3 Feb--San Marcos & Blind Lemon

Fri, 3 Feb sorry this has taken so long ... internet connection hasn't been the best, and i lost this whole posting and had to reload and redo :( but, here it is, better late than never :) the plan is to check out of our hotel this morning and go on a 'vacation' from Panajachel to visit a few of the other villages around the lake. here is a map of Lake Atitlan ... #1 Panajachel, our home base, at the top of the map in the middle. #2 Santa Catalina that we saw on the way to #3 San Antonio, the pottery village, a few days ago. #11 Casa Del Mundo, Bill's restaurant and hotel #10 San Marcos ... where we're headed to today so we got to our launcha (boat) and headed for San Marcos. we had many many stops along the way at private residences and hotels ... but finally made it to San Marcos. Lonnie and Jolene told us that this is a "New Age" village, into meditation, yoga, crystals, massages, etc. .... personally i think they all look like 'hippies'. San Marcos has a population of 1,450. founded by a Franciscan in 1584. they cultivate agave, oranges, and veggies. Lonnie and Jolene came here a few weeks ago because they heard there was a Blues Bar called Blind Lemon. the bar was closed but they started talking with a guy in the street, who happened to be Carlos, the owner. he is a Blues guitarist and gave them a mini concert then and there. they vowed to return for a real performance. so they brought us here. Blind Lemon is named after "Blind" Lemon Jefferson, a blues singer and guitarist from Texas in the 1920s. Blind Lemon is very nicely done inside. the marble faux painting was incredible, as was the mural on the right wall of Blind Lemon himself. Eddi and I are staying at Carlos' home; but we needed to find a hotel for Lonnie and Jolene. so we stashed our bags at Blind Lemon and walked up the street and found the beautiful Hotel Jirvana ..... after walking down hundreds of stairs, and the hotel was right on the lake ... beautiful beautiful views ! ...wonder how many times i'm going to say that ? this is Jolene walking down the steps, with Lonnie even further below ...and their room was only US$ 20/night ... what a bargain they had the largest hydrangea blooms i've ever seen that's me amongst the Poinsettias that were 2 feet taller than me then we went back to Blind Lemon. Carlos greeted us and lead the way to his home .... up the road, up the hill ... we were beginning to wonder where the hell he was taking us, ... down narrow paths, between trees, over rocks and finally his home appeared .... he has a beautiful home and gardens that are hidden from view that he built himself. he reminded us that building a home here means building everything yourself, ... windows, doors, etc ... and it all had to be brought up the same small dirt rock paths that we came up. hard to believe it could be done. another amazing man, like Bill, at Casa Del Mundo, that had a vision and made it happen. ...impressive, ... both of them ! view from Carlos' home after we dropped our bags off, we went back down the trail and tried to mark it in our memory so we wouldn't get lost going up there later that night .. in the dark ..... then we went to get something to eat .... sometimes the restaurant you choose turns out to be not that great ... this was the case. Jolene ordered the traditional chicken stew, ... when i ordered the chicken sandwich, she pointed to Jolene and said that her order took the last chicken .... ???? so, i ordered the nachos next, but ... as she had told Eddi ... there was no avocado :) anyway, we finally ate .... the bread was very good .... see, i'm trying to find the good in all things :) on the way to the restaurant we saw several women with huge logs on their heads and also young boys with gigantic slabs of wood on their backs. the lake has risen about 9 feet since last year. many homes are under water, and the trees in front of this particular restaurant had/were dying because they were now standing in water. the guys were cutting the trees and hauling the wood away ... piece by piece. amazing how hard-working and STRONG these people are ! after lunch we walked through the 'streets' of San Marcos, which were really just small dirt very narrow paths .. with many massage, meditation, yoga, etc. places along them ... a very different village San Marcos. some had more elaborate paths it was really a tropic garden walking through there lots of coffee trees ... these are coffee beans .. aren't they pretty we happened upon some people who were on our boat ride in the morning. they were staying at this motel ... it was very eclectic and artsy .. i LOVED it ! check it out ! they did some great things with pieces of slate what a novel idea for a wall .... different sizes of rocks framed and encased in chicken wire ! it started to rain so we found a small place with shelter and Eddi treated us to Hot Chocolate which tasted very good since it had gotten quite cool. the Chocolate is very good here, but they don't use enough sugar for my taste. we made our way back to Lonnie and Jolene's in between showers for cocktail hour in their room. then walked to Blind Lemon for dinner and to listen to Carlos' Blues. Carlos had comfy sofa front row seats saved for us i provided the pre-show entertainment with a mask i found Carlos had a harmonica player with him tonight .... it was great to hear wonderful blues music again ... my favorite ! it was a GREAT night ! and another busy day :)