Flashback — Page 2

Flashback: Colombia

July 28, 2011 By Jillian

I’m going to tell you a secret. I was scared to travel to Colombia. In fact, when we arrived at the airport in Bogota I was sure things were going to end badly. No matter how many people recounted their love for Colombia, I had a hard time getting over my stereotypes.

That was until we met our couchsurfing hosts. They immediately welcomed us into their home with such warmth and hospitality, I was completely blown away. They turned out to be only the tip of the iceberg, everyone we met in Colombia was overwhelmingly friendly, hospitable and genuinely kind. People went out of their way to speak with us on buses and even on the commuter train in Bogota, a place where in the US you don’t speak to anyone! We received countless offers to come for coffee, of assistance and even offers to stay in people’s homes. These were genuine offers, offers that I wish we could have accepted.

When we arrived in Bogota I felt like I had been pushed into the decision to come to Colombia. Buyers remorse I guess, but I seriously questioned whether we had gone too far in our attempt to get off the beaten path. As our taxi weaved through the streets, I was sure we were about to be kidnapped, I had read every horror story on the web, I knew how these cons worked. We weren’t kidnapped, we weren’t robbed by a gun toting drug cartel, in fact we weren’t even hassled by street vendors. It wasn’t the drug cartel run country I was expecting.

Colombia, was for me, not only an amazing travel experience, but also the country that single handedly taught me what off the beaten track could be. It doesn’t have to be an uncomfortable living on the edge experience. I went paragliding for the first time (and learned a new Spanish word -acro- in the process), swam in the coldest waterfall I’ve ever experienced, biked 40 miles in the hot tropical sun and saw what is still today the most breathtaking museum in the world (Museo de Oro). Locals sang Happy Birthday to me in San Gil, I drank chicha and I learned that cheese and hot chocolate really aren’t a bad combination.

Colombia shattered my stereotypes. That’s not to say its a secure paradise. It is not for sure, but for all my fear, it was nothing like the wild west I was expecting. Although we’ve had friends who have been robbed in Colombia, I stand resolute in saying that it’s no more dangerous than anywhere else in South America. Colombians constantly offered safety advice on travel routes and I was duly impressed by their determination to push past their recent experience.

To be truly humbled in your life is an experience you’ll never forget. For me, the Colombian people did more than break down my stereotypes; they fundamentally changed the way I think about places, people and things. Colombia so fundamentally changed my way of thinking that the next time an opportunity arose at going to a “dangerous” country, I weighed the risks quite differently than I had before. Some of those “dangerous” countries we went to, others we skipped, but I took the time to really assess the information not just go with my prejudice. Those were some of our favorite countries of the trip, and as we flashback to them I hope I can do them justice.

Flashback: Granada, Nicaragua

July 6, 2011 By Danny

We’d had an awesome time going Volcano boarding in Leon and were on our way to the splendid Isla de Ometepe, one of our favorite places of the entire trip. With one stop to make between those wonderful locales we decided to try and do something we hadn’t been able to do for a couple of months…couchsurf.

There weren’t many profiles available for us to choose from but we did find one for an ex-pat who said that if you stayed with him you’d help to ‘give back’ and paint the neighbors’ homes. We thought that sounded nice and sent the request, we got a response back almost immediately upon our arrival in Grenada went straight to his home.

What we found surprised us a little. This gentleman painted the neighborhood to help bring up the value of his home, which he wanted to turn into a night club. We were subjected to a video of political conspiracy theory (something about how Obama and McCain are in the payroll of the Federal Reserve….which is no more Federal than Federal Express…according to the video) and we listened as he offered his very negative opinions on everything Nicaraguan. The best part was probably when he told us the US Government tracked his whereabouts.

Later that night he took us to the local casino where we found some slots and blackjack games and not much more. He had a pattern while there and the staff was all to eager to help him lose his cash….he wasn’t exactly skilled at the games. We had a drink and gambled a total of five measly dollars in order to fill the time while we waited for him to do his damage at the Monte Carlo table. We took him to dinner and he later asked us to leave $30 behind for some paint…so he could buy some more of the colors he liked to paint the neighborhood: he refused to let people choose their own colors. This was one of the weirdest guys we’d meet in two full years.

I’m not sure why, but we stuck it out for two days. This was the ONLY time on our entire trip we felt uncomfortable with our couchsurf and although it was uncomfortable, we both felt we were not in danger in any way. Still though, the experience caused us to make a plan for ‘getting out’ of a couchsurf gone wrong. By staying with him we didn’t save any money and worse we were limited in what we were able to do on our own. On the plus side we did see a side of Grenada we wouldn’t have gotten to see otherwise but the real positive here was that we learned a good lesson without any real consequences.

When it was time to leave we did so in the middle of the day, he was still asleep and we quietly let ourselves out. We headed to Ometepe and had a wonderful time there…not couchsurfing.

Flashback: Honduras

June 21, 2011 By Jillian

Sometimes it’s about the journey not the destination. Bumping around in the back of an overloaded Toyota pick up truck on our way into “the heart of darkness” was not my idea of fun. Maybe that’s a bit dramatic, but I couldn’t get Conrad’s book out of my head. We were going into the heart of Central America’s largest wilderness and it was certainly a journey.

We had been pretty “vanilla” in our travels up until Honduras. We hadn’t really gone off the beaten path yet. As we got our travel legs we became more and more adventurous, staying at places not listed in the guidebook, taking guidebook suggestions with a grain of salt and relying on word of mouth recommendations from other travelers above everything else. In Honduras we finally hit our travel stride and took a sharp turn off the beaten path.

By sharp turn I mean we decided to go to “La Mosquitia”, which Wikipedia kindly refers to as: an underdeveloped region of tropical rainforest accessible primarily by water and air. By primarily they mean only by air and water. See, it’s about the journey.

I’ll admit that I was not thrilled when we decided to launched off into the Mosquito Coast, the coastline is heavily used by drug traffickers and it was starting to be rainy season. Torrential downpours, underdeveloped jungle, mud and mosquitos? I’d seen this in a movie before, and trust me it wasn’t a pleasant situation.

I quickly realized my opinion would hold very little sway when we met a solo traveler who had just returned from the region. He enthusiastically gave us all the information we needed and although Danny asked if I was interested in going, I saw that glinting “Indian Jones” spirit in his eyes and decided to quietly squelch my concerns. In the words of a famous fitness retailer I decided to “Just Do It.”

So there we were, bouncing along in the back of a pick up truck, wedged between bottles of Coca-Cola. To say it was an adventure getting into the heart of La Mosquitia is an understatement.

My memories are akin to someone experiencing trauma. Thinking of that journey is like reliving a painful experience and my mind has successfully blocked out all but part of it. I have distinct memories of choking on the dust in the back of the truck, of the intense heat and the physical discomfort. Of riding back to civilization atop the truck’s gear shifter in the cab, of a driver who had been deported a few times from the U.S. telling me how bad the State Police are in Georgia. Our time in La Mosquitia was an exotic adventure (definitely worth a read, click here for Part 1 and Part 2), but it was really more about the journey than the destination. Once there we hiked in torrential downpours and experienced the jungle in rainy season, not something I’d recommend.

Spanish has a phrase vale la pena which loosely translates to be worth it, to be worthwhile. It’s one of my favorite idioms in Spanish. La Mosquitia was our first turn off the beaten track and although the journey is what I’ll remember the most, I can’t help but look back on it and ask myself again was it vale la pena? Even two years later I can say yes. The journey was vale la pena.

IF YOU GO: The entire eastern coastline of Central America is tropical jungle and although we went rather remote, you don’t have to go deep into La Mosquitia to experience the jungle. Winter is the perfect time to go to the jungle so if you’re spending the holidays in Cancun, it may be worth it to take some extra time and overland the coastline. Traveling through Belize and into Honduras is relatively easy and there’s a lot to do. We learned how to SCUBA dive on Utila, which was an enjoyable way to spend a week and also went to a couchsurfing meet up. We arranged our transport into La Mosquitia along the way from La Ceiba and you should be able to get information in La Ceiba on the trip.

Flashback: Belize

June 7, 2011 By Jillian

It’s pitch black and the bed is shaking and, wait, no the whole building is shaking. For a second I freeze in a panic and grab Danny. He’s awake as well and we hold each other, tightly wondering out loud what is going on. Finally it dawns on us that it must be an earthquake. We quickly scramble out of bed, but can hardly stand up on the floor, I feel like I’m on a ride at an amusement park. The building stops moving and we are able to make it downstairs and safely out of the house. There the family regroups. We’re all a bit shocked and chattering away like monkeys although on our half asleep faces we’re showing signs of worry. Flashlights flicker down the beach as other people get out of their homes. We stay outside wondering if there will be aftershocks. Eventually someone reminds us that we’ re on a beach, looking at the Atlantic Ocean, and hey, aren’t there tsunami’s? Where can we go we ask- the roads aren’t great and there’s nothing around for miles. Hours later we eventually go back to sleep, just in time for light to break on the horizon.

Belize. A 7.1 earthquake. It turns out a tsunami watch had been issued, and cancelled 90 minutes later. Not that we would have known.

Fortunately we weren’t alone when the big one hit. My aunt and uncle had looked for months for a vacation rental in Belize, one big enough to hold the family but small enough that it wasn’t a resort! It was perfect, a nice big area (with wifi!) to hang out in, and a small eco-resort down the street with an awesome pool and bar.

The afternoon after the earthquake we were back at the pool, our general location for the whole time we were in Belize, chatting away with honeymooners and other vacationers. We were dissapointed not to see jaguars in the jaguar sanctuary (isn’t that what it’s there for after all), but got over it by barbequing for the first time in months!

It was our first vacation from “the trip” and it was a beautiful break from traveling. Spending time with family recharged our travel battery and although we were shaken, we weren’t stirred…from continuing our travels… and so we went on (looking back on it there should have been martini’s!).

Flashback: Quetzaltenango

May 26, 2011 By Jillian

We crossed the border from Mexico to Guatemala on Easter Sunday. That afternoon, waiting for our transport to be arranged, since buses weren’t running on the Guatemalan side of the border, we ate fried chicken and gingerly added green sauce- a condiment we had come to respect in southern Mexico. A metaphor for things to come, the green sauce, which had been incredibly potent in Mexico, was blander than milk. Things were decidedly different south of the border.

Not only was the food and culture different, but also our way of travel. We settled into what became the closest we’d come to a permanent expat life in Quetzaltenango (Xela). My desire to learn Spanish before we continued, and Danny’s to brush up on his Spanish skills brought our travels to a halt at the Spanish school he had studied at six years before.

My first reaction when I think of Xela is cold! Perhaps it was unseasonable while we were there, but Xela is very high in altitude and although it was April, the temperatures were downright frigid. Fortunately every street corner had a second-hand clothing store and I scored a brand new North Face Fleece for only $5. A true bargain!

Studying Spanish gave us a bit of a routine and a new appreciation for eggs, rice and beans. Eggs, rice and beans for breakfast. One-on-one Spanish lessons in the morning. Back home for lunch- sometimes eggs and beans again, but occasionally pasta with ketchup or hot dogs. Then back out for the afternoon. Salsa lessons at school or studying at the random German café in town. Home again for dinner (eggs, rice and beans- you got it- maybe chicken) and time with the family. You get the drift. When we left I never wanted to see another black bean again.

Since I’d previously studied French and Italian, my Spanish lessons advanced rather quickly. My first teacher, who I spent two weeks with, ran me through a series of vocabulary and verb exercises, but my second teacher focused only on conversation. We wandered through the markets each day, chatting about Guatemalan politics (corrupt), the dual class society that existed, the economy and often her asking me pointed and complex questions about life in the United States. We made fun of Danny (she had him as a student six years prior) and somehow I learned Spanish.

Xela has somewhat of a sizeable Western expat population so we got into a bit of a social routine as well. We had trivia nights to attend, expat bars, English language book stores, groups to go to the hot springs with and even people interested in summiting a volcano by moonlight. A steady stream of students looking to learn Spanish, volunteers and non-profit workers and travelers kept the place interesting and we couldn’t help but find comfort in our routine.

That’s not to say life is easy in Xela. It certainly isn’t. Guatemala is plagued by crime and violence. A corrupt political system (the President was accused of murder while we were there, later exonerated), serious economic issues and memories of its decades long civil war haunt the country. Infrastructure is outdated at best, and the shower at our host families home electrocuted me ever so slightly every morning when I bathed. There’s that memory of being cold again!

So Xela, how do I sum it up? I was cold and always eating rice and beans!

Flashback: Colombia

Flashback: Granada, Nicaragua

Flashback: Honduras

Flashback: Belize

Flashback: Quetzaltenango

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