Just a quick review of our week I picture form

lava, by far my favorite substance on this planet,

EL LAGO!!!!
shawnys front fender was destroyed somewhere around Acalpuco, Mexico, who would of known that it would of been nice on the muddy roads in Guatemala
shawny, David, janet , and Tracy kickn it old school in old school Antigua, Guatemala

perro(dog) troubles

This past week of our trip has been pretty great, we spent the weekend in Lago de Atitlan with Alicia and some friends from spanish school. The ride to the lake for shawny and i proved to be the coldest ride of the trip so far. It started raining soon after we left xela and didint stop. The road to the lake was so pretty it climbs the mountains to around 13000 feet above sea level which at that elevation in guatemala can be freazing cold im really quiet suprised it wasnt snowing on the top of these peaks. the road is quiet amazing it winds through the mountains but was quite dangerous for the road would go from a perfectly paved 4 lane highway to a two laned dirt road at a drop of a hat I found myself side ways quite a few times trying to slowdown for unmarked speed bumps and crazy slippery roads, im not sure if Ive just gotten rusty over the past week of not ridding or if the road was really that dangerous, but i feel that that 2 hour streach was the sketchyest section of our trip.
The lake is georgous and set under massive volcanes and mountains we spent our days swimming and kayaking the lake, and our nights attending some a corinatation for the towns pagents, it was all in traditional myan style.
Upon arriving back to Alicias house were our motorcycles had been stored for the weeked we found that the horrible dogs at here house had torn my seat to shreds. If it hadnt of been the funiest site Ihave ever seen I would of killed those dogs, but I still laugh when I think of how funny my bike looked with the seat in a billion pieces.
shawny was lucky his seat was so high off the ground that they left his alone, but was not so lucky upon returning to xela. shawn decided he was going to go runing everyday and as he set out on his first jog around xela he was chased down by four dogs, the pack went strait for him probably because his shoes smell like rotting fish or because they like the tast of gringo hes not sure. but shawny with his quick wits started throwing rocks and yelling and pretty much scared the hell out of the locals as well as the dogs. Hes now known around town as the white guy who fights packs of wild dogs. Im not sure how that translates in to spanish but am sure thats what people are saying when we walk by and they point

choose your own adventure!!!!

hey hit up some of these adds(right side) and choose your own adventure theres some good ones on here. who knows maybe it will change your life!!

XELA

Lago De Atitlan most beautiful site ive seen on this trip

shawny traversed above the window and drew some onlookers from inside this building

best cemetary ive ever been to, oh and largest!

so aperntly its a famous bridge in xela, why not climb it!!!
shawny on a wall outside our church
these ladys were loving the buildering that we were doing they thought we were crazy!!

Romeo my landlord is in love with my bike, he rides it all the time this time was with his grandaughter

this is where we are living now in xela, my teacher wanted to show me the view.

our drive to Quesaltenango, absolutley amazing

this guy really wanted to ride on the back of shawnys bike into Guatemala for some reason it took shawny an hour to convince him that it wasnt going to happen

lost in who knows what town shes not happy

we found some rad kids from Guadelajara camping on the beach in Puerto Escondido, by far my favorite beach town that we hit up in Mexico

Get the facts

We made it, we actually made it! nobody died, got robed, or got in any knife fights! all of our bikes made it with very little problems, and were ready for another 3700 miles, actually were not, its so nice to be off the bikes and in a place we can call home for a bit. the city that were in is called quezetanango, or something like that but its such a beautiful city high in the green mountains of Guatemala I´m excited to post some pictures in my next post so you can see how amazing this place is. i had goose bumps as we rode up the road to the city one because it was actually pretty cold, and two because it was so beautiful. the school that were attending is great and we get to stay with a family here in the city during the time were enrolled in school, we have discovered that theres some rock climbing here that were stoked about, and some volcanoes we can hike. this city's flat out ILL!!!!! i´m really happy to be here and can´t wait to start learning some good old Spanish!!

Heres some FACTS about the ride here:
1. we rode 3700 miles
2. in 20 days
3. about 40 gas station stops
5. 6 pairs of sunglasses lost
6. twice Alicias I pod fell out of here pocket while riding 40mph plus, the second time it hit me in the face and then got smashed by a truck
7. Shawny wrecked 5 times and dropped his bike 10 times
8. Alicia wrecked 2 times dropped her bike 37 times
9. I wrecked once "in the mud" and dropped my bike 2 times I win!!
10. 0 flat tires
11. 400$ in tolls
13. gas is cheep in Mexico like 2.75 a gallon
14. gas in Guatemala like 5.50 a gallon
15. pairs or shoes lost or thrown away 7
16. number of "mexicos next top model" contests attended on accident, 1
17. number of romances on this trip, 0 we smell bad, like gas and exhaust and B.O.
18. number of times honked at just to say hi 1 million and 67 times
19. number of ponytails right now 3!
20. number of times Alicia burnt here legs on the exhaust pipes 77
21. finally making it to Narnia/Guatemala...... priceless

Ok heres the low down, we have made it half a days ride from the boarder of Mexico and Guatemala. The last 3 days it has been raining like crazy which is no fun on motorcycles. we stayed in Puerto escondito for two nights which was amazing Its my favorite part of mexico so far. the days before we made it there were pretty rainy one night we pulled over ontop of this mountain pass and a lady named victoria let us stay in a shed that was desighned to be a taco stand but had never been used she made us dinner which was so good and let us buy stuff from here little store that she runs out of the front room of her house.
the day before as we were meeting up with shawny alicia and I were racing through the mountains trying to make it to acapulco before sundown and we came across a wreck on the road. there was a motorcycle on the road a smashed up and a white sheet covering the person that was riding the bike. We were sick to our stomachs and road so slow after that. it was kind of a wake up call to be more percacious.
so were going to cross the boarder today in to Guatemala I think were all really happy to be getting there finally after 3000 miles and 18 days of ridding. at the same time though were a little nervous, im sure it will be fine its just when crossing into another country theres always that feeling of the unknown. we hope to get t lake atitlan very soon for we here its paradise. and I cant wait to start taking spanish classes i hate not being able to talk fluently. im staying here until i know spanish. ok see you all latter.

Who likes photos? Raise your hand!!! Actually raise the roof!!

chaco nation beat this!!!!

so i like to pick up dead fish, get over it!!!!! it looked like a pirana crazy teeth, oh and smelled soooo bad!

he let me ride his horse how could i say no!!!!!!

um i dont know!!!
driving the coast is soooo slow but so amazing some of the greatest views its hard not to stop everywhere we pass. expessially when we were suppose to meet up with shawny in Acapulco and we still havent made it there. shawny if your reading this no worries were on our way ha ha ha!

we made frinds with the receptionist at our hotel in guadalajara and she wanted to know where we were going to park our bikes at night cause there was a lot of theft in the area. we told her we didt know and she told us to put them in the lobby of the hotel. ha ha ha only in mexico!!!!!!!

So seeing how Alicias bike breaks down in every city that we stay in we have tons of internet time to blog so Im putting up more pics cause there more interesting then reading. were replacing the starter on her bike which has been going out now for the last couple of days it got to the point that every time we would stop we would have to pull start it with my motorcycle, which can be a task, but very successful if we dont fall over doing it. today at a gas station some ladys saw us pull starting the bike and stoped us and told us they had a friend who was a mechanic and that he was on his way to help us fix the bike. so long story short I love Mexicans there always looking out for us. like last night i asked a guy where we could camp he gave us directions to this place right on the beach it was a returant and small apartment turns out it was were he lived and the people who owned it let us set up our tent in there out door resturant this was the secound night of sleeping in peoples resutrant, and all for free. the drive from guadalajara was the prettiest drive through the mountains and some sand flats like the salt flats of utah, except there were sighns everywhere saying be careful of the tornadoes which was a funny thing to be careful of, but sure enough they were everywhere, which sucked for me seeing how the day before the visor for my helmut was ripped off by the wind and i had no sunglasses. Bad combination unless you want your eyeballs sandblasted!!!!! ok well enjoty the pics and dont for get to check out our sponsors on the right of the page hit those guys we need your help!!!!!

como!!!!

Were still ten days from Guatemala and I fell like were all feeling the pressures of traveling on old school motorcycles. Each day we have new problems with our bikes and were not at all suprised anymore when one of them doesnt turn on. Weve become quite good at diagnosing the problems and jimmy rigging up some kinda solution. weve switched out egnitions, filters , pumps, exchanged bolts with tie downs(ps tie downs are the new duct tape) ones actually holding my gas tank on right now. To tell you the truth were just as suprised as you are that are bikes have made it this far and weve come to relize that theres really no reason why we cant make it all the way there on them. there old but there good to us and even though they cause so much frustration we still have some pride in our old bikes.

weve made it to guadalajara and are really suprised at how clean of a city this is, its a huge city second largest in mexico but is suprisingly really nice. theres some really great parts of town where you feel as if youre in some european city with cooble stone streets and colonial type buildings. As you can imagine the cathedrals are so amazing we walked around the city today in aw of these huge churches. we spent a good portion of our day trying to navigate the city and the outlining areas for a climbing spot but failed and ended up getting completely seperated from eachother, after about three hours of being lost and fighting our way through traffic we all met back up at the hotel. Alicia laid down her bike in traffic and some nice guy came and helped her pick it up. That bikes taking a beating!!!! Were itchen to get back to the coast its so hot inland and with no ocean to cool us off it can be a little to much when the sun high in the sky. All and all Mexicos been pretty good to us and we havent felt any threats since being in the country, it feels safe. definatley not as crazy as most people told us it would be. people here are great.

finally some Photos!!!!!

just one of four lay downs that shawnys had, his last wreck was into the back of a taxi in Mazatlan he brock his head light blow out his front shocks and is still up and ridding. what more can i say he,s a natural!
First night out we got poured on 40 miles into the drive so we ate some dinner and kept on ridding the first 3 days of our trip were so freaking cold!!!!!
we were so nieve

mexico
last night we stayed at a ranch with some guys who took us in off the freeway with no hesitation, they cooked us dinner, let us ride their horses and gave us beds to sleep on, people here are super hospitable and expect nothing in return, I really like this culture

every night has given us beautiful sun sets