Jan. 15 – San Ignacio, BZ. to El Cruce, GT.

In the morning we maneuvered the bikes off the hotel porch, and loaded up.  Found a bookstore (the owner claimed that she had the only open used bookstore left in the country!), and stocked up on reading material.  Off, in the rain, to the border, only a few miles away.

The border crossing was an experience.  Had to pay to exit Belize, and then deal with incredible third-world weirdness with Guatemala.  Immigration was a snap – stamp, stamp!  No customs AT ALL!  But the vehicle importation required photocopies of all sorts of papers, and, of course, there was no copy machine in the border station.  We had to walk through ankle-deep mud, 1/2 mile down the road into Guatemala, and across a two-way one-lane bridge, to a roadside hut that sold photocopies, and then back, in order to complete the entry process.   Fortunately, there was an english-speaking Guatemalan hanging around waiting to help confused foreigners like us, for a small fee.  Without his help, who knows what we would have done!  All very silly, but not too bad and no-one was nasty or threatening.    Quiet the contrary, everyone was very friendly and patient;  just the normal crazy bureaucracy, I guess.

We found an ATM in the nearby town, and got some local currency, then set out for Tikal.  The road west started out as greasy, slippery, nasty mud for the first 5 miles or so, then changed to badly rutted and washed out gravel, then changed again to pot-holed and un-maintained blacktop.  Nice first impression for Guatemala.  The rain continued without a break.  We rode all the way to Tikal, only to find that there were no affordable lodging there: so we back-tracked to the small town at the turn-off from the ‘main’ road, and found a place there. $16 USD.  We celebrated our first night in Guatemala with an expensive dinner, and cuban cigars.  Rain, rain, rain. Got in some internet time.  Both bikes are running good, at last.