Merry Christmas, USA

Back to the States for us. Christmas was calling, and we were too excited to see fam and friends. Jon and I parted ways 7:30 Tuesday morning after a long last night in San Jose. We had spent our finals days in Santa Teresa, Costa Rica at one of the nicer hostels of the trip with good people and decent waves. It couldn't have been more relaxing..
We're already dreaming of the next adventure: motorcycle trip through South America or southeast Asia.

But for now, we welcome winter with open arms:

A few shots

We are behind on blogging but are too busy and too near the end of our trip to really try to catch up.
After dirt biking on a Volcanic island in Nicaragua for a few days, we hit the beach for a bit more and then cruised on to Costa Rica. Now in Santa Teresa. Here are a few shots a friend took of me surfing in El Salvador.

Headed to Nicaragua. Leaving Salvador. Had some real tasty waves at a place called Sunzal. We stayed at a pretty posh place, it was the home of the director of Christian Surfers in Salvador. His name was Salvador too. Here is te view from our villa.

Back to the Beach

The last day on the lake we gathered a few friends and pooled money to rent a private boat to take us around the lake. We are continually blessed with a great group of friends from all over the world where ever we go. At the lake we spent a great deal of time with Swedes, Canadians, Irish, Aussies, Americas, English and more and more.

In the morning we started making our way to El Salvador and back to the waves! We met a Polish girl at the train station who decided to come with us and then our good friend John, from Roatan, randomly walked in to the bus station. We have been with him 3 times before this and each time still had not traveled together. So he modified his plans too and decided to come with.

We got into the San Salvador around 10 and arranged a taxi to take us to the beach. A few minutes away from the bus station, Kelly, realized that he left his Debit card in the ATM. After much searching for it, Kelly called home and asked his parents to cancel the card. Bummer.

We pulled up next to the beach last night around midnight in La Libertad to find the hotel we were going to stay at closed up tight. After a little searching we found a fabulously sketchy hotel. It only had several small rooms and it wreaked of fish. We soon discovered there was no lights at all, there was no running water, there was no working toilet, no locks on the doors, and the rooms were home to many large, juicy cockroaches. BUT, the hotel was literally right on the beach and we could watch wave after wave peel off a point break directly in front of us. Perfection. We also got the hotel for a mere $2.50 per person.

This morning we promptly went to a surf shop, rented some boards, and charged out, so stoked to be back in the water. The waves were clean and consistent and so fun. Gotta love the ease of point breaks. Dodging a few rocks when big swells would come in and suck out more water, you had to cross your fingers you didn´t get smashed to pieces when you bailed from the wave.

Adventure at Atitlan

Our plan was to leave Antigua and spend 2 (half) days and a night at Lake Atitlan. Some one from our Hostel in Antigua told us, ´I think you will set a record if you manage to spend just one day at the Lake. It is impossible.´ Now we understand what he meant.

This is just our third day at the lake but we have already done so much. The lake is known as one of the most beautiful lakes in the world, and it is easy to see why. Volcanoes circle the lake and create a breathtaking background any direction you look. Small towns are speckled around the lake and each boasts a semi-unique feel. We stumbled upon one of the most ´eventful´ towns, San Pedro.

After enjoying riding the horses up the Volcano so much, Kelly and I started yesterday morning off with a ride along the lake. We dropped a massive $6 to ride these horses at an exhilarating speed. My heart was bursting with excitement as Kelly raced along side me and we soared along the side of the lake.

Later that day we took a boat to a near by town were their was some small cliffs to jump off (around 30 ft). We jumped in a few times, and then I attempted a dive, which ended miserably. I am not an expert diver. I grew up in the ocean and not in pools. This ended up being more of a 30ft belly/face flop than anything that might resemble a dive.

Many locals paint and sell their art work to tourists. We found out we could take ´Mayan´ style painting lessons and gathered some of our friends from the hostel. 6 of us climbed up the side of the mountain to a house with a spectacular view of the lake and for the next 3 hours, we all painted pictures of Lake Atitlan with the guidance of a local painter. His whole family turned out to be painters and they all got involved in helping us gringos assemble some sort of presentable art. Surprisingly, we all walked away with decent looking paintings and we were asked by a few locals where we had purchased them from. Kelly added a bit of his own spice to his and in the center of his lake, swims the Loch Ness Monster!

San Pedro sits at the base of the San Pedro Volcano. We heard the climb was supposed to be between a 6 and 7 hour climb. Kelly and I were determined to push ourselves and shave as much time off as possible. We awoke this morning before 5 to ensure being well on the mountain when the sun rose over the lake. Charging up the mountain we summitted faster than we expected. After enjoying the view from the top between the passing clouds, we turning to trail run down the mountain. Overall the hike took us about 3 and a half hours. Still morning time, we stumbled back into our hostel and have been enjoying a leisurely day since then.

(Pics to give an idea. Not our own again! Hard to load pics but will do, when we can)

A look into Anitgua

Here some of our own pics and not stolen from the world wide web. A glimpse of Anitgua.
Notice in the picture with the church, the volcano in the background. It almost always has smoke pouring out the top. Also included is a bit of the horses up the volcano. And lastly, the Kelly and I found these masks in the market and could not resist. We wore them all around town. We had many old women laughing, and a few children running in fear!

Horses, Volcanoes, and Cigars

Guatemala. Beautiful Guatemala.
We have already been so stoked over our time here. Kelly and I continually look at each other and the only word we can think of to describe our current situation at any present moment is ´perfect.´

Jess and Kelly (the girl) joined us for their thanksgiving break from teaching and we spent thanksgiving, giving much thanks to be in the beautiful city of Antigua. The city is like a taste of Europe blended with charming Central American culture surrounded by active volcanoes. Cobble stone streets are filled with smiling Guatemalans and a great deal of backpackers and travelers. For Thanksgiving dinner we found a tiny restaurant with a tremendous character and enjoyed tender steak instead of turkey.

The next day the four of us headed to a near by active volcano. When the girls were away, Kelly (boy) and I rented horses for us and the girls. When they told us we couldn´t gallop and run with the horses, we said ´Ok, No thanks then.´ They quickly made an exception and we took off racing up the volcano on our trusty stallions! Smoke continually billows out of the top of the volcano and because of a large explosion a few months ago we cannot go to the tip top. Close to the peak steam pours out of many parts of rock. We entered a cave with too much steam and heat too stay long.

Jess and girl Kelly headed back to Roatan on Sat missing the arrival of our friend John who we also met in Roatan. Visa restrictions made him alter his trip and he decided to head our way. We are staying at a sweet hostal close to the city center, so told John to meet us here whenever he gets in and he found us like a champ, a county away, with no phones. Through our broken Spanish we made friends with many more people in the hostel. Two girls from Argentina made us a sick dinner last night the 5 of us enjoyed from our roof terrace.

Today we Sabbathed and relaxed on the roof most of the day, playing chess and smoking cigars with two other traveling guys.


(Ps. Stolen pictures from the web to give an idea. Will try to get our own on later)

Into the Center of the Earth

Yesterday we grabbed some old rope and set off on the long walk down the beach with our island friend Brad. Brad had discovered some caves on the island and we were now on a mission of further exploration. Many sun burnt heads were turning as climbed up the coral wall with our rope and disappeared into the trees. When we came to the entrance of the cave, I thought he was joking. There was no rock entrance to crawl into, just a muddy hole going straight down to the abyss that looked as if some quicksand spot had given way.
After securing the rope to a nearby tree we began the slippery descent into the cave the locals refer to as "hell". Bats flew out of the narrow, twisting passage as we lowered ourselves down and tried to grip the muddy wall with our feet. When we finally touched out feet to a flat stand-able area, besides the hundreds of bats that circled our heads, we were greeted by a tarantula next to our feet.

The only way to other parts of the cave is through the water. So using a mask and a dive light, we would dive through the top layer of muddy water to reveal crystal clear water just 10 feet below. Diving deeper we found passage to other huge sections of the cave. It was always slightly scary turning from your diving to come back up. You need air, but the clouded, dirty water above you doesn't let you see if you had dove under any rock or ledges.

Walking covered in mud and insect bites back up the beautiful beaches, past plenty of indulgent sun bathers, we certainly did not blend in.


Today we did our last dive. A drift dive, where the boat drops you off in the water and you move along with the current. We went deeper than we had ever gone before and dove next to the wall of the reef. We saw a new vibrancy of the reef we had not yet seen. The island is surrounded by the reef and is varies a bit in depth, but then like a shelve, the reef drops off (hence the "wall" term) to deeper parts of the vast blue beneath us.

We are heading to Guatemala for Thanksgiving. The teachers we lived with also have a short break, so two of them are joining us for a bit. The four of us board a boat back to the mainland tomorrow.

paparazzi

Finally some pictures! We have been so greatly enjoying our time here. Kelly and I are now official scuba divers. We finished our Open Water Dive Certification a few days ago. When we got here, we weren't even sure if we were going to dive at all, and now after spending so many days exploring the reefs deep below the waters surface, we can't imagine ever passing it up.
The reef is vast and gorgeous. Completely wait less, we flew through this utterly foreign world to us and perpetually found ourselves speechless and blown away by the continual new wonders. We dove with eels, turtles, and more fish that I ever imagined.



Lion Fish! While diving one day a few guys with us speared an epic amount of Lion Fish. These are extremely poisonous fish, and my friend got stung and his hand swelled. Very painful. These are our instructors and people from our dive shop. We filleted the fish and made lion fish sushi!

These are some of the teachers we have grown so close to. Great people. We are heading away from the island in a few days and heading with all of them to Guatemala for Thanksgiving.

This is a conch I pulled up while free diving. The size of my head! I sauteed it up and Kelly and I enjoyed FRESH grub.

Now on to new places and new things...

I'm late on a promise

This is a photo I took of a local Mexican Surfer in San Miguel. Hopefully, he will look at it. I told him that I would put this up a month a go

Beautiful Day

Still on Roatan. Overall we've had more cloudy/rainy days than sunny. But today was not one of them. We went to church this morning with our dear friends, and I sat in and played jembe for them. After church, we went out to the beach and hung all day. Our days have been pretty lazy. We do some snorkeling, a lot of sleeping, and a fair amount of trying to make tortillas; it has been great and really relaxing, just what we need.

No te preocupes
Kelly

Reefs, Diving, and Jobs??

Roatan is a beautiful island of sweet Hondurans how speak in an island english and numerous Ex-Patriots. There are tons of Americans, and Europeans living and diving here. I heard this was voted one of the best places by National Geographic to lose your identity. So we meet many ex-americans with interesting stories.


For a long time Kelly has always considered working and living on an island for a period of time. Through Harrison (the guy we are staying with) we found out a guy named Mark who owns an outdoor tours type company has been looking for some Christian guys to help mentor and work with his many local employees. The job would be taking cruise ship guest snorkeling, kayaking, and on snuba trips. http://newgumbalimba.homestead.com/SNUBA.html We would also get Open Water Dive Certified and get to dive all the time. So for the last week we have been tossing around the idea of staying here and doing this. We shall see....


Clint, one of the other owners of the park took us out diving yesterday. With the sun high over head, we ove through crystal clear turquoise waters over and around the most stunning reefs. Fish of all shapes and color swam around us as we woul cross to a new section of the reef and have our minds blown again. Truly one of the most beautiful and amazing things we have ever done.

(We hope to get up our own pics soon! We have been slacking! These are just to give you an idea where we are!)

Roatan

Boarding the plane to Honduras we realized we knew practically nothing about our destination. We had looked online through Central America for good price tickets and found some here. So we rolled the dice and bought tickets. This summer I had met a friend of my sisters who teaches on Roatan Island and he had invited us out. A few days before we flew out we emailed him and told him we would see him in soon. 

Upon arrival into the county Tues night, we called a contact from couchsurfing.com. It started to get late and he wasn't answering his phone so we prepared to sleep in the airport. But he came through and called back on a cell we had borrowed. We caught a ride to his house and enjoyed a safe, free place to stay. 

After a few taxis, a bus ride, and an hour and a half boat ride, we set foot upon the island home to second largest reef in the world. Harrison and his band of fellow teachers gave us great welcoming and made us feel right at home. The island is about 1-2 miles wide and less than 30 miles long and surrounded by crystal clear waters with reef everywhere. Today the winds blew ferociously so we didn't have any visibility but enjoyed a warm swim and lots of exploring.

We all went out for Kelly's birthday tonight and we shared many laughs with our new friends. Our plans consist of...well...stay here till we get bored or the wind carries us away..

Ok, let's go.

Sitting on the plane in Miami, just thought we'd throw up one last post before we leave the states. We fly to San Salvador first, then connect to San Pedro, Honduras tonight. Keep us in your prayers, we'll update when we can..

Feeling Trapped Amongst Epic Beauty

It was Tuesday afternoon and getting way to late of a start, we packed out Eric's small Mazda with mountain gear and headed North. We arrived at the town at the foot of the tallest mountain in the lower 48 states around dusk and found a store where we could rent crampons (spikes for the ice and snow you attach to your boots). We began our ascent to climb Mt. Whitney around 8:30pm. Not your typical start time. As we gained elevation, the temperature plummeted. Sandy, warm beaches just days before were quickly forgotten as we began to loose feeling in our finger tips in the 20 degree air. The cold was biting. We set up camp after mid-night as we struggled to make use of our fingers. Like sardines, we crammed into the tent and decided we would start the summit climb in a few hours. We didn't really get any sleep and tried to rest unsuccessfully till around 3am.

With improper rest, we loaded our packs and set up the long, laborious, freezing climb. The hours before dawn were peaceful. Peaceful the way ice is, beautiful but harsh. The climbing got more intense around dawn as we hit "99 Switchbacks". With crampons on our boots, and hiking poles in our hands, we went up the perilous switchbacks. The view was of untold beauty. From here on up, the the world looked as if it was a snow globe, perfect and magical. As the view got better and better, the lack of sleep and tough climb in snow and ice, weighed us down more and more. The going was slow. Our packs felt as if they were gaining weight and as if our feet were dragging chains.

We reached the ridge line at around 13,000+ft and had only several more miles and less than 2,000+ft to climb. In deep snow, every step along the steep slopes was a step that had to be placed carefully. For hours more we took every step with great patience so not to end our days short. The summit seemed to continually linger off too far in the distance. Around 3pm we collapsed our cold, spent bodies upon the highest point in the contiguous United States. We felt victorious...momentarily. With all energy sapped from our bodies, we knew we had a terribly long way back. We had already been hiking 11 hours and we didn't know how it would be possible. But there was no choice. We couldn't stay there.

Back along the same cliffs, buried in white, begging to take our lives, we felt emotions hard to put into words. It seemed impossible to make it. Eric even considered leaving all his camera gear and pack on the mountain. Possessions are so inconsequential when life is being played with. The "99 Switchbacks" was difficult to navigate as the sun sunk behind the mighty mountains. With still miles to go, the world around us grew black. Over slippery ice, we struggled to follow the trail back. Ice doesn't leave great foot prints to follow. At some point, we began to question if we were on the right trail. It's late and dark, we are more exhausted than ever, its freezing, and we feel utterly trapped. After 3 hours of tracking crampon spike prints in ice and looking over multiple tracks, we realized the trail was right upon us. Fighting hallucinations from lack of sleep, we pressed on down the trail and tried to keep from collapsing.

We stumbled into our camp around 1am. We had been hiking 21 hours on no sleep the day before. I have never been so glad to see my tent. We slept in the next day as much as we could. With weak legs we finished the last few miles around mid day. Driving back to the town we found a diner and indulged in the world's largest and most unhealthy burgers.

Yard sale, Hollywood, and tattoos, a tasty combo

Last weekend we decided to unload our extra bus gear before we find a buyer for the beloved member of the trip, Samson the school bus. So we had a yard sale at Ryan Brown's house near LA on Sunday and sent Clint off with the bus back to Riverside.
From there, we headed north to hang with Eric Mackintosh and make plans with him to climb Mt Whitney.

In the meantime, Eric showed us the night life in Hollywood.
On a side note, Jon has been thinking about getting a tattoo of the Outer Banks, the chain of islands of the coast of NC. These are his stomping grounds where he was born and bred.
This thought became a reality when he walked into a tattoo parlor in Hollywood on Monday night. Later on in the night, we met up with Eric's friends at a place where Darrell from the office was partying a little too hard on his birthday.

Another one bites the Dust

This trip started with 8 of us getting a bus and living on it. But life happens and plans change. After losing many others along the way, Clint informed us two days ago that the trip had ended for him as well. So now it is just the two originals. Kelly and Me. We are sad to see Clint go, but this frees us up to be able to have Clint handle the selling of the bus and Kelly and I bought two one way tickets to Honduras. We fly out of LAX on Nov 2nd.

We transition from life on a bus, which though posh and luxurious, can be quite cumbersome and and laborious, to life with just two of us and back packs. We are able to appreciate both extremes. Now time to live light, and be able to move quick.

Communes and Characters

After coming back from Mexico, we were excited to be able to attend a dinner that some people at the Yellow Deli had invited us to attend. We drove for quite some time deep into the back roads of the Mountains. After many twists and turns we came upon the "Ranch" of the Twelve Tribes. Close to 100 hippy Christians opened up there home and way of life to us for an evening. 25% was out of shear love and hospitality, 75% was out of an effort to convert us to there commune (thought to be a cult by many scholars). After some light conversion efforts, we broke into circle dancing, and sang folk songs and danced with the 1850's looking group. Some one announced thanks that we had come to visit and a a standing ovation lasted far beyond the point of being awkward. They finally stopped after several minutes when Ricky raised his hand like the Pope to silence them. We dined under candle light and thanked the fish for giving their lives, and then ran out of there as one overly enthusiastic convert tried to take Sharaya as his wife.

The majority of our days are filled with surfing, talking about surfing and then sitting on the bus. We enjoyed some famous breaks such a Pt Loma for a few days were we got many days of head high, slow rolling, fun to ride waves, and Black's Beach. At Black's we met some very interesting characters. One guy had worked for the CIA since he was 13, had been gassed by Osama, and has at least $89 Billion in the World Trade Center. Certified Wacko. His told us many Sci-Fi plots he believed to the core were his life.

It seems that it is obvious to everyone else that if we live in a bus, surely we smoke weed and may also sell as well. If you know us at all, you know this isn't true, but everyday we have people either ask us for weed or offer it. Maybe if Kelly would cut off his dreads that might help our image. But for now we are trapped as hippy, dread lock surfers and forever the cops will be suspicious and the locals jealous.

One night we decided we needed something else besides Ramen for dinner and headed to Panera to take our turn begging. Through a fortunate series of events and many conversations with Panera, we left Panera that night with ALL of the baked goods they had. We have more than 4 trash bags full of bagels, pastries, and loafs of phenom bread. Bread is our greatest currency.

Yesterday we surfed Upper Tressels. Surfing through the rain ran off many surfers. Thecrowd especially thinned out during the lightning and thunder. Today we awake to more rain and less waves.

Kids with Guns

We hit our first Cali waves today. Point Loma. Point Loma university sits right on a great break. We drove through security in our big yellow bus and of course attracted attention. We parked the bus up on the cliff as we climbed down and paddled out. From far off in the water we saw a security truck checking out our bus. After hearing some horror stories of huge fines and towings, Kelly and Clint made the mad dash and paddled back in to move the bus to a spot they wouldn't tow us from.

We are perpetually plagued with people being suspicious of our bus. Yesterday evening in downtown San Diego, two cops asked to board our bus and search for a missing person. Really? Of all San Diego, why our bus? Then 5 minutes ago as we parked the bus on the street in front of our friends in public parking, this lady freaked out on us. She told us we couldn't park there. She had no real reason. We told her she was just giving us a hard time because we were kids. She then went off "Yeah, well kids can get guns, and then they kill people!" She made a machine gun motion. We told her thanks for welcoming us into the neighborhood and we left the bus on the street.

People either love the bus, or they are scared of it!

San Miguel Surf

We headed back to San Miguel today. After battling some waves for a while, I decided to head in, grab my waterproof camera and body board so I could try to get some shots. At the truck, the most pitiful puppy I've ever seen came up to me. I'm not sure what he wanted though, cause he definitely wasn't interested in the trail mix I tried to give him. After he refused my offer, he crawled into a bush, and I'm pretty sure he died there.

Anyway, after shooting the guys for a bit, as well as, a couple locals, we headed in and back to the aunt Pat's pad for the rest of the night. After promising the local we were riding with that I would throw up a pic of him on our blog, I realized that it may be a bit until I find a cardreader for my camera. (I left my USB camera cord back in CO[sorry local dude, check back on Friday, and I may have the photos up.])
-Kelly