El Retiro
Of all the places I have ever stayed, El Retiro is by far the most relaxing. It combines the communal and friendly atmosphere of a hostel with the seclusion and serenity of bungalows. The lodge consists of several bungalows with small dorms and lofts nestled alongside a hill overlooking a small river (which you can tube down if you desire). There is a large bar and restaurant by the river, with internet in the loft and plenty of hammocks and swings below to chill out on. Dinner is served communally, and everyone who stays there eats there, so it is easy for people traveling independently to meet fellow travelers. The lodge also arranges tours to the nearby attractions of the Grutas de Lanquin and Semuc Champey.
My nemesis. The only complaint I can think of was the fact that this stupid rooster started cock-a-doodle-dooing every morning around 6 a.m.Grutas las Marias and Semuc Champey
Semuc Champey is a natural limestone formation, over which flows a series of nine lagoons and waterfalls. It is arguably the most beautiful natural sight in all of Guatemala. The tour to Semuc Champey began with an exciting jump into the river via rope swing, which was followed by an exploration of the caves at Las Marias. This was the coolest caving I have ever done [even beats out the caves in Laos], but unfortunately I have no pictures because it was too wet inside to risk bringing my camera. A dry description will have to suffice.
A river flows along the floor of the caves, and upon entering I immediately found myself wading through the water. Within a minute, the water was too deep to touch, requiring us to swim to continue. Inside the cave, there was a series small waterfalls, which we navigated around using a series of rickety ladders. At one waterfall, there was a rope attached to the top that we used to scale the face of the waterfall. Finally, at the end of the cave, there was a very deep pool of water. Our guide started climbing up the side of the cave wall to a ledge about 12 to 15 feet high, and then proceeded to hurl himself off into the pool. Of course, a few of us promptly followed. Quasi-cliff jumping inside a cave - pretty cool.
After the caves, but before Semuc Champey, we crossed this bridge. Who wants to jump?
Our guide decided to paint our faces using the juices from some native flower.
There's a viewing point that you can climb to that provides a picturesque view of the pools of Semuc Champey below.
More jumping...Grutas de Lanquin ("The Batcave")
The next day we went caving at the Grutas de Lanquin. This caving experience was much less impressive than the Grutas las Marias, but for me all caves are pretty interesting.
Some sort of crazy cave spider.
Marco, our guide.
The highlight of the tour was the bats. We stayed in the cave until dusk, and then turned off all of our lights and waited by the mouth of the cave. Soon hundreds, maybe thousands, of bats began flying by us, exiting the cave to begin their feeding. It was pretty crazy to have bats flying so close by your face that you could feel the wind from the flapping of their wings.
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