Pirate Attacks and Finca el Paraiso

Today we set out from Rio Dulce, north towards Poptun and Flores with detours to the Castillo de San Felipe, which we saw from the river yesterday, and Finca el Paraiso.

Castillo San Filipe is a somewhat surreal apparation at the mouth of the Lago Izbal. In the middle of indigenous Guatemala sits a perfectly presereved Spanish castle. Tall stone towers capped with tiled red roofs, rise up on the rivebanks. The walls are crenellated, with cannons jutting out over the buttresses. A drawbridge leads through the heavy walls and into the plaza, with elegant walkways above. Below the walkways were a labrynth of cool and dark keeps, storehouses and cellars. The Spaniards constructed the castle in the 1650s, rebulding and refortifying it a number of times, to defend the Lago Izabal against pirate attacks. From the castle they would string a chain across the channel, a rude awakening for unwelcome vessels.

Finca el Paraiso was an hour and a half further down a deserted and delapidated dirt road. While the trip tried the boys' patience, the results were well worth it. At the heart of a working finca, a short walk through the forest, there was this amazing little lake and thermal waterfalls. While the swimming hole was cold, the falls were almost scalding sulfury water. Underneath the falls, the noise, heat and spray were almost overwhelming, but a little further away they created a pefectly warm pool. The shores of the stream were lined with smooth bolders and stones on one side and a network of huecos on the other. You could climb into the caves, where there were all sorts of petrified plants and prehistoric looking frogs.

For a few hours, we had what was perhaps the most beautiful and peaceful spot in all of Guatemala all to ourselves, swimming and splashing. It was amazing. Personally, this is where I would have constructed my castle, as a defense against unwanted tourist-types.

Tonight we’re stayed at Finca Ixobel (pronounced Isabelle), outside of Poptun on the highway between Rio Dulce and Flores. It's a beautiful place, surrounded by pine forests, with lots of ponds perfect for swimming and foothills and caves perfect for exploring. We rented a tree house, complete with bunk beds and hammocks. It includes fabulous family style meals, made mostly from organic food grown on the finca itself. The Finca has a great family feel and a definite draw for laid-back traveler types from all over the world. Some of them had been staying at the finca for weeks, earning their keep.

It’s run by a wonderful woman named Carole DeVine, whose husband was Mike was kidnapped murdered by the Guatemalan military in 1990. His murder and the activism that followed forced the US government to suspend military aid to the Guatemalan government. While a number of soldiers were convicted of the crime the captain escaped from prison (probably with government complicity) shortly after his arrest and the others served limited sentences.