I just got done with my first week of Spanish, and I already realize that my vocabulary grows every day! So that´s really good! I meet new family members of my hostfamily every day, and I still wonder where these people sleep! It had been raining here a few days, which made those steep streets of San José incredibly slippery. I fel down a few times, but I survived!

The worst thing was the micro-bus to Flores the other day. The roads were only mud, mud and more mud, and the bus was slipping and sliding all over the road! I keep putting myself in these situations where I think: ´Am I going to survive this??´ But up until now that has always been the case! Thank God!

This weekend was spectacular! We went with a group of six people to an archeological site in the jungle called Yaxhá. There were three people from the United States (Malik, Kelly and Stacy), there was one lady from Canada (Kathleen) and than the two Dutch girls Sara and I! We also had two guides, Emilio and Antonio (don´t forget the guide!!!).

We left Saturday morning really early with a little bus. It was about a 2 hour ride. We got to a small campsite, where we hang out hammocks in some little houses on poles. It was some platform on poles with a roof.

That afternoon we took a little boat, lancha is what they call them here, on the lake to a small island called Topoxté (I probably spelled it wrong!). On this island used to live extremely small people years and years ago. These Mayan people also build tempels, but then really really small! It was very funny! We walked around there, and climbed some of the tempels. If you think this would be easier than climbing these huge tempels in Tikal, you are wrong! It was pretty hard to put your big feet on these little steps who were extremely slippery!! But we managed!

After walking around for a while, and seeing pretty bird, we went back to our campsite. When we got back we went into the forest to see some monkeys. There was a whole bunch of them way up in the tree-tops! It was incredible to see how they jumped from tree-top to tree-top! And the sound they made was amazing, those little monkeys, we couldn´t believe it! It was like a lion or something! 

That night we made a campfire and cooked our dinner. It got dark pretty early, as always here, around 6 o´clock. When it got dark, we all walked around the lake looking for crocodiles, who would come up during the night. I was SOO scared! I was picturing these Steve Irwin (the Crocodile hunter) scenarios, but then they wouldn´t end so good in my mind! But luckily we only saw one little head sticking out of the water. And he was just as scared of us as we were of him!!

We were all tired pretty early, so we tried to go to sleep. Well guys, I give you one advise: NEVER try to sleep in a hammock outside in the jungle!! I had a pretty good hammock, but Sara´s hammock was full of holes! The poor child
almost fell out whenever she only moved one finger! haha! But yeah, I didn´t sleep much better either. And if things weren´t bad enough, our mosquito net broke! Fine, without mosquito net. We couldn´t get up to hang the stupid thing again in the total darkness. Plus I was wearing three layers of clothes, and we had mosquito repellend enough!

There were the howlermonkey´s, the freezing cold and some snorring guides next to us who kept us from sleeping. It was horrible, but a great experience!! The next morning everyone was happy to get up at 5:30 when it finally got light! Breakfast was incredibly good! After that we packed our stuff and went into the jungle again. This time we went to the Mayan tempels of Yaxhá. These were pretty high as well, but again, the view was magnifiscent!! You could see the two lakes in the area, and all over the rest of the jungle of Petén. We sat there relaxing and enjoying the view for a while. How amazing! I realize all the time how lucky I am to be here in Guatemala and to have these experiences!

Anyways, on our way back, they dropped us off in Flores, so we could email a bit more. But that was my weekend in Yaxhá!

Miss you all, and hope to hear from you!!

Ciao,

Marjolein