Nichole Chism

21.7.11

Tikal

Tikal, the New York of the Mayan civilization.

Our guide got stung by this little guy!

He was hiding in his umbrella and when he opened it, "STING".

The Tree of Life, absolutely beautiful!

Mega ant hole, random.

Semuc Champey

A gem in Guatemala. Electricity from 6 – 10 pm.

Every time we passed this little old house a cute little old man would grab his bowl of homemade chocolate and run over to us to try and sell it. Every time we would just smile and say no thanks. After two days my heart began to ache for the little old man because this was his only source of income, hoping that tourist would buy his chocolate, and with it being “low season” you could tell he hadn’t sold any in a while. On our last night there I walked past his house one last time and sure enough he grabbed his bowel and came running towards me. As he came I waved him over and a huge smile spread across his face. I bought all the chocolate he had (roughly $3 US dollars). I can’t begin to express the feeling that I felt and the gratitude he conveyed.

Cute little mans house ;)

Kids are amazing and always willing to share. As we were walking some local kids shared some of this huge pod things (how you eat them: crack open, suck giant bean looking thing, the spit out) they weren't half bad.

Semuc Champey is this HUGE natural set of pools. The water is crystal clear, a beautiful aqua color, and nice a cool.

This beautiful butterfly was just fluttering around us and then he landed right on my hat and Mike was lucky enough to snap a quick picture, priceless! I love butterflies :)

LOVE this man!

This picture is my favorite! Hilarious, he tried doing a back flip and his face ended up hitting the water first. Seriously I almost peed my swimsuit laughing!

19.7.11

Lake Atitlan

Breathtaking! A huge lake nestled in a valley surrounded by mountains and a volcano. There are several villages perched around the shores of the lake. We stayed in San Pedro which is noted as a cheaper village with lots of outdoors activities to do.

We stayed in a beautiful little hostal with an amazing view of the lake. Unfortunately, there were bed bugs because two days into our stay I had several little bites all over my left leg and arm. Boo bed bugs, you suck!