I am staying at La Manzana Verde... an amazing hostel. I love it here... this town has a great feel about it.

My visit to the Copan ruins was one of sheer luck and great meetings.

The night that I arrived in Copan Ruinas I shared a microbus from the border with 3 swedish-norwegian girls, an Aussie bloke, and a couple from Portugal. Turns out the guy from Portugal, Ricardo, has been fascinated with the Mayan culture for the past 14 years of his life and has done extensive reading about it all. I tagged along with him and Sonya to the ruins and was witness to several amazing things.

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Ricardo knew the layout of this city by heart.... no map needed. He could read the hieroglyphs and stellae like I can read a good book. He pointed out fine details in the stellae and gave fascinating history on all of it. Since this is his life long dream... visiting all of the Mayan sites I also got to enjoy his enthusiasm for it all. He was truly in his element and it was fun to see him shine at seeing each new picture and temple. A really neat visit for both of us.

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The day after visiting the ruins I enjoyed an afternoon with an Aussie and a Kiwi (now claiming US citizenship thanks to some crazy diversity lottery he won) and we visited Agua Caliente. These are VERY hot natural springs that flow into a VERY cool river. It cost us a dollar to get into the place and it was amazing. We were given a tour of the source of the hot spring and told that at the source an egg can be boiled in 5 minutes. That is hot.... maybe too many eggs being boiled accounts for the sulfur smell there... ha ha

A couple of hours at these springs really worked out any traveling kinks. The ride back, standing in the bed of a pickup, was amazing because we watched the sunset on the hour drive back to town and really worked our arm muscles waving at all of the local kids excited to wave at the gringos going by in the truck! It was so cool to see their smiles, hear their laughs, and share in their enthusiasm.

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I walked up to Finca San Lucas and enjoyed some fantastic tamales and views. The walk was really fun and while hiking up and around the finca we came across a small village with some really enthusiastic children. They all had corn husk dolls and were eager to make a deal. Literally they came running in huge numbers with dolls shoved into my face. It was very overwhelming but funny. There were 10 kids shoving two hands full of dolls into my face... surreal.

One girl even made the distinct point that "Mi amiga... yo aqui primera" or "my lady friend... I was here first!" I got what she was saying.. if purchases were to be made... she had seniority. :) I made no purchase because once money came out I would be leaving with about two dozen corn husk dolls to keep the balance of power fair by buying a doll from everyone.

The walk home was a weird one. My friend and I (both women) encountered a group of four teenage men who wanted to show their affections in an unwarranted way. We were ok with them so long as they kept their distance but once they surrounded us while walking down the road and started closing the space in between us and them.... that crossed a line. We looked at each of them in the eye... stopped walking to allow them to pass us and gave them some time to put distance between us. This did not work so well.

As we stopped to visit with some horses... they stopped to work their sling shots at some fruit. As we stopped to look at the sunset.... they stopped to smell the roses. Their attentions were relentless and they stayed in our company.... with groans...hisses...and some very close physical gestures. The most uncomfortable I have been in my visit.

Fortunately we ignored them long enough that they got bored and finally left us alone after some 30 minutes. Cheeky Little Bastards.... my friend named them. I completely agree!