A visitor and the end of a 90-day visa

Our little adventure down here took a different kind of twist and we had a visit from our friend Erin.  She lives in Albuquerque, which according to my nephew Jackson is pronounced "Albert Cookie".  We spent a couple of days in Antigua shopping and looking at ruins and shopping and eating and then shopping some more.  It was fun for David and I, not just to share a fun place with a friend, but also to have an excuse to live a little and spend a little more money than usual.  We went to the fanciest restaurant in town, the kind with a chef instead of a cook, and had the most amazing meal.  Mine was so fancy I couldn´t even pronounce it.  For a 5-star meal, set inside the most gorgeous ruin of an old monastary, for three people we paid less than $100.  We´d practically pay that for TGI Fridays back at home.  In fact we enjoyed it so much we did it again at a different fancy restaurant a few days later.  I am so spoiled.

We did a day trip up to Tikal to show her some toucans, lizards, crocodiles, howler monkeys and an agouti.  Also there are some ruins there, which she also thought were pretty cool.  Then we did a few days around Lake Atitlàn.  We found a much nicer hotel in San Marcos than we stayed before, the Aaculaax, that along with a great lake view also included spiders, lizards and scorpions for our enjoyment.  In Pana we fed bananas to some spider monkeys.  It turns out they ignore you if you are skimpy and throw them a bit of banana, but if you throw the whole thing in the peel they love it!  Actually saw a squirrel in San Marcos grab a banana out of a tree and kindly stopped in full view of the balcony to let us watch it eat it.  There was also a cross-eyed dog that loved to play.  Hmmm, was Erin´s trip all about animals, or it is just me?

We were also excited that she got to experience an earthquake, which was just a little rumble but lasted a good 15 seconds.  Later that day we saw a volcano erupt in the distance, with a huge plume of smoke rising up into the sky.  We didn't really notice the ash fall, but the hotel staff were complaining about all the extra dusting they were having to do that day.  I'm not sure she enjoyed the large spider she found in her room, but it is always good to go home from the tropics with a good bug story.  We even did some hard bargaining at the local market, and she found one of the items she bought at the airport for almost 200% more than she paid, so I guess we did pretty well.

We didn't get the chance to ride a chicken bus, but we told her all the stories of crazy driving and bad road conditions.  So as we were leaving San Pedro in a shuttle bus, we come to a section of road where there has been a landslide and a huge boulder is blocking the road.  Several guys were already there, and our driver and a few others got out to help, and they muscled it off the road over the other edge.  Nothing like a little necessity to get some road work done!

Now our little vacation within a vacation is over, and it is time to get back to some travelling.  Actually, to my astonishment our 90 day visa expires on Tuesday.  Where does the time go?  So after much consideration, we are heading to Belize tomorrow, taking a night bus back up to Flores (our third visit!) and then will jump on a local bus to and across the border.  We haven't exactly decided what to do in Belize, as we are expecting some pretty hefty sticker shock.  But I'm sure we will enjoy it.