Martine picked us up in her dinghy; we sped around the corner to Jennifer’s house, tied up the dinghy and all climbed into Jennifer’s 16 ft lancha; we picked up Doris and Penny and Bea at their respective boats; we motored up a little creek that runs from El Gofete toward the mountains, tied up to a tree, climbed up the bank, met Kelli and Diane, and went for a walk!

We used to think that one of the drawbacks to staying down the river was the lack of a place to walk, but we are in business now! A group of folks in the neighbourhood walks for a couple of hours several mornings a week – at 7 am because it gets too hot later on – and what a delightful walk it is. The road winds through a finca, past pastures with cattle grazing and then branches off – right to connect with a road that goes all the way up to meet the Puerto Morales/Rio Dulce road, and left to keep going through pastureland toward the base of the mountains. We went left this time past lush undergrowth, trickling streams and towering trees – including a beautiful ceiba – the Mayan tree of life. With our group of 8, we were able to split into a faster group, and a slower one so we could each find a comfortable pace, and we certainly worked up a sweat as we travelled.

On the way back, we mingled with a group of mountain folks headed for the river and the collectivo to take them … somewhere! I so wish I could have taken pictures, but my greater desire was to relish the experience and not stick a camera in their faces. There were men and women, young children and a baby, the men wearing jeans and button up shirts and women in traditional woven skirts and blouses, children in the same t-shirts and pants we see on children in Canada and the US (and the clothes come down here in containers so they really are the ones once worn by our children.) They were all (well – not the baby) carrying packs and bags of greenery – specimens of a tree that I never did catch the name of. Some of our group speak Spanish so we engaged in conversation as we walked along. The children were so lovely – sweet smiles and giggles – and one boy solemnly said, “My name is William” in answer to my “Que es su nombre?” Once they got to the river, the man carrying the sleeping baby hung up his sling from a tree branch and they all settled down to wait for the collectivo (a taxi lancha) as we clambered down into our boats.

We learned that this is the route taken by the men who come by in Cayucos. They walk over an hour down this road from their pueblos, get into dugout canoes and paddle all through the bays with their produce or baskets to sell to residents on land and in boats. At the end of the day they paddle back up the river, up the creek and walk the kilometres back home again.

The Indigenous Mayans who live in these hills speak a different dialect from the Mayans who live along the shores and earn their living by fishing. These are farmers, many of whom moved here from the mountainous interior of Guatemala to escape the bloodshed during the wars of the late 1900’s.

So we found a road, and we got some exercise, and we absorbed yet another level of experience along the Rio Dulce.