TEA PARTY

tea at los andes




FINCA LOS ANDES: FEBRUARY 15
A community of some 150 families have their homes on Finca Los Andes. Two full-time and a part-timer teach at the primary school. High School is down on the coastal plane. The finca funds scholarships to University. The young woman who greets me and shows me to my room studies business management.
Jim Hazard is out on the finca. I sit in what was my Uncle's sittingroom and explain myself to Olga Hazard.
Olga's blood lines reach south from Mexico to Colombia. She is a warm woman, kind and gentle- yet steel must lie at her core. There is steel in any woman who survived the clandestine war and possesses the courage to create a life up here on a volcano that was guerrilla territory.
Guerrillas entered the house when Mark and Helen were here. The leader addressed Mark as Enginerio in recognition of the hydroelectric system Mark designed and installed. In describing the incident, Mark told me that Helen behaved “Very well”
Though a Scot, Mark was schooled at Eton and was very much an Englishman. Very well was high praise.
My Aunt Helen created the garden that stretches beyond the window. Seed for the camellias came from the Botanical gardens at Kew, London. My uncle built a relationship with Kew. He sent orchids from the cloud forest to the orchid house.
The relationship was useful.
Mark was keen to plant tea at Los Andes (none was grown in Central America). I smuggled 20 kilos of seed from Kenya to England. I don't recall the name of the botanist at Kew whose name my Uncle told me to quote should I have difficulty at Heathrow airport. Mention of Kew was sufficient. Mark had a connection at the Guatemalan Embassy in London: the seed was forwarded to Guatemala as Diplomatic baggage.

OLD MAN, OLD MEN

FINCA LOS ANDES: FEBRUARY 15
An old man slithers down the bank. He has one upper tooth. I have none. He has no lower teeth. I have five. My five are vaguely white. His one tooth is dark green at the gum fading to yellow at its peak.
Am I visiting Don Jim?
Yes, I am visiting Don Jim.
Had he known my uncle?
Certainly he knew my uncle. My uncle aided him during the time of the guerrillas. The old man left the finca at the time of the guerrillas. He had to leave. I am uncertain why. Lack of teeth impairs his diction and I am moderately deaf. Added to which I am astride a bike with the motor running.
I nod in understanding of that which I don't understand and ask directions to the house.
The old man points this old man uphill.
The house is white and overlooks an acre of lawn and trees and flowering shrubs.Look a little further (sixty Ks) and the darker blue way below is the Pacific Ocean. A woodpecker pecks a rowdy tattoo.

THINK LESS AND RIDE WITH CARE

FINCA LOS ANDES: FEBRUARY 15
The road is cobble. A light breeze stirs the rubber trees and small spits of sunlight penetrate the canopy. Trees are pale grey. Knife wounds scar te bark. White gum oozes into cups.
The road climbs out of the plantation. A culvert cuts through pale red earth. Coffee bushes are dark green, multiple stems. I helped Charlie Zagaritis introduce multiple stem pruning to East Africa. Another memory opens: playing rummy at the Greek Club in Arusha, Tanganika. The Korea War was over: no need for sand bags; the sisal boom had turned to bust. Coffee was king. Multiple stem pruning increased yield.
Why was I in East Africa?
Because I wasn't in Guatemala. That is the easy answer. Another would be that I had no education, no qualification, and was searching for my father. My father settled in Kenya prior to World War 1. He died when I was five. I have no memories of him. Searching for other people's memories? Risky thoughts when riding a small city bike on slippery cobbles up a volcano...

BRAVE COWARD RIDES AGAIN

cobbles through rubber
entrance to finca los andes


TO FINCA LOS ANDES: FEBRUARY 15
My mother's brother, Mark owned a plantation on the high slopes of the volcanoe that dominates Lake Atitlan. In my early twenties, Mark invited me to work on the plantation. A month later Mark changed his mind. I wasn't suitable. He was probably correct.
I have lived for fifty years with a What if?
What if has stopped me visiting Los Andes.
Eugenio has pressed me over the years. “You need to free your head...”
I am 75, an adult. I don't have much time. Eugenio is correct. I do need to free my head.
Mark sold the finca late in the clandestine war.
Jim and Olga Hazard are the owners. Jim has invited me to stay Friday night.
I ride down from Antigua to the coastal highway. Harvest time and smoke rises from vast tracts of sugar cane; farmers are burning leaf.
The road up to Santa Barbara heads straight for the reverse side of volcano Atitlan. This was guerrilla territory. A swing barrier bars the road. An armed guard asks my destination. My license number is recorded. Sugar gives way to brittle pasture. Boulders litter paddocks. Santa Barbara is one street, low houses, a few mini stores. The road is newly concreted beyond the village. The white central line weaves a little. Giant bamboo form a tunnel. Concrete gives way to a cobble. Tyres kick and slither over stones – dangerous to lose concentration.
Two locals riding a 250 trail bike ask my destination and beckon me to follow. We cross shallow fords and climb through rubber plantations. A loose feathery leaf-canopy softens the light. The air is cool and fresh with forest scent. Above towers the pyramid peak of Atitlan.
My guides pull in at a small modern house.
“Straight on,” they tell me. “You will see the entrance.'
They would have been young during the clandestine war.
Which side did they support?
Was my uncle the enemy?
Would I have been the enemy?

WHINE, WHINE, WHINE...POOR OLD MAN? SILLY OLD MAN.

silly old man


SOMEWHERE DARK INSIDE MY HEAD: FEBRUARY 19
I haven't ridden for two days. I haven't written for a week. I want to plead mental exhaustion. Truth is that I am a coward. Writing fact, or my perception of fact, is uncomfortable. Safer to hide in a foxhole...Or stick to writing fiction - though the novel I have with Clare (editor) is anything but safe. And riding this wretched bike, am I courting danger? Or have I, in my seventies, finally become an adult? Adult writers don't whine. Adult writers write.
Here goes: I have been invited to Finca Los Andes. I leave Antigua Guatemala early on 15th February. Erick photographs my departure and leads me out of town...

SUSTAINABILITY IS CASH COSTLY

ANTIGUA GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 14
An intelligent man is attempting to design a cash-free sustainable living environment. He lives on the shores of Guatemala's most beautiful lake, Atitlan. He finds Atitlan deeply spiritual. He intends generating his electricity through solar panels. Solar panels are cash costly.

VALENTINE

ANTIGUA GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 14
Erick and I visited the flower market early this morning: roses for Monica Smith and for Lucia. My youngest son, Jed, has organised flowers for Bernadette. I wish I was home and holding Bernadette in my arms.
Back home in England, I don't do parties. I don't do rooms with more than eight people. In the Americas I am working. Attending a party is only marginally more unpleasent than riding my Honda up a mountain in sleet.
We attended the opening of a painter's exhibition yesterday evening. The gallery was small and pleasantly empty but for the paintings. The celebration was on a large roof terrace and packed. Most of the packing was retiree North American. Erick and I arrived late. The wine had run out. People talked a great deal - mostly of each other.
Later we were seven for dinner at a Japanese restaurant. One of the seven was an early teenage boy. He wore a baseball cap. I am of a generation which considers wearing a hat indoors to be ill-mannered. Wearing a hat indoors is ill-mannered unless you are a woman. Baseball caps are a disease anywhere other than on a baseball field. Baseball is a disease anywhere other than North America. I suspect that North Americans wear baseball caps to bed and with the peak reversed so that they can nuzzle.
Yes, I know. I am an aged Brit Blimp...

AMONGST FRIENDS

manuel, building site


ANTIGUA GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 13
I moved residence yesterday to Lucia's home in town. Erick is overseeing the building of a new house. Five pint-size Maya workers mix concrete for a terrace. A studio apartment for Lucia's son, Manuel, is complete. Manuel is in residence. A passionate and expert rock climber, Manuel graduated from University in Colorado and now works as a mountain, white-water and nature guide. He is more qualified than most and has a good Toyoto 4x4. He is also young and handsome which is no bad thing in a guide. Fluent in Spanish, English and French, he makes ideal company for an ascent of Antigua's volcanoes. He will also take clients to visit haciendas that are closed territory to the standard tourist. Call him on 50255269110 or check out his web site: www.wildguatemala.com

VISITING A PERSONAL HISTORY

the smith's antigua home, rose red on the right


ANTIGUA GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 12
I visited Monica Smith today in Antigua Guatemala. Monica is 86 and frail. Monica's husband and my uncle Mark were business partners (both men are dead). My uncle Mark married Helen Rolfe. Helen's sister, Lilian, was a radio operator attached to the French Resistance during World War 2. She was caught and tortured by the Gestapo, sent to Ravensbruck and shot.
I found Monica rereading the Lilian Rolfe biography. We sat on a bench in the patio at Monica's Colonial home and looked at photographs. Lilian Rolfe was so young when caught, young and fresh and innocent and shared a remarkable beauty with her sister, Helen.
Monica spent time in Paris before World War 2. Her French remains fluent. Speaking the language brings back joyful memories. We sit together for an hour and admire the flowers and the changing sky above the patio and watch birds pick seeds from a bowl and chat in French of this and that – memories, mostly, and that we will meet next on a heavenly cloud...Though Thursday is Valentine's day. I will deliver roses.

BBC AND UNGLUED DENTURES

volcanoes at the end of the street



ANTIGUA GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 12
I am to do a BBC live broadcast over the telephone at 1.30 AM – El Antiguo in La Antigua. I was in bed soon after 10 AM. I read a while, checked the alarm, turned off the bedside lamp. The alarm wakes me at 1.15 AM. I fumble for my spectacles; reach for the cup holding my dentures. Should I glue them in place? Surely there is no need?
The telephone rings. I answer.
Am I ready?
“Absolutely,” I reply - too late for glue.
I can think of nothing other than my teeth. Will they pop out in mid broadcast? Will I lose them under the bed? Or, while hunting for them, stamp them underfoot (something I have done in the past).
The interview progresses badly.
Obsessed by teeth, I lose clarity of diction. The interviewer blames a poor connection. The line is cut. I drop my dentures back into their bath and turn off the light. I am 75 and a failure. I can't sleep.

75th DINNER PARTY

ANTIGUA GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 11
Lucia is a Guatemalan painter. Her husband, Erick, is French. We are friends of long standing. They are perfect companions for a 75th birthday dinner. My host drives me to their Antigua home. We drink a rum in front of an open fire, drive to a restaurant. The chef is French. The meat is excellent. So is the wine, an Argentinean Merlot Norton. We are served pastis on the house as an appetizer and anejo rum on the house to finish. My host is an habitual early riser and likes to be in bed by ten. End of party...

LOCUSTS WOULD BE PREFERABLE

antigua guatemala, first university in central america



ANTIGUA GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 11
Spanish Conquistadors founded Antigua. It is a small compact town. Much of the architecture is 16th and 17th Century. Streets are cobbled. Bougainvillea spills over ochre and terracotta walls. Climate is ideal, permanent Spring. Three volcanoes surround the town. Though spectacular, volcanoes make uncomfortable bedfellows. They erupt. Added to which, Antigua has been devastated by earthquakes. Though rebuilt and lovely, the town now suffers a fresh plague. It is the number one tourist destination in Central America. In such quantity, locusts would be preferable.

SUICIDE RUN

plaza, antigua



HIGHWAY TO ANTIGUA GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 11
All Guatemala's trade to the Atlantic passes through the port of Barios. I recall the road up through the hills to Guatemala City as a suicide run. The road has been widened and Guatemala City is bisected by a six-lane highway. I am a survivor of Venezuela. Guatemala is easy. I left Rio Dulce at shortly before midday, stopped midway for coffee and a bun, and am in Antigua soon after 5 PM.
My host in Antigua is a family connection. His house lies outside of town in a condo. He meets me in the plaza and leads me home in his Landrover.

MULATO LATINOS - WHAT DO THEY KNOW?

TO ANTIGUA GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 11
Today begins with incompetence: I leave my passport at Hacienda Tijax. I realise my error as I pass the police post at the south end of the bridge over the Rio Dulce. Back I go to the house, set off again and race a rain squall to a road-side shelter. A dozen men sit on wooden benches beneath a thatch roof. Two have bikes, one owns a scooter. The remainder wait for a bus.
Sun strikes the rain curtain as it speeds towards us. Dry tar is grey. Wet tar is black. Trees bend and leaves point down beneath the rain. The shelter shudders as the squall hits.
“Five minutes,” comments a young man in jeans, red T shirt and white trainers.
A man wearing a white plastic Stetson asks whether I am from the US or am I German?
“Britanico,” I reply. “More or less from the US. We have been sold by our Government to President Bush.”
“Bush is an ignorant man,” says the Stetson. “He has no education.”
“With much arogance,” says an older man. “Much arogance.”
The others nod and murmur agreement. What do they know? They are country folk. Mulato Latinos...

ENDLESS SEPARATIONS

view from tijax tower
HACIENDA TIJAX, RIO DULCE, GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 10
A 75th birthday is a biggy. I leave tomorrow for Antigua, first capital of Guatemala. Monica and Eugenio have offered a haven towards which I rode. Tonight we dine at the resort en famille. Eugenio's daughter has baked a birthday cake. Rather than a celebration, I suffer the sadness of one more parting. Such is this journey, seemingly endless separations, because of my age, probably final.
In the TIJAX BLOG, Eugenio claims that I have been an inspiration.
If so, I am humbled.
Eugenio is my inspiration.
Tijax demanded vision and is an ongoing achievement.

STUPID OR UNFORTUNATE?

leg - 2006
arm - 2008

HACIENDA TIJAX, RIO DULCE, GUATEMALA:
FEBRUARY 10
I rested at Hacienda Tijax on my way south to Tierra del Fuego in 2006 and burnt my leg on th exhaust pipe.
I have stopped at Hacienda Tijax on my way north to enjoy my 75th birthday amongst friends.
Eugenio says that he does his best to look after me. I fell on the walkway across the mangrove last night. The rope saved me from an involunatry mud bath. However, I have a friction burn on my right arm.

MAN AT WORK

HACIENDA TIJAX, RIO DULCE, GUATEMALA:
FEBRUARY 10
I am almost up to date with my writing. The bar at Hacienda Tijax is a good studio.

WHITE GUESTS ONLY

HACIENDA TIJAX, RIO DULCE, GUATEMALA:
FEBRUARY 10
I can't connect to the internet on this machine up at the house. I am writing at the resort bar. Odd guests turn up looking for a room - or a nest.

KIDDIES PARADISE

HACIENDA TIJAX, RIO DULCE: FEBRUARY 8
I am in Kiddie's Paradise. I have been driving Eugenio's crawler this morning. The crawler is yellow, as are the butterflies and the blossoms and the breasts of the small birds flitting amongst the red hybiscus.

ADVICE FROM A STUPID OLD TOAD

volunteer guideCASA GUATEMALA, RIO DULCE, GUATEMALA:
FEBRUARY 7
My guide is eighteen. She is born to parents who do good (adopting children with difficulties). She wishes to do good. She has an excellent and active brain. What direction will she take?
Working in an orphanage offers immediate reward.
Working to make such charities unnecessary is seldom rewarding...And yet you may make a minute difference...Yes, after years of frustration and boredom, years of keeping your mouth shut while striving to reach a position where you can make that difference.
Decision is never easy.
My only advice is to seek a qualification that enables you go in different directions.

CASA GUATEMALA

up river to hacienda tijax


CASA GUATEMALA, RIO DULCE, GUATEMALA:
FEBRUARY 7
I will carp again: the orphanage lacks direction, lacks planning, lacks management discipline. Perhaps this is partly reliance on volunteers who stay a month or six months or leave after a week.
The orphanage clinic is the exception. For coolness, it is built on stilts over the river. Everything is freshly painted white. Two lavatories are being installed. The pharmacy is well stocked and spotless. So is the doctor's office.
The doctor is Spanish and a recent arrival.
He has spent the past year traveling through Hispanic America.
He is imbued with endless energy and mental discipline. He is a rock thrown into a pool. His influence will spread each day.
How long will he stay?
He has no idea.
Pray, children. Pray...

DON'T SMOKE IN SCHOOL

CASA GUATEMALA, RIO DULCE, GUATEMALA:
FEBRUARY 7
Volunteerrs at the orphanage contribute US$180. This is a one-off payment. They can stay as long as they wish and return as often as they wish. Their food is free and they occupy the volunteers' house. OK, shack.
Why has no volunteer bothered to build a little comfort into the place?
Work is over for the day. Two volunteers sit on the small terrace. A third lolls in a hammock. They shouldn't smoke.
They absolutely should not smoke where children see them.
They should be particularly careful as to what they smoke...
Yes, I know. I am carping again.
I chat briefly with an elderly worker on the farm. The land is poor. Rains leach all goodness out of the soil.
A couple of kids hoe beans. They should hoe natural fertiliser into the soil. Chicken shit, pig shit, kitchen compost.
A boy leans against a wall to ease the weight of fresh sheets from his shoulders. I carry the laundry for him to the boys' dormitory. The sheets are required upstairs. I barely manage the climb and am twice the size of the boy.

FOOTBALL OR WITCHES

CASA GUATEMALA, RIO DULCE, GUATEMALA:
FEBRUARY 7
Break time, and I sit on a low stone wall. Boys play football. Girls gather in groups and giggle. Two girls lead each other to me by the hair - play pulling rather than painful pulling. Which of them is the most vicious. The smaller of the two. She is a witch. A real witch? Yes, yes, a real witch...the two colapse with laughter.
A smaller girl sits on my lap while I am interogated by the real witch and her friend. A small boy squats behind me and rests his chin on my shoulder.
A young woman with blond blond hair sits on the same wall and is happy for small girls to use her as a climbing frame.
Happiness appears abundant.
So does dedication.
Staff are volunteers. Of the teachers, ten are Guatemalan, four are Spanish.
Other volunteers build or work on the orphanage farm. Two are Israeli. The blond blond is Finish. An eighteen-year-old of Danish and Asian Indian parentage conducts me on a tour. The farm has excellent pigs. It has a non-functioning bio gas plant that requires cleanng and rows of non functioning hydroponics beds built recently by volunteers from the US. The farm has chickens in chicken houses, cows, grows vegetables and beans and fruit. Fish abound in the river.
Two hundred and fifty children are fed at the orphanage each day. This is an achievement. Well done, Dona Angie.
Many of the children are not true orphans. Their parents are unable to care for them. The orphanage clothes and educates them. Well done, Dona Angie.
A miniscule few from the orphanage go to University. One is studying medicine, another is an economist. A minuscule few is way better than none.
Well done, Dona Angie.

JACK, JILL AND ANNIE ARE UNSUITABLE

CASA GUATEMALA, RIO DULCE: FEBRUARY 7
Casa Guatemala is an orphanage. Dona Angie founded the orphanage. She owns the Backpackers Hotel on the river bank south of the road bridge. The hotel supports the orphanage. So do charitable donations. Local people complain that confusion or lack of clarity exists in the twin finances. Dona Angie is Honduran.
A launch delivers me from the hotel to the orphanage ($10).
I sit in a classroom built out over the river. The teacher is female, young, Spanish, charming, sincere, dedicated. Her students range from 12 to 15. They are remarkably well behaved. They are reading children's book translated from North American English. Characters in the books have Anglo names: Jack, Jill, Annie, Mollie, Robert.
Is this important?
Yes.
The message is clear:
Books are foreign.
Education is foreign.
Children with Maya names are unworthy of being characters in a book.
The teacher agrees. She shows me the library. Books in English fill the shelves.
The books are donations. The donors should consider what they give. Guatemala has its own writers. Guatemala has publishers and printers.
Donors, please. Guatemalan books for Guatemalan orphans...

A DUMP BY ANY NAME REMAINS A DUMP

HACIENDA TIJAX, RIO DULCE: FEBRUARY 7
Hacienda Tijax is 17 years in the making. I visited first from Cuba in 1992. What is now the town of Fronteras was tin shacks and a few buildings either side of a dirt track. Eugenio had completed a few thatched huts and was planting rubber, teak and mahogany. Now Fronteras is a tar main street stretching north one and a half kilometers towards El Peten. Latino machismo blocks the traffic. No Guatemalan gives way. Klaxons and curses are weapons of first recourse. Between the trucks whizz lunatic young un-helmitted on motor scooters. All five of Guatemala's major banks have branches. Hotels, restaurants, farmacies - all are new. Only the whore house remains the same – and that Fronteras is a dump with few redeeming features. Why do I feel such affection for a dump?

BRIDGE OF DELIGHTS

HACIENDA TIJAX, GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 7
Eugenio leads me on a hike this morning. 2.5 Ks of graveled paths and cable bridges thread the jungle. One bridge is 75 meters in length. It spans a ravine. Look down though tree tops to ferns and water and spits of reflected sunlight.
Stay at the resort and walk the trails in the company of knowledgeable local guides.
A woman from the US complained on Lonely Planet's Thorn Tree forum that Eugenio charges for access to the jungle and mangrove. Perhaps she believes that paths and cable bridges and stone towers are created and maintained by God. Or is she one of those backpackers from the First World who consider the Third World their playground and resent having to contribute more than a minimum per diem? The kind of tourist who proudly boasts of having beaten down the price of a piece of woven cloth without caring that hunger in the weaver's family is the tourist's bludgeon? Why am I so cross this morning...?
I am writing at a table on the front terrace. Forest protects us from the town and the resort. Cows and the resort horses graze the paddocks. Cloud softens the distant mountains. Two yellow butterfly chase each other through the shrubs. A small yellow-breasted bird darts between the hibiscus. Yesterday we saw blue morpheus in the jungle, listened to
birds, admired wild orchids, sniffed crushed leaves from the allspice tree, hunted for vanilla pods. Perhaps I am envious of Eugenio's achievements.

GIANT PRAWNS AND SNOOK

pool, tijax
HACIENDA TIJAX, GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 6
I ate shrimp last night down at the resort. The shrimp were mammoth. Monica and Eugenio chose river fish freshly caught. The restaurant was full. We ate at a table in the marina-side bar. Lights reflected in the river between wooden docks, Sailboats stirred in the wake of a passing taxi launch. As an arrival, near to perfect...

QUITE CLOSE TO HEAVEN

tijax tower
no, not za golf fairway - tijax horse paddock
HACIENDA TIJAX, GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 5
The lands of Hacienda Tijax swoop up from the Rio Dulce. The resort lies on the river bank. A walkway leads inland through mangrove to horse and dairy paddocks. Rubber, teak and mahogany plantations share the highland with primary and secondary jungle. A stone meditation tower stands on the crest. I burnt my leg last time I visited. I was wearing shorts and tried ridding to the tower. The first rut in the track did for me – and selfdelusion: that I was back in my twenties in Ibiza and riding a 350 Bultaco trailbike, Brrmmm Brrmmm. The exhaust tube did the burnng. Ah, well...
This evening Eugenio drives me to the tower in the pick-up. Below lies the river and Lago Izabal. Turn and we gaze out over tree canopy, In the distance stand mauve mountains. The mountains encircle us. Layers of gold float behind the western peaks.

RESURECTION

casa tijax
TO RIO DULCE, GUATEMALA: FEBRUARY 5
Into Guatemala I ride through hills on a fine twisting highway. Trees are in pink beside the road and on the lower slopes. Bouganvilla tumble over a cottage. Pale blue flowers trail amongst the tree tops, scarlet berries, splashes of fierce yellow. I catch the sour sweet scent of mollasses, pungent odour of a pig sty, coffee beans raked to dry on concrete, pine tar. A rock peak pierces the pine forest. The river below flashes shards of sun reflection. Green is brilliant in the irrigated fields along the river banks. Beyond the valley rise dry, pleated hills, summits pillowed in white cumulus.
The past month travel has been distance to cross. No fun in it. A chore to be undertaken, drudgery. Today I rediscover the joy of earlier months. Why? Because I will reach Hacienda Tijax this afternoon, sit with Monica and Eugenio on the terrace in the evening, absorb the view? Or because Tijax is one of the final waystations on this journey? The end is in sight. Or was the friendliness of the frontier officials a catalyst?
Or did yesterday in Copan Ruinas reawaken my enthusiasms? That sign at the base of the pyramid? Professor Cruz? Nikki? The owner of the hotel? The gardener raking leaves? Somewhere in there I recaptured a sense of being more than a passer-by, of being in contact, of caring.

FRIENDLY FRONTIER

HONDURAS INTO GUATEMALA: FRBRUARY 5
This is the friendliest of all borders. Honduran and Guatemalan immigration share the same low building. Officials ask about my journey. Which country was most beautiful? The kindest people? What difficulties did I overcome? Is it true that food is scarce in Venezuela? What do I think of Chavez? And the almost obligatory condemnation of US President Bush. Bush is ignorant, ill educated, arogant.
Headng south, I drank beer and watched Mexico play France on TV in the office of the head of Honduran customs. The Guatemalan Customs officer is in his late twenties. He rides a 200 cc Honda. He leaves tomorrow to holiday in Nicaragua. He will sleep a night at San Pedro Sula. Can he reach Granada the following day?

TRINITY, DUBLIN

COPAN RUINUS, HONDURAS: FEBRUARY 4
English sports coaches urge players to Put your heart into it.

Maya sportsman did put their heart in.

The photograph shows the ball court at Copan.

I spend the afternoon and evening with a young Irish woman, Nikki. She is the product of Trinity, Dublin, Trinity should be proud. They have aided the development of an enquiring mind.

HITLER, McARTHY, HILARY CLINTON

COPAN RUINUS, HONDURAS: FEBRUARY 3
Sculpture in the museum raises a fresh chain of thought. PreColombian artists worked within a box. Break out of the box and you risked being next up the pyramid for a little knife work. Yet scuplters did break out. The humanity of the artist escapes in the minor works and in tiny details: the hint of a smile on a stone face, the line of arm and belly, humour in the portrayal of a plump frog.
If sculpture is universal and timeless, why not the simplest strictures of good and evil?
In Christendom, the doctrine of Universal Human Rights was expounded first by a Franciscan mendicant in Hispanic America. Others must have had the same belief. To express such beliefs was dangerous. To express anything outside the box is dangerous – or, at least, uncomfortable. Heretics are burnt or marched up the pyramid for heart surgery.
Silence is safe - thus acceptance of Hitler or McArthyism, parts of the Patriot Act. People recognise the evil. They are frightened to speak. Fear is the constant. People are always frightened.
Hilary Clinton voted for the Iraq War. Why? She was frightened of endangering her political career.
Her surrender to fear condemns her. She is unfit to be President

RACIAL PREDJUDICE?

mini pyramid

COPAN RUINUS, HONDURAS: FEBRUARY 3
I remark to an middleaged Englishman from Leeds on how many flies there would have been on the pyramid in the days of human sacrifice. He replies that I am wrong to judge the Maya according to modern standards. Why are the Spanish conquistadors condemened according to modern standards?

TRESPASSING

COPAN RUINAS, HONDURAS: FEBRUARY 3
The Copan archaeological park contains magnificent Maya ceremonial buildings. I ride out to the ruins this morning. I require permission to photograph inside the museum and reproduce photographs in the second volume of the travel trilogy. Oscar Cruz is the Professor of archaeology at the ruins. Certainly I can photograph. “Please mention the source in your book.”

So easy...I imagine attempting to obtain a similar permission in the British Museum.

I meet with a Honduran family home visiting from the US

The grandmother hugs me. The little girl adds her own hug. She reaches my knees. She then holds my hand for a group photograph.

Later I photograph a bilingual notice at the foot of a pyramid. The Spanish version is an apology for prohibiting tourists from mounting the pyramid. The English version is typically stark: NO TRESPASSING.
Entrance to the park is US$20.
Lawn-short grass surrounds the ruins
A Maya gardener rakes fallen leaves. He has four children of school age. He earns US$5 a day.
I ask can he live on $5. Barely.
His children have no interest in education.

MAYA MAGIC

COPAN RUINAS, HONDURAS: FEBRUARY 2
Copan is a tourist town. Every other building is a hostal, hotel, restaurant or shop selling tourist tat. Architecture is Humble Hispanic Colonial. Mini boulders pave the streets, though my guidebook refers to cobblestones – the writer should ride a small Honda. Hotel Patti is on the first block. Rooms surround a courtyard on three sides. My bike is safely parked. Water is hot day and night, cable TV. I shower, change into clean clothes and sit with the owner by the gates, chat and people watch. What more could a traveller desire?

NO BANDITS BUT DON'T STOP

TO COPAN RUINAS: FEBRUARY 2
I must catch up with my writing. I have Emailed Eugenio at Hacienda Tijax on the Rio Dulce that I will arrive on the 5th. I head direct to Copan where I can work for two days. I stop for lunch at a restaurant on Lake Yojoa.
The owner is a woman. We talk of this and that, my journey, her tiresome husband of whom she is delighted to be rid, our children, the cost of living. She treats me to my meal. I ride on happy to have made contact with someone from the country through which I am travelling. I am so happy that I become overconfident and head on through the hills to Copan with dusk already falling. I stop at a police post and ask whether there is a hotel before Copan.
"No, but the road is safe."
"No bandits?"
"No bandits, but don't stop."
"Right," I say and follow a slow moving truck with good lights.

THE KIKUYU

the kikuyu


DANLI, HONDURAS: FEBRUARY 2
I save money by staying at the hotel beside the Esso station. My guidebook recomends it as clean, with TV and parking. The parking is true.
I find an internet cafe and am recomended to a Mexican restaurant. The food is OK.
The Kikuyu serviced my bike in 2006. My editor asked why I called him the Kikuyu. I know him by no other name. I rise early and ride to his shop. He embraces me, checks my bike, tightens the chain an unecessary milimetre.
Brave, I ask, "Why do people call you the Kikuyu?"
He shrugs: "It is a bad habit people have."
A pickup arrives towing a trailer loaded with trail bikes. The Kikuyu is their support.
He and I embrace again, wish each other good fortune and head our separate ways.

RICE PADDY AND LEATHER JACKET

TO DANLI, HONDURAS: FEBRUARY 1
North towards the Honduras border, the road between San Isidro and Estell crosses a flat valley of brilliant green rice paddy. The surounding hills are dry dust and rock. The road climbs again, twisting through mountains to the frontier. Clouds cover the sun. I stop and put on my leather jacket for the first time since leaving Patagonia.
The border is a few buildings and a few shacks. Leaving Nicaragua is quick.
Honduras takes a couple of hours.
None of the officials are difficult. They are simply understaffed to deal with the slough of regulations. Trucks take a day. They take a day passing from Costa Rica to Hondurous and a day into Panama. Central America must compete with China. The cost of these delays is critical to its economies. Damn fool Governments are to blame.

EXHAUSTION IS IN COMMAND

TO DANLI, HONDURAS: FEBRUARY 1
A good road skirts the lakes and climbs through dry hills reminiscent of Africa. Shacks by the roadside give evidence of poverty - though the people are decently dressed. How on a minimum daily wage of under $2?
I am depressed by my ignorance.
I am aware that I have lost contact with Central America. I have become a tourist. The voyage to Panama marks the change. I was with fellow travellers, followed by Christmas and New Year in the States. Back in Panama I was with Nigel and then with HOOKEDONPANAMA. In Granada I have been with Gillian and Joe.
Now I am on the road again.
However entering into conversation with strangers demands too much effort. I have been travelling for so many months. Exhaustion is in command.

MEXICANS ARE LESS RACIST THAN THEIR PARENTS

ADIEU GRANADA: FEBRUARY 1
On the bike again...My hosts had a dinner party last night. One of the couples founded and fund a school in Granada for mentally handicapped children. She is Dutch, he from the US. He and I have friends in common in Guatemala.
The other couple were also from the US. She collects houses and sculptures. I spent a day with students at a private school in Oaxa. She seemed anoyed that I found the students less racist than their parents. Or perhaps she thought me arogant in having an opinion. How could I know? I replied that I watched them group during break.
She remained disatisfied - or irritated.
I am a Brit, of course.
Mexico is a US preserve.
So states the Monroe Doctrine.

MADMAN SEEKING ADVENTURE

view across cathedral square


GRANADA, NICARAGUA: JANUARY 31
Staying with Gillian and Joe for ever isn't an option. The bike waits. Joe would enjoy riding the bike. He rode a Vespa all round Europe and the Middle East. He would garage the Vespa for a few years where ever his journeying took him, return when the bug next struck.
Gillian met Joe in Kenya. He was flying tourists over the game reserve in a hot air baloon. He retired from professional balooning aged 65. A couple of years ago he canoed down the San Juan river. Now he needs a new adventure. He would make great company for Ming and I when we ride across China. And he is younger than me by six months.

PERFECT BEACH

GRANADA, NICARAGUA: JANUARY 30

Gillian and Joe take me today to the perfect Pacific beach. The beach is protected on each side by rock reefs and from the front by a small island. The sand is soft, the sea is clear. A fishing skiff floating to moarings would be to the beach as an olive is to a martini - delightful but not truly neccessary.

We swim and later drive to a small fishing village and eat freshly-caught snapper at a wooden table overlooking the sea.

Joe's father used to say that even a blind hog could occasionally find an acorn.

Joe drilled for oil on his ranch in Texas. He named his oil company, THE BLIND HOG OIL COMPANY. It was a one-acorn search.

PERFECT URBAN ARCHITECTURE

GRANADA, NICARAGUA: JANUARY 30

I am a very privledged guest in Gillian's and Joe's home in Granada. No need for corridors, no need for air conditioning. All rooms open to patios or the road. Through-drafts keep the air moving and cooled by water in the patios. A big room on the first floor between the two patios is open front and rear to stupendou views of the cathedral and volcano. That New World meld of Islamic and Hispanic architecture has never been equalled, let alone surpassed.

SYBARITE

GRANADA, NICARAGUA: JANUARY 29
I am staying a few days in luxury. Gillian and Joe are my hosts. Gillian is a Brit. Joe is from Texas. They have resurected a colonial house a block from the Cathedral. The house has two patios. The rear patio has a pool. I swim sedate lengths between sips on a gin and tonic.

BYE-BYE COSTA RICA

NICARAGUA: JANUARY 28
The gale forced me off the road into La Cruz yesterday evening. This morning I suffer both the gale and continual rain. Great. I arrive soaked at the Nicaraguan frontier. No shelter for the bike. The rain becomes a downpour.
Costa Rican officials are self important and understaffed. Nicaraguan officials are pleasant and understaffed. Transiting a truck across the border wastes twelve hours.
My photocopies go to the man in charge of issuing vehicle import permits. I explain the loss of the originals in Argentina. Lunch hour and two of his staff take a break. The boss processes my paperwork himself, moving from desk to desk. A thirteen-year-old boy carries my briefcase and laptop and crash helmet. An elderly cop behind teases the boy in a kindly manner. Ninety minutes and I have my papers.
I chat with a US biker on a 650 trail bike. He and a band of brothers took the wrong road yesterday, more of a river bed than a track. He came off seven times. Heartening this further confirmation that I am not the only biker who ends on his butt.

EXCEPTION PROVES THE RULE

view through a haze from La Cruz

LA CRUZ, COSTA RICA: JANUARY 27

The Dutch are friendly. A Dutchman owns the hotel at the top of the hill in La Cruz. He is exceedingly fat. He is sitting out on the terrace by the bar and he is watching TV. I enter and am invited for a beer by a gentleman blessed with a long straggly beard. This gentleman owns a cabin in South Carolina where he fishes, and a cabin in West Virginia where he distills moonshine. He claims that his moonshine has cachet in West Virginia circles. People pay him double the price of legal bourbon. He gives me his address and his telephone numbers and invites me to stay on my journey north through the US. The Dutchman is watching TV on the terrace.

I walk over the crest of the hill. The gale shoves me towards the edge. The view is spectacular. I watch the sunset and walk back to the Dutchman´s hotel. The Dutchman is watching TV on the terrace.

The hotel has a pool. Rooms are $10 a night. The hotel doesn´t have a liquor licence. The Moonshine Oldie keeps a private ice chest behind the bar. We drink a couple more of his beers while the Dutchman watches TV. We switch to bourbon and lime while the Dutchman watches TV. The Dutchman doesn´t strike me as particularly friendly. But how would I know? I am at the bar. He never speaks and never takes his eyes off the TV. Weird...

Sunday and the restaurants are closed. I find a bakery and eat cake.

COSTA RICA SUPERIORITY

LA CRUZ, COSTA RICA: JANUARY 27
Brazillians consider themselves superior; so do citizens of the US. The US and Brazil are vast countries. Costa Rica is little bigger than an afterthought. How come Costa Ricans consider themselves superior?

THEY DONT TALK WITH PEOPLE WHO RIDE 125s

PAN AM NORTH THRU COSTA RICA: JANUARY 27
I loathe having trucks on my butt. The wind strengthens all day, finally threatening to shove me off the road, or, worse, under the wheels of oncoming traffic. I stop for coffee in Liberia. A pose of Panamanian bikers on Harleys pulls in. The bikers say Hi in that distant manner rich guys on Harleys reserve for old men riding pizza delivery bikes.
I ride on into the wind.
The wind becomes a gale.
Tomorrow will be better. Why am I persecuting myself. Sensible to turn off prior to the Nicaraguan border at La Cruz.

OLD MEN CAN'T WAIT

hers and his, little and big


QUEPES, COSTA RICA: JANUARY 27
Quepes by day is OK. I load the bike, visit the ATM machine, eat breakfast. 8:30 AM and my fellow biker remains in bed. She joined me for dinner last night. She is from Denver, Colorado, and deals in eco power such as commercial wind farms. She is a sportswoman and suffers from too many falls on mountain bikes and skis and whatever. She and my mountainboarder son, Jed, could compare scars. Probably her knee played up in the night and she didn't sleep. What ever, I can't wait. Sad. I want to wish her well. I hope to learn whether she took the Limon/Almirante road out of Costa Rica into Panama. If so, how did she find the United Fruit rail bridges?

BIKERESS OR TIGERESS?

hers and his

QUEPES, COSTA RICA: JANUARY 26
Dusk as I enter Quepes. My eyes are bunged up with dust. I can´t see much. I do spot a small hotel with a courtyard protected by iron gates. The receptionist resembles a late middle-age frog in a straw hat. He hails from the US. He supplies information while entering my details in the guest book. Gringos frequent the bar one block to the left on the sea front: the working girls are safe. Best fish is across the bridge and a further two blocks. The fish interests me.
My room is clean. Towels are big. The shower has hot water. I rinse off sufficient dirt to construct a beach in the shower tray.
Down in the courtyard a woman dismounts from a 650 KTM trail bike. She is fair, late thirties, my height, green eyes, long hair. The KTM dwarfs the Honda. It has aluminium side panniers and a proper biker bag on top of the gas tank. The woman has a proper helmet. She is dressed in a proper biker suit, proper boots (though not Alpinestars).
I feel somewhat inadequate.
"Hi," I say.
She says, "Hi..." A real biker conversation.
She took a fall yesterday and limps a little.
She declines my offer of help in carrying her bag.
Maybe she will catch me later at the fish restaurant two blocks up from the bridge. Or maybe not...

DUST AND WORKING GIRLS

TO QUEPES, COSTA RICA: JANUARY 26
The Pan American Highway follows the coast. Flat land is given over to oil palms and billboards. Hillsides are forest interlaced with billboards and subdivisions. Glimpses of the ocean are small compensation for such cross-cultural horror. I intend sleeping the night in Quepes. The final 47 Ks are dirt. Massive trucks drag dust clouds. Construction machinery looms out of the dust. Rocks kick the front wheel and the rear wheel. Gritt fills my eyes. My butt is numb. My thighs cramp. More dust. A sign appears out of the dust. The sign warns of a bypass round an uncompleted bridge. Miss the sign and you hit a dead drop of twenty feet. This is not fun...

COSTA RICA IS FOR SALE

TO QUEPES, COSTA RICA: JANUARY 26
Costa Rica is for sale. The country would be beautiful minus the billboards advertising subdivisions and condominiums, spas and country clubs, serpent farms and butterfly farms, horse ridding, surfing and canopy trails, plus every other type of crap that might gull a tourist into an investment.
I head into the hills a way in hope of escaping. No such luck- and I switch off the engine to make certain that I haven´t run a bearing. The screaching is cicadas protesting at billboard encroachment.

COSTA RICA COUNTER POPE

PANAMA/COSTA RICA BORDER: JANUARY 26
Entering Panama from Colombia, I was issued a 30 day visa. Customs gave me a 30 day permit for the bike. I received a fresh visa when returning from the US. Not so the bike. The bike has overstayed. Panamanians are understanding of such small irregularities. The Customs officer at Carpacho glances at the bike documents, stamps them and gives me a grin. The relevant clerk in Costa Rica is a small man, grey wiry hair, half moon spectacles and a power complex. I watch as he revels in exercising his authority over bus and truck drivers. Danes would call him a Counter Pope.
My bike documents are photo copies. I have crossed the length of South America on photocopies. He doesn´t give a damn for South America. I produce originals or I don´t enter Costa Rica.
I sit in an office and wait for the head of Customs. A woman customs clerk glances at me from behind the counter. She is plump and comely, wears a nose stud and smiles frequently. A while passes before she enquires as to my problem. She dissapears for a few minutes, returns and escorts me outside. She grabs one of the touts who seek tips for aiding travelers transit the border. "Get a lawyer´s stamp on an afidavit," she tells me.
The tout conducts me to a kiosk where a young Chinese Panamanian woman types my affidavit and complains that Costa Ricans are a pain in the butt.
A lawyer´s mother runs a dress shop. She charges me a poem for taking the affidavit to her daughter´s office in David.
The daughter charges $20 for a stamp.
The Costa Rican counter pope accepts the affidavit with ill humur.
The comely Customs woman accepts a kiss on both cheeks.
Finally I am on my way. I have been at the border four hours.

SNORING

PUERTO ARMUELLES: JANUARY 25
Cameron persuaded the Banana directors to go the workers co-operative route in Puerto Armuelles. The job is done. Cameron and his wife are packing. Next stop is Mozambique, Cameron will be overseeing a multi crop agricultural venture. This will be his first visit to Africa. He is in his late fifties. He has made a ten year commitment to the British investers. His enthusiasm is that of a twenty-year-old. He runs me back to the hotel at 2 AM. I have been moved in with one of the young boat captains from the US. He snores gently. I snore loudly. He retreats to a couch in the lounge.

JOY

My adoptive daughter, Anya, and her partner, Michael, are the parents of an extraordinarily handsom and intelligent son, Shane Ravi.

UNITED FRUIT COMPANY

PUERTO ARMUELLES: JANUARY 25
Puerto Armuelles is a typical United Fruit town. Housing is according to Company status. Three small bedrooms and a small yard for clerks and mechanics. Three medium bedrooms in a large garden for engineers and accountants. Offices and the guest house are zoned at the foot of a small hill that overlooks the town and wharf. Management houses are on the hill. The Regent's house is on the crest. 1 AM and I slump in an easy chair in the small sitting-room, drink cold beer and pump the good-natured Cameron for information.
Throughout the first half of the 20th century, United Fruit had a near monopoly. They produced for seven cents and sold for seven dollars. They enjoyed the wealth and power now wielded by narcotraficers.
At best they were paternalistic.
At worst, they chose and deposed Presidents and fermented civil wars: the clandestine war that crucified Guatemala for thirty-six years was a United Fruit Company creation.