Rio Dulce

The day started with one of these situations I will never fully understand. I wanted to take a bus from Lanquin to Rio Dulce from where I would then take a boat to Livingston on the caribbean coast.
I had already bought my ticket for the bus in Flores. I was a little worried as I had heard that sometimes tickets bought elsewhere are not accepted. But when the hostel called the travel agency in Flores to confirm the date of my departure (I had bought an open ticket) they said everything should be fine.
So the pick up truck brought us from the hostel into town where all the shuttle busses with different destinations were waiting. I found the bus to Rio Dulce and showed my ticket to the driver. But he said he couldn't accept this ticket. I told him to please call the number on the ticket as they could probably confirm that the ticket was valid. But he only asked "Where do you wanna go?" "Rio Dulce." "Which hostel did you stay?" "Zephyr Lodge, but I bought the ticket in Flores. Please call that number." "No, it's the wrong ticket!" (and of course all this was in spanish).
Another guy showed up and I had the same conversation over and over again. When the bus driver finally called the travel agency there were already 4 people there telling me I had the wrong ticket. And they still asked me every now and then where I wanted to go. Seriously? Still Rio Dulce.
After the bus driver had spoken to the travel agency he made 2 more phone calls. All the while even more guys walked by asking me where I wanted to go, telling me I had the wrong ticket.
But suddenly after a few minutes the bus driver put down his phone saying "esta bien!". He took my ticket, put me on the bus and suddenly everything was fine.

The bus drive to Rio Dulce took about 5 hours. The first 4 hours over really bumpy gravel roads. The streets in Guatemala are definitely the worst I've seen so far. Never felt such an relief when we finally reached the paved road.

But the journey from Rio Dulce to Livingston made up for everything. We got to Rio Dulce just in time that I could hop on the public lancha (small boats who work like collectivos) to Livingston. These boats make a few stops in between and give you a few informations about the area. Finally the sun came out again and it was a really nice tour. The river ends in the ocean and I was back to the Caribbean.Read more