Day Four: Rio Dulce

No day in Guatemala can be dull, as we found out when our 3 hour tour on board a sailboat turned into a day long cruise along the Rio Dulce.

Early on, our captain informed us that we were sailing into the river where the early Tarzan films were shot. Vines hung from steep cliffs on either side of the river and small fishing boats with one or two guys scraped the edges of these cliffs in search of lunch. Our captain was a Breton and his mother, who was vacationing in Guatemala for the summer, was along for the ride. Also on board was another guy--a friend of the captain--let's call him Carlos since I forgot his name in the several days of delirium that followed our encounter. He seemed like a cruise director of sorts. He had some sort of a business relationship/friendship with the captain and it later turned out that he managed a hotel in the river town of Rio Dulce.

Our gang had grown. We had said farewell to Roberto, who was to drive back and meet us in the town of Rio Dulce. In his place, we now had the captain, his girlfriend, his mother and this guy whose name I've forgotten.

After breakfast, Michelle began chatting with the captain's mother. This didn't turn out so well as his mother's Spanish was very choppy and laced with a thick French accent. This was the beginning of the linguistic spaghetti that would have me all day. It was also right about this time when the trolling motor on the boat went out. The steep cliffs on both sides of the river blocked any wind we'd have caught and so now begins our 8 hour odyssey on the Rio Dulce.

Of all the places to be stuck 8 hours, the Rio Dulce rates pretty high, right up there with being stuck in a chocolate factory, or in a spa. The weather was beautiful, the scenery unlike anything I'd ever seen in person and the company as easy-going and sociable as I could have asked for.

I was having such a rockin' time that I even threw my stupid fear of deep water out the window and hopped in with the others for a splash in the river. Although I am proud of the courage this entailed for me and truly enjoyed floating alongside the boat, I can't say it was the smartest thing I did while traveling. I am fairly certain that this little adventure was at least partially responsible for the severe intestinal discomfort I felt for the remainder of my stay in Guatemala.

At the end of our elongated boat tour, I became suddenly very ill. I spent a good deal of the evening sitting on the toilet with my head in the sink. It was not the way to spend a holiday. Fortunately, that guy from the boat had set us up in his hotel for a reasonable price. We had a nice bamboo-style cabin with monkeys on the roof. Their crazy noises actually lulled me to sleep, but I am still disappointed that I didn't get to see them.

Sick and delirious, I did manage to get up and have some soup and seltzer around 10ish. That turned out to be such a crazy brain scramble, as I stumbled into 3 conversations, each in a different language. I was too tired for it to matter, so I flowed between French, English and Spanish. Despite the worst kind of sick I can ever remember, me and my amoeba were havin' a blast.