mountain biking in guatemala

So, way back in August, I decided to bring my mountain bike with me when I moved down to Guatemala. I'm somewhat embarrassed to admit this, but the decision was in part based on a story in Bike magazine that said Guatemala has some amazing riding. It does. But the Bike magazine writers toured the country with a guide the whole time, had a car to bring them wherever they wanted to go, and were able to find, and stick to, reasonably well established mountain bike trails.

I'm glad I brought the bike, and if I hadn't, I'd go insane living in a country with this landscape without any chance to explore, but needless to say, my experience has been a bit more frustrating than a magazine travel piece.

There have always been a few trails just down the road from our house - great singletrack, but it's just 25-30 min worth of riding, and every time I've gotten excited about a new trail I find back there, it dead ends. And finding other good trails to ride has been tough, particularly around the lake.

This is great. But it took less than 15 min to get here, and the trail ends in 200 ft.

One of the reasons it's tough to ride near the lake is that the slope down to the water is just too steep, and the trails have become heavily rutted by erosion. Nerd alert: the International Mountain Bike Association recommends following the rule of half when building trails. Trails should be no greater than half as steep as the fall line of the hill they occupy in order for water to run off properly. Trails here weren't built - they formed through years of farmers and animals walking to their fields, and Guatemalans tend to spit in the face of the rule of half, walking straight up the fall line.


Riding to the top of the ridge above the lake seems to be the recipe for good rides though, as the mountains beyond the Atitlan crater have a gentler slope and there are actually a few parks built for recreation, as opposed to trails just leading to a farmer's field. Still though, there are frustrations.

View from somewhere near Santa Clara.

hello.

First of all, to get to the top of that ridge you have to ascend about 2100 vertical feet, not including the half dozen smaller hills on the way to base of the main climb to Santa Clara. To get to the next ridge after Santa Clara (and the downhill through a park called ChuiraXamolo is awesome): another 1500 or so feet vertical. For me, all that climbing on the road is boring, and since I'm not in the best shape right now, it leaves my body pretty wasted for the fun part, the actual trail riding.

It's a bit hard to see the switchbacks on the road below, but this isn't even all the way up the climb. No fun.

Lately, I've been resorting to what mountain bikers in the US call "shuttling," although in the U.S. that typically means having a buddy drive you to the top of a mountain so you can ride down. Here it means I tie my bike to the side of a pickup truck or the top of a minivan and hop in the back with 15-20 campesinos, who all think I look funny in my bike shoes. Even with the pickup, there's no such thing as a flat ride here, and I invariably have to do tons of climbing, so I don't feel too lazy.

Tied on with a piece of nylon cord. Safety first.

Terrible video of the pickup truck. In case you were wondering about Guatemalan public transportation.

Second, the U.S. has established trail networks, and Guatemala does not. My rides generally consist of spotting a promising-looking trail on the side of the road, and if it doesn't end in 100 yards, I ride for 10-20 minutes before popping out on a dirt road somewhere. Then repeat. Sometimes I get the chance to ask a Guatemalan if there's a sendero, no un carretera o camino (singletrack, not another dirt road, goddammit) that goes to X town or X road. They invariably do not understand why I would want to ride the bike on anything besides the road, but 1/10 of the time I get some good directions that lead 20 min of great riding.

Also, there are a lot of obstacles. Not like logs on the trails or rocks that make the riding difficult, but other things. Best kinda-crash I've ever had: rode headtube first into a rope. One end was attached to a fence, the other end to a cow. Both of us went away unscathed.

More often, the obstacles are just of the hike-a-bike variety. The hills here are super steep, so it's pretty frequent I have to shoulder the bike for at least a few minutes every ride, even in parks like Corazon del Bosque.

I am getting effing serious about practicing my shoulder carries for next cyclocross season! Gonna be the fastest guy in the B's up the run-up, and first to the beer handup.

Partway up the stairs in the Corazon del Bosque park. Five minutes later, got chased by 3 dogs.

That being said, even though it can be a bit frustrating, and I never get the chance to ride on trail for an uninterrupted hour or two, when the riding's good, it's great. It's an awesome way to see the country, and it feels great to ride on singletrack knowing that it's been a while since the trail's seen a bike. The downhill from ChuiraXamolo to Santa Clara is one of the most fun I've ever ridden - 20-30 minutes of mostly downhill ranging from technical singletrack to super-fast, but still mildly sketchy doubletrack. Here a few extra pics from the last couple of weeks (most media in this entry is from my ride on Saturday).

Partway down from ChuiraXamolo to Santa Clara. Not too shabby.

Taking the trail down > the road.

Some people think PowerBars are the mid-ride snack of choice. I strongly disagree. I hope they didn't give me that plate just because I'm a gringo.

In other, unrelated news, Stacy spent Sunday away from the house, hanging out with a friend across the lake in Panajachel. This was her welcome home present. She is not thrilled.

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fotos de cumpleaños

some photos from birthday weekend. we're both pretty fed-up with blogger these days, so forgive us for not posting more. there is a lot going on here.... but it's so difficult to share. stay tuned for some more photos and hopefully stories (if they don't get deleted) about the art studio, english classes, coffee cupping, making cakes and tamales and more!

god, those glasses.... ahem... yeah. he had a great few days.

pool at hotel toliman

pre-birthday dinner.

italian fruit tart as birthday cake

una receta para ustedes: dos

2/3 lib. "green beans"
3 tomates
1/2 cebolla
1/3 pimiento rojo
2/3 tbs pimientos chilis
4 dientes de ajo
1/2 cucharon gingebre fresco
1/4 taza cilantro
1/2 taza mania, machacada
jugo de un limonito
salsa de soya o Braggs y copos de pimiento rojo machacados
aciete de olivo
arroz o pasta




2/3 lb green beans
3 plum tomatoes
1/2 onion, finely chopped
1/3 red pepper
2/3 tbs chili peppers, diced
4 garlic cloves, minced
1/2 tbs fresh ginger, minced
1/4 cup cilantro, chopped
1/2 cup peanuts, crushed
juice of 1 small lime
Braggs and crushed red pepper to taste
olive oil
rice or pasta

serves 2-4

Instructions:

1. Blanch green beans for 4 minutes in a medium pot and begin cooking rice. Drain green beans, break in half, and set aside.



2. Meanwhile, heat oil in a large frying pan or wok on medium heat.
3. When oil is hot, add garlic, ginger, and minced chili pepper. Cook for 30 seconds, then add onions.
4. When onions become translucent, add crushed peanuts and lower heat slightly. Cook for 2 minutes, so outside of peanuts take on a roasted color. Note that there is absolutely no wisdom for why I added the peanuts at this phase, that's just how I did it the first time. You can add the peanuts later if it makes more sense to you.
5. Add green beans and red pepper to the frying pan, then pour in Bragg's or soy sauce to taste. Cook and continue to add Bragg's/soy sauce so that the green beans take on the flavor.
6. As you see fit, add the diced tomatoes, pour the lime juice into the frying pan, and cook for about 1 minute, then add all but two teaspoons of the chopped cilantro.

Entonces, buen provecho!

Thanks

Hi, it's taken me a bit to write this, but I just wanted to say thanks for the birthday wishes. I'm more than slightly embarrassed by my parents (thanks Mom), but that's nothing new...

Seriously though, thanks so much for taking the time to say happy birthday, especially if it meant learning to use a webcam/Youtube for the first time.

After dinner at the house on the twelfth, we had a relaxing Sunday/Monday/Tuesday in nearby San Lucas, essentially doing nothing. Which was awesome, in no small part because doing nothing means not having to handwash clothes or dishes for 3 days. The only downside of the weekend was wearing no sunscreen with a rather deep v-neck. One of the wierder tanlines I've had to date...

Anyways, here are a couple pictures from the birthday/Valentine's day retreat. Pics from Stacy's camera, since I didn't charge my battery. Hasta luego.

Nevermind the photos for now...blogger's taking forever tonight...I'll upload later

los regalos de cumpleaños a kevin

so today is kevin's birthday. kevin doesn't like birthdays, but everyone wanted him to have a happy one anyway. we'll be spending the weekend in san lucas toliman. this village in the left of the photo. awesome.

and because i think sometimes he is exhausted of my company (and one person singing is never quite as nice as lots of people singing), here are some birthday songs for kevin.

from new places: new orleans, new jersey, new york, new zealand

and from other places: DC, california, connecticut, massachusetts.

enjoy.

from jake, etc.

everybody loves you! happy birthday :)

we are elsewhere.

A few days ago, I heard about this writer, Colleen Kinder. Jennifer took some travel writing classes with her last year and told me about her new book project. Ms. Kinder is traveling around the world meeting with Americans who are living abroad. She wants to know why. She basically asks people,

"Can you tell me in one word why you are living abroad?"

I really started to think about this, as I reminded myself that this is the second time (for Kevin too) that I have lived abroad for a period of time. I usually had answers for "Why are you going there?" or "What are you going to do there?" But I never really thought about the trips like a residency, even though they are. I never considered my travels to be part of a larger migration pattern of Americans that leave the "land of opportunity" to pursue something elsewhere.

My friend Joe also created a super neat program, based on Facebook info, that shows you a map of where all your friends are located. I started to think about where a lot of my friends are today, and they are at all corners of the globe. For real- New Zealand, Korea, London, Oregon, Ecuador, Texas, Halifax... And in the last few years, people I know are constantly traveling. I'm thrilled to be living in a time where I can know these things and still communicate with friends thousands of miles away. I'm also lucky to know such marvelously talented and interesting people that share my fascination with different cultures/time zones/languages/etc.

Kevin and I came up with some words... and in all honesty, our words for this time in Guatemala are entirely different than words we might have chosen for our time in Peru or the Netherlands. That's what is so neat about traveling, living abroad or even just leaving home. I don't believe that anyone needs a reason to do these things. And it's almost impossible to make concrete plans.

That's the beauty of it: being abroad forces you to learn flexibility, patience and tolerance. It allows you discover your personal limits and boundaries in a way that school and the workplace can never teach you. Traveling away from home allows you to truly live and learn what makes your life unique, and how to best cultivate your decisions to adapt to your surroundings.

Does that even make sense?? I don't know. Just something I've been thinking about recently. And also- wanted to graciously thank my parents and family for allowing me to pursue my life abroad and supporting me every step of the way.

So the three words I came up with were "space to think." Which is not one word at all, but these things happen when you live abroad and your English vocab starts to slip down the tubes.

I had written a bit more on this, but blogger deleted it. Which is probably a good thing, because it sounded a lot more pompous than I intended (using a blog for personal reflections is not really my thing). But yeah, living in Guatemala, with a substantially different lifestyle, has given me the chance to step back and slow down from the rhythm I had in DC, and think about life a bit more, instead of just rushing to a next shift, errand, or destination.

Coffee in Guate, pics from Stacy

Hola,

It's been a while since I've posted, largely due to laziness, but also in some small part due to busy-ness.

Yesterday evening I just wrapped up 3 days of teaching a coffee prep at FEDEPMA (with a ton of help from Stacy), and that was just the culmination of a couple week's worth of prep work.

Before I left Guatemala for the holidays, the directors at FEDEPMA asked me to teach a course on coffee prep for some workers, friends, and associates of the cooperative, since we have an espresso machine that nobody knew how to use, and we're thinking about setting up a cafe as an additional source of income.


I didn't really understand how overwhelming it was going to be before I started working on it, and of course I procrastinated and didn't do any work while stateside. First of all, I haven't taught anything in a semi-formal fashion since the last time I taught swim lessons. Fall 2007. It's been a while. Second, coffee geek language and concepts are hard enough to explain in English. Trying to find the words in Spanish to explain "over-extraction," "settling and distributing the grinds," "even tamping," "blonding," "stretching the milk," etc. was a lot more time-consuming than I expected. Third, even though most of the teaching was hands-on and demonstrative, I did use PowerPoint for some of the theoretical explanations. I forgot how much I hate Powerpoint.

Bane of my existence.

Overall though, it was a great experience. And, with a bit more practice next week, some of the participants (not all - some just don't care) could become pretty good at making great coffee. In three days, we attempted to cover basic theory of the factors behind a good cup of coffee, black coffee prep by three methods (automatic, pourover, french press), how to pull espresso, and steaming milk for espresso-based drinks. Waaaay too ambitious, particularly considering that some of the participants had never had anything besides Nescafe, but it's been an awesome start.


The positives of the experience with a few pictures first, then a bit on my sort-of boss at FEDEPMA, Doña Loida, and other sources of frustration during the past three days.


The pluses:


1. Coffee: Obviously, I like coffee, and learning more about it is part of the reason I came to Guatemala and started volunteering/working at FEDEPMA. Teaching and lesson planning forced me to learn a lot more about coffee and how to explain it, both in English and Spanish. Also a good reminder that I am a nerd (about bikes, coffee, etc.).



2. Behind the bar: even though there were days in DC when I thought I wasn't that great at it, I do miss working the espresso machine. I think it's safe to say Stacy feels the same way. So this was a good time to play around a little bit and make some drinks. Stacy also helped me figure out why sometimes my milk was inconsistent, so I think this week helped me improve my skills a bit too. Bonus lesson for me.

Steam the milk.

Bury the milk.

Admire the day's winning pour.

Not the winning pour.

3. Teaching: honestly, it feels good to help people learn. And more than that, it's refreshing to see people who are interested in learning, and to watch them get better at pulling shots, pouring, or whathaveyou.

Bilson, distributing some grounds.

Ahhh, so this is what 30-40 lbs of pressure feels like.

Vicenta, with her own pretty damn good cappuccino.

4. Nuevos amigos: Met a few new people during the seminar, which is always a good thing.

Luis, full concentration on the milk.

5. Language improvement: Teaching (and being corrected by Guatemalans about how some of my colloquial translations just didn't make sense) helped me learn some new vocab and reinforced the fact that I have to work on several things I say wrong all the time, without any good reason (el leche, por ejemplo). I think it helped Stacy, too, who was basically co-teaching the whole time.

Now, the frustrations:

1. The colloquial language barrier: already mentioned, but holy crap, we have so many subtly-different words in English, not including coffee slang. Trying to explain techniques and coffee flavors (besides it tastes like coffee) was not easy.

2. The setting: we don't have a permanent place to set up the espresso machine or other coffee equipment. Which meant that every morning I had to move an 80 lb espresso machine to a new location. Not ideal for the espresso machine, and it's nerve-wracking because the machine costs at least $3000 dollars. Dropping it would have been a huge bummer.

The espresso machine also takes an hour to warm up. This was a problem for day 3, when the two people who have keys to the room we used forgot themat home, and I couldn't turn on the machine until 10 min before the scheduled start of class.

The sanitation station: Day 3 we were in a room right next to the coffee processing equipment.

3. I let Perla set up the PowerPoint one day and she put a virus on my USB memory drive.

4. Too many people. 11 people trying to learn on one single-grouphead espresso machine just doesn't work. Way to crowded for any personal space, and it's tough for everyone to get a turn. Plus, with 7 Guatemalan women bickering in Tzutujil, I believe the class was what Herb Williams calls a "hen party."

The espresso machine is only 15" wide. There are way too many people in this picture.

5. Frustration breeds apathy. This happens when teaching or learning anything new, but for a few participants, difficulty pulling good shots, steaming milk, or pouring led to a whatever attitude. It's not easy to do it well, so messing up a few times, particularly when the teacher can't explain things very well, shouldn't be a surprise...

Yeah! This is fun!

Ugghh...this is not easy. Eff cappuccinos, I'm sticking to instant.

6. Doña Loida Margarita: Holy crap, my boss is some type of insane looney tunes character. The woman can be so endearing some times, but drives me insane on other days, like all three days of this course. Definitely only listened about half of the time, and didn't really ever figure out espresso, but did feel like she could tell everyone what they were doing wrong.

Also, after day two, I was cleaning up, moving cups and whatnot back into the roasting room, where we store everything. Then I went to get the espresso machine. I can't see what's in front of me when I'm carrying it (like carrying a TV). Between the time I left the roasting room and came back 2 minutes later, Loida decided that she needed to move two cinder blocks into the doorway. Slammed my left foot into one, and my shin into the other, and almost dropped a machine that costs more than 3 months of most FEDEPMA employees' salary. And I was told that I should do a better job watching where I'm going. Great.

"Hi Kevin, this is my 'I'm pretending to listen, but I'm definitely not' face."

Boss of the portafilter.

Tamping while resting the portafilter on its spout is the 2011 sign for care and precision.



Get it.



"You're doing something wrong, and I feel like telling you about it."

Anywho, besides the fact that I definitely need a Loida vacation, and that the past week's been exhausting, it was an awesome experience. I think we're going to keep working on espresso in smaller groups this week, so everyone can dial in their skills a bit more. No more Powerpoints for a while...and some rest, rather than lesson-planning time, come night time.

And, if you haven't heard yet, we just bought our return tickets to the US for March 28. Flying into Boston, spending a few days in CT, then road-tripping down to TN to drop Stacy off in Norris. Then we start a hopefully-not-too-long period of unemployment at our respective parents' houses. Any job offers?