Marshmallows on a volcano

Arriving in Antigua was like we had just travelled to another universe. However, leaving LA on a flight with mostly Guatemalans felt as if we had already arrived in said universe. I was placed next to Maria, who insisted I fill out her customs documentation as soon as she sat down. She was born in 1936, as I discovered in her passport that was shoved under my nose. She spoke to me every 30 minutes of our 4 hour overnight flight to Guatemala City. The few Spanish lessons I completed on Duolingo while riding the Gautrain seemed insufficient to understand the intricacies of what my neighbour was so fervently discussing with me. Luckily, a "SI' every now and then seemed to satisfy her. 

Tip 1 for Central America: Learn Spanish

When we were descending she stretched from the aisle seat across me and another woman to open the window and proceeded to use my glasses placed in front of me to take a better look of the view. As soon as the plane landed, Maria was up and away- shoving and pushing her way through the crowd of people that stood in front of her. We realised once eventually out, that she was rushing for her "much needed" wheel-chair.

Through customs and straight to baggage pick-up, to find Jono's back-pack right in view. Little did we know that Jono's backpack was the cause of the entire conveyor belt stopping because the strap had got caught in the machine. This caused a great deal of commotion as policemen, cleaners and other airport staff were called to inspect said problemo... It was decided that it would be dealt with once all bags were removed and so was hoisted off the conveyer belt and onto the middle island as we watched from a distance. Luckily we knew it wasn't going anywhere. Sometimes you sits and think, and sometimes you just sits and watch your bag. :) Eventually with strategic pulling and some brute force Jono managed to pull it out.

Tip 2 for Central America: Ensure all straps of backpack are securely tied

In a low suspension minibus we were whisked away to Antigua - a beautiful cobble-stoned ancient city that was named the capital of the Spanish colony of Guatemala (that included most of Central America and some of Mexico) in 1543. This was up until the 18th century, when it was decided that the earthquakes posed too much of a threat after having destroyed huge portions of the city and so the capital was moved to Guatemala City. With a very Spanish charm, beautiful ancient churches and ruins surrounded by lush green covered volcanoes, this has been one of my favourite places so far!

Checked into a great hostel called El Hostal we then decided to wander around the city - passing the churches, the little parque central, getting lost in the calles and avenues, we eventually stopped in a coffee shop to eat some breakfast and drink some coffee. More wandering and a huge afternoon thundershower we had a great evening at Sky Cafe with a bucket of 6 different Guatemalan beers and then some dinner at Angie Angie, we headed to bed. 

TIP 3 for Central America: Make sure you like beans- all dishes include beans!

Wandered around the city in the morning exploring a beautiful church, grounds and museum. In the museum were the crutches of people who were crippled and then were healed were left as a memory of Saint Pedro (the first Central American sainted by papal bull) and his work he did. We then stocked up on supplies including a rain poncho for Jono, an umbrella, granola bars and sunblock.

At 2pm, the fully-loaded mini-bus arrived and we were whisked away again along the cobbled streets to the base of the volcano we were to climb. The hike up Volcan Pacaya was a slow and steady ascent. In 2010, the volcano erupted destroying 3,000 houses and leaving a very evident black trail all the way down the mountain-side. A very eerie black and white image emerged with the cumulus clouds hanging over the parched land. Our guide began collecting little sticks while the wild horses grazed what remained of vegetation on the mountainside. Sulphuric fumes hanging in the air at the summit and we climbed the volcanic talus (technically tuff, I think) to where our guide squatted over a vent and pulled out a bag of marshmallows.

Tip 5 for Central America: Carry extra marshmallows - you may have the opportunity to braai them over some lava on a volcano. 

And just like that - we were braaing marshmallows! The trick however, is to ensure you don't braai your shoes too. As expected, the rain came down in buckets in the middle of our braai-away-from-home! Since we were well-prepared we donned our ponchos and covered the backpack with the sneaky rain-protector I had found the night before! 

TIP 6 for Central America: Bring good-quality, water-proof hiking shoes

Above the crest of our braai spot, we have a magnificent view of Lago de Atitlan. For the next 2 hours we squelched through the rain and had to manoeuvre over muddy rocks with a remarkable lack of consternation - because our feet were dry! It was marvellous!

At one point, Jono pointed out that the lush vegetation was the perfect setting to explore the ambiguity of being met by guerrillas or gorillas and not knowing which we had encountered. A ridiculously fast drive home followed the descent, and a good night’s sleep was had by all. 

CITY RECAP: Antigua

Highlights: Ancient church ruins, beers at Sky Café, volcano braai, hiking in the rain and being over-prepared for it.

Lowlights: Losing Jono’s NY cap in the bus and realising the reality of 3^rd world customer service

People: Reserved, but polite and friendly and eager to teach you Spanish

Oddities: Charming cobble-stone calles, restaurants and shops that were all hidden by large embellished wooden doors

Jono & Jo’s totally objective and no-way subjective rating scale: 3 mouthfuls of braaied sugary goodness

Reminds us of: Nothing we’ve ever experienced

Distance travelled by foot: Probably about 6km.

California dreaming...

AREA RECAP: Southern California

Route: Cayucos, Goleta outside Santa Barbara, San Diego, Los Angeles

Highlights: Smoked fish tacos in Cayucos for $6, R23 through a desert-like mountain range that popped us out in Malibu, great bar in Gas Lamp District and discovering the Mission beach in San Diego, eating seafood on the pier at Santa Barbara, lady walking down the street in Santa Monica with a bird-cage hat (including a live bird inside), panoramic views of LA from the Getty (incredible centre with an exhibition on James Ensor), LACMA (Los Angeles County Museum of Art) with the lamp-posts installation and Japanese exhibition, La Brea Tar pits that are an archaeological  fascination (as the bones of animals including Saber-toothed Cat and American Lion that were trapped in the tar have been preserved), a man with a giant snake wrapped around him along Hollywood Blvd, driving around the ridiculous neighbourhoods off Rodeo drive, great Korean pork ribs in Korea town, the beautiful Japanese garden in Balboa Park.

Lowlights: Toll violation for not having a tag that we didn't know we needed and where paying cash or using a card was not an option. Traffic in LA, in general, is shocking. (I think we actually spent more time in the car on LA highways than we did exploring what LA has to offer). People throwing coins into the Japanese garden fountain despite the sign "NO COINS" just below it. After glaring a few people down, we managed to stop a few potential coin-throwing offenders and are now the self-proclaimed "Coin Police". 

People: Really diverse group of people - either stinking rich or terribly poor.

Oddities: Never actually spotting the Hollywood Sign despite a rather impressive attempt of riding around looking for it. Back-pack-fold-out-chairs (or "sitchels" according to Jono).

Jono & Jo’s totally objective and no-way subjective rating scale: 5 palm trees out of 8.

Reminds us of: the sprawl of Joburg.

Total distance travelled: About 2005 miles

And then we got engaged

After a quick ride around the quaint city of Berkley and some disappointingly cold coffee and lemon almond bun cake, we headed South to coastal California. Jono and I are convinced that the most popular store in town other than the Organic Food Store must be the Games Store with board- games for all the Dungeons and Dragons enthusiasts and the like.

We were chancing our luck, but we were hopeful that the Computer History Museum would be open, and it was!!! Seated in Silicon Valley among giants Google and Facebook, we found ourselves entranced by the history of computers. Super rad! J Everything was on display from a Google self-driving car to early calculators, punch cards and vacuum tubes to the UNIVAC, ENIAC, DECs, Apple Lisas, old floppy disks of Zork, transistor fabrication, Moore’s law and robots!

A rather late arrival into Monterey, we opted to do the 17 Mile Drive before heading to our accommodation for the evening – and just as well we did! It is a beautiful estate with several golf courses including Pebble Beach where the US Open is sometimes played (5 times, Jono adds). The true beauty of it all is the coastline dotted with Cyprus trees and fynbos-like flowers. We were enchanted! Clint Eastwood and his fellow residents sure know how to spend their nickels and dimes.

We arrived at Carmel-by-the-sea (a place that will forever be etched in my memory). By all appearances, one might have said that we were not even in America but rather in a coastal town in Italy or Greece. The roof for the evening was in the aptly-named “Cobblestone Inn”. We had a delicious meal in a Turkish/middle eastern restaurant with a full on performance by one of the chefs. Great vibe!

Jono woke up feeling under the weather, so after a rather late start to the day we meandered around the town in the car and then to Point Lobos Reserve. Jono had been told by Dyl and Dan that is was awesome and so without me realizing it, he was snooping out the place for the surprise later in the day. We decided that we probably needed hiking stuff and would come back later to do a walk. We watched Ghana narrowly lose to America in a Soccer World Cup group game. Disappointed, I wore “hiking clothes” for our hike including my hiking boots and rather unattractive hiking clothes. Jono said rather hesitantly, “ uh, maybe wear your dress from earlier …. Don’t think we need actual hiking things”…. UMMM! Wasn’t this the whole point of coming back to the hotel… But little did I know… J So, eventually I settled on jeans and a nice top and my hiking shoes…

We arrived at Point Lobos again and parked. There was a beautiful lookout point on a cliff, with fynbos everywhere and the view of the sea in front of us. Jono kept turning around to see if there were any tourists and I thought he just wanted to take photos. We had brought my little tripod and we were having fun with it – using multiple shots and videos… All part of a sneaky plan for Jono to learn how to use my camera so that he could subsequently film an important question! A classic Emmett/Beckwith series of events ensued... In one photo shoot with 8 shots – Jono picked me up and dipped me and when he lifted me back up, my hand bashed into his mouth and his teeth scraped some skin from my thumb (see photos below)… Then, Jono thought that the moment had finally come…. But, just as he is about to set up the video to record the entire thing, my camera dies. 

I am completely oblivious at this point that he is about to propose…. We looked out at the ocean, and he mentioned lovely things to me about our love and how much he adores me, and when I turned around, he was on one knee!

No other tourists, no video, just him and me, together! “Yes, yes I will….” 

Jono had organised Champagne and some of my favourite sea-salt Lindt chocolate for us when we got back to our room at the Inn. We decided to keep it just between us for a few days while we soaked in this new title of "being engaged". Jono had decided to leave the ring in our safe deposit box in New York while we are traveling, so he bought a $10 el cheapo silver ring in San Francisco and proposed with that, with the promise of something else later on.

What followed was an awesome drive down the coast - through Big Sur to Nepenthe. It felt like we were driving Chapman's Peak for 100 miles!

Be sure to wear flowers in your hair

CITY RECAP: San Francisco

Highlights: Cycling across the Golden Gate Bridge and having ice-creams over in Sausalito, visiting Alcatraz and surmising about the whereabouts of the three prisoners that escaped – (some believed they died trying to cross the ocean’s strong current, others hopeful that they made it to South America), the City Lights bookstore where Jack Kerouac spent a great deal of his time writing and reading, China town and eating dumplings for lunch for $2,50, seeing the view from Coit Tower, exploring San Fran’s very hilly neighbourhoods after getting off the trolley at the wrong stop, eating dinner in a fairy-lit courtyard at the Foreign Cinema with a movie playing on a huge white-washed wall, eating dinner two nights in a row at Rangoon Super Stars – a Burmese restaurant down the road from our Air BnB in Berkeley, lunch on the pier at Ferry Terminal.

Lowlights: Odd design choices in public transport, being yelled at by a crazy old racist lady.

People: Strangely enough relative to their reputation we found the people of San Francisco aggressive and rude to tourists – will have to revisit SF to see if we can get a difference experience of the people.

Oddities: incredible murals around the city, street names impressed into the concrete of intersections, street evangelists plying their trade with loudhailers.

Jono & Jo’s totally objective and no-way subjective rating scale: 3 escaped prisoners out of 4.

Reminds us of: Cape Town a wee-bit.

Distance travelled: 970 miles

Haikus from San Fran:

JONO:

Jo slips between cars

Quicksilver flashing, darting –

A fish on a bridge!

Under strings of lights

In the dusk you smile at me –

The sun blazes bright!

JO:

On my bicycle

Across the Golden Gate Bridge

Jono ahead: ride!

Sunshine, fairy lights

Ice-cream is melting. Smiling

With a golden heart.