Antigua

We went to the ChocoMuseo in Antigua today. We signed up for the “bean to bar” workshop. This wasn’t our first chocolate factory tour, but this was so much better than any of the others. They didn’t include picking cocoa pods or fermenting or drying the beans, but we did get to roast them, grind them into paste using a mortar and pestle, make various chocolate drinks, and finally make our own chocolate bars. We also learned a lot along the way. I really enjoyed the whole experience. If you’re ever in Antigua and you like chocolate, this is a workshop for you. And it’s only $25 per person. Very worth it. ...

One of the big reasons we chose to visit Guatemala this time of year was to be in Antigua for Semana Santa. They do some amazing things for Holy Week here. Some of the festivities were cancelled by the Catholic Church because of covid, but some of the traditions lived on. One of the most famous is the tradition of creating beautiful “carpets” out of colored sawdust. The artists work through the night to create these works of art that don’t even last through the day. ...

It’s amazing how quickly we can go from being awed by living in a big house with two chefs making amazing meals every day, someone doing all the cleaning, making my bed every day, doing my laundry, and a gardener who’s here three days a week making all the indoor garden areas, fountains, stairs, etc. look amazing… to taking it for granted. Taking all that for granted? Yes. We’re getting ready for our trip up to Semuc Champey tomorrow and I just caught myself wondering why my dirty clothes were still hanging on the clothes line upstairs and hadn’t been dried and folded yet. How did I get to that point? I’m very upset with myself for coming up with such a thought. ...

Pacaya blew its top again today and they had to close down the airport. Our weather forecast in Antigua was for “Volcanic Ash”. I think we got a little bit lucky with the winds today because some locations got several centimeters of ash on the ground and we just got a heavier snow than normal. But it’s probably a good thing we’re not trying to camp up there tonight. lol. ...

When you make plans to summit volcanos, your plans have to be flexible. Volcán de Pacaya just began a new intense eruption yesterday and a new period of increased activity, so the country closed the National Park. Nobody gets to go near the volcano until it slows down. We got the email about it today, so we won’t be climbing to the summit tomorrow night to watch the lava flow down the side of the mountain after all. We’re hoping it will calm down enough before we have to fly back to the United States in a couple weeks, but there’s no way to predict what it will do. Brett’s kids are pretty upset about missing it, but there’s nothing we can do except enjoy our other activities. We’re still expecting to have a great weekend in Semuc Champey this weekend, but even that depends on the weather. ...

Feeling Fine As expected, I felt fine this morning. I didn’t want to get too crazy, but I did eat some pan dulce and drank a little orange juice. We worked some magic and found a nice Airbnb on the beach in Monterrico, rented some cars from Alamo, and headed south for a beach adventure. It isn’t El Salvador, but it’s the next best thing. Our Airbnb hosts were hurrying to make our unit ready for us and said they could have it available by 2:00 pm if we returned the Excel spreadsheet with our passport numbers and license plates. The form had to be filled out by us, then signed by the owner of the unit and returned to the property management and security dudes prior to our arrival or we wouldn’t be allowed in the gate. Of course, we couldn’t fill out the form until we knew our license plate numbers and we wouldn’t know those until we picked up our rental cars. ...

It’s funny how quickly things can change. Yesterday we were trying to make plans for the weekend. Last night I was just trying to survive. I woke suddenly at 2:30 am with a stabbing pain in my gut. I could feel all the muscles in my abdomen starting to tighten up. I went quickly to the bathroom and puked my guts out. That was my routine every 2 hours for the rest of the night and on through the whole day. I didn’t sleep for more than about 45 minutes at a time from 2:30 am on. I had a fever that would spike and then drop and then spike and then drop. We measured it at 101.7. I felt terrible. By morning I looked terrible too. ...

We have recently been trying to make plans for this weekend. One of the things we want to do while we’re down here is swim the limestone pools in the river at Semuc Champey and swim through the Grutas de Lanquín. We really enjoyed swimming through the ATM cave in Belize and it sounds like the caves in Lanquín have a similar adventurous quality. Both of those adventures require relatively dry conditions, but the forecast for this weekend up there is for lots and lots of rain. We’re still in the dry season here, but the jungle can get rain anytime. So we can’t do that this weekend. ...

We can’t just play and eat all the time. We have to do something to pay the bills. Luckily, that something can be done remotely when there’s a good enough internet connection. The house we rented in Antigua has such a connection. It’s definitely not fast by our standards at home, but we’re able to do multiple simultaneous Zoom meetings without any trouble, and that’s our definition of “good enough” down here. ...

Last night we decided to meet at 7:45 each morning for scripture study before breakfast. I’m not sure how well that will work for me, because I’m used to sleeping until I wake without ever using an alarm. That usually translates to me waking up around 8, but there’s no guarantee. I’m definitely not a morning person, so we’ll see how it goes. I didn’t get to sleep last night until about midnight. Then I woke a few times due to noises and other things. By 7:00 I definitely didn’t feel like I slept enough, but it was time to start the day. Our two chefs were here and preparing breakfast. They cut up fresh fruit into big bowls. We had pineapple, watermelon, cantaloupe, blackberry, and papaya. I sucked down a lot of fruit. I’m so in love with papaya. The main part of breakfast was “typical” Guatemalan. We had eggs, black beans, and platanos fritos con crema. I loved the fresh fruit. The eggs had a nice salsa. The black beans had a really complex flavor. ...