A Parents Perspective on their Traveling Kid

Fortunately for me (sometimes not so fortunate) my mother is always brutally honest with me. I generally always know her opinion on my life choices. Generally, her opinion doesn't sway me one way or the other but that doesn't stop her from telling me. In this situation, it is nice to hear that even though she doesn't fully understand my love for travel, like why I would enjoy sweating it out in the jungle or living in a house with 35 people and one working shower, she still supports me. If you are ever wondering what your parents think of your travels, it's best to just ask! Their answers might surprise you. Here is what I asked my mother:

Backpacking Central America // Top 10

I decided this week to rewind to last summer when I went to Belize, Guatemala, and El Salvador with my old roommate from college.  I haven’t been travelling much these past few months because I have been saving for my big move to Australia! So I haven’t had many interesting things to post on here.

So this is just going to be a kind of free for all of information that I think might be useful for anyone travelling to these areas.  Before we arrived our only set plans were to fly into Belize City and fly out of Guatemala City, that’s it. We didn’t want to make any set plans so we could just go wherever, whenever and stay as long as we felt like it.  When we landed in Belize City we didn’t know where we would be staying that night. We just picked the cheapest taxi ride and went that direction.

Belize Top 5

5.  Dirty McNasty’s Hostel in Caye Caulker. This hostel only really sticks out in my mind because I got a really bad sun burn and they came in for the save with air conditioned rooms. I might have had a touch of sun poisoning so the A/C was my savior. It also had a really cool vibe and served free rum punch each night so all the guests could hang out.

4.  Private Cave Tour in Belmopan.  We stayed in this great hostel called the Hummingbird Guest Lodge that included free meals! The owner asked if we wanted to see a cave, so he took us on our own private tour of some cave he knew about and then dropped us off at the blue hole national park where there is a sink hole you can swim in. Naturally we were fed fruit and beer for lunch, and the owner was super friendly and I glad we had a chance to be shown around by a local.

3.  Iguana Project in San Ignacio. It was a little further of a walk than we had anticipated from our hostel in the main part of town, but it was definitely worth it! The Iguana Project is part of a hotel, but they take you in small groups down to where they take care of the Iguanas.  After a brief introduction they take you inside the cages and you get to feed the adult Iguanas. The guide will pick up the iguanas and place them on you so they can crawl around and eat the leaves.  Then you are moved over into the baby section.  They are so cute and tiny you can hold them in the palm of your hand! But once again they throw them all over you so you are covered in baby iguanas. It was so much fun!

2.  Tsunami Adventures in Caye Caulker. We went snorkeling through this company and it was amazing! We saw a manatee, turtles, stingrays, and Nurse Sharks. If getting up close and personal with all those amazing sea creatures isn’t enough, they also take you around the island and give you food and rum punch. Important: NO MATTER WHO YOU SNORKEL THROUGH, WEAR A T-SHIRT BECAUSE YOU WILL GET BURNT! (A rash guard shirt/drifit shirt works best) I learned that lesson the hard way.  I thought I was doing a great job reapplying the sunscreen every time I got back on the boat. The only problem with this method was that my skin wasn’t dry when I applied it and I would be jumping back in the water for more snorkeling before it had a chance to soak in. I am pretty positive I had a little sun poisoning.

1.  Actun Tunichil Muknal (ATM) Tour from San Ignacio.  I honestly can’t remember what tour company we went through for the ATM tour because there were so many places we walked into for pricing (Unhelpful I know).  It was about an hour and a half drive from San Ignacio to the site where we began our tour. We had an amazing tour guide who had all sorts of information about rocks, caves, water, vegetation, and even the types of animals/insects living inside the cave.  The best part about his cave tour other than the great information was all the climbing around we did and there were actual skeletons still in the cave that you could see up close! It was amazing and creepy at the same time.  The fact that they leave everything the way they found it makes it a living museum and you get this cool yet eerie effect. I wish I had pictures or video to share but that is one strict rule they have on tour. No Camera’s! (If you google the cave, you can see some pictures and get an idea because people used to be able to take in camera’s).

Guatemala Top 5

5.  Semuc Champey Tour from Lanquin. We took a half-day tour through our hostel (El Muro) where we hiked up to see Semuc Champey, went tubing, and had the opportunity to jump off a bridge… (This was one of those moments you could finally answer your mothers favorite question, “If your friend jumped off a bridge would you follow?”)  The main reason this is ranked so low on my list is because the day before we celebrated my birthday so we had to struggle through with massive hangovers.  We didn’t realize we had to hike straight up hill for 45 minutes or that we would have to climb up a waterfall inside a cave.  It was definitely a very adventurous tour that we were just not mentally prepared for (also I thought I was going to go into liver failure or something dramatic because I felt so sick).  Also, another issue we had with the tour was that there were just too many people, we felt like cattle being herded through the cave and the tour guides could be pushy.  Overall, it was fun but there were many times I thought I might die. Moral of the story: Don’t do this tour hung over or if you are afraid of heights.

4. Los AmgiosHostel in Flores. I don’t know what it was about this hostel that I loved so much but it was one of my favorites for the whole trip.  They had a restaurant and a bar inside and you could book all sorts of tours.  We had a great time socializing with friends we had met along the way and they even had this crazy sound proof room that you could drink in at night so the neighbors wouldn't be disturbed.  Also, the small island of Flores was cute and had a few fun things to do during the day.

3.  Tikal Tour from Flores. There are many different times the tours take place and a lot of people pick the sunrise tour.  We decided against it because many travelers told us it was so foggy in the mornings to actually see the sunrise. We opted for the 9am tour so we could still be out there before it gets too hot. It was an amazing tour with intelligent guides.  Even though we were out there at 11am it had already begun to get hot, like up in the 90s. Once the guided tour was over you could stay as long as you wanted because there were shuttles taking people back to Flores every 45 min. It is a great place to explore and you can even climb up some of the temples for an amazing view!

2.  Volcano Pacaya. You have to do it! There are no words to describe the beautiful views from the top. Also at the top there is an area where you can roast marshmallows over hotspots (I think even my sneakers melted a little).  I could go on forever but this post is already too long, so just take my word for it and hike this bad boy.

1. Antigua. Everything about this city makes it my number one pick for this list. From the beautiful old architecture to the nightlife, there is nothing disappointing about Antigua.  There is something for everyone in this quaint old town.  There are history museums so you can learn about the culture, you can hike a hill for the perfect overlook of the whole town, there is even shopping to be done.  I have not yet mastered the art of haggling but this town was a great place to practice, I bought a ton of amazing stuff to take back to my family.  Did I mention the nightlife? You would think this small town would be sleepy on a Wednesday night but instead they had ladies night at some of the bars and it seemed like it was the place to be.  There are tons of places to eat, drink, and dance to every genre of music. It didn’t hurt that I ran into my friend from Ireland (good lord the Irish really know how to throw them back).  If you can only visit one or two places in Guatemala, Antigua should be at the top of your list.