Our amazing hotel had a playground.
Really nice spacious room and bathroom with a balcony.
So on the volcano trip yesterday, Becky got a horrible sunburn. Turns out she forgot to put sunscreen on her arms and did not bring a longsleeve shirt. The back of neck is very burned too. We made a stop today for after burn lotion.
Becky and I take pictures of the landscape from the van. I don't let Ally play much on her phone in the car so she has to look around. But we want to document what Guatemala is like for her.
Ally took a selfie of us.
It was market day in the town of Tec Pan.
Can you guess which sister is sunburned? At the ruins we hired an English speaking guide to tell us about the site. I took notes. They are below.
Iximche
200 people lived inside the city of the ruling class. IXIM= corn and CHEE = plant (icks shim chey)
40,000 Mayan people outside the city
Iximche was the city of one tribe of Maya
1465 founded
1524 discovered by Spanish
Main alter shows 4 directions E W N S
Each corner has 5 angles which makes the whole alter have 20 angles which symbolizes 20 days and they had 20 days and 13 months in a year
All the walls and floors of the city were covered in Stucco
Nearest quarry for the stone was 7km away so all the materials were carried by slaves/people. Guatemala has no large indigenous animals and they had no wheels at that time.
The city was built on a land peninsula with large ravine surrounding it on 3 sides.
Beth is demonstrating how to go up the steps.
Many people believed the steps are so narrow because Mayan people have small feet. (We all laughed, our guide had very small feet for a adult and we all know Ally has tiny feet for her age) but it is just a legend. The real reason for the narrow steps is that the Mayan believe the steep narrow steps are to go up and down sideways so they never had their back to the sun. So you climb sideways.
It was a beautiful day and amazing site and we learned so much.
Here the guide is showing Ally using the compass on her iPhone that the altar was built showing the directions, east west south and north.
The city had a serious of aqueducts they used to collect water.
At the back of the ruins there was a Mayan "burning ceremony" taking place. Our guide is Mayan. He speaks English, Spanish and two different Mayan languages.
These are pictures of the ravine and cliffs surrounding the city.
Then it was time for gymnastics around the ruins:
Look carefully, Ally is not doing a split on the ground. She is airborne.
Above is Ally stretching before her scorpion. Even stretching she is elegant.
Group pictures:
My favorite picture of the day:
Ally said as we walked out of the ruins into the museum "this is really cool". Learning about her heritage is important. She was psyched that she didn't have to pay an entrance fee, only non Guatemalans have to get a ticket. She is a native Guatemalan so no charge!
Back into the van, a stop for lunch and then to Pana.
Ally ordered chicken soup, on recommendation of our driver, and it was assemble yourself. You add the chicken, avocado, vegetables to the soup base. She liked it, and the chips and guacamole.
Beth and Becky posed for funny pictures in our "live edge" wood table.
I don't think those are winner of our photo contest.
Becky tried really hard to take pictures of the volcanos surrounding the lake as we drove into town. It's hard to get good pictures from a moving vehicle.
Settled in our hotel for the next 3 nights. Beth and I are out on the patio. Off to walk around and find some dinner now.
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