Our Man in Antigua

good god..is it only thursday? left here Tuesday to the City for a bus…a good bus but the station is in Zone One…homeless, street people and one addled hooker with her ‘assets’ hanging out of her sweater…artfully cut holes to display the goodies but at noon she was hammered, swaying and in no shape to do much of anything..and it was raining like hell..

‘got to Retalheleu about 6pm…’checked into a halfway decent hotel: note to travelers…Moon Guidebooks are out of synch..phone/email..cha cha..’found the La Torre Supermercado around the corner…wooohooo!…Reu isn’t much of a town, aside from the town square..cabbies aren’t interested in working, the hotel staff are lackadaisical…further note..for current cab fares to Takalik Abaj, ask me…Moon’s #’s are absurd…Take-a-Lick? outstanding, outrageous and now one of my top 3 sites in central america…’got the inside tour by the archeologists, complete with cops with guns/bikes…blew me away, again, over and over..i’m whipped and my head is spinning with all i heard and saw..will download photos tomorrow..’blew outa there this morning, got a police tuk-tuk down the hill, gypsy cab to Reu…rhymes with feo…got a 2nd rate old grayhound bus…more about that and then at Esquintla(that dirty hell hole)a chicken bus back to A-Town..yep, got to have a wish answered..’wonder what Alotenango looks like?’…answer…dog shit…don’t bother..lost my fave old money clip(with 200+q)between the mercado and home…screw..not the bucks..the memories of the clip….dropped into DV…had a shot of rum..medicinal, you know…and per Luis Miguel, Claudia #3 is still working..monday tuesday…’ran into John H, working out travel plans with an African group…sounds good for all concerned..and of course, he knew all about Take-a-Lick…I’ll be writing a series on Take-a-lick…it’s incredible..filled both cameras with images, notebooks fulla stuff..ate well, on site…bit rough quarters but the price was right(free) I’m crashing early tonight…a long sweaty day on the pacific coast: think about how a chicken bus, originally designed to hold 40 students, becomes crammed with 80+…and we’re all sweating…more tomorrow, when this reality settles in..