Hi there, sorry to disappoint those of you hoping for my colourful demise, you'll have to wait some time yet. Actually, despite some scare stories (mostly from sheltered locals who have become paranoid from the scare stories they hear on the news) I find Mexico to be a very safe place to travel, and the only disagreeable event to have happened to me being the theft/disappearance of a bag of 3 plums and a bunch of grasshoppers from the hostel where I was staying in Oaxaca.
Back to the story in hand though. For the past 3 days I've been travelling along the border between Mexico and Guatemala so that I could see some rather out-of-the-way sights. (Oh, before I carry on, I have some more praise for Mexico's public transport system. Even when travelling between some rural backwaters over here, the frequency of buses, or colectivos, is surprisingly high, so you don't have to wait for ages, or plan your day around departure times, like you do in most of Europe.) First off were the Lagos de Montebello (Montebello lakes), each of which is famed to have a different colour. It may or may not be so, but they were pretty, usually a rich, clear blue or green, and it was even possible to go swimming in one that was formed in the extinct crater of a volcano.
The night was spent close to the lakes (taking great care to apply lashings of insect repellent, as I had now descended into midgie-land) in a rather rustic guesthouse. The next day started early as I woke to catch the 6am bus (actually it started an hour earlier as I forgot that this insignificant rump of the country doesn't bother with Summer time!) for the 6 hour trip to Frontera Corozal, which, as the name suggests, is a border town between Mexico and Guatemala on the Usmacinta river. From there a 1 hour boat trip along the border is the only way to access the haunting ruins of Yaxchilan, deep in the heart of the jungle and hidden from civilisation. However, due to the late time of my arrival, I was afraid that I'd be the last person to arrive and would therefore have to pay for a boat just for myself. Luckily I arrived just in time to tag along with a group of Lithuanians (why not?). It was definitely worth it as we were the only people there, and I soon peeled off from the group to go and explore by myself. You would think that in a place like this it would be very quiet, but in fact the opposite was true because of what sounded like a rally of Harley Davidsons, which in fact turned out to be howler monkeys living up to their names with their raucous growlings from the treetops.
The next day I popped over to a nearby indigenous village in the Lacandon rainforest where I managed to hire a guide for a trip into the forest. Now for years I have wondered what could possibly attract people to botany, when you can study animals, which are far more exciting and do stuff, instead, but on this little sortie I finally understood, as the little buggers kept running away, whereas the trees behaved themselves and stayed put so that they could be inspected. Nonetheless I saw a whole bunch of weird and exotic animals and plants as well as some supremely well-hidden Mayan ruins (the damn things are everywhere). However there were 2 things that really fascinated me whilst I was there: the first was a monstrously huge spider (about 15-20cm) catching and packaging an unlucky fly; and the guy sitting at a shelter in the forest collecting a small fee for visiting the reserve and writing your name in a log book. Now the latter event in itself is not particularly interesting, but what intrigued me was the fact that the previous visitor to arrive before me was there 5 days ago, and I was just wondering whether he goes out every day to his shelter in the forest and just waits. And waits. And waits. And maybe, one day, if he's lucky, someone might turn up so that he can write their name in his log book. And then he waits some more.
Finally I arrived at Palenque and tomorrow I will visit the ruins here, which are said to be the most spectacular in Mexico, so I'll pass my expert eye over them and give you my verdict.
Back to the story in hand though. For the past 3 days I've been travelling along the border between Mexico and Guatemala so that I could see some rather out-of-the-way sights. (Oh, before I carry on, I have some more praise for Mexico's public transport system. Even when travelling between some rural backwaters over here, the frequency of buses, or colectivos, is surprisingly high, so you don't have to wait for ages, or plan your day around departure times, like you do in most of Europe.) First off were the Lagos de Montebello (Montebello lakes), each of which is famed to have a different colour. It may or may not be so, but they were pretty, usually a rich, clear blue or green, and it was even possible to go swimming in one that was formed in the extinct crater of a volcano.
The night was spent close to the lakes (taking great care to apply lashings of insect repellent, as I had now descended into midgie-land) in a rather rustic guesthouse. The next day started early as I woke to catch the 6am bus (actually it started an hour earlier as I forgot that this insignificant rump of the country doesn't bother with Summer time!) for the 6 hour trip to Frontera Corozal, which, as the name suggests, is a border town between Mexico and Guatemala on the Usmacinta river. From there a 1 hour boat trip along the border is the only way to access the haunting ruins of Yaxchilan, deep in the heart of the jungle and hidden from civilisation. However, due to the late time of my arrival, I was afraid that I'd be the last person to arrive and would therefore have to pay for a boat just for myself. Luckily I arrived just in time to tag along with a group of Lithuanians (why not?). It was definitely worth it as we were the only people there, and I soon peeled off from the group to go and explore by myself. You would think that in a place like this it would be very quiet, but in fact the opposite was true because of what sounded like a rally of Harley Davidsons, which in fact turned out to be howler monkeys living up to their names with their raucous growlings from the treetops.
The next day I popped over to a nearby indigenous village in the Lacandon rainforest where I managed to hire a guide for a trip into the forest. Now for years I have wondered what could possibly attract people to botany, when you can study animals, which are far more exciting and do stuff, instead, but on this little sortie I finally understood, as the little buggers kept running away, whereas the trees behaved themselves and stayed put so that they could be inspected. Nonetheless I saw a whole bunch of weird and exotic animals and plants as well as some supremely well-hidden Mayan ruins (the damn things are everywhere). However there were 2 things that really fascinated me whilst I was there: the first was a monstrously huge spider (about 15-20cm) catching and packaging an unlucky fly; and the guy sitting at a shelter in the forest collecting a small fee for visiting the reserve and writing your name in a log book. Now the latter event in itself is not particularly interesting, but what intrigued me was the fact that the previous visitor to arrive before me was there 5 days ago, and I was just wondering whether he goes out every day to his shelter in the forest and just waits. And waits. And waits. And maybe, one day, if he's lucky, someone might turn up so that he can write their name in his log book. And then he waits some more.
Finally I arrived at Palenque and tomorrow I will visit the ruins here, which are said to be the most spectacular in Mexico, so I'll pass my expert eye over them and give you my verdict.
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