From Anchorage to Ushuaia by Bike

It was with a certain amount of hesitation that we decided to once again leave the context of the Association Planète Durable et Solidaire for three days. Given the precarious security situation in Guatemala we didn’t want to spend too long biking through, but Atitlan Lake, Panajachel and Antigua had been so recommended that we felt we couldn’t leave the country without seeing them.

So we decided take a three day bus trip to get there, naturally being very careful.

Antigua is a small city, very tidy compared to the other towns and villages that we’d passed. The city is surrounded by three volcanoes: Agua, Fuego and Acatenango. Magnificant!

We also went on a guided tour of the Pacaya volcano. It is still active and the guided tours take visitors right up to a lava stream still reddish from the heat. (Unfortunately in the past there have been a number of tourists attacked on the sides of the volcano. It is safer now, but still highly recommended to go in groups). The sight was amazing, and what was chilling – despite the heat still emanating from the rock – was how small we felt compared to the raw and naked power of the earth. Pacaya could wake up at any moment and it would useless to try to run.

After that we went to Panajachel on the shores of Lake Atitlan. All the boats leave from there going to the other villages beside the lake. It was a small town, nothing spectacular: since it is so touristy it attracts many locals trying to sell their wares (weaving, sculptures) to tourists looking for a little authenticity. So we couldn’t walk anywhere without being accosted by all sorts of Mayan vendors.

We ran into a family of four (kids aged 10 and 12) traveling by bike. The Venhages left Los Angeles and we headed towards Santiago, Chili, on two tandem bicycles.

During these three days, we also encountered our worst enemy (after the wind, of course) in Central America: the chicken bus. In this local transportation, it is all too common to find oneself traveling with chickens (hence the name). The buses are old school buses from either Canada or the US, given a new life in Central America. So we were able to infiltrate, and study the enemy from the inside: we traveled on a 1987 bus from Brantford (Ontario, Canada). The buses rule the road: they pass on blind corners (if there’s an oncoming car, it has to know its place and get out of the way!). These fearless drivers have mastered the arts of tailgating and weaving through traffic. A number of the bikers that we’ve been following told us about them: if a chicken bus comes through, it honks its horn and you’d better get out of the way since sharing the road is a totally alien concept…

Sara

This bus trip was separate from our work within the Association Planète Durable et Solidaire. But we continued to post updates on the website in order to share all our adventures with you.