Antigua, Guatemala

Summary

• Easter parade that beat Moomba any day
• Volunteer work with Constru Casa
• Toasting marshmallows on steam from a volcano

Easter parades
We were lucky enough to be here in Antigua during Easter week which is known here as Semana Santa (Saint's week). We were intrigued by the parades which involve men dressed in purple or black robes carrying massive floats depicting Easter scenes of Jesus and women dressed in white or black carrying slightly smaller floats of Mary. Some of the floats weigh in excess of 2 tonnes and are carried by up to 90 people.
Each float is accompanied by scores of other people dressed similarly, a full band and heaps of onlookers. It was so interesting to watch and be a part of buzz around town.
Another part of this festival is the creation of beautiful carpets on the street made from either coloured sawdust or plants/seeds. We enjoyed watching groups of families or friends work together to create these gorgeous pieces of art. Often they took hours to create and the sad thing was that the paraders would come and walk all over them!
It was great to see and made us feel a little like Easter. Although, on Good Friday and Easter Saturday it felt like you couldn't turn a corner in Antigua without running into Jesus or Mary being carried by some poor souls.

Boys carrying a Jesus statue

Girls carrying a Mary statue.
The parades go on for hours and even through the night

A sawdust carpet

A flower/seed carpet in the making

The parade walks over the carpet

The biggest float we saw - the crucifixion

Volunteering
Now I know many of you thought it was strange that I had got myself roped into volunteering at a construction site. Well, you were not let down.......after two days on site shovelling sand, gravel, dirt and concrete I flaked with a sore back and took a few days off. I returned in the second week doing half days and assisting where I could.
Mark continued on (of course) pitching in enough for the both of us. His many and varied jobs included shovelling and block work as well as assisting to put the roof on one house and cementing in the bricks on another. He got to be good buddies with the masons despite minimal language on both sides.
The house we helped build is for Flor and her family. We were lucky enough to meet them on our last day on site. It was a really emotional experience which made us reflect on how lucky we are to have all that we do. Flor is taking care of her parents and 3 children. They will live in a 3 room house.

Lunch with the masons

Mark & I with Flor and her family who will llive in the house we helped build

Preparing bricks for the masons

Making cement - all manual work, no mixer here!!

the chicken bus we take to/from work

Building a wall of the house

Mark 'working' on site

About the project
Constru Casa is a non-government organisation which builds homes for needy families. The project requires the family to own the land on which the house is built and repay 1/4 of the cost of the house over 2 years. A family member or friend is also required to assist professional masons in the building of the house.
The houses we worked on are for families who lost their homes in the floods a few years ago. The land was given to the families by the municipal government in exchange for the land they own on the flood plain. In total there is room for 16 houses on the land.

Visiting Pacaya Volcano
Apparently no visit to Antigua is complete without hiking Pacaya volcano so we signed up for the very expensive tour ($10 each). Traffic on the way there was crazy, an accident had backed traffic all the way back up the hill. After waiting for a short time behind a ute carrying a whole family (complete with baby younger than 1 year old) our driver thought it would be more efficient to simply drive down the opposite side of the road and push into the banked up traffic when faced with a car travelling the correct way up the road! It worked, we made it to the Pacaya national park without too much delay.
The volcano last erupted 11 months ago so we weren't able to trek to the peak on account of the steam still rising from there. The trek was interesting with the volcano rock resembling a moonscape. In the area we were able to visit we toasted marshmallows over 'vents' created by small caves in the rock. Quite tasty actually and without the smokiness of marshmallows toasted on a fire.

Antigua with Pacaya volcano in the background

At the peak of the hike
(smoking summit of Pacaya in th ebackground)

Toasting marshmallows.
The heat from this vent was enough to ignite the sticks in the picture! 

Pacaya volcano

Cuba - viva Cuba!

Summary

• Old American cars, Buena Vista Social Club and gorgeous buildings!
• Cycling in Pinar del Rio - 170kms in 30-35 degree heat in 5 days......not bad I think

Havana
We fell in love with Cuba. The first thing you notice about Havana is the 1950's American cars which are everywhere! They provide hours of entertainment spotting different types and colours. They are used as tourist taxi's, private vehicles and collective transport for locals.
The old Havana is where we spent most of our time, in amongst the old buildings and plaza's. Mark especially loved Plaza de Armas with it's second hand book market and revolution paraphernalia. It's also one of the few places with shade!
We ate a few meals in and around Plaza Vieja which is ringed with colonial style buildings. In Cafe Taberna we were lucky enough to see the Buena Vista Social Club which was simply incredible. They were so impressive and really spent a lot of energy getting the crowd into it. We were suprised to see people leaving before the end of the show! We were there to the end and even sought out the members for pictures after the show - total groupies!

Sunset over Havana

Buena Vista Social Club concert - amazing!

One of the main streets in Cuba

A car outside our hotel

Cycling in Pinar del Rio
As many of you know, the main thing we did in Cuba was a cycling tour. I was quite anxious about it before we got there given I hadn't been on a bike since Uruguay and even then it was only for and hour or so...... The ride was tough going in parts, especially given the heat and lack of any shade whatsoever but we survived! I got on the support bus a couple of times but Mark managed to ride the whole thing (But only because I managed to block out the sun on my face - MK)!
Cycling was a fabulous way to see the countryside plus we met a great bunch of people on our tour which made it even more fun. It's definitely an experience I won't forget in a hurry - riding past horses and buggies, tractors converted into some sort of collective transport, bull & cart and not to mention the beautiful old cars! I think the best part was when people called out to say hello, especially kids in school - so cute!
We had the best meal ever on this part of the trip when we stopped in with a local family. It was delicious and nice to chat to them through broken English and Spanish. They were such generous and welcoming people despite not having much themselves. It was truly humbling.

Traffic congestion - some of our group over-taking

A stop for fruit. 10 bananas for a dollar!

The beautiful scenery we passed on out bikes

Mullah Mark our Bedouin rider

Lunch at the home of a local family. The grandmother was the sweetest lady ever!

A friend I made at a tourist stop

Our special bus which we nicknamed the "Party bus" on account of our driver Carlos pumping Cuban Salsa tunes and dancing in his seat while he drove behind us cycling.

This little girl adopted us and collected shells from the bottom of the river for us.

Evidence that I did ride my bike!

Last to arrive at the meeting point - exhausted!

There are a million other little stories about Cuba and I could go on for ages but I won't. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves!

Costa Rica - Arenal, Monvteverde, Manuel Antonio, Corcovado

Summary

• Swimming in the hot springs from the Arenal Volcano
• Zip lines through the forrest canopy and rapelling waterfalls in Monteverde
• Saw a Sloth in Manuel Antonio
• Corcovado has 2.5% of the world's biodiversity!

Arenal/La Fortuna
La Fortuna was an incredibly beautiful place and the best thing was the amazing hot springs at the base of the Volcano Arenal. We spent hours swimming in the springs and drinking cocktails at the swim up bar (the best Pina Colada!). The pools range in temperature from cold through to 67 degrees! We were there in the evening so it was a great way to relax.

Infront of Arenal volcano on our hike

Monteverde
The town of Monteverde is tiny and many of the roads are bumpy dirt tracks which makes for an interesting journey into and out of the mountainous area. The main thing to do here is to take a zip line tour of the forrest canopy. I was all brave about it when we were booking the tour. Pay an additional $5 to "superman" the last zip line? Sure, why not! When the time came to actually be attached to the wire at my back I nearly chickened out but, I'm proud to say I did the 1km superman zip line which passes at a height of 800m above a gully! Ok, so maybe I closed my eyes for most of it but at least I did it right?!?



Putting my life in Mark's hand (look at his guns) - literally



Mark coming into land after his superman
(you can see some of the cable in the distance)

While in Monteverde we also decided to do a waterfall rapel tour which battered us around a bit but was amazing! One of the best things we've done. It was basically abseiling down a waterfall which was really difficult. Mark was like spiderman jumping down one of the tallest falls (40m) rather than doing the tiny step by tiny step like I did. At one point I lost my footing and had one foot above me, one below and no idea what to do. Mark's response to my cry of "I'm stuck".....sympathy? No. suggestions of possible alternatives? No he yelled down "just think!". I managed to get out of it with a cut elbow and bruised hip.

Me at the top of the largest waterfall we rapelled

Spiderman Mark rapelling the 40m waterfall

Manuel Antonio
Our couple of days by the beach was very cool but, not the nicest beach we have been too. I guess we're just spoilt with Aussie and Thai beaches.

We stayed at a gorgeous little place 5 mins from the beach near the Manuel Antonio national park. We saw a lot of wildlife there including a Sloth moving in slow motion (as they do). I was very excited about that! Unfortunately, my pictures are pretty bad as it was quite far away and my camera zoom wasn't strong enough but you get the idea.....

Corcovado
Home to 2.5% of the world's biodiversity and the site of Jurrasic Park, we were really excited to visit Corcovado. We stayed in this gorgeous little lodge nestled on the side of a mountain, 800m (steep) walk from the beach. The cabins were very cute, open on 3 sides with only mesh to keep out the creepy crawlies.
We spent a couple of days here. We went snorkelling at Cano Island and were lucky enough to see dolphins on the way. Again, I was like a little kid, so excited to see wild dolphins for the first time!
Despite swimming not being a skill or strength of his, Mark did get in the water. Quite impressive as we were out in fairly deep water which was a bit choppy due to stormy weather. Some of the fish we saw snorkelling reminded me of Finding Nemo.
We also hiked through the national park and saw more wildlife. On our final walk from the lodge to the boat which would take us back to civilisation we finally spotted a Capuchin monkey which we had been hearing from our cabin for a day or so but hadn't been lucky enough to spot.

Corcovado national park

Our cabin

Panama & bee sting #2

I was so happy to arrive in Panama purely for the warmer weather. Panama suprised me a bit, it's a really international city with lots of skyscrapers. It reminded me of Hong Kong a bit, with the blend of some old world charm but lots of new development.

Our main reason for visiting Panama was to see the canal but we spent the first day shopping as Panama has a lot of shopping malls and the prices were quite reasonable. I still wasn't feeling well so this was my idea of therapy.......

We did end up seeing the canal and were lucky enough to be there to see a few small ships move through the first part of Miraflores locks. The whole process of watching the boats come up into the lock and raising the water level takes a good hour or so and, while we were waiting, I got stung by a wasp! Seems like karma got me for laughing at Mark and his bee sting (Smiling - MK). Subborn me was determined to see the boats move through before I sat down and had a sook about my sting.

The canal was very impressive! I'm glad I suffered through my wasp sting to see it. (Suffered!! Nothing in comparison to my swollen ear. Now that was pain! - MK)

Boats being prepared to move through the locks

The locks before the boats have been lifted.

The same locks after. The water level must be equal for the lock to open

Bogota

Summary

• Bogota is really cold
• Safer here than in Rio - weird!

Bogota overview
The first thing that I noticed about Bogota was the cold. Due to it's elevation the temperature hovers around 17 degrees year round. Couple that with pretty frequent showers and I got a shock to the system which resulted in a pretty bad throat infection. Boo hoo for me, yes - I know.

The original plan was to visit outside of Bogota but things didn't fall into place so all we saw was Bogota and a nearby village called Zipaquira where there is an underground church in a salt mine. The main square in the city is beautiful and surrounded by lovely Spanish architecture. Bogota is a blend of old world and modernisation.

Overlooking the city is the church of Monserrate which is perched high on a mountain. Luckily for us the cloud cleared while we were up there visiting and we got some amazing views of the city.

Monseratte church

 

Black Jesus statue at Monseratte church.
Thought to possess special powers. (Yeah thats right!! - MK)



The view of Bogota city from the church.
Note the jacket - it was freezing!

A typical Bogota street - very pretty!

Bolivar square

Security
Most people's first question about Colombia (as mine was) is about security. Is it safe? In our short time there we felt pretty safe. There is a lot of police everywhere and also special tourist police. They are incredibly helpful and friendly (helping us with directions when we got lost).
The one scuffle we saw (involving a kitchen knife) was quickly dealt with by police and army (unlike the first fight in Rio which the police watched with mild indifference). All in all, I felt safer in Bogota than in Rio.


Who needs pepper spray, when you can rock out an uzi submachine gun.

The people were also really friendly with a couple of random people coming up to help us in the street and saying "First time to Bogota? Welcome!". Given the history of the counrty, the people go out of their way to be friendly.

Accommodation challenges....
Most interestingly in Bogota we stayed in three different places. At first we were staying in a hostel because we had stayed in a budget hotel in Rio and wanted to get our budget back on track - big mistake! The hostel was noisy because the room we had was next to the common area (yes, we are party poopers). Also, during this stay we confirmed our earlier suspicion that shared bathrooms are really not for us anymore. There's something about having to wait in line to pee which irritates us (and tinea potential - MK). But the biggest concern we had was the security of our stuff in the room as the lock was, well, it looked like a padlock from Kmart on a door that could have easily been pushed in. Given we are flashpacking it, we thought it better to move on.

Paying a little extra to stay at a budget hotel was no biggy but a budget hotel in Bogota where tourism is truly in it's infancy didn't work out so well.
Advertisement:                                                        Actual
- Double room                                       Very spacious room with double bed (tick)  
- free wi-fi                                              Only on the first three floors of the hotel (they put us on the 6th)
- cable tv                                               Only in Spanish (not so good if you dropped out of school - MK)
- hot water                                             Only a trickle of hot water (so technically they didn't lie)
- all day american breakfast.                   Being forced hamburgers for dinner and declined breakfast on 
                                                                morning #1. On morning #2 we were given a refund of $10,000 
                                                                pesos to buy breakfast.

Poor customer service and no hot water moved us on.......luckily it was to a beautiful 4 star apartment as I had a pretty severe throat infection by this time and barely left the apartment.

Personally, I was pleased to leave Bogota and head back to the warmer weather.

When my baby smiles at me I got to Rio.......de Janeiro......

Summary

• Ever wondered where all the budgie-smugglers went? Go to Rio!
• Can't escape Carnival in Rio - we had an amazing ride on the tram from Santa Teresa
• Christ the Redeemer was covered by clouds most of the time but we did get to see it

Copacobana and Ipanema
Of course the first thing to do in Rio is go to the beach. After hiring a couple of chairs and an umbrella we claimed a piece of Copacobana beach. It was beautiful and full of people, mostly tanning and exercising but it was great to see.
If you ever wondered where all the budgie smugglers went, just head to a beach in Rio. The disturbing thing being that they are worn by young and old.......the women's swimmers were equally skimpy but that was as expected. We were a little disturbed to see pre-teens in g-strings......anyways, each to their own. I was, of course, the most covered up person on the beach on account of my sun protection obsession and milk bottle skin......

Santa Teresa
The tram to Santa Teresa is the best 60 cents you'll spend in Rio. Sata Teresa is a beautiful old part of the city high on the hill above the city. It's so pretty and notorious for the artists and intellectuals of the city. We had a lovely lunch at a funky little cafe where our sandwiches were served on plates made from melted wine bottles - very cool.
The tram down the hill was hilarious. We heard the tram coming before we saw it on account of the mass of people on the tram singing and chanting. Evidently they had been at Carnival all night and at the after party which was passed on the way to the tram in the morning. Mark and I grabbed what space we could - me standing in between two Brazilian women who were lovely and Mark hanging onto the side of the tram. The group chanted and sang all the way back down to the terminal - crazy.

Christ the Redeemer
The most famous site in Rio is, of course, Christ the Redeemer. Unfortuantely, it was so cloudy most of the time we were in Rio that we couldn't really see Christo Redento. Luckily, the day we went up sugar loaf mountain (the vantage point from which  most pics are taken) as well as the day we went up Corvocado to see the monument, the cloud cleared and we were able to see Him and get a few shots. Just like all the pictures (although slightly smaller than I imagined).

Other
I have to mention that I finally did some shopping in Rio which resulted in 4 new pairs of Havaianna's........sounds completely crazy when you think it'll be winter when we get home. Oh well!!!