Well, how do you write a blog
post about the best part of 2 and a half months of travelling?
I’m not too sure either, but I’ll
give it a go.
Basically, I wrote a short blog
about El Salvador way back in November I think, but then I got way too lazy and
didn’t write any more about all the other countries we visited. Also, it’s a
lot harder to write the blog on an iPad than on a laptop, so that’s my real
excuse!
So, in order to keep this short
and not cause too much boredom amongst you all, I’m going to talk about my top
5 of travelling. Enjoy!
5. Antigua,
Guatemala was one of my favourite cities of all the places we’ve been. This old
little city is famous for its cobbled streets and markets. The markets are
incredible, with so many hand-made clothes, ornaments and anything else under
the sun that can be hand-made! There was also a second-hand market full of
absolute bargains so we spent a fair bit of time there. Around the city there
are a couple of active volcanoes, and we saw smoke coming out of them which was
rather cool. We also walked up to a viewpoint which had an amazing view over
the city, with the volcano in the background. Our hostel was owned by a couple
of Irish guys, so a few from our group were chuffed with that!
4. In
Belize, it was only Robbie, Ellie and I because everyone else had gone off back
to their projects or to meet people. We were in Caye Caulker, a stunning little
island a boat ride away from Belize City. One of the days we decided to go on a
snorkelling tour. Now when we were told before we started we may see sharks and
stingrays we were very excited but what we were about to see was way beyond
what we expected. After swimming around on the reef for a while, we got on the
boat and went to a different site. As we pulled up, the driver pulled out some
fish and a good 30 sharks and many more stingrays surrounded the boat. Then he
told us to get in and swim with them! This was pretty incredible, swimming with
these sharks and rays, and having them swim in to us and touch us was pretty
strange but amazing fun!
3. Volcan
Concepcion. 1610m high above sea level. And we started from sea level. At 6am
the hike started. We set off up a gentle slope and after an hour or so we faced
a wall which we found out went on for a good 4 hours more. We were scrambling
up rocks, rivers of boulders that had been blasted out of the volcano, all the
while we were in the clouds because, in typical fashion, we’d chosen a day
where the clouds were covering the vast majority of the volcano. But anyway we
went on. The guide was extremely concerned about our pace, or supposed lack of
it. We were told unless we hurried up we wouldn’t make it down before dark fall,
at 6pm. So we weren’t allowed any breaks whatsoever. We got to within about 5
minutes of the top and were told to leave our bags there. We scrambled up a
muddle, gravelly path to reach the crater, where we weren’t allowed to stand up
because we might get blown in due to the wind, but we couldn’t really sit down
either because the ground was so hot (it was an active volcano!). We also couldn’t
stay at the top for long because of poisonous gases that came out of the
crater! We descended down the volcano, and despite all of us falling over a few
times, we got to the bottom at about 3pm, 3 hours before darkness. The guide’s
worrying was completely unnecessary but funny nonetheless. Despite all the
moaning I seem to have done about Concepcion, it genuinely was such a good day
and an amazing achievement to reach the top, and to get down to the bottom in
one piece!
2. The
best thing we did in Guatemala, and what I think is the best day we had
overall, was visiting Semuc Champey. Semuc Champey is a natural bridge of
water, with pools that are the most beautiful turquoise blue possible. Before we
actually got the Semuc Champey itself, we went caving by candlelight; swimming
in the pitch black, jumping into pools and climbing up underground waterfalls.
After that we went out and went on a rope swing that threw us into the river.
After a quick break for lunch we went up to Semuc Champey. After a hike up the
hill, the view we got was incredible! We then went down to the pools, swam,
dived, jumped and loads of stuff. We even went into a tiny little cave that my
head didn’t really fit in to!
1. My
favourite experience of the whole trip has got to be the SCUBA diving we did on
Utila over Christmas. It truly is unbelievable to be able to go down to 18 metres
and breath more or less normally, swim around, communicate with everyone and
see a huge array of incredible fish and wildlife. The course ran over 3 days,
with a break for Christmas day. We started with very shallow dives just off the
dock of our dive centre. We practised things like taking our masks off, running
out of air and having to make emergency ascents. On Boxing Day, we did our
first proper dive, down to 12 metres. We did 4 open water dives during the
course in total, and then we 2 free fun dives with our course. I saw many
amazing creatures: a moray eel, angel fish, spotted eagle rays and parrot fish
to name a few. Completing the course was amazing, and it now means that, in
theory at least, I can dive with one other qualified diver without an
instructor, down to 18 metres. However I do not think that would be advisable
because, as of yet, I do not trust myself that much under the water!
So that’s my top 5 of Central
America. Of course there were many more amazing things that we did while
travelling, I just don’t want to bore anyone too much by rabbling on about
myself too much!
I can pretty much certainly say
that the past 10 weeks were the best 10 of my life so far, and if anything ever
wants to beat it, it’ll have to be really incredible!
I’m back in Punta Gorda now,
ready to start the new school year on Monday. It’s nice to be back and see
everyone again: all the little kids, Mary Lou and her amazing meals, and the
teachers who’ve been in to school over the past couple of days to sort things
out.
The people who I’ve travelled with
over the past 10 weeks have become so close to me, and it’s weird spending even
2 days here on Roatan without them. Saying goodbye was strange because we’ve
spent 2 and a half months together, 24 hours a day 7 days a week. It seems strange to be back, but we’ll be meeting up again soon, probably at Easter, for
another Visa run.
That’s more or less it from me
for now, so I hope you’re all well wherever in the world you may be!
Hasta Luego, y un abrazo a todos,
Sam xx
