THE CENTRAL AMERICAN SERIES PT9
TIKAL, GUATEMALA
Farzad and I are heading our separate ways as he needs to head back to Tulum for his sister’s wedding.
I’m off to Flores which is apparently home to some of the best Mayan ruins in Central America. Some people see the Mayan ruins like the temples of Asia; once you’ve seen one then you’ve seen them all. However these ruins are just incredible, like something out of Tomb Raider or Indiana Jones.
WHERE IS FLORES?
A dislocated shoulder & Tikal Ruins
FLORES
Flores is this tiny built up island in Guatemala which reminds me of some of the towns in Croatia with its cobble stoned roads and built up towns. There are a few coming tonight that we met in Belize so will probably do the ruins together.
THE ROPE SWING
The girls checked in and the next day we had a few hours to kill because the ruins tour was a sunset trip. Kez and I decided to hit the rope swing which is pretty famous in Flores. It’s nothing special just an old man who tied a piece of rope beside his house, but it works.
DISLOCATED SHOULDER
We were loving it as soon as we got there but after only 2 goes kez wanted to try the diving board which wasn’t high by any stretch. She wasn’t keen on diving but I soon told her to shut up and get the head in. Well In she went and out popped her shoulder.
I thought she was joking at first until she crawled out of the water, it looked terrible. You know those games you get as a child when you have to put the body together and sometimes start mixing the limbs about, well that’s what it looked like. The old man wasn’t far away though and to our shock (more so Kezias) to it upon himself to popped it back into place, my guess is that it’s happened before! It’s safe to say Kez wasn’t going to make the trip to Tikal.
RELATED READ: GLACIER, ICE SHEETS & THE NORTHERN LIGHTS
TIKAL
Initially I wasn’t sure what I would make out of the tour as it was quite long but I couldn’t help but be impressed. Me being me all I could think of was how did they build these? The view of the sunset was like something out of Jurassic Park, however I think a few scenes from Star Wars was filmed here.
To view the sunset you pay a fee when you arrive into the park. Our tour guide had other ideas and instead of making our decision so early, we waited around until close to sunset to check the conditions. Then instead of paying 100q each, give the guy at the top 20q direct, result.
A dislocated shoulder & Tikal Ruins
RATINGS….
- PEOPLE – 7/10
- BACKPACKING – 7/10
- WEATHER – 7.5/10
- THINGS TO DO – 7/10
FINAL THOUGHTS
I’m off to Antigua and the girls are hanging around for a few days to get fixed up!
NEXT UP
Getting the shits in Antigua! Click to read.
SAFE TRAVELS, DS x
64/229
This post is part of The Central American Series, click to explore or for episode 1 click here.
