Saturday, January 17, 2009

la antigua guatemala (guatemala).

The trasnfer from Copan into Guatemala to Antigua was supposed to be really nice and convenient, till our shuttle broke down on the side of the road out of Guatemala City! With cars, chicken buses and all sorts of motorcycles zooming by and the sun setting, we didn't know what the problem was...the driver said he had run out of gas, which didn't make too much sense because we had just pulled into a gas station where he had poured water onto the engine!!! So we waited for him to run back to that same gas station, get a gallon of gas and come back...the van still wouldn't start! So then he asked all the passengers to help push the van to the side so that he could drive against traffic (which was downhill) in the dark to get the minivan running and the engine starting...at that point, for some reason nobody thought it sounded a bit crazy, so we did just that...the car started, we almost got run over several times, and as soon as the engine started we jumped on and continued on our way...till about 2km later, when, the road still uphill, the engine broke down again, all of a sudden!
So then we decided we were going to hail a chicken bus down to get on and eventually make it to Antigua before nightfall...when all of a sudden a brand new, shiny minivan pulled over in front of us! Rescue had come to us!!! We proceeded to pull the broken down minivan to a gas station, where our former driver waited mfor a tow truck or something...then, 3 hours later, we finally rolled into Antigua!
Antigua is a really nice colonial town, a nice, tranquil, touristy oasis in Guatemala...many travelers end up ligering on for way longer, many others prefer to stop over here than in Guatemala City,...I met a couple whose bus from Flores got assaulted by people...
oops my shuttle is here...one hour to Guate, then seven to San Salvador, then 18 more hour on the bus to San Jose...night at the airport, then a 7-8 hour flight back to big D...it'll be long!

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