July 2010

11 Things that Didn’t Make it Home: The Central America Casualty List

To be totally honest, upon returning from 5 weeks in Central America, I felt pretty lucky to have all of my most valuable belongings still with me. I didn’t have any problems with my laptop and no one tried to snag my debit card or passport. These had been the main worries and I was happy to have had them all on my return flight with me. There were a few smaller items, however, that weren’t as fortunate and didn’t […]

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Featured Travel Photo: Painting the Streets of Antigua

A painter sits on a quiet street of Antigua, Guatemala as he paints the view of Fuego Volcano overlooking the small city.

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Things I Bought for Less Than $3

Travelers are almost always on some sort of budget. We try to make the money we’ve set aside stretch as far as it can possibly go, enabling us to see as many places as we possibly can. With that in mind I’ve compiled a list of a number of things I was able to purchase in Central America for under $3. Some things on this list aren’t a huge surprise, but there were a couple of times I was baffled […]

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Featured Travel Photo: Lake Atitlan Through a Spider’s Web

Lake Atitlan, Guatemala.  Shot from Indian Nose Point just outside the town of San Pedro La Laguna.

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Home Sweet Home

Yesterday was my first full day back in the states.  I’ve made time to catch up with friends and family, and have even started working again in the past 48 hours.  It has been a bit of a whirlwind and honestly, even though I was only gone for five weeks, I’ve already noticed some things I’ve got to adjust to back at home, like not speaking Spanish to random strangers.  I did this about three times in the airport just […]

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Beyond the Veil of Antigua

I’m back in Antigua, Guatemala, one of my favorite cities I’ve spent time in on this trip. Antigua is a beautiful city, with a quant Spanish colonial style, an easy 9 block by 9 block set up that is easy to navigate, numerous amazing restaurants and hostels, and dozens of backpackers to meet and mingle with. With all of these positive features of Antigua it is very easier for a visitor to take for granted the numerous other villages that […]

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Photos from Semuc Champey – The Gem of Guatemala

A few days ago I almost decided not to make the trip to Lanquin to see Semuc Champey. That would have been my worst decision of this trip and I am sincerely glad that I decided to make the trip! Semuc Champey was easily the most beautiful place I have seen duting my time here in Central America, and possibly the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen. I know I’ve said something similar to this a couple times throughout the […]

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The Cave of A Million Bats

Two days ago I picked up my girlfriend in Guatemala City. She flew in to spend the last week of my trip with me. We spent the next two nights in Antigua (one of my favorite cities so far) but today we made our way across the country (it sounds far but it isn’t too bad) to the tiny town of Lanquin. Lanquin doesn’t consists of very much but is home to some amazing bat caves, and even more importantly, […]

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My “Direct” Shuttle to Guatemala City

Yesterday I purchased a ticket from Copan Ruinas, Honduras to Guatemala City, where I will be meeting my girlfriend in the morning for the last week of this trip. I gave the guy at the desk an address of a hostel I had reservations at and asked if I could be dropped off there. He said there was absolutely no problem with that but I’d need to pay an extra $5 since the shuttle did not normally go to that […]

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Back to the Mountains and Mayan Ruins

For those of you keeping up, two days ago I was struggling with the decision of whether or not to leave the lovely island of Honduras and head to the town of Copan Ruinas in the highlands of Honduras. I made my decision and yesterday morning I left on the ferry out of Utila at 6:20am. It was a long day of traveling, including a three hour bus ride which I spent standing in the aisle for a vast majority […]

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Should I Stay or Should I Go Now

Right now I am in the middle of a bit of a dilemma. I am still in Utila, and have been diving everyday for the past 4 days. I love every second of it. Today I dove to my deepest depth at 30 meters to a ship wreck. It was the best dive I had had yet, until my next dive, where we swam within 10 meters of a Eagle Ray and followed a sea turtle for a few minutes. […]

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The Right of Passage

There are many types of organizations that have some sort of right of passage that new members must go through. People experience this in things like sports clubs, making it to the varsity football team, fraternities and sororities, and sometimes even being the new employee in a workplace. These rights of passage also exist in the world of Scuba Diving. For the past four days I have been on the island of Utila, Honduras. Utila is one of the Bay […]

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