La Ruta Maya (cont.) | Outside Online

You Are Here:

Home >> Travel >> La Ruta Maya (cont.)

Today's Question
Where should I camp in Switzerland with my kids? answer

What's the best volcano to hike up in North America? answer

How can I plan a trip around riding the biggest, fastest roller coasters? answer

Online Favorites

Special Issues

Photo Galleries

Outside Magazine's 2002 Travel Guide

Page:

La Ruta Maya (cont.)

FINCA IXOBEL, POPTÚN, GUATEMALA
The next leg of our journey, to Lago Atitlán, west of Antigua, was a few hundred miles. We flew past pink evangelical churches, a mom sitting on a tree stump nursing her baby, a man combing his hair in a rearview mirror, and a young couple at a bus stop absorbed in a marathon smooch.

At dusk, we arrived at Hotel Ecológico Finca Ixobel, a conglomeration of guest houses, campsites, and Crusoe-esque tree houses built around massive pines at the foot of the Maya Mountains. The inn offers its global backpacker clientele horseback riding, tubing, jungle exploration, caving, and ping-pong, but the main attraction is the nightly candlelit dinner served family-style at communal picnic tables.

That night's dinner was overcrowded, so we sat around the ping-pong table swapping jokes with a young couple from Denmark. A dark cloud descended over the vegetarian eggplant and lentil dishes, however, when the couple informed us that, back in 1990, the inn's American owner, Michael De Vine, was found beheaded by the side of the road just a mile away. Five years later, it was reported that the murder was ordered by a Guatemalan colonel on the CIA's payroll. To this day, nobody knows what really happened. Determined not to let this all-too-common act of terrorism scare her out of her adopted country, De Vine's wife Carol still owns and operates Finca Ixobel.

Dinner soured. So we turned to drinking. Every time we emptied a beer, we hatched a mark next to our name on the guest list in the kitchen and headed to the communal fridge for more. By the end of the night, the hatch marks were a messy blob and our table was transformed into a rollicking multicultural ping-pong tournament, played more off the walls than on the table.

Page: