Home » Thick Grass and Dripping Rainbows

My Central American adventure all started in the pleasant and colourful Antigua, ex-capital of the country from which the coffee tastes best - Guatemala. A rushed (and thankfully so) taxi ride through Guatemala City and I'm dropped off at a quaint little hotel down one of the many, identical orange cobbled streets, and there I was at last.

 

Although they are said to be no match for the flawless Costa Ricans, the Guatemalan people I encountered and observed were nothing short of breathtaking in their own way. The rich mocha tone of their skin and the obsidian that shone in their hair - I felt envious every single day. But I should have expected nothing less than beautiful people in such a beautiful place. Antigua itself, dotted with these sensational soft violet blossoms, was graced by an elegant touch of architecture and a certain aged character - it felt like I had been there and seen it before.

 

From one densley-populated city to the banks of the algid waters of Lake Atitlan, and a friendly beach town called Panajachel. Passing the hustle and bustle of the biggest market in Guatemala - Chichecastinango - where the handicrafts and textiles looked like they dripped rainbows, they were so full of colour, I was pleased to come to a more relaxed, low-profile spot. The village tour around this lake distinguished a striking difference between cultures just miles away from one another and opened my eyes to a whole other brand of religion and deities that I had only ever before seen in my imagination or in the pages of my school books. Being introduced and physically emerged into such a profound and sincere holy environment, where, by example, people still competed to have a saint's statue reside at their home for a year-round blessing, and thereafter donated expensive silk scarves, rum and cigarettes, was awesome.

 

Next, I headed to Rio Dulce, a less well-preserved or pristine hotspot, renound for its drug crime as well as its swamps. Far away, at least, on the other side of the river, from the trouble, though, I resided for a few days in an Eco Lodge in the densest part of the jungle. It was like coming from tarmac on roads and hand rails alongside stairs to half-broken wooden bridges, swaying on rusty chains, over dark water which was probably misleadingly thick. A party for the insects who thrived on the humidity, when all these untouched tourists came to stay. Nevertheless, there was that brilliant taste of adventure and a real recognition of your new traveller status when confronted with the holey mosquito net hovering above your hay bed. It was an especially authentic jungle experience when a spider the size of my outstretched hand decided to pay a visit, probably keeping company to the large mice that made homes for themselves amidst our bedsheets.

 

Down the river was an old Spanish fortress, deserted now for many centuries but still as full of life as ever. It started off our day down to the mouth of the Caribbean sea and left us with a taste of History in the palate - perfect for savouring the famous seafood and banana soup at the seaside town of Livingston. The boat ride itself was worth every Quetzal, for as you looked around you in every direction you could with ease envision a camera crew and a few natives armed with a bow and arrow and believe you were in an Indiana Jones film. The rainforest stretched up so high that in the evening the sun fell shy behind its mammoth growth, and the pelicans, in all their haste, flew home.

 

But Guatemala would be incompletely done without a trip to the ruins that gave it its place on the World map; Tikal. We stayed nearby on the island of Flores, a pastel-coloured network of streets and restaurants on a lake, with, at its centre, an island bar encased in reeds. The buildings looked like they were covered in a chalky dust, as if they had been recently built, and the roads similarly left your shoes with a white kick. Tikal was worth the journey - hands down the most breathtaking place I have ever visited in all of my eighteen years. It is one of the only ruins to be trapped and hidden away by the selfish jungle, so it is as if you are for the first time discovering each and every palace, ball court and temple and casting light onto it for the rest of the world. Standing at the top of the tallest temple, and seeing the peaks of all the others, sprouting proudly from the green bed in which they for so long slept, felt like I was living History. There, exactly where I was standing, looking out for some stellar constellation, a Mayan person had stood. And the vastness of Tikal is something you cannot prepare yourself for - and to think it is but an existing part of an even greater Mayan empire that crumbled years before.

 

Guatemala was undoubtedly a country rich with skill, superstition and sun. Never before have I seen more vibrant colours or thicker grass than there. The people were so in touch with their land, a concept so outwardly backward and yet that clearly bore a very fulfilling and fruitful relationship between country and people, so much so that millions of tourists go to catch a breath of that air.