An Unexpected Stop

This is the 2nd blog I've written today, read "The Black Hole" first if you haven't yet. Dave, Hiroto, and I arrived in Panajchel and were immediately surrounded by people trying to sell us bus tickets and cab rides. We ignored them and walked into the main part of town to find a travel agency. We organized a van to take us to Guatemala City, where we would switch buses and catch the 3:30pm bus to San Salvador, El Salvador. Our driver told us that it would be just us 3 in the van, and that we could make it there by 3:30. For the next 30min, we drove around Panajchel picking up passangers to fill up the van. So much for that. We got into Guatemala City around 4, and got our van driver to drop us off downtown, and checked into a hotel that the book suggested. It was a really nice hotel, and our room even had a TV. We dropped off our stuff, and then went to go for a walk around town while it was still light. I guess its a pretty bad idea to be in Guatemala city after dark. We walked around town and kept an eye on the sun. The buses and traffic here is just insane, the buses are so crammed full I don't know how anyone gets off at the stop they want. They actually have people hanging out the side of the bus when its too full to fit more people on, and they unlucky ones to get stuck outside have to worry about being hit by other buses while they're moving.

We came across a billiards room and stopped in for a few games. The sun was almost down, so we decided to go find somewhere to eat back near our hotel, so we wouldn't have to walk far in the dark. It felt like a vampire movie or something, having to worry about the sun and making sure we're not out after dark. On our way home we stopped at a corner store to pick up some rum and ice. All the convenience stores here have bars at the door, so you can't actually go inside, you just go up to the bars and tell the person inside what you want, and they pass it through the bars. We went back to our hotel and taught Hiroto some Canadian drinking games, and then decided to go find a bar to have a few drinks. The guy at the front desk called a cab for us, and we went out of the dangerous downtown area and into a place where the big expensive hotels are. The first one we went to was called "Shakespear's Pub" we were talking to the bartender and owner, who was American and asked her where was a good place to go. She gave us the name of another place and after a few drinks in her pub we went to the other place.

It felt like a vampire movie...

We managed to get them to turn the TV from soccer to hockey, but the game was over and it was just updates. We stuck around that pub for a while, and then cabbed it back to our hotel. In the morning we called another taxi to take us to the bus terminal, our bus to San Salvador was to leave at 1pm. Guatemala City was better than I thought it would be, and certainly better than Belize City.