Guatemala with the Padres 9/13/11

We woke up at 4:45 am. It was pitch black and raining cats and dogs. We didn’t want to go against our word though (for the kayak tour that we figured out the night before), so we all got out of bead and headed towards the lobby area. We waited around for a good 10 minutes, but nobody showed up. Feeling more than slightly relieved that we wouldn’t have to kayak around a pitch black lake in pouring rain with a Spanish-only speaking guide in the middle of Guatemala, we headed back to our room, napped and read for a while. At 8, we headed back to the restaurant area to have some breakfast.

At breakfast, we met some people from the US. They are big sailors and actually live on their sailboats. The spend September through December in Rio Dulce because it is a safe haven from the strong storms that develop during hurricane season. We were talking to them about wanting to do our hike, but not being able to, and they suggested with talk to George.

A few minutes later, George showed up to eat breakfast. Mom talked to him and got the details, which included another telephone call in Spanish (for me, telephone calls are much more difficult because I cannot read body language or hear distinct differences in words) that I was not so excited about, but did. Don Rodriguez would have been more than happy to give us a slightly different tour, but unfortunately we were told there would not be enough time. So, after breakfast, we made our own little tour walking around the hotel grounds and exploring for ourselves.

The "hallway" leading to our hotel room.

Our hotel room/cabin.

Mom talking with George (he spoke English).

The swinging bridges we walked around on.

The hotel/lobby/restaurant area.

We left the hotel at 11am and met Byron for our transport back to Antigua. This was an incredibly long drive, about 6 hours. Not so much fun, especially considering the traffic we hit on the mountain due to an accident (amazingly the first accident I’ve seen in Guatemala) and the traffic we went through in Guate. Finally, we made it back to Antigua and the same awesome hotel, Hotel D'Leyenda.

That night, we had dinner at a place named El Sensilo. This was seriously the most fancy place I have been since I got here. The building was so beautiful and the food was delicious. I had a carrot soup and an eggplant cheese dish… the first day I didn’t eat fish! We also had chocolate peach crepes for desert with a scoop of vanilla and a scoop of chocolate ice cream. Amazing!

After dinner, we headed back to the hotel and went to bed.

This room is made for proposing! We didn't get to eat in here, but we were given a tour of the grounds and were shown this. We actually saw a couple walk in, but we don’t know what happened!