Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Antigua and Semuc Champey (09.07.2013 - 12.07.2013)

We reached Antigua in one of the many tourist shuttle busses which dropped us off in the city center. After having found a place to stay (which we changed for the second night) we went to wander around this old town with its many half demolished buildings/churches. We saw a poster about O.X. an adventure tour operator and headed there inquire about one of the many volcano tours. Sadly the next overnight tour would only depart 3 days later. So we decided to do the downhill bike tour the next day. Which was awesome! They took the two of us and a young american couple (kids basically ^^) up the mountain on a pick up truck. From there we had to ride maybe half an hour more or less uphill through villages and corn fields. The downhill part that started there was exciting and you could get quite some speed. Just beware of the farmers coming uphill :) After arriving in a little town the guide told us we could grab a little local shuttle bus to get up hill again, for not even a doller each. The americans had enough but the two of us didn't ^^

The next day we headed up north to Coban, where we had dinner at one of the many food stalls which are parked around the main plaza in the evening. All the stalls sell/server the same menu, not so entrepreneurial...
The day after we visited Semuc Champey. These lime stone kind of waterfalls and pools are of a awesome colour and quite some fun to splash around! We did the steep climb up the viewpoint first, the view was definitely worth the exhaustion. Swimming in the pools afterward was even more refreshing that way.