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From Mexico to Guatemala

After a good night’s rest in San Cristóbal de las Casas, we were up early to get a move on. Today’s drive would include a border crossing, so we wanted to get a nice, early start. As the sun was just starting to rise, we walked back down the hill 2 1/2 blocks to where Chivo was parked. Once we were packed up, we hit the road… again.

Beauty!

It was another mountainous, windy, beautify road coming out of San Cristóbal. Luckily, the rains from the night before had subsided and we were treated to some stunning views.

After a couple of hours driving through the southernmost part of Mexico, we reached the border crossing into Guatemala. Again, I am a planner, so I had done extensive research about what to expect at the border. (Big thanks and special shout-outs to the blogs Freedom With Bruno and Neli’s Big Adventure. There are tons of others out there if you’re looking, but these were two of our favorites for their incredibly detailed descriptions of border crossings throughout Central America.)

Leaving Mexico was fairly straight-forward – we have to get our passports stamped out, cancel the TIP (temporary import permit) on Chivo, and cancel our tourist visas. After waiting in a couple of lines, we have all three items done and are on our way! We cross a little road and are in Guatemala! Just like that!

Just on the other side of a gate, we were waved to the side by the Guatemalan border crossing guards. Right away they see Bosco on my lap and ask if he’s quarantined. I said no and after a few mangled half-Spanish, half-English exchanges, the kind gentleman tells me it’ll be 76 Quetzals – about $10. Okay, no problem. He tells me to go pay it at the bank, two buildings down. So we exchange some Pesos for Quetzals and all walk over there and pay it, get the receipt and come back. We are struggling to communicate with each other, but then he brings up Google Translate on his computer and types in what he’s saying for me to read the English version. Thank you technology!! Now he tells us to go over to the building in the middle to take care of our immigration. Okay, we walk over there and get our passports stamped. Back to Guy #1. He sends us to yet another building to get the temporary import for Chivo. Another quick trip to the bank building to pay for that. Okay, Guy #1, how about now? Nope, a few more back and forths, then he has to check our receipts, verify the VIN on Chivo, and finally we’re done. All in all, it was about an hour-long process. It was challenging because so much is lost in our poor Spanish speaking skills and because there are barely any signs anywhere! But we smile through the whole process, say “muchas gracias” as much as we can, and figure it all out. This was part of the adventure and we feel pretty good about our second border crossing!

I wasn’t ready with the camera, but it says “Feliz viaje Guatemala Pais de la Eterna Primavera” – Happy Journey Guatemala – Country of Eternal Spring”
The little town of La Mesilla just after the border. So cute!

As we drive through Guatemala, we are once again going up, down, and through beautiful mountainous terrain. Thank goodness we have had so many years of driving through Colorado’s mountains – I can’t imagine someone from a flat area like Kansas driving through! The clouds were so low, but they made for awesome pictures!

As we’re driving through the country, we keep seeing what appear to be election signage. This person smiling with a thumbs up, this person smiling with their arms crossed, lots of “vota asì” – vote like this. It is clear that there is an election coming up soon! What’s interesting about their election signage though, is that there are lots of symbols crossed out. From our roadside conjecture, we determine that each symbol represents a party (similar to how donkeys = democrats and elephants = republicans in the US), and that particular candidate is against that party. We think. Please don’t take our word for it! 🙂

After another couple of hours, we arrived in the capital city of Guatemala City. It was a bustling city indeed! According to Wikipedia, it is the largest city in Central America! We make our way through the city traffic (no where near as bad as some parts of Mexico!) and arrive at our hotel. For this night, we are booked in the AC Marriott Guatemala City. Incredibly, it was less expensive than most of the Air BnB’s I researched, so it was a nice little treat knowing that we wouldn’t drive up to a construction site or a bug-filled room. We had no idea what a treat it would be though! WOW! The hotel was in the middle of this gorgeous area called Ciudad Cayala. Think Central Park in New York, meets a bustling outdoor shopping square in Italy, with the posh feel of the finest area of Paris… and you might get an idea of what the feel was! Simply put, it was lovely. After checking in, the rain had cleared up, so we decided to take a little walk around. There were tons of people out – locals, tourists, couples, families, groups of teens, and lots of people with dogs on leashes (a rarity south of the US, we have come to learn). We strolled for a couple of hours, enjoying the fresh air and not being in a car!

As the sun was starting to set, we could see some dark clouds rolling in, so we decided to head back to the hotel and have dinner on the patio of the onsite restaurant. We started with a couple of glasses of wine and two appetizers – tuna tartar and balsamic mushrooms with Gouda cheese. Bosco sat on my lap (because he hasn’t done that enough this trip????) while we waited and, just as we thought, the storm hit and the rains started to pour. Luckily we were covered, so we just sat and enjoyed looking over downtown Guatemala City.

Nicholas ordered a bottle of “Gallo” the local beer, because he just had to try it.

After an underwhelming entree of Shrimp Alfredo for both of us (so boring we didn’t even bother getting a pic!) and another couple of glasses of wine, we headed back to our room. In our room, we connected to HBO on our iPad and watched the finale of Game of Thrones (booooooooo!) before nodding off. Tomorrow would be another day of driving with another border crossing and another new country. If we only knew what that day would hold for us…


One response to “From Mexico to Guatemala”

  1. William Rembowski Avatar
    William Rembowski

    Thanks for including all of us on your trek. Personally, I’m loving it.

About Us

We are Nikk and Shannon – and we love all things BEER and BEACHES. We originally started this blog to capture our journey moving from Colorado to Costa Rica, but now we’ve got a new adventure – driving the PanAmerican Highway from Alaska to South America. Join us and follow along for fun!

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