Sunday 8 August 2010

Landslides and Chicken Buses

So, I finally found the Zapatistas in Mexico. Bizarrely they were en route to Palenque. We drove through a military checkpoint which had a sign stating that they were searching for drugs, but when I asked the driver what drugs were in the region he said the sign is only for tourists. Really they're searching for arms entering the Zapatista towns further along the road "otherwise why would they only stop people in one direction?". And sure enough, as we progressed down the road we came across many towns with brightly painted Zapatista murals as well as many signs declaring voting allegiances in elections past. And a lot of Mayans living well below the poverty line.

Before arriving in Palenque we visited a few waterfalls, with many brightly coloured butterflies, including some rather enormous electric blue ones. Palenque itself was impressive, and the tour interesting, although rather difficult to follow as it was all conducted in Spanish... However I did learn a lot about the history, how it was abandoned, apparently for no reason, and how the grave of a woman (the red queen) was found in the temple next to the most important central temple. Who this woman was remains a mystery, but made for an interesting story. Fortunately most archaeological and scientific terms are the same in Spanish and English! On the way back the weather came in and parts of the road that I swear were present on the way to Palenque had vanished into the dark abyss below. We finally made it back to San Cristobal at 11pm, only to find the roads more resembled rivers than roads.

The next morning I was up bright and early ready for my shuttle to Quetzaltenango (Xela) in Guatemala. Ever hopeful of arriving at the predicted time of 2-3pm I was looking forward to a smooth trip the likes of which I had on the way to Mexico. All went smoothly until the Mexican border. The border control itself was simple, and for some reason I didn't get charged the entry fee to Guatemala that everyone else did, but the problems began when we couldn't gain the border in the shuttle. So everybody out and we hiked across the border to Guatemalan immigration. Then we sat and waited in the sweltering heat. It became apparent that the shuttle was not coming and eventually our Mexican driver found the reason for the lack of traffic. A landslide an hour up the road. So, back on with the backpacks and we hiked through the border town of Mesilla until we found a chicken bus. Chicken bus to the landslide, or as close as it was possible to get (2-3km away) and then hiking past the cars filling both lanes of the road, honking their horns and the lorry drivers sheltering from the rain drinking coke under their trailers. Finally we gained the landslide, just as they were breaking through clearing it, and hiked around, through a corn field, emerging at the other side to find a shuttle and a very confused and surprised driver (mostly because there were 3 of us who were very insistent that we'd booked shuttles to Xela and not to Pana and therefore really DID want to go to Xela). Finally the driver took us close to Xela and paid for a taxi to the centre for us, having missed all possible connecting shuttles!

Today, having recovered from the hiking in tropical heat and occasional rain, the three of us decided to go visit a nearby town, Zunil, to see San Simon and check out the town in general. All of this sounded like an excellent idea, and we caught the chicken bus without any problems. Of course then the chicken bus stopped in the next town down where a mudslide had filled the whole main street. So for the second time in 2 days we were hiking over a mudslide (although this time it was neither raining nor tropically hot, but we are over 2,000m here, so not the easiest work...). At the other end there were no buses, but we managed to find out from the locals where we could catch a pickup from, and finally made it to see San Cristobal and a cute little Mayan town, surrounded by fields and with a rather torrential river flowing through it, and with that half-constructed feel of so many places in Guatemala. The way back was relatively easy, I know the drill by now, and am a pro at landslide hiking now...

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