Yours, Mayan and Hours

Not wanting to oversleep, I was jerked awake at 0430 hours (0 dark hundred for those not familiar with military time). Breakfast was due in our room at 0600. I twisted to grab more coffee and felt an unwelcome twinge of pain in the middle of my back. Oops .. this is not a good development. I decide I will proceed on the planned "Tikal or Bust" 10 hour tour. First step is The Champ (a/k/a Gary) finds most of our group in the coffee bar. We must turn in our tickets together if we expect to be on the same bus. Gary is unanimously voted in as Mom to keep the Nine Niftyfooted Neighbors together. We learn we will fly up with the 23 strong "Guatemalan Gorrillas Group". We crawl through San Tomas, where Belize is now looking like a swanky destination. Every humble abode is enclosed at the property line with fencing - chain link, barbed wire, electric .. take your pick.

Finally, we arrive at a little-used airstrip and are given the Obsidian Opportunity - be prepared to explain, in sufficient detail, why the Mayans would locate Tikal (properly pronounced ti-ka-hol; rhymes with al-co-hol) 33, count 'em 33 km from the second largest lake in Guatemala. There's 1/2 pound of Obsidian waiting for the FIRST person to provide the correct answer.

After boarding our prop jet carrying 34 out of 34 passengers, we enjoy a 30 minute, 3 course breakfast service. Chewing gum trees were a big part of the Guatemala greenbelt, so it was only fitting we got the 2 pack of Chiclets for our dessert course. We were greeted with cold towels, a guava smoothie and a snack box for our one hour ride to Tikal. Cool!

We found our "Lunch is Better than Climbing a Bunch" group van. Two of our fellow passengers joined the NNN - Michele, Don, Marc, Susan, Russell, Andrea, Richard, Anne and Mom.

Julio is our guide, along with Carlos 'El Toro' the driver. His English is superb, but he's a graduate of the 'why use a sentence when a paragraph will do?" tour guiding school. It's his job to let us know lunch is scheduled for 2:30 pm following our Tikal Tiptoe Tour. We are assured we will walk in the shade and do more drive-by then climb-high touring of Tikal. Anne immediately drills Julio with the Obsidian Opportunity - we need the correct answer! Julio obliges with a 45 minute, four possibility answer. Hmm .. no slam dunk for our team. Mom thinks the best answer is for defense reasons.

Julio is negotiating hard and fast to secure the services of a genuine Guatemalan experience - stuff an undersized truck with 13 people in a space designed for 8. We spot the national bird of El Salvador along the way, amidst the bumps and bruises of ancient Mayan walking paths now rutted out due to vehicular traffic. Julio reminds us the driver would appreciate a tip. Our unanimously elected Mom morphs into Dad, who explains to Julio he'd best arrange for our truck to show up at Tower 1.

Ohh . we are greeted by a raccoon like creature whose distant relative must have dallied with a weasel. He's in it to the finish so long as we have munchies. We don't feed him, but there are lots of others who want to toss him a bite or two. We walk up a rutted out hill, and are at the next challenge: sashay through the Lost World. Lacking Indiana Jones and the Bull Whip, we send in our lead explorer, Alabama Marc Levin with the graphite walking stick. He's followed by Texan Bravehearts Michele, Richard, Susan and Russell, armed with the long shot and high tech Canon artillery. Massachusetts Andrea is next in line, with her Canon and Golden Bear Don. Philly Patriots Anne and Dad bring up the rear. We learn about the cardinal points and why East and North beat the pants off of West (emerging underworld) and South (shove the dark beings back into the underworld) as far as Mayans are concerned.

There's a big tourism opportunity scheduled for Dec 21, 2012 (12/21/12) - the end of the 5200 year mayan calendar. Come to Guatemala - either the world will end or they will simply start on the calendar all over again. the Pleides star constellations (the fuzzy stuff around the belt in Orion's constellation) are the only ones who know for sure.

We sally forth and search out the Grand Plaza, where we climb Tower 2, surveying the immediate part of the ruins. The ladders are an OSHA-free experience. Safety girl says 'one slip of the step means personal ruin in the ruins' - sort of steep leads to really steep. Anti-wuss kicks in: I may never return and it's time to scale the stepladders. I get to the top and am rewarded with perfect light and a place to catch my breath. Backing down the ladders, we are greeted with the oscillated turkey, a bird who shimmers as the sunlight glimmers.

Tikal is a breathtaking experience, and well worth doing should your travels take you to Guatemala. We were very glad to see that part of the country. As Marcie said, the other excursion with high marks was the beach resort.

Our truck shows up promptly at 1 pm Guatemala time - 1:30 and we hoot and holler down to the van. Off to our lunch in San Elena, followed by our trek to the airport. We're only 45 minutes late - or early, depending on whether you are Guatemalan or not. Dad is stopped by airport security, being lectured about the danger of the nail file attached to his nail clipper. They snap off the nail file attached to his nail clipper, then allow him to proceed. Alabama Marc, on the other hand, is allowed to board with the claw-tipped graphite walking stick. Go figure!

We finally depart at 3:45 pm and enjoy the 2 course flight back to San Tomas. We missed out on tea time trivia, but saw a breathtaking display of spinner dolphins in the river on our descent to San Tomas from Tikal. All in all, it was a magical experience.

The Slow Row to Ft. Lauderdale

As reported, we are on the Slow Row to Ft. Lauderdale. We've circled the football pool for both the Packers-Eagle game (winner take all; right now Suzie of the Sistahs is in the lead) and the BCS bowl game tomorrow. Hearts was the card game of choice this morning; the constellation theater is broadcasting the Eagles-Packers game right now.

I must sign off - tea time trivia is quickly approaching. Thanks for sailing along with us.

Cheers, Anne