging in the sun lulled us into a false sense of security for what was coming up next. As we left the sheltered coast line and rounded the first headland under full sail the wind picked up from a casual 15 knots to 30 to a full on tropical storm 60 knot in a matter of minutes with the seas running a 15ft swell underneath us. With everyone else down below smacked out on seasickness drugs it was up to myself and Captain to reef the boat down and try and ride out the storm which even with the main sail fully reefed we were keeling massively, everythings not just gin palace sailing in the Caribbean. Luckily the storm blew itself out after a while and with it the wind disappeared completely so we were retired into the little town of Mirimar rather than cruise on further down under power.

Setting sail out of port on a perfect Caribbean sailing day we all got the time to helm and learn more about the boat on the long cruise down to the San Blass islands.

As you approach the archipelago you can really see the range of the 400+ picture postcard islands that make up the San Blass.

They are exclusively owned by the Kuna people so foreigners can´t wade in and overdevelop everything like they have done in most other places, and thus most islands have little more than a basic straw hut on them, and more than half of them don´t even have that.

The Robinson Crusoe in each of us takes over as we we pick a random island, anchor just off shore then dive over board in a race to be the first to concur the new island for England/ Ireland/ America/ Israel/ New Zealand.

The next week pretty much was spent the same with a dive into the warm waters then a lovely breakfast of fruits and amazing Panamanian coffee before moving the boat over to another island of our choosing, then having a bit of explore both above and below the water as the snorkeling and wildlife around the islands was very interesting, including one of the most incredible sights of a giant eagle ray jumping 2m out of the water in front of the boat and seeming to flap its giant wings in the air before disappearing below the surface again. In the afternoons if people could be motivated from lounging on deck, we would sometimes go visit some of the natives and barter produce with them for whatever they had to offer, although I´m not sure where they got their inspiration for their dress sense,

but we weren´t to complain as big chief´s island had little more than a couple of straw huts but most strangely a giant fridge stocked full of ice cold beer! The nights were spent chilling on deck with obvious quantities of quality pirate rum and Captain amusing us with some of his sailing yarns or teaching us the art of night navigation, before trying to find a flat place to sleep under the millions of stars.
After managing to persuade Captain to stay 2 more days in the islands (think he was having as much fun as we were so he was in no rush) we eventually had to start moving towards our destination, but not before getting our immigration papers sorted on one of the most insanely inhabited islands I had ever seen with houses literally hanging off the sides whilst neighboring islands had one solitary house sitting in the middle. This was also the place with surely the most remote hardrock cafe in the world,

and we walked around like kings as the tallest person was little more than 5ft so for once in my life I felt like a giant.

After waving goodbye to the beautiful islands we set off into the big blue sea for the 2 day open ocean trip across the bay towards Colombia, and within a couple of hours we could see nothing more than blue sea and blue sky.

With not much else to do our time was taken up with trying to catch Moby Dick, but even after trailing lines all the way from Panama we got nothing more than a bite which instantly snapped the line anyway, so we had to do without the BBQ´d fish that we had been promised; the only thing that we did manage to catch (or to be honest caught itself) was a flying fish that jumped into the cockpit which Captain had the honour of eating alive. As the second morning arose we had our first shout of land ahoy, and our first sight of South America; although the little fishing village which the guide book had promised had got slightly more developed in the last few years

Leaving the faithful Twylad and setting foot in Central America for the first time was a strange and rather wobbly experience after being on a boat for a week, but it was time to begin a new adventure.

• *it is not the choices we make but the chances we take that determine our destiny**

The good ship Twylad remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Quite strange being in a city again after all this time on beaches, especially such a developed one. Sparkly lights everywhere, massive shopping centres and big banks lined the streets which supposedly the drug cartels created to funnel their money through. Although did manage to find the camera I had been searching the last 3 countries for everyone thinking about going travelling has to buy one of these, its amazing!

As with most cities there is an attractive colonial part

which is nice to stroll around and afforded contrasting views of the new city across the bay,

then onto the three linked islands which make up entrance to the canal zone as the ships steam in under the bridge of the Americas.

Walking up one of the hills on the islands gives great views of the city, and also one of the strangest entry methods into a bar ever seen...

a zip line through the jungle! unfortunately the bar wasn´t open at the time so didn´t get the full experience.

Of course one of the things you can only see in Panama is the canal itself and a visit to the Miraflores locks

to watch the giant boats make their slow way out to the sea having crossed 60 miles of impressively man made waterway is an incredible site, especially when the massive panamax boats come through with only inches to spare each side.


Even with the best of planning intentions the designers of 1900´s couldn´t of predicted the shere demand for transport in the 21st century so work is already underway to extend the capacity of the lock to allow for the post Panamax vessels which currently have to dock at the mouth of the canal and offload all their cargo for it to be shipped overland by freight train.

There is only so much city heat and pollution that one can take at any time, so a journey back to the hill country of Boquette near the Costa Rican border was a nice breath of fresh air, literally. This is a place famous for its magnificent Quetzals (the national bird) although after walking the Quetzal trail I didn´t spot a single one, but the views of the rolling hills and coffee plantations spreading out before you made up for it.

I was going to pay a visit to a nice looking golf course winding its way through one of the valleys but after being told I couldn´t enter wearing shorts or even walking I decided to give it a miss and went for a cycle ride in the hills instead which after 6 months of no exercise nearly killed me.

Left the hills early in the morning to get back to the big city with the intention of sorting out a boat over to Colombia in a few days time, but just as I was arriving at the hostel there was a group of people leaving for the coast to try and find a captain so I went straight back out without even setting my bag down and on to the fortified little port town of Portobello.

Home to the black christ, an eight foot wooden statue that was washed up in the harbour in the 1600´s and atributed with magical powers after attempts to send it back out to see resulted in a few unexplained deaths

and now the mystic powers are enough to convince the belivers to crawl on their knees (some all the 53 miles from Panama City) to worship before El Nazareno.

Looking out onto the harbour you see all the yachts mored in the safety of the bay

waiting to take us on the next stage of the adventure...

There´s more to Panama than the canal remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Being back on a super chilled Caribbean island you have to get used to the more chilled way of life where nothing really happens in a hurry, and I even had to go without breakfast one day before diving because a slice of toast and scrambled egg took more than 45 mins to appear.The living conditions can only be described as beautifully feral as you are living beside the turquoise sea in a palm-roofed hut, washing in a bucket and there only being electricity between the hours of 6-9pm every day. I loved it.
The island itself is home to only 500 people and there is nothing faster than a bicycle or even anything more than a small path to allow it.

This allows for a complete circumnavigation of the island in an afternoon checking out the other cabina´s dotted around the deserted bays

, and the views from the fire town on the hill in the middle of the island show just how perfect this little bit of paradise really is.

The diving on the islands takes the same pace of life as the rest of the island with only one dive a day recommended so you can chill in a hammock for the rest of the afternoon and reflect on the days activities. The dives are quite different from the Bay Islands with lots of intricate cave systems and swim throughs at a max depth of 18m so most dives can last for around 80 minutes!
And luckily was my first sighting of the beautiful eagle ray,

when we managed to swim along next to a school of 4 of them gracefully flying through the water for 5 minutes, simply stunning creatures. The night dives were of course just as amazing with some giant turtles and sleepy parrot fish snuggled up in their sleeping bags of mucus; I even managed to nearly swim straight into a sting ray as I was so busy checking out a bright red reef octopus eating its dinner!

The people on the island are so friendly with greetings of ´Alllriiiight´ and ´oooooooooooookay´ as you stroll past them chilling under the trees, and are willing to regale tales of the giant octopuses eating fishermen whole;

and more believably how when a cocaine shipment is washed up on the beach it gets sold to the local dealers on the main land and the proceeds get distributed throughout the whole island to buy new engines for the boats or to build a new pier. Drugs aren´t all bad.

The Corn´s remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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SJDS
The usual spiel of "there is no bus to .... today you have to get on ours instead" is getting a little tiresome, but something you have to live with in these areas. However arriving in the surf town on San Juan del Sur soon makes you forget all the hastles involved in getting here.
The town itself is nestled between two hills on a palm fringed half-moon beach, much as I would imagine Brazil to be, and generally brings in perfect offshore conditions 360 days a year although as always happens with these things the wind had switched to onshore and the usual chat of "you should of been here yesterday" is common around town. Due to the natural beauty of the place,

and the low land prices, the investment coming in to the town now that the country has gained a modicum of stability is evident all over with new developments springing up all over town; and sadly this place might become another Costa Rica with floods of American tourism and investment over the next few years, so its worth coming to now while you can.
Although one good thing about the money is the beautiful 5* resort in the hills overlooking the bay, where on Mondays and Wednesdays its worth a trip up to for the 2-for-1 cocktail nights to see the sunset from a different angle, and to lounge in their infinity pool if you can sneak past the guards... which turned out to be quite a regular thing when the whole crew eventually rocked into town.

There are a multitude of surf breaks around town,

both accessible via dirt track and others where a boat in is the only option, although they are better left to the pros. And when the wind turned back to the right direction and the swell came in the reason for SJDS´s fame soon became evident with some great surf just north of town at Playa Madiras where you can stay in one of the surf camps right on the beach.

Confidence was high when playing on the fish in the smaller break so when a lull in the swell came in it was time to paddle out to where the big boys were hanging out at the back. Big mistake. When the set rolled in again the realisation of just how big the waves were became evident, as even the 7ft tall americandutch was getting standing barrels, and after a failed take off it soon became a fight for survival as I struggled to breath air not water on my rapid return to the beach. Then just when things weren´t bad enough already I managed to find a rather unfriendly stingray under my foot (okay I guess it wasn´t his fault) who proceeded to leave quite a good hole in my leg and me in agony for 12 hours (yes it really does f*cking hurt, and no, pissing on it doesn´t work). Oh well, chicks dig scars and I am certainly a but luckier than that fool Irvin, although the boys did offer to go on a killing spree in the same way the Auzies have after losing their hero.

One of the best ways to see the local area is to hire one of the insane quad bikes they have around town, proper sporty numbers not like the work horse that they had on the Bay Islands, and an amazing way to explore the local coves and the hill over looking town if you can´t be bothered to climb.

Although being on the back of one when an crazy Icelandic is driving

is asking for trouble, but a great guy to have around when they run out of petrol.

MANAGUA
Leaving the pacific coast to jump over to the Caribbean means a stop in the capital Managua to get the connections out the next day, generally a thing to be avoided in central America (although I did manage to sit next to my first chicken in the last 4 months taking chicken buses!). The shere poverty in this city is evident as soon as you enter with people scraping the chicken scraps off your plate to take home to their family when you have finished eating, and giant plastic tent cities for the displaced people in most of the public parks; and as always the hostels are localed in the less salubrious areas of the city where we actually had our own private security guard to take us out to dinner/ drinks whenever we wanted to leave the hostel at night. Although popping out to the mall for a bit of retail therapy the distinction between the classes seems incredible, as it is stocked with Armani suits and giant plasma TV´s, something is going wrong here somehow...

Surf and shopping remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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The change going in to Nicaragua (the poorest country in Central America, and also in the world) was drastic, with children banging the windows of the the bus on the way out of the border station begging for anything they could get;

but despite that the decoration of the houses and the surrounding scenery make a pleasant change from the drab Honduran apathy and a necessary distraction from the dirt track we seem to be travelling down at 80kmh on our way to Leon.

Arriving in Leon, the first decent sized town for a few months, the old Spanish influence is really visible in the cobbled streets and beautiful colonial buildings.

This is the town where the revolution started many years ago, overthrownin the sandinista government, but despite the massive significance of the event the only recording of it is a small one room ´museum´ with a few faded newspaper cuttings. Walking round the town is a pleasant stroll away from the touristy towns of the last few months with the obligatory churches and even a beautiful cemetery

where the tombs themselves are works of 18th century classical art; and up to the hill for views over town past the ´recycling plant´ which still relies primarily on fire.
Just outside the city is the old capital of Nicaragua Leon Viejo, which according to design principles of the time was built alarmingly close to a rather volcano-looking hill and so to their surprise they had to abandon the city when their hill started smoking,

and the control of power then eventually went to Managua.

Due to the availability of volcanoes in the area, one enterprising Australian hostel owner decided to make a living out of sending tourist flying down on various contraptions, and thus a trip to Volcan Cerro Negro (the Black Volcano) is a must for any visit here. For those of you that spend far too much time on youtube, this is the same place where the world downhill mountain bike record was set just before the guys forks snap sending him face first into the mountainside.

Even just the walk up the hill is worth all the money, with the startling contrast between the black lava rock and and green trees emphasising the stunning scenery spreading out below you.

Arriving at the top of the hill, and according to Nicaraguan health and safety principles, you get to run down into the crater of an active volcano amidst all the beautifully coloured volcanic rock,

only to realise that at the bottom the reason the rocks are that colour is because of all the sulphur being released before the frantic scramble back up the scree slope before you suffocate!
Luckily the boards have been refined from the original designs of table tops, fridges and snowboards; but still it is little more than a plank of wood with a couple of blocks nailed on the top to give you the allusion of a seat.
Getting kitted up at the top in orange jump suits that made you look like a cross between the Beastie Boys and some escaped convicts

, you are given a safety talk which pretty much consists of ´try not to crash, it hurts´ whilst hypocritically offering rewards for the first blood of the day.

And even though you don´t get to stand up and ride like a snowboard any more (believe me you don´t want to) after a practice slide down the baby slope even the most confident looking people are a little dubious.

The run down is over in less than 30 seconds if you´re doing well, but due to the lack of control the boards have it is nigh on impossible to keep them going in a straight line and some pretty serious crashes occur

and I still have some lava embedded in my head as a souvenir. Everyone is hyped at the bottom and raring to go up again, but the boards are pretty much one use only due to the caustic nature of the rock, so we jump back in the ute for the trip back through the feral forest

where children run and scream at you like they have never seen a white person before.

The quality of local music and food has certainly increased massively so we treat ourselves to a 5 course dinner in the poshest restaurant in town for $10 (despite the scathing looks of the upper class locals with 6 scruffy travellers being amazed with real cloth napkins) before checking out some of the live salsa music the town has on offer every night of the week.

Nica remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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The main port of call for anyone that goes to Belize has to be the Bay Islands, a couple of hours off the mountainous coast line just out of La Ceiba.

Utila, billed as the ´cheapest place to dive in the world´ is the preferred destination for most travellers, which unfortunately also means for a kind of Thailand-esq scrum of diveshops trying to ply their trade to the fresh meat arriving off the ferry each morning. But once through the wall of flyers the charms of the little island are quite evident, and living on the water at Altons diveshop became my life for the next week.

The dive sites on the island are amazingly convenient to the main harbour with massive corral formations, wrecks (the Haliburton was a deliberately scuttled 100m long supply ship just off the lighthouse reef, however the powers that be failed to obtain a protection order on the vessel and thus according to maritime law as soon as it goes down it is fair game. So within 15 mins of it being sunk perfectly by the local dive shops, 2 massive salvage tugs were steaming towards here both intent of refloating her and flogging her off for scrap! luckily this was averted giving us some amazing diving round and through it) and sea-mounts within 10 mins of the dock, so managed to get quite a lot of diving in, but again without a decent underwater camera these things can´t really be shown to a wider audience, you´re just going to have to come out here to see for yourself...
One thing a camera can never quite capture is the whole surealness of diving at night, dropping in just as the sun is going down things take on a whole new life, seen by the light of the torch in the real colours they are without the filtering effect of the sea water above you. It really is an amazingly peaceful way to dive and the lobsters, octopuses and weird glowing squids that only come out at night, along with the millions of stars you get to see when you surface in the middle of black sea make you want to give up daytime diving all together.

The whole PADI way of trying to role people through the courses as quickly as possible was again evident out here, with Divemasters qualified at 18 yrs old with less dives than I have as a ´non-staff´diver. And more frighteningly supposed ´advanced´ divers perfoming emergency accents from 20m just because they couldn´t clear their mask out resulting in a slightly worrying trip to the hyperbolic chamber.

Altons was the king of the party schools with regular bbqs on the dock and ´booze cruises´ round the bay throughout the week with compulsory rum. These boat trips turn out to be a great place to perform the final examination of the Divemaster qualification, the infamous snorkle test as Randy proudly demonstrates below





and along with the initiation into the rugby team at uni is one of those things that you really only want to do once in life...

Of all the bars on the island honorable mention has to go to the Jade sea horse aka Treetanic . THE greatest place I have ever been to in my life. Basically one guys lifes work, creating a giant nevernever land style tree house, with exquisitely decorated little niches, even after going there for 3 nights in a row we were still finding new rope swings and grottos to explore and relax in.

Photos really don´t do this place justice in the slightest

Unfortunately with all the diving, swimming and jumping off docks I managed to get quite a nice ear infection; stopping my diving career before it even started. So what do you do on a tropical island when you can´t even go in the water? turn to rum of course...
That lasted 3 days until I realised trying to sit out the infection for another week would pretty much be the end of my liver, and that wasn´t insured for as much as I would of liked it to be, so the next morning I was up at 5am for the first boat out of town.

Rum and Rum remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Needing to get some hammock time in, it was straight to Belize City (with the strange entry into the 'city' via the municipal graveyard), then on the fast boat out to Caye Caulker. A beautiful white sand and palm-treed island where everything is painted in Dulux Caribbean colour range,

with big old Rasta mummas cooking up jerk chicken at the sides of the paths (there are no roads or even any cars on Caulker), and the inventive naming goes as far as Front Street, Middle Street, Back Street and Very Back Street. ha ha, you got to love the Belizian vibe.
Got all settled in to the wonderful Tina´s backpackers, which has got to be one of the best hostels I´ve ever stayed at with hammocks strewn around the palmed gardens looking out onto the bright blue sea,

the Caulker motto of ´Go Slow´ really applied to this place and the hammocks lived up to all expectations.

The island itself was split in two a few years ago when a hurricane blew on past,

which is also where the beach ended up; making swimming interesting as you dodge the crocodiles/ hammerhead sharks/ power boats and attempt to make it over to the other side of the island.

As with all Caribbean islands, the sunsets and sun rises are typically stunning, probably going to have millions of these pictures in the same way as the fire ones from camping,

but you really can´t get enough of it out here.

So its not all lazing around in hammocks, drinking copious quantities of rum. One of the best activities you can possibly do on this island is hire one of the beach cruise bikes (which really do only have a max speed of just above walking pace) and ride around trying to find all the strange signs that are littered around the island.

Oh and also trying to race a plane on the runway, although they don´t tend to take too kindly to that.

Being the hunter-gatherers that we are, the temptation of sitting around on a dock drinking beer trying to catch dinner proved too much, and for the first time in my life I actually caught a fish!

although when it got round to killing the poor little thing I failed miserably but gave the locals some amusement as I tried to smack its head really gently against the dock. It was just about edible, so cooked it up with some of the Brixton recipe jerk sauce and fed the five thousand.

The reef is so close to the island here and shallow, you don´t have to worry about expensive dive trips, and with captain Miguel taking the Tina´s crew out on sailing/ snorkeling tour on the good ship Ragamuffin, it was always going to get a little messy. We went to the three main snorkel sites just inside the reef and within seconds of jumping in the crystal clear turquoise water

we were surrounded by sharks, rays and supersonic jacks swimming right at your mask going wild for the chump that Miguel threw in right in front of you!

Setting the boat on ´auto pilot´ after the last of the sites, a few bottles of rum emerged

and the 2 hours cruise back to the island turned into quite a hedonistic 18-30s stylee booze cruise.

Can´t quite remember much after that, but I did manage to see the sunrise from where I must of passed out on the dock!

My first dive back in a few years was quite sensibly straight down to 42m at one of the greatest dive sites in the world, the great blue hole.

This is a 200m wide sink hole in the middle of lighthouse reef, 2 hours off the island, which is definitely quite fun to get out to in a small dive boat when the seas are running 10ft swells. But once you´re on the way down into the hole you enter a whole other world.
It really was one of the greatest dives I´ve ever done, you drop straight down one side of the hole to swim through a giant stalagmite cave, then slowly ascend up the wall with the perfect dive photo above of 6m nurse sharks silhouetted circling above you. Coming up to their level is a terrifying prospect as even though they are ´vegetarian´ they really do look like proper sharks should when swimming right towards you. Unfortunately without an underwater camera its still only in my head, but these guys have got some
http://www.nationalgeographic.com/photography/galleries/belize/photo2.html
The other dive sites were just off deserted Half moon caye

, where we lunched with the red footed boobies (ha ha, must resist) and where for their own sake we should of really left the cruise-ship divers in case they even think about diving again without learning how to actually dive properly without running out of air at 20m!

After being stuck on the island for going on for 2 weeks (its very very easy to do) we decided the only way to get off was to have a blowout party for everyone, so 20lbs of bbq´ed shrimp and 30 gallons of rum later we all ended up in Oceanside shaking communal booty with the locals.
Thanks to Amy, her sister and husband for dropping on by, laughing at our pathetic attempts at cooking and taking over the whole thing; creating the greatest feast I have had since I have been out here.

you better belize it remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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brother from another mother remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Tempted to try out the small bit of beach and the few waves that Guatemala has, we arrived in Sipicate (El Paridon surf camp) via a cute little cruise across the mangrove swamp, in one of the hottest places I have ever been to!

Black sand beaches stretched for miles in each direction, but were inaccessible from 7am-7pm unless you wanted 3rd degree burns on your feet. And when the slight breeze during the day died off at night time it turned the whole place into one giant sauna.
The surf rolling in in the morning and evening sets was pretty monstrous beach break

which if you managed to make it out through the nasty rips provided some pretty exhilarating surfing, but usually a lot more painful wipe outs when the thing closed out on you, much to the amusement of the locals. And I certainly kept them very amused...
The sun sets, (and a good helping of local run) bringing on some sort of Martian glow to the place, made it all worthwhile though

It really is too hot to stay down there for too long so after one too many beatings, it was quite a relief to get back to the more climatic highlands of Antigua; which after 3 weeks chilling in more isolated places was quite a shock to find what was billed as a 'beautiful quite little colonial town' was little more than one giant Covent Garden market. Every other shop was either a travel agent, a super expensive restaurant, or one of the thousands of tourists tat shops selling exactly the same things at whatever price they could con out of you.

ok, it did look actually look quite nice, have some good mountains surrounding it some good churches

and some even better graffiti

and of course like the proverbial magpie to the shiny thing I was eventually lured into getting one of their amazingly colourful blankets for Daver (cos I know he likes rainbows)

and a guitar for me (case, pick etc included) for a whacking GBP20!! woop! gives me another excuse not to study my Spanish and just wait, by the end of the year I might actually be able to play something other than yellow submarine...

The main reason to go to Antigua is to check out the local volcanoes; as, with Guatemalan health and safety standards being what they are, you can actually climb up an active volcano and toast marshmallows on the river of lava flowing down right next to you. (remember to wear trousers as it really is surprisingly hot up there!)

Seems like my sunrise luck also applies to volcanoes too, and all there was that day were winging American tourists complaining that they actually had to climb a volcano and go near lava on a volcano climb to see lava, and one red glowing rock. The scenery was the nicest thing up there with some weird kind of Dartmoor landscape interspersed with rivers of cooled black lava.

A lot better tour was with Outdoor outfitters up the local volcano Agua on bikes.

luckily seeing as I gave up going uphill on bikes a long time ago, we got shuttled up and were guided down the insane single track by some crazy local on a 1950's Garry Fisher!

It was great to get back on a bike again flying downhill, until at one particularly gnarly section I forgot that American brakes are set up opposite to English and grabbed a handful of front by mistake, ending up 15ft down the trail with half the hill embedded in my leg.

luckily at the end of the trail you can get tours round a Macadamia plantation, get to see Herby

and even a facial if you ask nice which made everything better.

It was time to leave tourist town for some proper jungle action in Rio Dulce, staying in the rather pleasant Casa Pelicio jungle lodge for the night just off the main lake

we got a little closer to nature than intended having to remove scorpions and tarantulas from the beds before we could shelter beneath the mosquito nets afraid for our lives.
The main lake itself is pretty much an inland sea, and a proper yachty haven for those seeking shelter with boats ranging from nice cruisers to super gin-palaces waiting for their super-rich owners to fly in for the week.

People don't seem too keen to take on crew here (probably cos every single backpacker is looking for the same ride out of town) so had to take a taxi boat down river. The journey itself down the river is worth all the money, travelling through jungled valleys

checking out the local fishing communities

before arriving in the colourful Garifuna beach town of Livingston for the first Caribbean vibe of the trip.

Rustys Iguana is the hostel to find here, certainly will be when he gets the swimming pool sorted out and that alcoholic barman out of there so people can go to bed before 4am...
The beaches in town still aren't that much to write home about, though a short boat ride up the coast to the 7 alters waterfalls (where Tarzan was filmed)
(see the resemblance?) and playa blanca for some serious chillin, gives a nice alternative to drinking.

Last stop in Guatemala (via a 6 hour chicken bus ride standing up) was up to Flores in the north, to see one of the biggest Mayan ruins in central America - Tikal. Thinking that my sunrise luck must surely of run itself out by now I booked onto the 3am trip into the park; which, despite the guide book saying was impossible cos the guards would shoot you on site, turned out to be a group of 30 people walking straight past them. Of course nothing but the good old greyness was there to welcome us as we waited for a glimpse of the day

but it cleared off later so we were able to get a proper view of the scale of what these guys made thousands of years ago!

The reason they left is still unknown to this day, why put all this effort in to what was a massively advanced civilisation, only to leave to build another one and never return? Incest and mercury paint poisoning is rumourd, but maybe the Mayan game of Ball where you got sacrificed if you won and sacrificed if you lost kind of put most people off?

After one slightly dangerous night using nods, smiles and broken spanish chatting to the locals I nearly got myself a new special friend, so it was time to cruise into the relative safety of Belize where at least an ignorant nod to the wrong question wouldn't be quite so painfull...

there is more to Guatemala than the lake remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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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...

The mystic lake remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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I am currently enroled for 3 weeks at http://www.sanpedrospanishschool.org with a brilliant maestro called Julio, and living with a family up the hill in town for complete imersion style learning. His style of teaching of chatting all day then remembering that we should maybe write a verb or two on the board suits me down to the ground, as you learn so much by speaking constantly without the parrot style memorisation normally associated with learning.

Normal day is up at 7 for breakfast with the family, then in school from 8-12, quick lunch with the family then back to school to teach (well, ish, was meant to be teaching them long division today but do you know how to do that?! my answer was ´adults use calculators´) in a volunteer project for proper poor kids from 2-5, despùes another hour of class followed by either a lecture on Guatemalan culture or salsa classes, dinner with the family at 7 leaves my brain like jelly but I´ve learnt more in a day than I would in months of classes in london! Its not all dossing around on beaches out here you know...

A little tangent back to the world of work seems apropriate now to explain where I´m at with my study: a wise women once explained a kind of learning curve graph to me, but for the life of me I can´t remember what the axis´s were, think it was something like ability/ knowledge or vice versa. But in essence the red area where I am now can be sumorised to ´a little knowledge is a dangerous thing´.

Today it really applied as after a week or so of study I have got a vague grasp of the language and lost my initial inhibitions of keeping to simple things like ´hello´, and got some rather strange looks when I supposidly asked if I could sleep with my neighbors cat.

p.s. if you´re reading this then please remind me what it was all about, I was listening honest ;-)

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At last I managed to leave the Mohitos behind and actually get on a plane, for a short hop across the carribean to a landing skimming the roofs of Guatemala City, and it only got more sketchy from there on in...

Guatemala City is hyped in the guide books as being a a bit of a nasty place, but the book of lies always said that so I wasn´t too fazed with all the shotgun toting guards out side EVERY shop (ok it was a little wierd to see a shoe shop protected by a 12 bore) however getting my first chicken bus of the trip out of their was quite an experience.
There were only 10 of us on the bus from the main bus station, all locals and myself so was a little confused when I was told (in pictionary style gestures cos my spanish couldn´t quite cope) when they motioned to lay down. I didn´t really need to sleep and wanted to see the city on the way out so stayed sitting up, only when the driver floored it out of the bus station and screamed something at me which even with the lack of vocabulary I could pretty much guess at ´get your f*cking head down´ I actually complied. Only being able to see the roofs of buildings from where I was lying I can only guess at why we needed to boost it out of the city in such a manor, but after 20 mins of jumping trafic lights we stop to pick the rest of the passengers sensibly waiting outside the danger zone on the outskirts of the city.

When I could eventually raise my head I was in for quite a shock change from the stunted growth of Cuba, this place was just a more crazy baby brother of America. McDs on every corner, giant Explorers and Escalades, and even a Hooters! (am going to have to go back to check that out for research purposes).
Leaving the city 4 hours of climbing into the highlands with the temperature dropping rapidly, I wished that the rest of my clothes weren´t on the roof, but the body heat from the 5 other people crammed onto the same seat kept the hypothermia at bay. Eventually dropping down out of the mist I had my first glimse of Lago Atitilan

Rather enthusiatically after a 15 hour travel day already I signed up for school then checked in to the friendlyest looking hostel going as after the drout of travellers in cuba it was nice to chat to someone in english for a bit. Luckily the next day the school was running an excursion up to the ´indians nose´ (i´ve found in my travels most will make any mountain look like a face/ nose/ camel just to get stupid tourists to climb it) but the views from the top were certainly worthwhile

dropping down off the hill into the local market town for some locals snacks was a dangerous experience, but not the sort mentioned in the guide books. Guatemalan people are generally of quite short stature and thats coming from me... and they tend to make the roofs of their stalls only just big enough for them, so most of us returned from the market sporting a nice array of roof shaped injuries...

the dress of the local people is massively colourful as they are desended from the original Mayan culture, with the patterns and styles indicating which tribe they belong to in the same was as tartan.

with even the children getting into the act from an early age

there were so many more photo opportunities around, but without asking and most times paying first, these people don´t really appreciate the intrusion.

Bienvemos a Guatemala! remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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As with all comunist/ socialist systems knowledge=power=freedom and so to control the population you just have to simply prevent them from finding anything out about the outside world or have the outside world find out about them. Internet access is banned (although some houses are allowed email), education is free-but all books are written by the state so much biased; but most of all they don´t want the 2 systems (that is the tourists and locals) to interact.

Talk to the people and you will find for the few that idolise Fidel the majority detest him and their way of life that has been forced upon them. They are so repressed they leave in the hundreds every night (in organised boats) from all over the country and keep trying until they either get to the US or they die. If they get caught the penalties are severe and the risks great, but for many this is the only option despite the possible consequences.
They party does not want this know and go to great lengths to enforce it ´for the security of tourists´. The segregation is so great that Cubans are pretty much banned from talking to tourists, so much so that one night out drinking on the Malecon with some local amigos over the space of 6 hours or so, all were arrested for varying excuses then released hours later without and reason, some even twice; our protestations they they were our friends only made the situation and our guilt even worse.

So what is the future? Who knows. But possibly the new mans Che/ Fidel starting a new revolution is inevitable.

adios amigos remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Strangely the least friendlyest of all the casa´s so far, but that´s not an insult as the standard is so high, but the first place with local ´slaves´running the casa whilst the rich plantation owner sat in his own section of the house.

The beach being one of the nicest encountered so far, not being overshaddowed by monsterous hotels and the only place in the country where casa´s are allowed alongside. Only finding a perfect reef 100m offshore with sights comparable to many 20m+ dive sites, the setting was perfect for chilling for the few days.

Santa clara, the most cosmopolitan town found so far, is the honourary home of Che as much of the local graffiti shows

as it was the stage for the first major victory of the revolution. Now, since his remains were discovered after his murder in Bolivia, there is a plaza commemorating his and the others fight

After the fiasco with the flight the few spare days and my birthday was spent in Havana´s neglected cousin Matanza, which lies at the base of the Verado peninsular and provides a more authentic experience than the 5* all inclusive resorts up the coast. Unfortunately as I found there was little of interest apart from the train journey there through some dramatic scenery.

Even the beaches were out of action at the time as strong winds had blown hundreds of blue-bottle jellyfish onto the beach, and after Davers unfortunate stingger-bollock incident in Auz I wasn´t going to chance it. Highlight of the day though was the taxi driver trying to take a shortcut through a tunnel to save petrol (barely wide enough ride a motorbike) and getting us so wedged that we had to climb out of the back window and unscrew the bumper before we could reverse out again.

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The cobbled streets of Trinidad are more of a tourist destination than Vinales, although amazingly confusing to navigate having been designed to flumux pirate raids when the town was first born, with the size of the colonial properties around reflecting Trinidads old position as the centre of the sugar industry. With the wealth contained in the houses completely disproportional to peoples wages it is quite a supprise to see antiques that would make David Dickinson wet his pants.
We found a beautiful 3 story casa with 2 massive roof terraces

overlooked by and ancient mango tree, where we would eat all our meals for the next few days, and so much marble in it that even the banister up the stairs was handcrafted out of a single piece.

Everyone here is an artist of sorts, be it a painter in one fo the many galleries, a musican in one of the many bands around town, or a barmaid who came up with this beauty ### which promptly wipped me out for an hour as it was about 50% alcohol!. Although after discovering that a bottle of rum was only 80p we soon made some good combinations of our own...

Needing another break from the relentless heat the next day was a pleasent cruise on a cat

to Cayo Blanco, 15kms off the coast. A beautiful white sand island populated by hundreds of hermit crabs

and iguanas, with some great snorkling on the reef just off shore.

Hooking up with a few others that evening we felt the safety in numbers needed to find the cave club. You know those spelunking trips you did at school, well the Cubans have found a decent alternative where you don´t have to crawl around in bat shit - a full on 200person club in a cave with lazers and everything. 100m undergound it is like something out of the lost boys where you´re expecting Kiether Sutherland bitiing your neck at any moment. Shame about the music which was a bizzare take on Cuban R&B, it would be an awesome place to hold a full on party.
A relaxing strole through the local mountains the next day

and a swim in the waterfall

cleansed out any remenants of a hangover the night before, then a bike tour (on particularly shoddy bikes) to Playa Ancon for a last bit of snorkling in the Trinidad region.

Trinidad (not the one in Tobago) remains copyright of the author AndyPandy, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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