Another post to brighten the day of my northern friends who are dealing with cold and snow. 🥶 Winter can't last forever, my friends!
Went for a walk today to take pictures of flowers for my Mom. She was the one who got me interested in gardening when I was a little kid and I used to love going to the greenhouses with her in the spring and summer. I remember especially loving marigolds and lilacs.
Here in Guatemala, it's basically summer year-round so there are always flowers in bloom. It's dry season right now, so things are a bit dusty but still warm and lovely weather for a walk around town. I visited the three viveros (plant stores) that I know of here in Panajachel. I wish I could have bought some plants for my garden, but I just don't have the energy right now to nurture them -- and to fight off the dogs from digging them up. Whenever I dig in the soil, they think it's an open invitation to tear up all the dirt they can get their grubby paws on. 😣
Vivero #1 on the road up that goes to Godinez
Vivero #2 on Arboles across from Deli Pan
The flower lady inside the market building. (#3 on the map)
Of course, there are lots more ladies selling flowers at the market but this is one of the places that's always there, not just seasonal.
The Vivero across from Despensa Familiar (#4 on the map)
Map of Panajachel showing the three plant stores and the market.
Now a few pictures of some lovely flowers around town, on the roadsides and in people's gardens.
A rare pink & yellow butterfly weed. There are lots of orange & yellow ones around but this tiny guy was different and beautiful.
Literally growing between the rocks on the hot river road.
I love these pretty pink flowers. I'd rather have these than bougainvillea.
The hated bougainvillea in brilliant fuchsia.
These are what I consider the "fall" flowers around here. They start blooming in October. They're at the end of their time now and most have gone to seed. You can see all the DUST on their leaves!
Tiny little yellow flowers, only about the size of my pinky fingernail.
That's a poinsettia twice as tall as me!
I believe this is a kroton.
These flowers are pale blue though they look white in this picture.
These orange "finger flowers" always remind me of undersea coral.
A local business that sells gravel and sand has brightened up their yard with geraniums.
No pictures from my own garden as it's a dust bowl! My basil is doing well in the heat, plus a nice spider plant and a jade plant and a pink geranium. The bougainvillea is the bane of my existence. I hate that plant! I would cut it all down if it was up to me. But I guess it does cover the ugly fence quite well and the birds love it.
I'm heading to Tapachula, Mexico, next weekend for my first visa run since Covid-19 started so look for that blog post when I get back. 👍
Panajachel is a total mess right now. They started construction on a few different roads before Christmas and it's ongoing with no end in sight. Not sure why they decided to rip up the main streets now. I mean, why didn't they do it when we were in lockdown and there was no traffic?
The past two weekends for Xmas and New Year's was a total disaster. City tourists have started coming back to the lake in their fancy new cars with tinted windows. They all drove in circles around town trying to figure out how to get anywhere. There were a few traffic cops standing at intersections directing people and every second car would stop and ask either "Where's the beach?" or, "How do I get to the highway?"
It's also been a disaster to try to walk anywhere in town. The picture above is the main corner by Chalo's near Despensa. The road is like this from Batres pharmacy almost all the way up to the market. Los Arboles is now two-way street for part of it to try to redirect traffic around, and it's not wide enough for that, so all the drivers are always freaking out. Chicken buses turn around in the middle of the street because there's no way through.
Interesting note for my first-world friends: construction is done primarily by hand. There are literally guys in the trenches digging with shovels and pickaxes. It's insane. Just get a freaking machine to do it for you!! Geez.
In better news, they repaired the tuc-tuc bridge near my house a bit more, so now there's not a gaping hole in the metal. The municipality was so proud of fixing it, they posted it on their Facebook page. (Slow news day?) It's kinda funny to remember the bridge the way it used to be, all cobbled together with wood and scrap. You can go back and look at my post from 2016 here.
Pana sure changed in 2020. So many businesses closed or moved. The Riconcita pupusa placed moved a few streets over, I think into someone's back yard, and then a new pupusa place opened in the same location. The El Dorado plaza is basically all new stores. One of my favourite tiendas is now a BBQ restaurant. We have a new gas Texaco gas station less than a block from the old Texaco gas station. They also tore down a whole block of buildings not far from Despensa and there was a rumour on Facebook that a McDonald's was going to be built there, but so far it's just an empty lot. There were lots of stores with closed shutters on Santander, but now that tourism is picking back up and restrictions are being lifted, new businesses are opening.
Happily, most of my fave places are still in business -- La Palapa, Mister Jon's, Hana Japanese restaurant (now also serving Chinese!), the 3Q store, Intermedio, and the little Pepsi tienda near my house that never gringo-prices me. A new pet food store opened up on the main street so we don't have to go up to the market anymore to get dog food.
The weather is great, as usual. Dry season has started, although it did rain yesterday, surprisingly. Here's a picture of some nice mini roses growing over someone's fence. I hope it cheers up anyone who is dealing with cold and snow right now.
After 9 months of staying home, Bert & I finally decided to take a trip to Quetzaltenango, more commonly known as Xela (SHAY-la). It was good to get out of town for a bit and see the "big city" but also a bit weird with all the COVID-19 restrictions still in place. Masks are mandatory still, of course, and the buses had dispensers of antibacterial gel bolted to the side of them. Technically, only one person was allowed per seat but only one of our buses actually enforced this. The driver was also behind a plastic sheet, yet the ayudante (helper) who collects the money walked freely thru the bus touching everything.
Most of the buses had some form of sticker indicating where you could sit.
The bus driver behind his plastic. You can see the blue mandatory mask sign as well.
We had thought about taking a private or semi-private shuttle but decided to take chicken buses because they're super cheap and also give you plenty of time to reflect on your life choices as you hurtle at 100 km/hr along twisty mountain roads with no guard rails.
The prices have increased since I last took this trip.
Panajachel to Solola Q5
Solola to Los Encuentros Q5
Los Encuentros to Xela Q30
So it was Q40 per person one way to go from Panajachel to Xela. The trip normally takes about 2.5 to 3 hours.
However, we ran into a bit of trouble this time. There was construction at Cuatro Caminos so our bus took a detour. Suddenly, we stopped at the side of a four-lane highway and the helper motioned to a few of us to get off the bus. He told us to cross the road and get on a different bus to go to Xela. We bolted, terrified, across this extremely busy highway and got on a new chicken bus...which then proceeded to wander through a strange town I'd never seen and dropped us off by a blue arch and a McDonald's. The guy said something in rapid Spanish that I didn't understand as we got off the bus. Another guy immediately tried to push us onto a packed minivan but we hastily declined and spent a few moments just catching our breath and trying to find our bearings. Eventually, we found a taxi and decided it would be better to pay Q30 for a ride to our destination rather than try to walk around lost on steep and unfamiliar city roads.
Finally at the Pradera (Walmart) mall, we washed our hands in the stupidly crowded bathrooms (keep your distance?? How when there are a dozen women in one small room?) and then had a quick lunch in the food court. I had Panda Express Chinese food, mushroom chicken & rice plus two yummy spring rolls for Q46 (about $7.50 Canadian or $6 American) and Bert eventually decided to have McDonald's, which he didn't like and ended up sharing my Chinese.
Christmas Tree in the mall.
After fueling up, we began to walk down to the Dollarama at the Utz Ulew mall a few blocks away. We had forgotten how chilly it could be in Xela (higher altitude) so we stopped at a sidewalk vendor and bought Bert a lightweight Adidas hoodie for only Q40 (cheaper than my lunch!).
Passed this ginormous Xmas tree on the way.
Weird giant fake Christmas tree in Xela. They were selling real pine trees nearby.
We hiked down to the other mall solely to shop at Dollarama. However, we found that the prices weren't nearly as cheap as we expected them to be and the selection was poorer than we remembered from last time. (Although that was a different location.) We picked up a few things that are hard to find in Pana and walked back to the Megapaca. Megapaca is a giant second hand store that's behind the Walmart mall. It's HUGE. You could spend hours in there shopping but we didn't have that much time, so we kinda hurried through the racks and managed to find a nice pair of sandal-shoes for Bert.
Just one part of Megapaca in Xela.
A quick trip into the Walmart to look for anything else we missed and we were back on the bus to head home. The problem with doing a day trip to Xela is that it takes so long to get there and back, that you have little time for relaxed shopping. We had left Pana at about 9 in the morning, got to Xela at around noon, and were back on the bus just past 4. We reached home after dark at 6:30 and trudged home to be greeted by our overly ecstatic dogs.
However, as I said, it was nice to get out of town and see the beautiful countryside. Traveling around Guatemala always reminds us that we are in a foreign country. That might sound weird but living in Panajachel has become so mundane, it seems just like normal life now. Even a little bit of travel makes us both feel inspired and adventurous. Time to start planning for another trip... but to where?? Hmmm...
