Livingston, Guatemala and the Rio Dulce

Poor Chris. He woke up with a horrible cold the morning we were leaving for Guatemala. He had a sinus headache, a sore throat, and a fever. Boooo. Not a fun way to travel.  We headed out early in the a.m. to start our typical bus hopping but this time we had to add in a boat, the only way to access Livington, which is located at the mouth of the Rio Dulce river.  The Caribbean side of Guatemala, which is much different, and not as visited as the rest of the country. The majority of the people are Garifuna, descendants of people from West Africa.

We initially had planned on skipping Livingston and heading directly to a cabin in the Rio Dulce. We decided to stay a night. We were excited to get in some more Caribbean beach time and to experience the Garifuna culture.
I loved the boat ride. Chris did not. The boat slapping down on the water each time it went over a wave did not do much for his aching head. I felt terrible. We had no idea where to stay once we go to the town. We had generally had good luck finding a place on our own.

When we got to the dock we were approached by a couple of backpackers who had fliers for a hostel in the area. Looked nice enough: wifi, book exchange, private cabins. We decided to walk around the town on our own first and then if we couldn't find a place, we'd head to the hostel.

The minute we started walking into town we got a very bad vibe. It was broad daylight but the place felt dangerous. Stall upon stall of cheesy tourist crap like sea shell statues and Tee shirt moo moos (no shit) filled the streets and multiple sketchy characters asked us if we wanted to buy drugs. One drunk local guy in particular took interest in us. He started asking us where we were from and what we were doing. I ignored him. He was up to no good. Poor Chris in his sick and altered state, started chatting with the dude. Next  thing we know the guy is following us, and then pretending to lead us to the hostel where we had decided to go, because we couldn't find any other options.

We were mortified that this guy was pretending to be our friend. We got to the hostel and he walks into the common area yelling and announcing he had new guests. The owner came out and asked if he could help us. The first thing he said we should do was lose our drunk buddy. NO problem. We told him we wanted a clean quiet place to stay. He told us this was not the place to find either of those things! At least he was honest.

He told us to run away while drunkenstein was bothering some other people. We grabbed our packs and fled. We still had no place to stay.

We were greeted by a drunk man passed out on a sofa in the "lobby" at the next "hotel."  His young son went and grabbed his mom to show us the horribly dingy room, for which she wanted to charge us $30. HA! 
Finally, we found a half-way decent place with a big clean room where Chris could crash and sweat out his fever. This place was interesting. It looked like a guest house for pirates back in the 1700s. Also, there were no other guests. Kinda creepy. The girl at the front desk gave us a key to our room, and a key to the front door of the hotel and then she left. Weird. We had the ENTIRE place to ourselves.

Oh, by the way, there are no beaches in Livingston. You have to catch an expensive boat to get to the nearest beach, and the place is a port town, which means hoards of people on cruises stop in for an afternoon excursion, thus the cheesy knick knacks, ridiculously expensive food, and sketchy looking characters looking to rob unsuspecting tourists. Honestly, this was the first place on our entire trip that we did not like at all.

The kicker? At dinner, where Chris had watery flavorless chicken curry and I had slimy shrimp, another drunk local approached us and tried to sit down at our table. We ignored him. Then , angrily, he said something to us in a strange language. It sounded like a fricking curse to us! Great. We beelined back to our hotel where Chris sweat out his illness and I laid in bed waiting for the morning so we could leave.

The next day, our luck started to turn around. We wanted to leave Livingston as soon as possible and decided to head to the docks to see if we could find the boat that would take us to our hostel on the river. As we approached the dock, we saw a small skiff with "Finca Tatin" printed on the side. The guy was just shoving off, so we yelled to get him to stop. He waved us on and like that we were leaving this weird and terrifying town. First we had to make one stop. We approached a smaller dock away from the main part of town. Waiting eagerly for our boat was no other than ... the evil curse man! He was getting on our boat. Oh man, Chris and I thought were going to get  stabbed or tossed over the side of the boat. We avoided eye contact, but even in his drunken stupor, he recognized us! But he wasn't angry he just gave a chuckle and sat back. What were the chances?! Fortunately, he was just going to the hovel where he lived on a little island a few minutes away.

What a surreal experience.  We made it to Finca Tatin on the Rio Dulce without further incident. In fact, the ride was spectacular.

Finca Tatin is a series of cabins attached to a main lodge and dining hall. The Finca sits directly on the green peaceful waters of the Rio Dulce and behind lies lush green forest.

We rented a private cabin with a deck that overlooked the water.  We put on our suits, grabbed a couple beers and headed to the dock for some rope swinging and tube sitting. I dreamt of places like this when I was a kid.   The river was calm, clean, warm, and most importantly, devoid of any scary critters.

We spent the next three days swimming, tubing, and jumping off a rope swing.  I never really over came my fear of the swing. I was terrified of slipping on to the deck, or smashing my face (the latter proved to be true. luckily I suffered no permanent injuries). Chris couldn't get enough of swinging from the ten-foot life guard tower into the water below. Until he lost his wedding band. He had put on sunscreen right before he grabbed onto the rope, and when he jumped, his ring slid right off. He attempted to search the deep murky water for the ring, but that was futile.

What can you do? We were really sad, but we decided that people in the community would be searching for that ring for years. Perhaps a legend about the mysterious ring would born.

Rio Dulce, was as I said earlier, a fantasy land. In addition to playing in the river, we swam in an ancient Mayan cave and snuck up on bats living in a cavern with a giant waterfall careening into a pool below; and we had the hostel jungle dog lead us on a hike through the thicket forest to a slot canyon teaming with red bromeliads  and fluorescent green moss.

We headed out on our third day. We were going to Flores, Guatemala where we were meeting our Norwegian pals and organizing an expedition to the hidden El Mirador Ruins!

I'll let Chris get onto that. One last thing... the bus ride to Flores was the worst of our entire trip. I did not know it was possible to fit that many people in a bus. The bus was made for about  75 people yet around  150 were crammed on. A man literally used a stick to jam people in. Chris and I were standing on one foot for most of the ride. Chris had his arm pit over a tiny old woman, and was unbenounced to him, sweating profusely on her. I was close to having a panic attack. I hate crowds. When two people next to us got off the bus and left an empty seat, I jumped on it. Literally. After that I refused to ever get on a bus that crowded again. EVER.  (I bet I will again, but I hope not for a long time!).