My videos in chronological order:
1. I sound like a bit of jackass here but this is Volcan Talculmulco. Cool to see the top with the sun setting and the weather begining to turn. Climbing down in the dark, however, was not great.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9SI0Nksm_g
2. Volcan Chicobal, Guatamala
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQjWcgGc7WA
3. Semac Champay Guatamala Jungle-River
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bupxJsF-LpU
4. Tikal at sunrise
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iqk3ZLYtOc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDNTm7qgIrM
5. kayaking in Rio Dulce
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xm7x3mnL0Q4
6. Lago Nicaragua rain storm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fL42DAqMnEQ
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Monday, May 5, 2008
May 5 Update
Hi Guys,
Sorry for not posting very often in the last month. I am going to try and update the blog more often in the next several weeks.
I have spent the last two weeks in Honduras. I spent a day in Omoa, a town on the Caribbean just inside the Northern boarder of Honduras. It was very hot there and my nerves were frayed from dealing with importing the motorbike into the country. It turned out to be a mistake to drive into the country using an off-the-beaten-path border crossing. I ended up paying $70 to import myself and the bike into the country and had to jump through many beurocratic hurdles including: getting a visa for myself, filling out paper work and paying money at the boarder to temporarily import the bike into Honduras, driving 35 miles with a guide on my bike to the port town of Puerto Cortes to complete the importation paper work, take a digital photo of the bike license plate and printing the photo out at an internet cafe, make 3 more trips to a bank for variouse amounts of money to complete the paper work, all while sweltering in what felt like 85+ degree temperatures with very high humidity while wearing full motorcycle gear. All in all, it was a miserable experience. I think this was the first time I lost my temper during the trip so far, as I was so frustrated by the experience that I berated variouse officials in Spanish, and at one point went to far as to try and return to Guatamala to go to another border crossing before discovering, in Guatamala, that importing the bike into their boarder crossing would be nearly as difficult as getting into Honduras. In the future I will only cross into new countries using the main freeway crossings, CA1.
Omoa itself was a nice town with an impressive Spanish fort and an interesting mix of afro caribbean and ladino cultures.
After Omoa I drove South East to La Cieba, another hot-as-a-frying-pan town on the Honduran Caribbean coast. I stayed in this town for a day, then took a ferry boat to Utila in the Honduran Bay Islands. Utila is famed at the cheapest place in the world to learn to scuba dive. As such, it is a major tourist destination. I spent about 10 days in this town learning to scuba dive. I completed two courses, the PADI Open Water dive course and the PADI Advanced Open Water Dive course. Each course cost about $250 and included lodging in the price of the course. I took my classes at the Cross Creak Dive Center, and had a really great time. I was fortunate to bump into two fellow travellers on the ferry, Neil and Kim, and we were able to go through the courses together and most importantly share a cabana with AC, a refrigerator, and a TV. Doesnt sound like much, but down here AC is heaven. I do not have a good basis for comparison, but I though diving in Utila was great. I made 13 dives in total visting many coral reefs, ship wrecks, and seeing lots of fish, shrimp and lobsters in the tropical waters. The water is so warm, about 27 degrees celcius, that I seldom needed a wet suit, diving in only a swim suit and scuba gear to depths as deep at 115 feet. I do not have an underwater camera, so I have not pictures, but being that far underwater and watching the light pass from the surface of the ocean into the depths is an amazing experience.
The one problem I encountered in Utila was that a bug bite on my right foot became infected on Wednesday of last week. The bite soon became imflamed and painful, and I required antibiotics, first in Utila, then later in a hospital in the capitol of Honduras. I think I am recovering nicely now, but I was not feeling very good the last several days.
Now that I am feeling better I am going to try and get to Nicaragua this afternoon.
Love you guys and hope you are well!
-Christopher
Sorry for not posting very often in the last month. I am going to try and update the blog more often in the next several weeks.
I have spent the last two weeks in Honduras. I spent a day in Omoa, a town on the Caribbean just inside the Northern boarder of Honduras. It was very hot there and my nerves were frayed from dealing with importing the motorbike into the country. It turned out to be a mistake to drive into the country using an off-the-beaten-path border crossing. I ended up paying $70 to import myself and the bike into the country and had to jump through many beurocratic hurdles including: getting a visa for myself, filling out paper work and paying money at the boarder to temporarily import the bike into Honduras, driving 35 miles with a guide on my bike to the port town of Puerto Cortes to complete the importation paper work, take a digital photo of the bike license plate and printing the photo out at an internet cafe, make 3 more trips to a bank for variouse amounts of money to complete the paper work, all while sweltering in what felt like 85+ degree temperatures with very high humidity while wearing full motorcycle gear. All in all, it was a miserable experience. I think this was the first time I lost my temper during the trip so far, as I was so frustrated by the experience that I berated variouse officials in Spanish, and at one point went to far as to try and return to Guatamala to go to another border crossing before discovering, in Guatamala, that importing the bike into their boarder crossing would be nearly as difficult as getting into Honduras. In the future I will only cross into new countries using the main freeway crossings, CA1.
Omoa itself was a nice town with an impressive Spanish fort and an interesting mix of afro caribbean and ladino cultures.
After Omoa I drove South East to La Cieba, another hot-as-a-frying-pan town on the Honduran Caribbean coast. I stayed in this town for a day, then took a ferry boat to Utila in the Honduran Bay Islands. Utila is famed at the cheapest place in the world to learn to scuba dive. As such, it is a major tourist destination. I spent about 10 days in this town learning to scuba dive. I completed two courses, the PADI Open Water dive course and the PADI Advanced Open Water Dive course. Each course cost about $250 and included lodging in the price of the course. I took my classes at the Cross Creak Dive Center, and had a really great time. I was fortunate to bump into two fellow travellers on the ferry, Neil and Kim, and we were able to go through the courses together and most importantly share a cabana with AC, a refrigerator, and a TV. Doesnt sound like much, but down here AC is heaven. I do not have a good basis for comparison, but I though diving in Utila was great. I made 13 dives in total visting many coral reefs, ship wrecks, and seeing lots of fish, shrimp and lobsters in the tropical waters. The water is so warm, about 27 degrees celcius, that I seldom needed a wet suit, diving in only a swim suit and scuba gear to depths as deep at 115 feet. I do not have an underwater camera, so I have not pictures, but being that far underwater and watching the light pass from the surface of the ocean into the depths is an amazing experience.
The one problem I encountered in Utila was that a bug bite on my right foot became infected on Wednesday of last week. The bite soon became imflamed and painful, and I required antibiotics, first in Utila, then later in a hospital in the capitol of Honduras. I think I am recovering nicely now, but I was not feeling very good the last several days.
Now that I am feeling better I am going to try and get to Nicaragua this afternoon.
Love you guys and hope you are well!
-Christopher
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Now I am in Honduras
Sorry for not posting so much. I feel like I do not have the time!
Here are some picuturs from my flickr account. Not very well organized. But you can see some of the stuff that I am upto.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/25191067@N06/
Here are some picuturs from my flickr account. Not very well organized. But you can see some of the stuff that I am upto.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/25191067@N06/
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
April 8
So I was able to drive to Guatemala. It was pretty exciting. There is alot of new construction on the main north south highway CA1, as it is being expanded from a two to four lanes through some very rugged terrain. The day I did the drive from San Cristobal to Pana was very exciting due to the traffic, the road, and me not knowing where I was going.
Pana is the biggest city on Lago Atitlan, a large lake in a volcanic crater, very similar to Lago Majore or Lago Como in Northern Italy.
I did not enjoy Pana much though, so I promptly drove "back" North to Quetzaltenango, or Xela, as everyone calls it. I enrolled in Spanish classes here and have been working (sort of working, I guess) on improving my language skills. I succesfully climbed my first mountain (Talqulmulco) the highest peak in central america three times on two seperate trips to the mountain. The first two times I climbed the peak I did it with a group of friends and a guide. Of course, I got lost climbing down the mountain and ended up hitch hiking and taking buses for three hours to return to Xela. Oops. Thats what I get for being impatient and walking infront of the group. And for forgetting to bring the GPS. I have some very nice pictures of the mountain that I will post eventually. I returned to the moutain 4 days later, this time with some folks from my Spanish school and no guide. We summited the mountain just in time for sunset (it was not technically a sunset as it was foggy and we had very little visibility). Byron, one of the guys with me, had Shine on You Crazy Diamond on his cell phone and we played it as the sun set. Then it got very dark and what should have been a half hour climb down, turned into a two hour adventure (lost again, in the dark, in the fog... oops) before we got back to the fire.
Other than that things are muy tranquilo as they say down here. Alot of Spanish, some naps, eating too much, not too many adventures on the bike.
I will post more when I have more to say. Hope everyone is doing well!
Pana is the biggest city on Lago Atitlan, a large lake in a volcanic crater, very similar to Lago Majore or Lago Como in Northern Italy.
I did not enjoy Pana much though, so I promptly drove "back" North to Quetzaltenango, or Xela, as everyone calls it. I enrolled in Spanish classes here and have been working (sort of working, I guess) on improving my language skills. I succesfully climbed my first mountain (Talqulmulco) the highest peak in central america three times on two seperate trips to the mountain. The first two times I climbed the peak I did it with a group of friends and a guide. Of course, I got lost climbing down the mountain and ended up hitch hiking and taking buses for three hours to return to Xela. Oops. Thats what I get for being impatient and walking infront of the group. And for forgetting to bring the GPS. I have some very nice pictures of the mountain that I will post eventually. I returned to the moutain 4 days later, this time with some folks from my Spanish school and no guide. We summited the mountain just in time for sunset (it was not technically a sunset as it was foggy and we had very little visibility). Byron, one of the guys with me, had Shine on You Crazy Diamond on his cell phone and we played it as the sun set. Then it got very dark and what should have been a half hour climb down, turned into a two hour adventure (lost again, in the dark, in the fog... oops) before we got back to the fire.
Other than that things are muy tranquilo as they say down here. Alot of Spanish, some naps, eating too much, not too many adventures on the bike.
I will post more when I have more to say. Hope everyone is doing well!
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
March 26 Upto Date
OK. Yesterday I left Oaxaca at 10:30 AM and had a fairly big drive on the bike, getting into San Cristobal about 7 PM. This was a fairly uneventful drive. Some of the interesting things were that it was quite breezey at the coast and consequently the bike was a challenge to drive for about 100 miles. I though that there was more wind on this section of road than on the grapevine, with the main difference being that it was daylight and that I elected to drive at a slower pace. I also managed to suck my backpack tie down straps into the sproket on the rear wheel. This did not effect performance at all as I did not notice that this had happened until I tried to take my pack off the bike at the hostel. The effect of this accident was the straps were just sort of melted and torn up. I repaired the strap ends, and I think they are about 1 foot shorter now than yesterday morning. Using the panniers as a center stand I inspected the chain, rear wheel and the swingarm on the bike and everything looks to be in good shape. This is a strong argument for using relatively week nylon type straps.
After not seeing another gringo on a motorbike since Cameron left for Seattle, I also ran into two motorcyclist in the same afternoon. The first guy I met driving from the coast inland to San Cristobal. Alone on a windy mountain road (and pushing the speed somewhat hard, I felt) a guy screamed by me a big 1200 GS BMW. I waved at him and chased him for a while until leaning hard into a corner I felt my front wheel skip sideways accross the pavement. At that point I decided to let him go, only to find that a mile or two down the road he had stopped to wait for me. It turns out that he thought he was on the coast road (I do not know how this was possible, as we had been gaining elevation for about 25 miles and were very clearly in the mountains), did not know where he was or where he was going. I suggested that we travel together to San Cristobal and he agreed. After coming to this decision he turned on his bike (he did not take his helmet off or move from his seat the entire time we spoke) and immediately roared off as I fumbled to put my helmet and gloves back on. That would be last time I saw the guy on the 1200 GS.
After reaching San Cristobal I met another guy who had just sold his bike, Gage. Gage had ridden from Boston to Seattle and then down to San Cristobal, but as he had an older street bike that we begin to run strange, sold the bike here in San Cristobal and elected to fly home. Gage had met the guy on the 1200 GS before, and said he was a somewhat interesting guy, as he saw him on the side of the road eating three lobsters for lunch, sweaty, with red sauce running all over his face.
Anyway, I am in San Cristobal now. And I think I might try to go to Guatamala tomorrow. Wish me luck!
After not seeing another gringo on a motorbike since Cameron left for Seattle, I also ran into two motorcyclist in the same afternoon. The first guy I met driving from the coast inland to San Cristobal. Alone on a windy mountain road (and pushing the speed somewhat hard, I felt) a guy screamed by me a big 1200 GS BMW. I waved at him and chased him for a while until leaning hard into a corner I felt my front wheel skip sideways accross the pavement. At that point I decided to let him go, only to find that a mile or two down the road he had stopped to wait for me. It turns out that he thought he was on the coast road (I do not know how this was possible, as we had been gaining elevation for about 25 miles and were very clearly in the mountains), did not know where he was or where he was going. I suggested that we travel together to San Cristobal and he agreed. After coming to this decision he turned on his bike (he did not take his helmet off or move from his seat the entire time we spoke) and immediately roared off as I fumbled to put my helmet and gloves back on. That would be last time I saw the guy on the 1200 GS.
After reaching San Cristobal I met another guy who had just sold his bike, Gage. Gage had ridden from Boston to Seattle and then down to San Cristobal, but as he had an older street bike that we begin to run strange, sold the bike here in San Cristobal and elected to fly home. Gage had met the guy on the 1200 GS before, and said he was a somewhat interesting guy, as he saw him on the side of the road eating three lobsters for lunch, sweaty, with red sauce running all over his face.
Anyway, I am in San Cristobal now. And I think I might try to go to Guatamala tomorrow. Wish me luck!
March 24, Day 66 Mas or Minus
Outside Oaxaca there are many ruins and famous sites. Here are a few of them.
Mt Alban. This was an ancient Zapotec capitol that existed from about 500 BC to 700 AD. This city was built on top of a mountain whose top was flattened for construction of temples and buildings. It reminded me of the Acropolis in Greece. It seems as though the people of Mt. Alban were realitively peaceful, not practicing large scale sacrifice like the Aztec. Similarly to the fall of the Maya, no knows quite why it happened. My guess is that they ran out of water on the mountain top. The mountain is quite high and without a natural spring or water source I think it would be a difficult place to live.
Ruins at Yagul. A city in the Oaxaca region that rose following the fall of Mt. Alban.
A picture from inside a tomb at Yagul. These ruins are a bit off the beaten track and thus visiting them is a bit more of an intimate experience (ie you can crawl into tombs).
Hierve De Agua, a natural mineral spring outside Oaxaca. There are bathing pools for swimming and water from teh spring spills down the mountain leaving mineral deposites that look like frozen water falls. The day that I was there it was quite windy, I was by myself without any friends, the springs were crowded with locals, and I had no bathing suit. Thus I did not swim (but I have a small regret about not doing it anyway).
Another picture of the mineral falls.
Mt Alban. This was an ancient Zapotec capitol that existed from about 500 BC to 700 AD. This city was built on top of a mountain whose top was flattened for construction of temples and buildings. It reminded me of the Acropolis in Greece. It seems as though the people of Mt. Alban were realitively peaceful, not practicing large scale sacrifice like the Aztec. Similarly to the fall of the Maya, no knows quite why it happened. My guess is that they ran out of water on the mountain top. The mountain is quite high and without a natural spring or water source I think it would be a difficult place to live.
Ruins at Yagul. A city in the Oaxaca region that rose following the fall of Mt. Alban.
A picture from inside a tomb at Yagul. These ruins are a bit off the beaten track and thus visiting them is a bit more of an intimate experience (ie you can crawl into tombs).
Hierve De Agua, a natural mineral spring outside Oaxaca. There are bathing pools for swimming and water from teh spring spills down the mountain leaving mineral deposites that look like frozen water falls. The day that I was there it was quite windy, I was by myself without any friends, the springs were crowded with locals, and I had no bathing suit. Thus I did not swim (but I have a small regret about not doing it anyway).
Another picture of the mineral falls.
March 22, Day 64 Mas or Minus
Finally I had a chance to see Oaxaca. This was the city that was the joke that launch the plan for the motorcycle trip south nearly 3 years ago. "Mustaches and machetes in Oaxaca" was the bright idea we had at the George and Dragon after my General Exam.
It is interesting to compare the actual city to the one I had imaged before visiting. I had imaged the city to be close to the coast, lower in elevation, hotter, more humid, with more bright colors, like a Michael Mann movie (think Miami Vice). Actually the city has some elevation, is dry and cool at night, and does have the colors of a Michael Mann movie. It is also a sophisticated tourist city with many art studios, markets, and nice resturants with table linen and the like. It reminds me of a place like Cannon Beach in Oregon. Anyway, here are some pictures.
Cathedral Iglesia de Santa Domingo. A big beautiful cathedral named after a Dominican Saint. The Dominicans were strong in this region and tried hard to protect the local indigenous population from the Spanish Conquest.
A Micheal Mann alley.
Roof of the cathedral.
Pink doorway.
Huuuuuuge Satruday market. 100X Pike Place market. This is one of the nicer sections, the flower alley. Some of the alleys can be quite unpleasent. The dead chicken alley, with rows of yellow dead chickens, legs sticking into the walkway so you brush them as you pass is not so nice.
180 degress opposite the last picture. The alleys and vendors stretch off in all directions into the distance.
It is interesting to compare the actual city to the one I had imaged before visiting. I had imaged the city to be close to the coast, lower in elevation, hotter, more humid, with more bright colors, like a Michael Mann movie (think Miami Vice). Actually the city has some elevation, is dry and cool at night, and does have the colors of a Michael Mann movie. It is also a sophisticated tourist city with many art studios, markets, and nice resturants with table linen and the like. It reminds me of a place like Cannon Beach in Oregon. Anyway, here are some pictures.
Cathedral Iglesia de Santa Domingo. A big beautiful cathedral named after a Dominican Saint. The Dominicans were strong in this region and tried hard to protect the local indigenous population from the Spanish Conquest.
A Micheal Mann alley.
Roof of the cathedral.
Pink doorway.
Huuuuuuge Satruday market. 100X Pike Place market. This is one of the nicer sections, the flower alley. Some of the alleys can be quite unpleasent. The dead chicken alley, with rows of yellow dead chickens, legs sticking into the walkway so you brush them as you pass is not so nice.
180 degress opposite the last picture. The alleys and vendors stretch off in all directions into the distance.
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