Hello Costa Rica!

I had a great time at the beach the last few days... no doubt. I fought my hangover this morning and decided to head south into Costa Rica in search of new vistas and beers. Unfortunately I can´t upload pictures here so this will have to be a brief update. I´m heading to Montezuma in the NW of Costa Rica tomorrow, but tonight I´m staying in the dusty travel hub of Liberia. I´ll do a propper update tomorrow =)

Fresh Off the Beach

I just popped into town to get some supplies and I thought it would be a swell time to give a quick update. Unfortunately my SD card reader isn´t working anymore so I can´t upload any more pictures. I´ll search around town to try and find a replacement but im not optomistic =( I just found out that this place has a mini UBS cable so I guess I´m in luck today but who knows about tomorrow... but back to the beach talk.

The deal is that I´m staying at this cool little spot down on the beach north of town. It´s got maybe 5 houses that each have a few rooms for rent and one house that will cook for you if you pay them. I think I´ve heard a word for that before... the beach there is amazing! Huge waves crash right in front of me and the sound of the surf in the morning is deafening from my bed. Everyone that I´ve met at this beach went there for just `a couple days´ and ended up seeing 5 weeks fly by so it was great fortune for me that I rolled in the day after a big group left and picked up the best room there for $25 a night.

Most people there cook their own meals and then spend the rest of the night drinking and what not so last night I hung out at the home of `mushroom mark´who is so well established that he built a bar/kitchen out of driftwood and entertains there. Actually he just talks endlessly but he´s fairly entertaining so I guess its ok. Also, on the bus ride into town today I ran into a girl who´s also from Moraga, CA! She said that her name is Julia Sakkis and that she´s a friend of my sister. She also mentioned that on the islands in Panama that I´m headed towards (Bocos del Toro) the owner of the most popular bar (Mondo Taitu) is from Orinda. Small world.

This morning I got woken up when Mario was running aroung shouting ´Tortuga´which means turtle. Turns out that baby turtles were popping up out of the sand and we all needed to see it. After the turtles do their thing on the beach at night, the owner of my hotel digs them up and reburries them in the yard so that the locals dont dig them up and eat them. So, the turtles were popping up in the sand filled yard and we helped by digging them out, putting them in buckets of water and helping them to the surf. I got lots of great pictures.

I think that this afternoon I may actually go surfing or maybe just swimming and get some reading done. I paid for 3 nights at this hotel and I think I´m going to regret not doing more. Most importantly though, I need to get a bottle of Flor de Cana, the best rum in the world by most accounts, and some coke for cuba libres on the beach. I met a bunch of other guys staying a few rooms away from myself and they showed me some of the other nearby beaches. The one just north of us is a small one entirely occupied by a walled compound belonging to the richest family in Nicaragua. That means that we get the whole place to ourselved and the sand has been meticulously combed of rubbish. Sweet.

Out to Lunch

Over lunch I decided that this town was full of old people and not so much with backpackers so I need to move on. Too bad... it´s a nice place. Anyways, I´m heading up to a surfing school a few beaches north that supposedly has a cool hostel. If there´s room I´ll stay there but I doubt that it has internet so I may not update for a few days. Sorry Sam =( ttyl

Off to the Beach

I find myself in a nice air conditioned net cafe near the beach, so it´s time to do a more legnthy update. I ended up deciding to stay in Grenada for an extra day so that I could hike the nearby `Volcan Masaya´. I met another gringo yesterday, Robin, who had come up from Costa Rica so that she could get her visa extended. She voulenteers on a Chocolate farm down there with a lot of other gringas. They don´t get paid for their work and in fact they have to pay out $10 a day to stay there. There´s no electricity and they all date the local Ticos. I think they might also be communist. Anyways, she didn´t seem so bad and we met up the next morning to catch a bus out to the volcano.

When we got to the volcano we vowed to hike the 7km from the road to the top and after a lot of sweating and swearing I made it there. Granted, it was one of the shortest volcanos that I´ve ever seen, but it´s also the first I did completely so whatever. The crater at the top has a very dramatic depth and the Spaniards considered it the mouth to hell itself. They put a big cross near the top for good measure but that didn´t stop it from eruping a few years later to wipe out a couple villages. Maybe they just provoked it. It´s been fairly tame for a while now, but last year it spat up some rocks and crushed a couple tourist vans but nobody was hurt somehow. Anyways, it still took a swipe at us with some killer heat but there were some girls selling cold cokes at the top so it didn´t bother me too much. At the bottom of the volcano was a rather large museum on the mountain that had mroe volcano maps and diagrams than I´ve seen in my life. They really went above and beyond. Robin turned out to be interesting in at least one aspect, she knows a lot about my new favorite historical figure, William Walker. Not that he was great in all aspects but he was an American Confederate who tried to conquor Central America with a band of mercenaries and was the president of Nicaragua for a while. He ended up losing a key battle (which is celebrated around here) after he pissed off one of the Vanderbilts who paid for another army of locals and mercs to fight him. Anyways, you should read a little about him... it´s a crazy story.

After the hike I returned to Grenada and wandered around town looking for a nice bar. While searching, Robin and I heard a lot of music and clapping coming from one building so we went in and watched what I´m guessing was a school talent competition for a while. There was some dancing, singing, poetry, and some funky costumes. After that got boring I found a bar with fantastic mojitos (my favorite) and I chatted up some welsh guy who´s sponsoring a local girl to go to university. Charitable fellow. I bought him a beer and headed back to the hostel so I could get to bed early for my ride out of town the next morning. I rode out to San Juan del Sur, the most popular beach town in Nicaragua. Oh, and on the way I got to stop by the lake and take a cool picture of the volcano island that sits in the middle. Some of the people in the van were going there and I was feeling a little jealous till I found out that they were going to hike up it. That thing is way too tall for me. Upon getting to the beach town I got a cheap hotel and started wandering. It´s pretty but seems kinda dead and I think that I´ll try to catch the ferry to a different beach a little ways north where there´s a famous surfing school. Lord knows I need it. The other thing that´s going on in this town is a diving school and if the prices are right I may try to get my certification here. I´m gonna go find some grup so ttyl.

Brief Update

I had a fun day today, but I´m writing from my hostel that doesnt let me upload pictures so I´ll do the real update tomorrow. Today I climbed a volcano and tomorrow I´m traveling to San Juan del Sur, a beach town in southern Nicaragua. Just wanted to say I´m still alive. ttyl

Another Long Day

I didn´t like waking up today. Last night I ate at the only restaurant close enough to my hotel that I though I wouldn´t get stabbed at: Wendys. That was kinda gross and when I got up to grab a shower I saw my first cockroach of the trip... in fact it was my first one ever outside of a zoo. I must live a privilaged life. When I got out to the bus stop at 6AM I got to test the limits of mf my Spanish skills when I found out that a bus going south to Nicaragua does not stop at my town despite what I had heard the night before. Maybe it´s because it´s a Sunday. I made clear my needs to anyone who´d listen to me nearby the bus stop and they indicated that I should take a `chicken bus´ north and get off in some town that sounded like Jicama at the Oasis Hotel. I was falling asleep on the ride out there, but the bus driver kindly informed me when to get off and I found a very nice bus to Managua waiting for me. Quite literaly because I was the last person there and it took off the moment I stepped on board. Oh, about chicked busses... I don´t think that I´ve explained them before, but they´re old american school busses refitted with more seats, bigger engines, extremely tackey paint jobs and lots of chrome. They´re the cheapest busses and they´re so fast that they pass everyone on the road. I like em but they´re a bit crowded.

After changing busses a few more times I eventually got to Granada, a fairly famous city in Nicaragua. It´s supposedly the oldest European city in the new world, whatever that means. It´s very pretty, built on a lake, it´s been sacked by pirates no less than 3 times, and it once faught a civil war against the city of Leon a hundred miles away in an attempt to become the capital of Central America. They´re full of pride around here. That and Regetone music, the most vile kind of music there is.

After I found a cool hostel to stay at, the `Bearded Monkey´, I wandered around for a little while and watched a small concery being held in the town square. It was a bit of live ranchero music and I thought it was pretty good. Also I got Erika a preasent here but don´t tell her that ;) Shortly thereafter I ran into someone that I saw at the hostel eating alone so I had some beers with them and wandered around the city some more. It´s fiercely hot today and I don´t think that it´s gonna get any better when the two of us climb up some volcano tomorrow. I don´t recal what it´s called but I´m pretty sure that there´s no lava. It´s late now so I´m gonna go catch a shower... there´s a draught here so the city shuts off the water during daylight hours and you have to catch up on your bathing late at night. ttyl

Travel Day

Today I covered a lot of ground. I bid a silent goodbye to my roommates at the hostel in Copan as I left to catch my bus at 5AM. I loved this bus from the moment I saw it. It was decked out with huge seats with enough room for even my knees, movie screens (would you believe they played Apocolypto?), and drink service. I mostlt slept thru the 7 hour ride, and when I woke up I was in Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras. In my few waking moments, I noticed that the countryside was try and mostly forected with pine trees... one would be forgiven if they mistook it for the hills of california between Sacramento and Tahoe.

When I got off the bus finally I found myself at the bus station in the capital of the most dangerous country in Central America without a guide book and no other gringos in sight. I´ll admit that I felt a little vunerable. I knew that I could catch the direct bus to the capital of Nicaragua to the south but i´d have to spend the night in Tegucigalpa and wait for the morning. Without a guide book I´d be at the mercy of the taxi drivers who are known for scams. I decided to catch a shorter ride south on a different bus immediatly rather than wait out the rest of the day in the city. So, I rode that one another 4 hours south and ended up in Choluteca, 45 minutes north of the Nicaragua border.

I´m writing from the net cafe across the street from my hotel. I pushed the limits of my poor spanish skills and found the time and location of the bus to Nicaragua the next morning and got this hotel recomendation close to the bus station. Its a little smelly but I did get AC with it for a total of $10. Actually thats a really high price for around these parts but I didnt see any alternatives and it´s hot as holy hell here. I´ll write again when I´m actually inside Nicaragua. No idea where I´ll end up, but at least I´ll have a guide book.

Busses and Ruins

Hi guys! I'm writing today from sunny Honduras, rated as the most dangerous country in Central America. Actually it seems really nice to me from where I'm looking at it and I heard all the same stuff about Guatemala and and it was really nice too. So, after I traveled to Antigua yesterday afternoon, I got up at 4 this morning to catch the van to Copan Ruinas in Honduras. Copan Runias is a tiny town built next to Copan, which is a very nice set of mayan ruins out in the jungle. The town is about half a mile across and has a lot of great flowers, cobbled streets, and very short residents. The town square is a veritable garden of eden and a lot of really cool shops and restaurants are built around it.

After meeting up with a Canadian named Steve on the van ride out, we checked into a hostel together and hiked out of town towards the ruins. We got a little lost on the way out there but eventually found some of the most impressive mayan ruins around. Its not as large as the ones at Tikal but its got the best set of carvings and statues in the new world. Some of them are still out in the open like the macaw heads in the ball court seen in the picture here. Behind that is the 'stairway of hyrogliphs' covered up with a roof. Its got a huge set of starts that are covered with writing and record the history of the place. Unfortunately some of it got jumbled when part of it collapsed but the generally we've got the story straight. The rest of the statues can be found in the museum nearby.

Inside the museum is a recreation of the some part of the temple with fresh pait on it, and some petty damn detailed stone reliefs and stelae which are like carved pillars with huge depictions of the king, mostly a guy named '18 Rabbit' at this site. After tiring of that stuff we headed back to the hostel so I could clean up after sweating a couple pints in the jungle and now I'm off to have some shishkebabs with some more people I met at the hostel. Tomorrow I'm catching a bus at 5AM to get to the capital of Honduras, which I can neither remember or pronounce, and then I'm catching the Tika bus to the capital ofNicaragua... wherever that is. Hopefully I can get all that done in one day and start to spend some slow and fun time in Nicaragua. ttyl

Lots More Lake

Sorry I didn't update yesterday... but it wasn't a veryproductive day so there wasn't a whole lot to say. Actually, thats the best kind of day there is. I went back to the town of Panajachel to start my trip South to Honduras. When I got there I found out that my bus out was held up due to some protests being held somewhere so I'd have to come back the next day. It turns out that when the teachers or anyone else go on strike in this country, they block the main highway through the country to get some attention. Makes sense to me. The mountain shown in the picture here is called Indian Nose since its supposed to look like a Mayan face. I think I can see it. I took the pic from my hotel room.

After that I tried to hit up some ATMs to get a little cash. Neither of my ATM cards were working in any of the 6 machines around town and I was getting a little worried. So, I called up the banks, got some stuff straightened out and now the theory is that it will start working in a couple days. I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I've since learned from other travelers that going into the banks can land you cash when the ATMs wont work and that I could also just charge cash against my credit card inside any bank. They make it so easy for me.

After that I went back to San Pedro to spend the night and meet up with the guys again. I found them pretty easily and we proceded to bar hop until later in the evening when we held a lunar eclipse party with some other backpackers that I met. It was drizzling so no moon was visible unfortunately. Anyways, it was a good time. Basicaly a day party. I'm a little sad to have to leave town today but I've got a better time awaiting me in Costa Rica so I'd better just pack it on down there asap. ttyl

Relaxing at the Lake

After I last posted yesterday, I ran into an old guy, Ernie, that I had met that morning on the van ride to the lake. We talked for a while and I decided to go on a 2 hour horse riding trip with him the next morning. He had met some greek guy a couple weeks ago and managed to find the house of the horse owner by memory from the recalled directions. I couldn´t have found the place even if I had a map... it was down a lot of twisting garden paths with at least a dozen turns. I agreed to meet him early in the morning so I headed back to my hotel to get dressed for the town´s nightlife. I met a couple of Canadians (Greg and Brendan) who are next door to me. Btw, that´s a picture from my hotel room´s balcony. The cost of the room is $4 per night but I got talked into paying $6 so I´m a sucker ;P

I hung out with them for the rest of the day/night... they work on repairing ships at drydock up in Victoria and they decided to take off 4 months to travel. One of them has spent a bit of time in Central America already and lived in my current town, San Pedro, for a month so he knows all the places to hang out here. We went off to some restaurant that he liked and indeed I thought it was pretty swell too. It has a largist courtyard with table scattered about under thatched umbrellas with candles and ther was an open campfire in the middle of it all. They played the sountrack to Trainspotting before going on a Beetles binge as we knocked back many many beers. The guy who was here before has also spent a month on this tiny (2 acres) island in Belize called Tobbacco Caye that Erika and I also spent a few days on. He spent his time spearfishing, conche diving, drinking of course, and paying 8 doallars a day total. I´m wicked jealous.

We headed home at 2 when the bars closed, a couple hours after is legally permitted, and I definitely missed my 8:45 rendevouz with Ernie and the horses. I left a note on his hotel door appologising and maybe I´ll run into him later. He likes it so much here that he´s staying for a week. That´s pretty much the opinion of everyone that i´ve met but I´m going to start heading towards Honduras tomorrow. I´ve been mapping out how many days I´ll take in each place in my head, and I´ve got around 7 days that I haven´t got much of a plan for yet. Maybe I´ll stay in some beach town and try to get my open-water scuba license that´s required to take any kind of scuba tour that´s available. It takes several days and I´ve never had the time on any other trip to do it. Here´s a pic of some cafe I havent tried yet next to the water. Despite the ratty pictures that I´ve put up of this town, its not so shabby and I rather like it.

Lakes and Volcanoes

As promised, I did visit the volcano yesterday. The van took off at 2 but we got held up in terrible traffic when the afformentioned religious procession blocked off our path for half an hour. Unfortunately I did not get a chance to take a picture, but for the brief seconds that I saw it there were several large wooden platforms with life-sized statues of Mary, Jesus, and various saints being carried down the street by a hoard of purple clad people. Actually, they were wearing really large hooded felt robes and all the little kids had them on too. Apparently this procession is held every Sunday in the weeks leading up to easter which is Central America's biggest holiday.

When we got to the volcano, the sun was already set and clouds were closing in. Some people in the group opted to rent horses to carry them up to the top but I'm too proud and cheap for that so I hiked the rest of the way after the van dropped us off. I got to talk with an Aussie on the way up who is in the country taking language classes. He told me all sorts of colorful stories about recent crimes against tourists by gangsters and the police(who are equally as bad as the gangsters in this country) that were so shocking that I won't rcount them here lest my mother read this. By the time we got to the top of the mountain and started to decent into the field of lava flows it was getting pretty dark and cold. Thankfuly we had glowing hot lava at hand to solve all our problems.

Right before we started walking onto the lava field the guide offered this advice. He said that if you smelled buring rubber then you´re close enough but if you smell buring bacon you may want to backoff. I came to learn that he meant that my shoes would melt and indeed they did a little.

Most of the lava field that could be seen was all cool and jagged beyond compare butwe found the hot stuff easily enough. It wasn't shooting up but rather oozing extremely slowly. At 20 feet I was comfortably warm and felt safe but when I got to 6 feet of it so as to poke it with a stick it was almost unbearable. I had to jump over several lava filled fissures about 1 foot wide and several feet deep to get that close and I thank my video gaming skills for helping me navigate the field of fire. The Aussie that I was hiking with broke out some marshmellows and we roasted them on a coat hanger he also brought. Soon after we headed home and hiked for an hour in the rain. On the way back we passed through a mountain town on the side of the volcano and a lone gringo getting a off a chicken bus (that´s the cheapest kind of bus... refurbished american school busses with bigger engines and lots of chrome) and the guide said that the town was famous in Guatemala for banditry and that he was a gonner ;P

The next morning I caught an early van out of town to head for Panajachel. We had some minor mechanical problems on the van which included loud thumping noises and after than some old lady gat a nasty gash on her leg getting back into the van. There was really a lot of blood =/ We eventually got to town (and to a hostpital) and got to enjoy it for a few hours. It's a largish town build on the Eastern side of the most beautiful lake that I've ever seen; Lago Atitlan. The lake is dominated by two HUGE volcanoes on the north and south side of it and about 6x10 miles in size. That sounds kinda big but having the volcanoes next to it makes it look rather small. I had a nice lunch of pizza and a beer that I think was bigger than a 40oz and took a boat to San Perdo on the other side of the lake where I heard a nice atmosphere could be found. It was... the town is very small, built on a steep hillside along the water, and has a lot of people my age wandering around. I've already met a few but I guess I'd better go meet the rest. It reminds me a lot of McCloed Gange in India if you´ve been there... I think it would be easy to lose many days around here if you´re not careful. ttyl

First Day Out

I'm writing now from a net cafe in Antigua, Guatemala, and I've got a lot to report, but let me first explain howI got here.




Nine days ago on friday I had my last day at Kush Games. There has been a lot of drama there lately and I've accepted a new job at Zindagi Games. I know everyone there and it's 50 yards from my apt so it was an easy choice. Anyways, the president Umrao offered me a little time off before I started so I decided to take advantage of that to the tune of one month of travel. In the week before I flew out of LAX I spent a lot of happy days with Samantha. Here's a nice pic of us on the Channel Islands for a bit of hiking and picnicing. On the day before I flew out we also hit up Disney Land and had a typicaly great time. Now that I think of it, we also went to Vegas on the weekend before that. Busy times =)



At 1 AM on Saturday morning I flew out of LA. That was the plan at least but due to a 1.5 hour check in line and my showing up a mere 1.5 hours before the flight, I missed the plane. I got put onto the next flight an hour later and due to my multiple other connections having some layovers I ended up getting to Guatemala on schedule so it all worked out swimingly.



When I got to Guatemala City the next morning I blew through customs and hopped on the first minibus to Antigua. In tradition with all other Central American cities, the capital was crowded, smoggy, and filled with American franchises. I saw 2 Burger Kings and 2 Chuck-e-Cheese's within 4 blocks. The best plan is to get out ASAP unless you want to stick around for some museums or to get some sleep before a 5 AM flight out of the country.





The drive to Antigua consisted of a 1.5 hour trip throught some mountains that were less like a jungle and more like a forest. There were pine trees, lots of flowers, and I even got a little chilly. I guess I just pictured the whole country as a steaming jungle. When we got to Antigue I was pleased to see clean streets, not so much wood/car smoke, and more dilapitated churches than I can take pictures of. I think that the actual count is 38 churches within a couple square miles. The city was designated the seat of spanish rule over all of Central America in 1543 and was built up with a lot of flair. Unfortunately the city was built between two volcanos that didn't cover the town in lava but instead plagued it with earthquakes. After a particularly bad one in 1773 the seat of power was moved once again and the city has been at a stand-still ever since.



When I got here I walked around to at least 8 hotels before I found a room. It's a small but clean and has a bathroom accesable from the courtyard. After walking around for a while I got some dinner at the Rainbow Cafe... they make some of the best quesadillas I've ever had and I wish that I had taken a picture. I hate to eat alone so I sat with an older man (named Ian) who turned out to be the author of 'Roughing It: Guatemala'. He advised me on how I should spend my 17 days till I meet up with Samantha in Costa Rica, hundreds of miles away to the south. He suggested that I should spend the majority of my time in Guatemala, skip El Salvadore entirely, breeze through Hondures by bus, and spend a week in Nicaragua, just to the north of Costa Rica. We swapped some stories and he went on his way. He's headed to Panajachel where I'm going tomorrow so maybe I'll run into him again. I decided to spend a second day in Antigua so that I could get up early today and photograph some churches before the cars showed up. It's Sunday so there's supposed to be some religious procession with music, flowers, and floats but I'm in here writing so who knows if I'll see it =/ The other reason that I'm spending another day in Antigua is so that I can visit Volcan Pixcaya. It's an active volcano an hours drive away and I'm joining a tour of the lava field there. Apparently you get to walk on fresh lava just yards away from the glowing stuff. Can't do that in Hawaii ;) I'm going to head off for that in a few hours after I get some rations for the hike.


I think that my favorite part of travel would be the people that I meet. I like to go to the smaller places where there aren't too many wattering holes to get a beer at so you run into the same gringos constantly from town to town. Yesterday I chatted with a Parisian named Vincent, Ian whom I've already mentioned, an Austrain named Franz, and some others whos names I cant recall. Hopefuly I'll meet some more people at the Volcano that can steer me towards the best adventure yet. Either that or we'll parish in a hail of sulfer and fire. That's what makes it so stimulating ;)



I'll finish up the post with a picture of my lunch today beacuse I really enjoyed it even though it looked... questionable. It's churrizo soup with a side of tortillas and a glass of juice. Not too bad for 6 dollars, but I think that I need to find some cheaper eats. This town is one of the more expensive places that I'm going so it's not gonna be too hard.




Ttyl... next time I'll have pictures of lava, or is it magma?

Plotting and Packing

This weekend I did a bit of shopping for gear with Samantha and last night I got some more material in the mail. Pretty much everything that I'm going to take with me is now in my posession. I was reading the Lonely Planet forums the other day to glean some packing advice. What I learned (and already knew) was that the experienced traveler always packs light. I want people to think that I know what I'm doing so that's the advice that I'm going to live by. Rick Steve's website gives a good rundown of how and why to pack light.
So, following that advice I decided to only carry 2-3 changes of clothing and to do frequent washes in my hotel sinks. Obviously if I wash a couple of pieces of clothing every night then I would have to carry far less weight with me over the next month. I had a bad experience on a trip to Belize washing clothes in a hotel sink. I didn't have good soap and the cotton shirt didn't dry overnight. This was a problem because I had to pack it the next morning and it smelled strongly of mildew for the rest of the trip. The smell bled into the rest of my pack too. This time I'm going with a mostly acrylic set of clothing that will dry quickly and weight less. That said, here's a list of the clothes that I'm bringing with me.

2 pairs of pants w/ zip-off legs
2 tee shirts (cotton)
2 button down short sleeve shirts
1 button down long sleeve shirt
1 fleece jacket
1 thermal leggings (the pants are not warm and these weight nothing)
3 pair socks
3 pair underwear
1 brimmed hat
1 pair outdoors-ish sneakers
1 pair Teeva sandals
1 pair swim trunks

For a long trip, that's a pretty small set of clothing. It's mostly brown and khaki but I've got some color in the tee shirts and the long sleeve shirt is dark so I could pass it off as dressy in a pinch. I have put some thought into what other gear I'll need to have with me. I've decided that it would be a rare occasion that I'd need a sleeping bag or tent so I won't bring those. Here's a rough list of the other stuff that I'm taking.

1 set various toiletries
3 sets extra contact lenses
1 pair glasses
5 books (2 LP guidebooks, 2 novels, 1 programming book)
1 flashlight
1 medkit
1 tiny digital camera
1 alarm clock
1 silk sleep sack
1 light towel
1 small daypack
3 net stuff sacks
1 vial iodine tablets
1 notepad + pen
1 sewing kit
1 knife
1 lighter
1 piece of nylon rope (I've seen a lot of survival shows ;)

To pack it all up I've got a new travel bag. I really liked one that I saw on Rick Steve's travel site... it's a mid sized bag with stow-away shoulder straps that's the perfect size for light travel. Next I just need to put a little more thought into my exact itinerary. I'll relay that to you later.

Planning Tedium

Today I made the most critical step in planning any trip... buying the tickets. I know it sounds boring, but it not only signifies an absolute commitment to the otherwise speculative travel plans, but it also defines the frame of time in which to paint the picture of a dream vacation =) It's been my practice for the last couple of trips that I've taken (Belize and Costa Rica) to get the tickets first and then figure out exactly how I'm going to spend that alloted time. That style of planning buys into my idea that real travel (or adventure if you like to think of it that way) should be shot from the hip and not planned too precisely. That element of uncertainty and dynamism not only adds to the excitement but also allows me more flexibility to persue activities that I can't see from afar in the comfort of the office. It's like current Steve giving future Steve a high-five.

I've got a general idea some of the places that I want to visit but I've got a lot of research ahead of me to get a better grasp on that. The only firm facts are my flight times.



Los Angeles (LAX) to Zacatecas (ZCL) 2/16/081:00 am - 5:50 am Mexicana
Zacatecas (ZCL) to Mexico City (MEX) 2/16/087:00 am - 8:15 am Mexicana
Mexico City (MEX) to Guatemala City (GUA) 2/16/081:40 pm - 3:40 pm Mexicana


San Jose (SJO) to Phoenix (PHX) 3/13/087:35 am - 12:20 pm US Airways
Phoenix (PHX) to Los Angeles (LAX) 3/13/081:35 pm - 3:02 pm US Airways


So there we have it. I'm flying into Guatemala and out of Costa Rica four weeks later. I should note that I also purchased a ticket for Samantha (my girlfriend) to join me in Costa Rica for the last week. We're meeting up with some family of her's down there and hopefuly we'll get a local take on what's most important to see. I've been to Costa Rica once before and I visisted the capital and some of the NW part of the country. It was awesome. Here's a pic of that trip. ttyl