Jungle and Storm in Rio Dulce

After our stay in Lago del Atitlan, we headed northeast all the way up to the city of Rio Dulce. Travelling in Latin-America in the months of June, July and August can be a little unpredictable and we had both sun and storming weather with thunder and lightening on our way to the city of Rio Dulce.

We kind of underestimated the length of this trip, or in other words, we forgot that riding with a local bus includes a lot of stops and pauses. Manana is not only an expression here, but also how people live their lives, so when we arrived in Rio Dulce after 13 hours of travelling, 4 hours later than planned, we had to find a place to sleep.

Luckily, an old man appeared from nowhere and asked us if we liked to stay at Casa Perico. Since this was a place that we had read about and considered to stay at, we accepted his offer after having discussed the price for some time.

We thought that this place was located near the city, but it turned out to be located in the middle of the Jungle in the wetlands and we needed to go there by boat. After some minutes at the dock a boat appeared, and a friendly man took us across the river and into the jungle. It was quite fascinating to float through different channels in the river accommodated by the scream of howling monkeys and sirens.

When we got close to Casa Perico we could see a lot of candles in the dark. The hotel turned out to be a fantastic place with jungle hut’s and a lot of hammocks built on platforms that where connected by wood crosswalks standing on post in the water.

The day after our friend Eric from Montana arrived and we stayed one more night before going up the river to Livingston, which is a small place on the Caribbean coast of Guatemala. We had a fantastic night at Casa Perico with good food and wine. We met a lot of different backpackers arriving on their way to or from Livingston.

This night also turned out to show us what a small storm can be here in the jungle, imagine the sound of water coming down at us like in a car wash, combine it with strong thunder and lightening, and the sound of monkeys being afraid. All in all it was an exiting experience and despite all the noise we managed to sleep well through the night:-)

To be continued…

Tore

Tags: Backpacking, Adventure, Rio Dulce, Guatamala, Casa Perico Rio Dulce, Latin America