This Week In Antigua

This Week In Antigua

It has been a couple of weeks since the big volcanic eruption of Fuego and though we were riddled with a lot of dirt in the form of metallic sand, we are not worse for wear. However, each and every time it rains we get a little reminder in the form of the sand washing off the roof onto the terraza espanol. Hopefully it will be clean in the next week or two.

For a few days we have had trouble with our electricity. When the lights went out the first time we were on our way to the Mercado, upon our return the electric company was hard at work. The worker told me it all would be fixed in a half hour and the reason it went out was from people drawing too much power. The melted wires attested to the situation. Sure enough a half hour later the lights were back on and we back in business, so to speak. All was fine until the evening when once again the lights went out. They were out for quite a while and there was a lot of flickering happening as they tried to repair the line. Not a good sign.

After hunting for candles and giving them to the guests the lights came back on about 45 minutes later. Yeah, we have electricity. Or do we? Apparently some of the circuits were no longer functioning, including the one that was used by the refrigerator.. So we checked the breakers and saw that there was no problem. We had no idea what the problem was, so we moved the fridge to a working outlet and saw that we also did not have any power for our instant on hot water heaters. It is late and we know that there is nothing we can do now.

The lights go out again, for only a short time, and when they reappear the non working outlets are now working. However the flash water heaters are not. The next morning I begin to disassemble the heaters and contact our plumber. I can see nothing wrong. I look online and eventually find a fuse for one of them. Now if the hot water heaters are broken, I cannot wait weeks for parts and will need to replace them to the tune of $800. I am a little unhappy with the electric company. I look at the fuse and can see no filament, so I figure it is a simple fix. It would be if the fuses were available. At the sixth place I look I find a reasonable facsimile of the fuse. I buy 4 of them and then ask the woman to test the broken one, which turned out not to be broken. Uh oh, big problem, maybe the motherboard. The plumber has not shown up and I am looking at how easy it will be to swap heaters.

We are sitting in the outside area chatting with some guests, when, you guessed the lights go out again. It is actually rare to lose electricity here for more then a few moments, so this was a tad ridiculous. Shortly thereafter the lights come back on. I jokingly tell Diane to go see if the water heaters were fixed too. She goes in to check and comes out and tells me that the water heaters now work. I don't believe her and go in and check for myself, sure enough they were working. Welcome to Guatemala.

Earlier in the week I made arrangements to ride to lunch with a friend of mine who owns a KLR. The plan was to ride over the mountains, on my go too route (the ride I take when I just want to ride somewhere) and then continue on down to the beach. Now the route is close to where Fuego is located but far enough away not to have been covered in lava We head out and soon discover that although there was no lava, there was plenty of sand. The reason that I like this route is because it is lightly traveled, but it is the this lightness in travel that has left the sand on the route. We continue through the many twisties until we are eventually stopped by a line of cars. We pull to the front and inquire what is the problem. Well in addition to the sand, the rains have caused derrumbes, landslides that cover all or part of the road. We wait about five minutes and then continue to travel past the cleaner road. Not too much later we come across another one, that has been flattened by cars, then the next that was pretty muddy and then one that was literally a river of slime. We make it through unscathed and head further along where the sand is gone.

From the twisty mountain road things straighten out and then we head 30 miles of ruler straight road to the Pacific ocean with only tumulos to slow us down. The view consists of sugar cane and banana plantations. We see the occasional Dole truck. We park the bikes in the shade and go to one of the obsequious beach restaurants. Both Victor and I order ceviche, a large one each. I cannot finish mine, but Victor manages to complete his. We talk abut a different route home, but Victor says he knows a short cut that will allow us to miss most of the sand, though we will be on an unpaved road. We had back along the same route though Google maps manages to send us roads that no longer exist. Eventually we are back on our path. When we left the temperature was in the low 70s, halfway to the beach it was in the mid nineties. During one stop I changed my Darien jacket for my mesh summer riding jacket, but now as we were climbing back up towards Antigua, the temperature had dropped to 60. A thirty five degree shift in temperature over not two hours. I changed back into my Darien jacket. We are once again stopped by the crew cleaning up the derrumbes. Luckily this time, they were cleaning up the river of slime and we didn't have to ride back through it.

Sometime later I see some lights flashing in my mirror, it is Victor trying to tell me that the shortcut was approaching. He pulls in front and we turn down the road that has a warning sign informing us that this was not exactly a superhighway. Victor is in the lead and I am cautious with the new bike. I remember to switch the mode button to enduro and the F800 works much better. The road itself reminded me of my Vermont driveway at its worst. Of course this was miles and miles of it. The road ends up in a town quite close to Antigua and the shortcut saved us at least ten minutes. We arrive safe and sound with me realizing that I need to find a new go too route, at least until the end of rainy season.

I wonder what next week will bring.