We still had a few more days before we were due back in Antigua, but the weekends crowds had ruined the relaxing atmosphere of the beach side towns. It had only been a few days, but we already craved the cool tranquility of the mountains.
The day dawned clear and cool. We awoke to clear skies above our camp spot at the foot of the volcano. We could now tick: ☑ Watch one volcano erupt from the summit of another off our list. Ok. Technically there was no actual list. But if there were. That one would now have a big tick beside it.
Your birthday excursion up a volcano didn’t go quite according to plan? You can’t really be too disappointed when one of the first things you see when you roll back in to town is a lady selling assorted pastries out of the back of her car.
Shivering, huddling in the tent as the nylon fabric buffets aggressively in the wind. Nibbling on a slice of cold, plastic-tasting faux cheese. Waiting for the icy rain to subside. Not exactly how I envisaged passing my birthday.
A life of travel is certainly not destined to be one of routine.
The town of San Pedro la Laguna sits on the shore of Lago Atitlán. This town is awash with Spanish schools. Much like Starbucks stores in the US or 7 Elevens in Bangkok. You can stand at the doorway of one and see the sign for the next one just down the road. This over-abundance could make selecting a Spanish school either very easy or very difficult.
Oh no!—We’re approaching the event horizon of Overlander Oasis. It’s too late to escape. Deploy the rooftop tent. Crack a beer and open up the deck chairs. We may be some time.
Before we left on this trip, we had a habit at home of walking up steep hills.
Calvin laughed. “Everyone says they are just stopping by for a day or two, but then they stay for several weeks.” “Well, we’d like to stay for three weeks, so does that mean you’ll never get rid of us?” No truer words have been spoken.
We really needed to slow down. We had been travelling too fast and we were looking for somewhere to stop for a while. We hoped to not have to set up the tent every night. To know where we were going to sleep. To familiarise ourselves with a local food vendor. We also needed to save some money, because we’d budgeted for 18–24 months of travel and had used up over half of the minimum not long after arriving in the Mexican mainland. Our plan was that Guanajuato would be the place where all of this would happen.