Five countries,
58 days, 39 bus rides, 7 ferry trips, dozens of taxis, various rides, photos
and many memories.
(Photo taken at Tulum)
Since
closing my service at a Peace Corps Volunteer in El Salvador, it’s been an
incredible adventure of traveling throughout Central America and Mexico. The
majority of the trip was with my training group that arrived in El Salvador
with me over two years ago, a mixed group of amazing individuals I am lucky to
call my good friends.
I will try
my best to just skim the highlights for you. We returned to Nicaragua in order
to spend some time on the Isla de Ometepe. It is one of the largest islands
within a lake in the world and has two volcanos! We stayed at this amazing
finca (farm) looking for monkeys, hiking to a waterfall and renting bikes.
After
breaking off from the group, I spent a relaxing weekend in Granada, Nicaragua
and met some inspiring girls from all over the world. We climbed Mombacho
volcano together, then I continued north traveling alone onto Tegucigalpa
(capital of Honduras). There I spent a night before continuing my journey to
Northern Honduras to finally take a ferry to Utila Island which is a part of
the Bay Islands.
It was an
incredible week learning how to scuba dive and getting my open-water
certification, on my first dive I even saw a stingray and a group of dolphins,
which we were able to swim with! I loved the time spent on that small island; I
could have stayed for months (if my budget allowed it). Once returning to the
mainland, I was able to visit the largest national park in Honduras called Pico
Bonito, where I figured out how to do a waterfall hike in the middle of nowhere
(it was so beautiful!). After the jungle exploration, I met up with my friends
in Copan, Honduras to see the Ruins and make our way to Antigua, Guatemala to
meet up with the boys from our group who finished their service after us.
The entire
country of Guatemala is incredible. I highly recommend going and NOT just for a
“volunteer” trip, go explore! We spent a good three weeks there, making it all
the way to the Mayan ruins of Tikal (if you ever have the opportunity, GO!)
along with Semuc Champey which has the most beautiful naturally formed river
pools I have ever seen. The water was so clear and clean, even in Central
America! We explored caves by candlelight, relaxed at Lago de Atitlan and made
investments in some custom made leather boots in Pastores, outside of
Antigua. After my friends headed back to
El Salvador to collect their suitcases and fly home, I visited an avocado farm
on my own and stayed at an eco-lodge doing yoga and completely losing count on
the number of avocadoes I consumed (they were delicious).
On
September 25th, I met my mom in Mexico City (referred to as DF) and
we started our adventure of exploring one of the largest cities in the world.
We did a street food tour (totally my kind of eating style), passed through
numerous museums, and ventured to the floating river boats of Xochimilco
(similar to Venice). We flew onto Cancun to see one some Mayan Ruins including
Chichen Itza, Tulum, and Coba. We enjoyed wandering through jungle and desert-like
settings seeing old Mayan pyramids that archeologists are still trying to
figure out the meanings of these magnificent places.
Playa del Carmen was much more developed than imagined, I was surprised
how one could stay a few days in Mexico without speaking one word of Spanish, and
it felt like America….but in Mexico, indeed, very odd.
Thankfully we made a change in scenery for San Miguel de Allende to
visit some friends of mine from Semester at Sea! Joan and Bill have lived in
San Miguel for over seven years and welcomed my mom and me into their lovely
home. We were able to see the Botanical Gardens there along with many museums
and churches (my mom’s passion), while I enjoyed finding fresh fried sugar
coated churros in the street for five
pesos and numerous dishes of guacamole. J It was a pleasure to be with them
and we loved San Miguel. Afterwards we
headed to Guanajuato, which is a very traditional town, filled with lots of
small alleyways and tunnels underneath the city to get around by car. We
visited the mummy museum here. When people couldn’t afford a burial, they had
the option to be “mummified”, which is still done today. A day of dead people!
Yea! It was actually very interesting, just sad seeing the smallest and
youngest mummy in the world (6 months). To uplift our spirits, we participated
in a tradition in Guanajuato called Estudiantinos, where groups of University
students play instruments and sing in the streets with a group of visitors,
family or friends to raise money for the school while telling tales, stories
and also getting the group involved in visiting various places around the
historic center. It was a lot of fun, mostly because you usually drink along
the journey and the last destination is…a bar!
After Guanajuato, though we were sad to leave we made one more stop to
Queretaro which is the fastest growing city in Mexico. There were huge
production plants and company buildings surrounding the city. We stayed in the
historic center, enjoyed a trolley tour and took some amazing cooking classes
(learned to make mole enchiladas)! While there, we visited San Sebastian Bernal
which is known for having an enormous monolith of massive rock, called Pena de
Bernal which is the third highest on the planet. We hiked it of course, and
then had drinks and gorditas afterwards (stuffed tortillas).
After Queretaro, we went to Mexico City to end
our journey before flying home. It was a pleasure to travel with my mom the
last leg of the trip and I think it will help me adjust more to being back home.
It’s been a truly incredible journey. I think
making the transition home (living in my mom’s house, thanks for taking me in)
and trying to find a job in this economy is going to be a lot harder than I
imagined. But, one day at a time, until then I may be going through photos and
admiring my (too) many souvenirs.
In adjusting back, I do have my old phone (do
people even use blackberry’s anymore or does EVERYONE and their mother own an iPhone!?!)
number if you would like to catch up, meet up for coffee, or just a Skype date
would be lovely. I want to hear how you have been, what you have been up and
please update me on what I have missed (A lot? A little? Not much?).
I only have pictures from my Mexico trip
because my camera memory stick, and all my USB drives got viruses from backing
up photos, so more to come on Facebook (if you are not on Facebook, I can post
them here if you’re REALLY bored). Also any career advice or suggestions is
welcomed!
“The
whole object of travel is not to set foot on foreign land; it is at least to
set foot on one’s own country as a foreign land.” –G.K. Chesterton
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