I enrolled at Bio Itza on the basis of zero research but at the end of my first week in San Jose I am totally won over, not only by the quality of the teaching, but by the evident benefits of the project to the community and decide to stay on for a second week.
For [...]
I had been expecting to return to Carmelita the same way that I arrived but I learn that there is an alternative route which will not only take me past two more archaeological sites but is also in far better condition since it doesn’t get the same amount of mule traffic as the trail to [...]
Also tagged guatemala, injury, wildlifeIn the morning, I cook breakfast, break camp and walk less than a hundred metres before emerging from the trees into a clearing surrounded by a variety of more or less ramshackle structures dotted around a rough football pitch. I survey the scene to identify the building emitting smoke and then make my way towards [...]
Also tagged guatemala, ruinsThe remains of the ancient city of El Mirador is one of the earliest Mayan sites yet discovered. It sits deep in the jungle not far from the border between northern Guatemala and Mexico.
While most people are content to simply visit the nearby and much more famous and, therefore, accessible Tikal, El Mirador is on [...]
I head towards Calakmul, not primarily to see the ruins, but to enter the jungle again. Calakmul is 60 kilometres off the main highway, deep in the wilderness. I am slowed to a snail’s pace on the ride in by my recent purchase of a field guide to Mexican birds. I am halted every few [...]
Also tagged mexico, mud, ruinsThe road between Dos Lagunas and Rio Azul is considerably less demanding than the first leg of my jungle adventure and so it’s early afternoon when Rio Azul comes into view. Rio Azul is a much larger work camp than Dos Lagunas, with numerous cabins and buildings surrounding a large cleared area, but it is [...]
Also tagged border crossings, dirt roads, guatemala, ruins, wildlifeI set off through the jungle and the road is manageable, if not relaxing. No one state lasts for so long that it is completely overwhelming.
So the day passes, negotiating patches of mud and fending off clouds of mosquitoes while toucans flap from tree to tree overhead, turkeys, guans and carassows stalk across the track [...]
I am trying to reach the border between Mexico and Guatemala but, on the spur of the moment, I pedal on straight past the turnoff to Frontera Echeverria on the Usumacinta River to make a quick visit to Bonampak, a Mayan archeological site in the middle of the jungle. It occurs to me that perhaps [...]
Also tagged magic, mexico, ruins, wildlifeI wake in a damp tent after a night of heavy rain, pack my soggy things onto the bike and set of into the hazy dawn.
As the sun rises the steamy air heats up. I soon turn off the main highway onto a diversion that will cut eighty kilometres from the journey and the road [...]
Leaving the lakes, I head east into tropical jungle where the maniacal shrieks and growls of howler monkeys echo through the tree canopy. This area is still quite populated and cleared areas of the jungle, both large and small, are given over to coffee and banana cultivation and cattle.
The wet season has definitely begun – [...]