05/01/2011

Edwin and I took off from Monterrico today but our bus didn’t leave till 4pm… we just chilled with the others for the morning and early afternoon, cooling off in the pool every so often when the midday sun got too much.

The shuttle we took back to Antigua was much more comfortable and twice as fast than taking a series of chicken buses.

Arriving back in Antigua in the evening the first thing Edwin and I did was get some beers in. I met some people wanting to go out later and we sat back watching some basketball and headed out looking for a decent bar to drink, being a Wednesday it took us a while and also some beers on the street to find a decent place but I did run into some other sweds I met in Puerto Escondido in Mexico.

It was a good night out ending up in a Salsa dancing club where some “flash packers” from England and NZ kept on bringing me shots of tequila.

Coming back to the hostel with one of the girls who we went out with (Hainin from Taiwan) she wanted to also get a tattoo, I worked with some photoshop in my drunken state and designed a nice tattoo and after a tiny bit of fooling around I went to bed.

Hainin with my dreads 

04/01/2011

Edwin woke me up this morning because he and some others wanted to head to another beach 15 km down a dirt road. I grabbed some chicken from the corner store and we set off.

The black sand beach was secluded and the waves massive, it was a nice place to chill and get very sun burnt from the lack of tall trees to cast their shadows – lets say my back was about the same colour as strawberries and although it didn’t hurt I will be shedding my skin soon enough.

The group of us got too much sun so we gunned it in the van and headed back to the hotel where I slept in the hammock and said goodbye to the two groups of sweds.

Later in the evening I met a coked up Guatemalan guy who invited a few of us to his hotel down the road.

He was kind enough to buy us all beers but the bar wasn’t much fun so after the drinks I headed to bed.

03/01/2011

Happy birthday Me!

Turned 25 today…and started things off not feeling so great… but this was self inflicted, so only myself to blame.

I chilled for most of the morning at the bar with the Swedish girls and grabbed breakfast at a local place down the street.

When the black sand cooled I started a game of Volleyball. The locals were good but also quite drunk, they were the ones keeping score (badly, so we apparently lost).

After a short nap I put on a nice clean shirt and went out to dinner with the Swedish girls, Edwin, a Swiss guy and two Danish people. It wasn’t a fancy restaurant but the food was pretty decent coming in at $10 including a few beers.

Later pretty much everyone was in a food coma or feeling tired and went to bed… I still wanted to do something and later met some other Swedish girls and bought a bottle of rum and again got very drunk.

It was a good evening but doesn’t match my birthday in Thailand last year.

02/01/2011

Edwin and I wanted to head down to the beach to a town called Monterrico, there were shuttle services from Antigua to get there but they were quite expensive, we decided to take a series of chicken buses to save a little bit of money and to experience more foul smells from local Guatemalans sitting next to us.

In the long run it only saved us $4 taking public transport but the duration of doing this was 5 hours as opposed to 2 on the shuttle.

We did however get a go on a cruise on a small boat through a mangrove swamp where many people go bird watching, so this was a nice touch to the trip.

Arriving in the very small town of Monterrico we went in search of the only hotel in town with dorm rooms called Johnnys.

Johnnys is a nice place right on the black sand beach with several swimming pools, beach volleyball, bar and a restaurant, it was packed with people when we arrived but most of them were leaving and going back to work as the new years holidays were over.

Shortly after arriving at dusk we were told the leatherback turtle babies were getting released into the ocean at sunset, we went to go check it out; you can see by the photos below.

In the dorm there were a few people; two Swedish girls (Torra and Emmylou) and a weird young English guy (Raza). Edwin, Raza and I wanted to grab some food in town where I found some cheap burnt pizza and some fried chicken, we then grabbed some Rum and coke and went back to the hotel to get drunk to celebrate my birthday at the stroke of midnight.

The rum hit me hard and I was doing well by midnight, this is where Edwin handed me a packaged chocolate finger with a candle shoved in it and a gift; it was a fantastic gesture, one that I didn’t expect and the gift was a t-shirt. Thanks man.

This evening was a new moon and we all wanted to go swimming in the ocean, perhaps not the smartest or safest thing to do because the waves were big and they crashed hard but in the water we did get to see Phosphorescence. There were a lot of these little green sparkles of algae and as the waves crashed under the star light the waves were eluminated as much as the night sky… amazing.

After a few more drinks we all hit the hay.

On the Boat and Bird watching

The Sunset, a dog on the beach enjoying himself a little too much and the bucket of turtles they let go into the ocean

Turtles, turtles and more turtles

Releasing the turtles into the ocean

01/01/2011

Another one of those days where I did absolutely nothing, I was nursing a hangover all day and really didn’t want to leave the hostel. Went to bed very early in the evening where I crashed hard.

31/12/2010

I Prepared myself for an epic night in Antigua for NY eve by napping in the afternoon.

Not much to be said for the majority of the day but started in the evening drinking beers and cuba libras. The fireworks in the evening were loud and bright in the main square where we drank for most of the night.

Met some well off Guatemalan girls who bought me hotdog snacks when the night was over.

Arrived back home at 4am. I know im going to have a hangover tomorrow.

 

Beginning of the New Year celebrations

Fireworks, more celebrations and Santa?

More fireworks and the two Guatemalan girls who fed me food.

30/12/2010

Started things off relatively early, repacked our bags and took the 3 buses to Antigua, We filled up on breakfast whilst on the bus when people were selling sandwiches and snacks for the ride… all very cheap.

Last night I rested very well due to the two day hike but felt dazed for most of the morning.

Arriving in Antigua we met a Swedish couple who directed us to a hostel they knew called Umma Gumma that also had availability, it was around $10 a night over the New Year but after it dropped to a much nicer $5 a night after.

After a few drinks at the bar upstairs Edwin and I wondered the market and got some very tasty BBQ chicken with sides for dinner.

For the rest of the evening we continued to drink and at some point I got too drunk to go out and party, so I just crashed out. This wasn’t a bad thing because tomorrow is the New Years party and I wanted to start thing level headed tomorrow.