Rio Dulce - The Continuing Saga

After waiting about 1/2 an hour our launch arrived.  Actually the owner of the hotel arrived from town where he had been grocery shopping and took us across the lake to our abode-a cute hut in the middle of the swamps.  The owner is Swiss so when I asked if he had schnitzel he proudly answer certainly and we had Schnitzel for dinner.  We had not had breakfast or lunch, although I can't say we starved with stuff we had in the car, and a nice shower to wash off the smoke.  Hot and muggy again!

Ours is the little blue one in front that you can barely see.

Entering the canal to our abode.

Hope our boat has better luck

Walkways between buildings

Trees growing in the swamp

Termite nest in the trees

Our cozy little home for a couple of nights

One of three of my mosquito eating friends in the cabin with us

Those 4 black things up there on the wall are our resident bats.  Also mosquito eaters.

We had an excellent breakfast the next morning and got ready for our trip to Livingston.  The launch came right to our hotel and picked us up at 9 am.  He went around to other various accommodations and soon the 20 passenger launch had 18 people and we were officially off.  It was a pleasant trip and the breeze the boat created was very welcome indeed.  We passed bird island and he slowed down and gave us a brief description of the place and we were off again.

Our new friends Esteban and Julian

Enjoying the breezes.  Hey look kids.  I took a selfie

Bird Island

Our next stop was the lagoon of flowers.  Tons of lily pads and all in bloom.  It was lovely.  And then to the hot springs for a bathroom stop.  A tour through some caves was available but our stop was only 20 minutes and it took 20 minutes to go through the cave tour.  We opted to not miss the boat.

Lagoon of Flowers

Hot Springs stop.

The shores on either side of the river were thick lush jungle and the narrowest part of the river, called a canyon sported shear cliff that should have been ruins of some kind.  In fact one of the cliffs looks like it has a door in it.  Eldon says no but I think it is.  Maybe the Mayans have a secret city up there some where.  The vines and trees growing on the wall make it so one could climb to the top.  Not this person though!

Lush jungle along the river

Shear cliffs.  This should be ruins of some sort don't you think?

And then came Livingston.  It is a unique place populated originally by  black Caribs with their own language and their own culture.  Mayans moved in during the civil war.  We were greeted at the wharf by a group of black young men who teasingly said "Welcome to Africa".

The Docks

Hurricane must have put the ship there awhile ago.  There is a tree growing up through the decking!

 As we started into town we met an old man (4 years younger than Eldon) who started talking to us about the history and the real Livingston.  He is a teacher and an elder of the black section of the town.  He gave us a tour of what we would call ghettos but is their home.  They are trying to hold their community together.  A hurricane wiped Livingston out a number of years ago and they are attempting to rebuild and prevent their culture from going extinct.

Philipe Flores giving us a tour

Philipe and Eldon

Eldon gathering a sample of sand for a friend back home.

   After his little tour Philip Flores took us to his favorite place to eat and we had Caribbean food.

Mmmm!  Yum.  This was Eldon's soup.  Actually tasted good.

And my little morsel with fried sweet green bananas.  They were yummy!

One of the older original houses of Livingston.  Still occupied.

The boat left at 2:30 with just a few of us aboard and we were bucking the waves going back up the river.  The front end of the launch would fly into the air and come down with a hard and solid crash.  I think the only part in the water was the motor.  A two hour "flight" on that and I did not even get queezy.  Ernie would be proud of me.  We made it home in one piece though, and back to the heat without the breeze of the water in our faces.  We ate dinner, played 5 Crowns with one deck of cards made up from several partial decks and no jokers (a bit challenging).  Went to bed early and all the European backpacker kids played music and drank beer until about 10 or so.  Torrential rains hit about 2 am.

The next morning we got up, had breakfast, said good bye to the four bats and three spiders, all descendants of Aragog I am sure (Harry Potter for those not in the know), got in the launch and headed for the car.

Heading for the mainland

Beautiful scenery and smooth sailing but watch out for the potholes.

The car did well and the only issues were the not infrequent potholes in the road in some areas.

We got home, threw a load of laundry in and headed out to a temple workers party.  They had a fabulous marimba band and hot fruit punch (can't remember the correct name of it) tamales and a roll.  Some dancing ensued to the lively music.  All in all a great time.  The only thing we brought home we could have done without was the sunburns we acquired at Monterrico.  Wish you all were here to enjoy it with us.

Marimba band.  Best one in Guatemala