Juchitan to Quezaltenango

Quezaltenango. Thankfully, the locals call this city Xela (SHAY-la). From Juchitan, the midnight bus, we traveled for about 8 hours, stopping at one point in the night for the driver to have dinner. No one moved, most everyone was fast asleep. Thirty minutes later, the driver returned, and we drove on. We stopped in about 6 small towns, picking up or dropping off a few each time, and arrived in Tapachula, pop. 200,000, about 8:30am. The adventure of travel began here! We hired a taxi to take us the 20 minutes to the border, about $10US (in pesos, of course). From there, we walked about 6 blocks, the taxis were not allowed to go any closer to the border. We paid an officious looking man 20 pesos (less than $2US) - he wanted more, but I refused to pay more - to stamp our passports. From the moment we crossed the border, we were mobbed by men trying to sell us quetzales and get us on their bus to the closest village. It's very unnerving, if you're not prepared! We changed a few pesos to quetzales (7.8/US dollar), and later learned that he gave us a very good rate, and allowed ourselves to be shoved into a colectivo. There are basically two ways to travel in Guatemala: colectivo or bus. A colectivo is a mini-van, designed for 11 people. They can put at least 20 adults and an unlimited number of children, along with assorted packages, in one of these vans. The trip to Malacaton is about 30 minutes. From Malacaton, we allowed ourselves to be shuttled from one van to another, until I finally said, "Enough"! After asking a few questions, I learned that we had been driven in a circle, never straying far from the border. In Coatepeque, we got a chicken bus to Xela. That part of the Guatemala experience turned out to be the only time we were taken advantage of.

If you rode a US school bus in the 1970's or 1980's, you've ridden on of these buses. They are retired from service after a few years, and sold to needy drivers in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador. We passed a few in the night, between Juchitan and Tapachula, obviously being driven to their new jobs. Once in Guatamela, the gear box is changed to 6 gears, a roof luggage rack is added, interior luggage racks and hand-holds are installed, paint jobs are done if there is money, and speakers are installed. Then, they're ready to roll! And roll they do. A typical chicken bus in Guatemala will drive more in one day than most buses drive in one week in the US. And, even the locals call them chicken buses. They're sort of the national folk symbol of Guatemala.

Coatepeque is very hot, very crowded and chaotic. It's the main low-country city on the PanAmerican Drug route, and I'm glad to see the bus finally leave the city. Our driver circled the block 5 times, picking up more passengers each time. We were lucky: we got on early, and got a seat. Our bags were in front of us, our feet mostly over our heads, but we had a seat. We drove through the low country for about 2 hours, and stopped for a while in Retalhahue -Reyoo for short - while the driver got lunch. By now, the bus had emptied mostly. The rule about travel here: do it by early afternoon, the buses run later but it's not safe. I never felt unsafe the entire time we were in the country. We arrived in Xela about 3pm, both tired and thirsty. We were stunned at the crowds of people, and the buses. There must be 200 chicken buses here! The main bus "station" in Xela is beside the mercado, of course. The colectivos into the city are on the opposite side of the mercado. Really. So, with my backpack, and Stuart with his small rolling back, we pushed our way through the hard-to-describe crowd emerging without hurting anyone. The colectivo packed us in, and dropped us close to the main parque. We had marked a hotel in our Lonely Planet book, one block off the parque. Villa de Don Andres has four rooms, with a lovely, sun-filled courtyard.
Xela,pop 160,000, is more than a mile high, and cold. Colder at night. After dumping our bags, we find the best cup of chocolate I've ever tasted, and try to make a plan...dinner, and some sleep! Dinner was unremarkable, but the view of the sunset sky was nice. This is a colonial town, destroyed multiple times by the volacanos and earthquakes. Built by the Mayans, conquered and rebuilt by the Spanish, rebuilt by the German coffee plantation owners, and now drawing most people to more than 30 Spanish language schools. Much coffee is grown in this region, high on the mountains. Vegetables of every name are also grown here. It's on the tourist trail in Guatemala, mostly frequented by Europeans and Argentines. It's pretty, totally surrounded by volcanos and mountains and blue sky. I want to hike up a volacano, and we book a trip with a guide for New Year's Day. Early. Six a.m. Later, we asked ourselvs: "What were we thinking?!?"