You watch my back, I’ll watch yours.

One of the great things about traveling with someone is that she/he has your back. They’re there to help you along the way: assist you in lifting your backpack to the top of a bus, share snacks with you while you people watch in the park, take photos of you in front of cool things, make sure you don’t get run over by a bus as you cross a street.

On a day trip from Xela, Guatemala that I took with my new friend Anna, and my new student/volunteer and soon-to-be-friend Sarah, this sort of “team thinking” was very helpful. We took a van with a guide and a couple of other travelers to a coffee farm cooperative. The tour of the farm was on foot and included a very scenic hike to a lovely waterfall. This particular farm grew its coffee plants within the forest, on hillsides amongst the trees, and we were able to see and learn exactly how the coffee was grown. Because we were now at a lower elevation, the heat and humidity increased, and so did the perspiring and panting.

The first part of the hike was downhill, which may seem like the easy part, but not so much for me. I have some trouble looking down, as one does to walk down a steep hill, because of double vision I have from a car accident years ago. I only have it when looking down, and can get rid of it if I close one eye, but that, of course, leaves me with no depth perception. So it can be a little slow going, with or without heat and humidity. This particular hike was also a little tricky as the path was cut against a steep hill and had quite a number of switchbacks zigzagging up and down the incline. But luckily, my girls had my back. Sarah walked in front of me, and Anna stayed behind me. They stuck with me. The others in the group, especially at the end of the hike when we were walking up hill, were a lot faster than I. Had my friends kept up with them, I would have been left behind to eat raw coffee beans off the ground for sustenance, drink collected rain from leaves, and live with a family of spider monkeys. Did they leave me behind? No. Did they get annoyed when I had to stop and rest? No. Did they scold me when I ran out of water? No. Did they laugh at me? A little, sure. They were hot and sweaty, too, but they could handle it, whereas it pretty much kicked my ass. I’m sure I was quite a sight.

Here I am, after the hike down to the waterfall. I was too weak to smile
after the hike back up the hill. 

But glory to the gods of refreshments when we finally made it back to the eating quarters of the farm and were served the most amazing watermelon drink. Liquados are very popular in Guatemala, made of fresh fruit that is blended with ice or milk or both. (There has to be more to them than that, but I don’t know what it is because when I throw fruit and ice into a blender here in the U.S., it is nothing special, believe me). And we also had lunch to refuel after the hike. But that liquado de sandía was the best drink ever! I could have drunk a gallon of it. In fact, I quite possibly did.

Here are Sarah (left) and Anna (right, white), with the
fast walkers and the amazing watermelon liquados.

I’m not sure if Anna and Sarah knew how much I appreciated their patience and guidance. Anna had been trying to convince me to go on a moonlit hike up Santa Maria, a nearby volcano that is a very popular hiking destination. I had told her, “I lived in Wyoming and Colorado in the Rocky Mountains and never climbed a mountain. I was in Ecuador, in the freakin’ Andes, and never climbed a mountain. Now I’m in Guatemala, and guess what! I’m not climbing a mountain.” But she had persisted ... until that day at the coffee farm. Over the watermelon liquado I asked her, “Do you see why I don’t want to hike up Santa Maria?” And she said, “Um, yeah” and agreed that it wouldn’t be a good idea.

This is Santa Maria, the volcano I preferred to admire from afar.

When you are traveling with someone, whether it’s someone you know from home or a new friend you meet on your trip, you have a tendency to watch out for each other, even if you don’t know them all that well. Once you step out to explore new corners of the world with another person(s), you are a team, even if you just met them at your language school the day before. It is part of the energy when you travel and it’s really pretty awesome. It is also another reason why strangers on the road soon become friends ... especially when that road is long, steep, winding, hot and challenging.