Doug and I decided to take a day off in the small village of San Marcos along the shores of Lago Atitlan. This day off was weird to say the least as everywhere we looked there were hippies walking around like zombies, no one doing anything that involved moving fast. Pretty much the perfect place to lay low and rest for a day…. we thought. Bored out of our minds by the end of the day we decided to retire to our hotel at 8 pm for a good sleep so we could get out of town asap the next morning to a place that had a pulse. Turns out 8 pm is just the start of the action as a propagandah speech came blaring out of some large speakers somewhere up on the mountainside. For the next hr we lay wide eyed in our beds listening to this blaring noise, then a couple spanish songs were played and finally the racket died down. About 5 minutes later the dogs started barking and didnt stop till morning. And this wasnt just a few dogs, we figure every dog in town got into the action, at somepoints it sounded like there were 30-40 dogs going at it. No sleep that night. Nest morning at daylight we biked 80 km over the highest point on the pan-american highway (3670 m) to the large town of Xela. In this town we found sóme chocobananos for 15 cents. Pretty much the best food Id ever eaten. A semi frozen banana double dipped into milk chocolate. So good we decided to hang around Xela for an extra day so we could eat some more. On our day in Xela we awoke to a deep fog covering the entire town and plus 3 temperatures. Felt alot like Canada for the first time in months. Biking out of the fog we headed 5 kn out of town and climbed Volcan Santa Maria (3860 m). Pretty cool climb and there were around 20 Indigenous Mayans praying on top which added to the ambience. The next day Doug and I left Xela towards the highland village of Nebaj which is situated deep in the highlan mountains far from much anything else. At our meeting point 12 km out of town we missed each other at the crowded intersection which was full of people, cars, markets and dogs. Nonetheless we each ended up biking down opposite roads towards Nebaj. Dougs day was going alright till his bike wheel blew out and my day was going well till my back pannier broke off and jammed into my new wheel. Leaving all my food some clothes and other supplies I couldnt carry with me I packed what I could in my small pack and continued on, falling short of Nebaj by 60 km. The next day I climbed up to Nebaj where I now await for the energy stores to recover enough for the next move. Doug is currently trying to extend his vacation time and change his plane ticket or else hes off to Canada on the 7th.
