1/25-26/2011: Panajachel with Elisabeth & Steve

We have finally made it to our good friends' home in Panachel, by Lake Atitlan, even in time for Dances of Universal Peace led by Elizabeth, another Elizabeth we know from Compassionate Listening and yet another dancer from Seattle.  Today Yehudah has been recovering slowly from his version of traveler's diarrhea with nausea, chills and fever.  I went for a walk with Steve to see a bit of Pana down by the water.  Five volcanoes surround the lake.  It will be a good place to swim once we are both completely better.  We are staying here for a week.



Yesterday's travels:  Our trip via car with Ernesto and his friend, an environmentalist, Estuardo, was so wonderful, so easy.  We stopped for ice cream for lunch and they let us off at a chicken bus that was going directly from Guatemala City to Panachel.  Yehudah was okay in the morning, but by the afternoon bus ride his fever increased and he crashed on my shoulder as best as he could given all the curves in the road.  The bus was packed full of people by the time we were in this area, with many young people hopping on from the two towns close by.  We got our stuff in a tuc-tuc, made our way to Galleria, I went in & got Steve to take Yehudah to their house to crash.

Elizabeth speaking with Mayan woodcarver

I hadn't eaten much in two days and so I was surprised that I was well able to participate in the Dances.  It revived my spirit to be in group dance.  We went out to eat after and I had a large bowl of vegetable soup with some bread which tasted so good.  I knew I was on the mend.

Hopefully Yehudah will feel better tomorrow.  He is upstairs on the rooftop reading, drinking slowly the rice water I made for him and learning about Mayan philosophy.

Elizabeth trades an old radio for one of his woodcarvings

I will endeavor to post photos on each of these sites in the next few days. Here is a marvelous man who sells animal figures that are used as doorstops and slingshots! Elisabeth was proud of the trade of the radio for a pipe and a figurine that will serve as their house protector.