It's Been A While...

Ok, no excuses, I got lazy. So I'll paraphrase my movements for you to bring you back up to scratch. We flew to Mexico City apres Santiago. Arrival was the usual, airports, customs, bag checks, shoe checks, questions, check-ins-all of the things that I could do with my eyes closed. Mexico City is the second biggest city in the world housing 18 million people, all of which was clearly evident on arrival. Our hostel was located right on the main square and the bustle of both tourists and locals filled the air with a buzz. As I said our hostel was on the main square and looked out over the beautiful cathedral that's stooped in history which we were lucky enough to walk past every day. One of the highlights of said cathedral is a statue of Pople John Paul made out of devout follower's house keys that the church put together to commemorate him.

In the first couple of days we ambushed the obligatory sights; Freda Kahlo's house-a beautiful commemoration of an incredible woman, Leon Trotsky's house-where he was famously attacked in the middle of the night by gunmen and bullet holes of this attack can still be seen in the walls. We also made our first trip to a taco stand which was the first of many real Mexican food experiences. For approx 25c you could have a taco with refried beans and salsa that would blow your socks off. We were instantly addicted to these and within our first 2 days in Mexico City I think it would be safe to say we consumed near to 25 tacos each. Mexican food in Mexico is quite different from what I was used to back home. It's far more 'authentic'-for want of a better word. The salsa is hot, and not for the faint hearted. The meat is pulled and often mixed with veg and you'd be hard pushed to find cheese or guacamole at a taco stand-everything is thrown together in a matter of seconds by the 'taco man' so you wouldn't want to be a germphobe because everything is done by hand, and let's just say these people aren't the cleanest looking folk-but they know how to cook. We also sampled quesadillas where they could be found, the odd time you'd find an enchilada and fajitas don't really exist in mexico, from my time there I only saw them in tourist traps.

We visited the Museum of Anthropology, which in all honestly you could have spent three full days walking around there was so much to see, however we managed to learn about as much of evolution as we could in a few hours. Our best find in Mexico City however was their black market. We were told that this place was a must see and when we found it, we really never left. We went there every day for five successive days and could have gone back for more. The place was huge and in fairness huge as an adjective doesn't do it justice. It was like a maze of everything. Anything you could ever want, they had it. From DVDs to CDs, iPods, DVD players, vintage clothes, old cameras, TVs, laptops, new cameras, DJ equiptment, puppies, perfume, rolexes, shoes, food, bikes, souvenirs, you name it, it was there and it was all as cheap as chips.

Most of our time in Mexico was spent in the market, haggling with locals in broken Spanish, getting lost in the miles of bootleg mazes and finding stuff im sure we didnt need but had to have. I suppose it gave us a bit of a sense of Mexico City, as the whole time we spent in that market, we were the only foreigners there-surrounded by locals constantly.

While in the city we took a day trip out to the pyramids of Teotihuacan, some ancient ruins the aztecs left with the usual myserious inscriptions in the walls which will never be completely deciphered by our modern people if you ask me. It was interesting though, the brickwork was impressive for such an ancient tribe who obviously were doing everything manually.

After we'd spent ridiculous amounts of money and were satisfied that we had enough stuff we ventured off to Guadalajara-the apparent home of Guacamole-but as I said, Guac is rare in Mexico, it's mainly for the tourists. We spent a few days in this pleasent city but the cold weather soon drove us out before long. It really served as a stop off for us more than anything. So we continued on to the coast where our first stop was Puerto Vallarta. Here the cheap drinks, seaside vibe and decent weather proved satisfactory and we had an interesting night in an American chained bar where we were fussed over by the waiters who would come over and pour shots down our throats and then charged us for them, very sneaky. That said, it was a beautiful place and our first real taste of the Pacific.

Our next stop was a place called Manzanillo, which i can safely say I never want to go back to again. I don't like to make places sound crap but we were just so bored here. The hotel we were in was 'interesting'. The woman who owned it was about 105, and from what I could tell she never slept. She was always sitting in the lobby, sometimes she sat somberly like a statue with her eyes closed and a couple of times we thought she was dead. The room was awful, the bathroom stank of drain and the beds were ver undesirable. We were awoken at 4:30am by a parade outside on the street, which, no joke, went on for 3 hours. God knows why either. The beaches in Manzanillo were to be avoided, because as we were told, it was stingray season and we all know how dangerous sting rays are. So the days there provided us with little to nothing to do, except look at each other. Needless to say we didn't stay long as our next stop was Acapulco and I was about to die of bordem in that godforsaken place.

So Acapulco was an invigorating change. Our hostel was less than 100 steps to the beach and the beach was heaven. White sand, clear water, waiter service from the bar behind and 30 degree heat everyday. After so much bussing around we decided to chill out big time in Acapulco. Our hostel was full of interesting people who made for excellent socializing aquaintances-and Acapulco is GREAT for socializing. The numerous beachside bars always have something going on and the crowds of people and cheesy music along with the heat of the night never got old.

We spent one day on a glass bottomed boat which took us out to see the submerged Virgin of Guadalupe. As you can imagine the boat took us out only to see what looked like a statue of the Virgin Mary that someone threw in the water. The locals thought of it as somthing more suspicious mind. The boat then took us out to an island where they provided us with free drinks and an ancient ritual show put on by men dressed in the old get up. The island was a beautiful place with turquoise water and little inlets for sitting or sunbathing. The fed us a modest fish lunch and waved us goodbye.

An interesting find in Acapulco was the disco buses. Just average public transport with an interesting twist. From what I gathered any old eejit can just buy a bus and charge a certain fair for people to use it, however, the owners of these buses often decked out there vehicle with whatever tickled their fancy and the music was always blaring out of them. 80s buses, Heavy metal buses, rave buses with strobe lights-these proved the most hilarious, mainly because I'd look around-strobe lights on full force and dance music blaring out of the speakers and middle aged women sitting there with their groceries with a look on their face which conveyed a disconnectedness to all of this juvenile hysteria going on around them. It was pretty funny.

We reluctantly left Acapulco knowing if we didnt go now, we may well never leave. So we made our way south to the tiny surfing town of Puerto Escondido. We found a hostel in the lonely planet and just arrived there as soon as our bus got in, which was around 5am. There was a sign on the door to say that if no-one was there to just let ourselves in and wait for someone to arrive. The place was like a little alcove-someone's sitting room with pictures of English legends plastered to the walls; Diana, Beckham, The Beatles, Queen, The Tower Bridge etc etc. We sat in the sofas for about an hour, I found a 'New' magazine and I hadn't read trash in a good 3 months so I was satisfied. When the owner arrived-with a bang-we didn't really know what we'd let ourselves in for. The guy was insane. I'm not sure weather over the years he had smoked too much weed or he was just high on life, he was English and left England 8 years previous. Something told me he was on the run from the law. Anyway, he was an alright guy and proved a really entertaining conversationalist.

The beach at Escondido was an inlet surrounded by cliffs, it was small but so beautiful. It reminded me a bit of the beach in the film The Beach, that kind of vibe. The people were pretty chilled out and knew how to have a good time, whiling away their hours surfing and sunbathing. We left Escondido after a few days and got a bus to San Cristobel which is just next to the Mexican boarder on route into Guatamala.

Once we'd dealt with the boarder crossing into Guatamala everything changed. The buses, first off, weren't even buses, they were minivans in which they shoved 13 poeple into, no air con for up to 18 hours to get from A to B-nice. So after an unbelieveable uncomfortable journey we arrived down at Lake Atitilan, which is famous for the fact that it's surrounded by volcanos, which for a fee you can have a guide and climb up it. Well we all know that after Peru i was never climbing another mountain again so we passed on that. Instead I ambled around the village with my camera and captured the lake and volcanos from the water's edge. The place was evenly populated by begging children and desperate mothers who would ask for money constantly.

Seen as we weren't going to spend another few days trekking we moved swiftly on to the town of Flores, a quaint little place next to another beautiful lake. Flores is the access town for the ancient Mayan ruins of Tikal-famous also for the fact that they were the set up for the rebel base camp in Star Wars. We went to visit the ruins on a pretty bad day beause the rain came down non stop, and there isn't really anywhere to shelter when you're surrounded by mossy ruins. The place was beautiful, however with my ruined modern age mind it just made me feel like I was Lara Croft in Tomb Raider. It's a must see for Tomb Raider fans.

After Flores we visited the little town of Lanquin near Semuc Champey. We stayed in cabins in the jungle and this place was truely a culture shock. People lived out here in the middle of nowhere, no amenities, no electricity and the only way to get the nearest town is to hitch a ride when someone passes by. Which could be as little as once every 2 hours. We hitched a ride in a couple of times, throwing the driver a few bob when we did, often it was just a pick up truck and up to 8 people could just be sitting in the back bit. Little children would be waiting at the side of the road for a lift, some as young as 7 to go to the town to get food.

Our second day here was amazing. We got up in the morning and we met with a guide who brought us tubing down the green river with a natural current. It was great to float down the river look up and see all the trees, along the banks from time to time you'd see a woman washing her family's clothes, or washing her children. It's hard to put into words how beautiful this place was, you really need to see it for yourself. After the tubing our guide took us to see some natural pools above the waterfall, this place was like paradise, i couldn't bring my camera because it would get wet but I wish i could have. Huge crystal clear pools of water, which was fresh enough to drink. Our guide brought a rope ladder and secured it to a rock in one of the pools pulling it down threw the waterfall into the caves below. So imagine it, backing down a rope ladder with water cascading over you so hard that you cant keep your eyes open so can't see where you're going or what you're doing. The drop below is a good 60 feet, so if you fall, well you know. So on reaching the end of the rope ladder you have to really carefully place your feet so as not to slip, if you slip, you're slipping into a cave that's as black as night and in all honesty, i reckon that would be the end of it. So being careful we edged our way into the cave under the water fall and just sat there for a while. It was incredible, the whole ceiling was dripping with water that seemed to sparkle and the rocks which we were balanced on had varying degrees of slippy moss so we had to be really really carful at this point. Getting out of the cave was a little trickier and getting back up that rope ladder was almost impossible, it was like the most powerful shower ever, again not being able to see a thing and feeling around for the next rung on the ladder hoping to god my foot didn't miss it.

We got back on the road again to get to Belize. Again a less than comfortable minibus journey crammed with people was our mode of transport. After what seemed like a lifetime we arrived in Belize City and caught a boat over to Caye Caulker. Caye Caulker is a little island off Belize, in the Caribbean where the motto is 'Go Slow' and the people more often than not are doped up on life or sometimes something a bit more herbal. To our suprise, English is their native tongue alone with Creole, a derivative of English with a Caribbean vernacular which I couldn't understand a word of. Belize is famous for it's coral reef which is apparently second biggest in the world after the great barrier reef. We spent one of our days out on a sailboat with friends we'd made, snorkeling the coral reefs, swimming with eels, baracudas, puffer fish, octupus, stingrays and nurse sharks. The water was beautiful and the underwater life was incredible, way below us scuba divers let out huge bubbles of CO2 which looked fascinating coming up from below.

We hung out in Caye Caulker for the best part of a week, swinging in hammocks, reading books, eating lobsters and drinking rum punch with a really great mix of people, some of whom we have since met up with. The place was seriously chilled out and I could have stayed there for a lifetime.

Alas we had to move on for christmas. So we hopped on a boat and a bus to Cancun and arrived 2 days later. We got to Cancun, enjoyed an unusual Christmas in the blistering heat with a dinner by the only place in town that would provide us with a Christmas dinner on Christmas day-The Hilton. We went over to Playa Del Carmen for a few days in between Christmas and NYE. Like Cancun but a little less in-your-face, Carmen was a little beach town with alot of Americans and cheap beach huts on the beach. We headed back to Cancun for NYE, where we spent the festivities in the biggest club in Latin America, which proved a good choice, the party didnt end until the early hours of course.

Our original plans to bus it from Cancun to Texas were looking doubtful, mainly because we'd be on a bus for 2 days and it would cost us over $100. So we weighed up our options and decided to get a flight to Tampa, Florida.

Tampa was a great place to find ourselves. We were looking for a cheap vehicle to get us to the otherside of the country and we had copius amounts of people here to help us out. Before long we found a van for $500 so we went to look at it. The guy who sold it to us was the definition of hippy. With repititions of 'duuuuude' and his excitement of our interest in the van, a deal was soon made. We drove away later that day in the Vanetarium-so named for all of the glow in the dark stars that adorn the inside.

So soon enough we were on the road to DC for that world famous inauguration. We got there in good time and met up with some peeps from Belize. The place was jam packed with people, getting into a bar the night before proved difficult and the journey home which was normally a 10 minute drive took 3 hours due to road closures. On the day itself, we made our way out in the minus 10 climate over the frozen solid river across to the big Mall where all the festivities were happening. You know the details, presuming everyone watched it on tv I won't go into detail, I will say the atmosphere was electric though and people were on top form witnessing the 'change' they'd all been waiting for. It was great to be part of it and see the near to 2 million people who showed up for the two miles sprawling across the great mall. We went out that night in celebration. I found myself talking to a group of New York Times photographers and a few fo which were working for National Geographic. The table where they were drinking was covered with what i would imagine to be close to 25 grand's worth of equiptment and I couldn't get my head around why they were just sitting on this table.

After doing the usual DC sights the next day, we decided to head up to the good old Big Apple for a few days. The cold up there was unbearable and each time we would come back to the van our bottles of water would be frozen solid. We spend most of our time in the East Village, checking out museums we missed out on last time and getting a feel for the area we were in. One night we went to a bar-The Beauty Bar, which was an old hair salon which had been transformed into a bar but kept all of the original features, which made for some interesting photos of us getting our 'colour developed' while having a beer.

New York, of course had everything going on, minus the weather of course. We wanted to stay but had to leave, get on the road, continue what little time we had left in the states. So we headed over to Philadelphia, home of the Philly Cheese Steaks, most worth while. While there, we went to see the liberty bell, the Independance Hall, and of course the Rocky steps up to the art museum. Philadelphia is a big city with some beautiful architechture and alot of America's history. (I may be rushing through this but I said I was going to paraphrase)

In between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh we stopped off in a local Amish village and bought some root beer, cookies and fudge from an Amish family in their house. It's a bit of a culture shock to see these people and how they live, in their horse drawn carraiges and with no electricity or any kind of modern appliance. It was fascinating.

So we hit the road again and headed west for Pittsburgh; home of Andy Warhol, the Pittsburgh Steelers and more bridges than Venice. On the day we arrived, it was the superbowl final, a BIG deal over here and whaddaya know, Pittsburgh Steelers are in the final. So we go to a 'Superbowl Party' which was full of hugely enthusiastic American football fans. The game went on for about 4 hours and in the last 30 seconds, the steelers won, thank god, because i didn't want to be around if those fans got angry. Amazingly, as soon as the game finished, like clockwork everyone in Pittsburgh ran out of their houses and down the streets accumulating to hundreds of people running to nowhere in particular and screaming at the top of their lungs, an atmosphere which outdid anything I've ever seen.

The next day we headed down to the Andy Warhol museum which houses most of his sketches alot of his photography and paintings and a few of his 'time capsules'. It was really amazing to see all this stuff for real. It's the kind of place you could walk around all day just looking at stuff over and over again.

Once we left Pittsburgh we drove into Ohio and stopped off in Columbus, where we hung out with some guys who took us to see what the nightlife had to offer, we went to Ladies 80s night, which was all it promised to be. 80s hits all night and half price drinks for ladies. The one downfall Columbus had was about 4 inches of ice over everything. So there was numerous occasions of falling flat on the ground (especially in my case) so care had to be taken. We ate in the local diner and stayed indoors mainly due to the minus 12 conditions outside.

So now here we are in St Louis, Missouri. We went to a dive bar last night where an old American stereotype taught us how to play shuffleboard, we listened to the jukebox which was full of all the motown and country hits. This place was pretty much what you'd imagine. Old guys propped up at the bar avoiding going home to their wives and women who looked like they'd spent hours getting ready to come down to this place. We were by far the youngest people there-obviously out-of-towners, we were the main attraction.

So there you have it, I'll update in the next few days from now on...