Into the heart of darkness - El Mirador with NLX

[overlander]

So we headed off to Uaxactu'n from Tikal, which is well into the national park due North. Our goal is to check in with "the lady/Godmother/high priestist/reigning park monarch/big momma" to see her collectable artifacts and make sure the mules are laid on.


From Tikal to Uaxactu'n, the roads are "Guatemala Good", and it's a pleasant gravel road drive to get there. Maybe 45 min-1 hour (can't exactly remember).



Entering town center of Uaxactu'n



Uaxactu'n is a lazy little classic Central American village ("town" might be pushing it). What I'm starting to realize is that with very few exceptions like Tikal, Guatemala sees very little in the way of tourism. I would have to say based on my experience, it is the most underexploited region I have been to with respect to tourism for what assets this country has to support such an industry. While Tikal was buzzing with minivan euro-love excitement, only a bit North on these roads and the locals are completely surprised to see any outsider. A big daily event for the likes of Uaxactu'n is the local bus coming through and stopping. I'm talking about the hand painted, multi-colored repurposed school bus with the bespoke roof rack and locals holding chickens in their lap. For a moment, I was thinking I went back in time and drove onto a production set for "Romancing the Stone" (if your under 30 skip this part and go to the next paragraph). While the appearance of two black Defenders and the Pinz raised quite a few eyebrows and stunted the town for about 30 minutes, the cows, chickens, horses and dogs really didn't give us a second thought.

On the far end of town, we arrive at the quazi-ranch house of the town matriarch. She's not there, so a local goes to find her. Time for some needed refreshment and take in the scenery.





Under a tree about 200 meters away, is some local wildlife; two Hiluxes grazing. This is the wildebeest of Guatemala. Make note of the tires on those beasts. They commonly range in these parts from 34"-37" and had a significant effect on our travels, and the park environmental stewardship. More on that later when I share lessons learned on driving techniques, observed best practices and responsible off roading.



Under a hot sun and covered with dust, we enjoy a Moza while we wait. The looming departure from civilization is every present as the jungle canopy lay within our sight from here. There is almost a group epiphany that compels us to carefully manage our ration of precious beer and water. In the jungle, what you take is what you have. James pulls us together to inbrief us, showing us a map of the Peten and where we are, where we are going.

We are oriented to the location of the recovery equipment, the food, first aid kit. He also briefs that we have about 40 gallons of water, which is enough for if I recall 1/2 gallon per person per day for personal use water (not including cooking), before next potential resupply. We are also briefed on local wildlife dangers. James starts talking about panthers, jaguars, tarantulas, scorpions, bla,bla bla....FLEUR DE LANCE. Ok James, you have my attention. One of the more venomous snakes in the world, common throughout Central America, hang in trees and in grass. Then we're briefed that before we get out of the vehicles in the jungle, to look out at branches, then look down on ground, then when you get out expand your view search area, and DO NOT go into the jungle thicket. Ok, I've heard this speech before. This sounds just like a convoy briefing in Iraq on IED safety that I've heard many times not so long ago. Just like back in Iraq, I'm saying in my head "I can't let my guard down on this trip, no matter how tired or excited I get. It only takes a moment".

We wait for about 20 minutes in the heat of the day. Bill, Lee and I have started a tradition of sharing a single beer between us, which is sustained as our standard operation procedure for short halts during all trail riding through the rest of the trip. It's not only good rationing, but breaks the dulldrum of the Camelback water bottle that is within arms reach at all times.

James and Graham eventually inform us to load up, we're heading to Dos Lagunas as our destination for the evening and first night encamped. This is starting to feel like military convoy operations. A whole new wave of excitement comes over me as the reality of heading into jungle canopy in Land Rovers, which has been a life long dream for me, is only moments away. We make a right turn on the town road heading North and in 300 meters, turn off the road onto a jungle trail. Anyone my generation probably remembers the "Bat Cave entrance" from the Batman TV series. That's what I called this picture (sans the road block sign that flipped down automatically".


As we enter the batcave, the sun quickly transitions from equatorial blazing heat, to broken light and finally dark shadows with fragments of scattered sunlight. I take my sunglasses off and set them in Defender's parcel tray while holding on to the dash grab handle as the road switches from gravel to jungle rut. I won't put the sunglasses back on for 4 days....

 

[Tucan viajero]

Really nice!

I'm thoroughly enjoying this... Thanks.

 

[haven]

Great story!

One correction: The snake you were warned about is the Fer-de-Lance ("Iron of the Spear" or Lancehead), named after its triangle shaped head. The Fer-de-Lance grows to a length of 5 to 6 feet. It has a venom that causes tissue necrosis, which can necessitate the amputation of the arm or leg that was bitten. There's an effective anti-venom treatment, so a bite is rarely fatal if treated quickly.

 

[overlander]

Thanks for the correction and you are correct! Deep in the jungle, it's the "quickly" part that becomes the achilles heal. Also, there was a debate about how to deal with a bite, as James and Graham said there is another snake that is very simliary in appearance to the fer-de-lance that one can receive a bite from as well. Many jungle trekkers carry anti-venom, but anti-venom is specific to type. The risk is that if you are bitten, and the snake does not happen to inject a lethal dose, but the wrong anti-venom is delivered based on incorrect identification, the victim can die from anaphylactic shock from receiving the wrong anti-venom. It's like going to Vegas and hitting the roulette!

 

[overlander]

Now that Easter has past, back to the story...

So after picking up the jungle track, I don't think it was more than 1 km before we came to the first set of ruts on the trail; first of maybe 1,000 or so that lay before us. Low range and center-diff locked, we have good momentum at this point and it's not too bad, just some slipping, so we push through it and continue on.


February is the end of the dry season, as mid-March brings on heavy rains. Our trip was the last of the season for James and Graham, and as such we were expecting it to be drier than normal. In hindsight, I can't imagine what wetter than normal would be like other than "biblical". Only a a few hundred meters later, we hit our 2nd set of mud ruts. this one goes beyond what we can see and Graham gets out for a foot recce. The foot recce, as I'm sure most of you are well practiced in, will become over the course of this trip a second nature reflect. Bill, Lee and I at the start of this trip, would sit and wait for instructions every time we stopped. Later by mid-day, we would become habitualized to open the door, put of the recovery gloves and get out within seconds after a Rover stops....continously. That's how they role in the jungle.



Graham comes back moments later reporting that it's about 200 meters long and messy, so everybody out! As I begin to walk the obstacle I can see that this rut line has been cut deep recently. Graham lines up for the run and hits it with some Camel Trophy momentum! 50 meters!


Ok, time for the first winch.



Alright! Got some winching in! I was such a neophite that first day.

 

[overlander]

We continue on and it isn't more than maybe another 1km before we come up to the next one. Geez, this is going to be a long day at this rate. This one is maybe 300 meters long and has two bends in it. Same deep ruts as before. What a mess. Graham makes it again about 50-75 meters with James providing a ground guide until he can go no further, which was right at the first bend, then Graham guides James up into position behind him. To make the best progress before winching is required, careful ground guiding is needed to try and stay out of the ruts as long as possible. Having almost exclusively been the driver on all my excursions back home in my 110, I had completely forgotten what a learned skill ground guiding (or spotting) is.

Having gone as far as we could go with open differentials, now it's time for another winch pull. Karl and Byron are having no issues at all so far. That pinz has portal axles and factory hydraulic lockers on all 3 axles. It's amazing what it can just push it's way through.


I take a moment between winches to catch a rare glimpse of sky through the jungle canopy above. It's also this moment where I reflect on the threat of Fer-de-lances in the growth around me kicks me back into my deployed mindset of observing where I'm stepping ahead of me, and looking at not only the ground, but branches beside and above me.


If anybody sees a fer-de-lance behind me in the picture somewhere, please let me know. I know there must be one hidden!


Bill and Lee catch a few moments in the Remus to escape the heat. It's not even noon and we're wore out and sweating already. Refuge in the vehicles is a futile effort we soon realize. The only remedy is acclimatization and lots of water!


After two winch pulls we clear that obstacle as well and are able to pick up the pace again. 3rd gear low range is really moving on these jungle tracks!

We short hault at another clearing, and Lee points out this perfectly posed lone tree about the canopy. This is for all of you Pinz lovers out there.

 

[overlander]

We are actually able to drive a good stretch for maybe 30-45 minutes and at this point, it's nice to catch a little breeze from dash vents and open window. As we progress, the jungle continues to slowly thicken in density.


Eventually however, the progress ends at a new line of ruts, and our convoy comes to another short hault for a recce.


On return, we realize there's little chance the Defenders are getting through this stretch without winching. It starts with a deep water filled rut about 50 meters long, with the left rut 12 inches below water line, and the right rut about 10 inches above the left rut. To top it off, it ends with a ramp up out of the trench. Open diffs, eat your heart out. Once we come out of that, you have maybe 15 meters before a second set of ruts that span about 150 meters with a bend.

This is the point where James takes a knee to assess and come up with his plan of attack. You can see in his face that this is going to be a long day. Bill, Lee and I really don't have the situational awareness to know how far it is to the Dos Lagunas campsite, or how much progres we've made on that track, but we get a sense that we won't be there by lunch! Chopper says "Harden up boys!" (Youtube search for "chopper harden").


Time to take a momentary break from water and share a beer (Reminder-that's 3 gringos and one beer. We're on rations). There's man's work to be done now...it's Moza time.


I'm afraid we didn't get any still pictures of this crossing, as everyone had to roll up their sleeves. Further investigation by the team revealed more prep work required. The ruts had hidden logs buried in the water, there was deadfall that had to be moved for the bypass attempt on high ground, Maxtracks to be emplaced, recovery gear to be setup, etc.

GEAR CHECK 02!: At this point, Bill, Lee and I had our epiphany that we had brought our REI gators with us. This ended up being my favorite piece of gear. Combined with my Asolo waterproof boots, it was like having packable wellingtons, With those on, I was able to stand in mud up to my calves and my socks stayed dry.

As we're setting up for our run, another local convoy of Hiluxes arrives behind us. It turns out it's a news crew with female journalists, and a representative from the Department of interior with his hired locals. They are stuck behind our halted convoy waiting to pass. Byron, who ends up being our translator/local embassador/liason engages them while we are attempting our obstacle negotiation. We learn that they are also attempting the push to the Nacctun site in support of a Guatemalan government tourism marketing campaign to promote the region. They are well aware that the eyes of the world will be on Guatemala as the end of the Mayan calendar approaches. We'll see more journalists at most of the other sites we visit during the course of this trip.

The Department of Interior guy is growing impatient and wanting to pass us, and this kicks off the beginning of tension with this official that manifests over the next 48 hours. Naactun is one of the more remote and most recently discovered sites in the Peten, and very few have visited this site, so they are equally surprised to find that we are making the attempt as well. This reminds me of the book "Congo" where the two corporations are in a race to get to the ruin site for the diamond claims.

So Graham and James make their attempts to get through the first part of the obstacle, attempting a high side bypass on the rutted path. James gets about half way through and had to winch. Graham follows and makes it all the way! There's 10 minutes back. We pull off the far side to clear the way for the impatient government convoy. Now I'll ask you to remember those Hiluxes under the tree back in Uaxxactun. What I learn at this point is that the average local's technique for negotiating ruts, particularly in the wet season, is 37" rubber and lots of gas. I see it first hand as the first Hilux hits the obstacle, bouncing over ruts and logs with mud flying and wheels spinning everywhere. The 37" tires probably dug another inch or two out of that rut. There is no attempt to straddle the ruts; no professional trained technique; no Tread Lightly. What happens as well throughout these tracks is that once a rut is dug to where the Hiluxes can no longer negotiate them, they just cut a bypass through the jungle around it. Once that bypass is reduced to impassible, then they dig a third. It's not a very environmentally friendly way to negotiate this national park, nor is it a very good technique for an overlander that wants to preserve the reliablity of their vehicle over the long run. This is where I also realize that NLX chooses a much softer approach, choosing to winch whenever possible rather to minimize damage to the ecosystem and the vehicles. As I stood between the two obstacles watching the local pass and then James and Graham pass, it is like watching a controlled experiment on technique and equipment, and the results would prove later to become very clear. What I will say now is that as we all know, the Hilux is globally recognized as a capable and reliable vehicle, but even it has it's limits, and the local would also discover those limits in the not too distant future.

Also, as a segue, let me mention that these trails, as poorly maintained (ok, not maintained is more accurate) as they are, are part of the Peten National Park infrastructure, and they are the same roads that are needed by the government and archeologists to access the sites as part of their excavation and preservation. This is where it becomes clear to me that the government directly benefits from NLX accessing these sites, as James and Graham provided needed maintenance, clearing naturally occuring deadfall in a responsible way to open the site for following scientific efforts. It's truly a win-win relationship. More on this later.

One of the local Hiluxes. The driver in the pink shirt is the Department of Interior overlord (or so he thinks) that becomes our antagonist over the next 48 hours.

 

[overlander]

So after our vehicles pass the first obstacle, we pull off the trail before the 2nd obstacle to let the impatient government convoy pass. One by one, each Hilux is positioned on the launch pad and blasted off through both obstacles on their 37" tires. Mud is being slung everywhere and the sound of their turbodiesel whining is deafening. After a few bone jarring crashes on unseen obstuction in the buried ruts, they all make it through. At this point, impressive. Like conquistadors arriving in the new world, they carry themselves now with an air of superiority. The dismounted female journalists and remaining crew walk by us with a smurk and we can tell they are thinking "that's how it's done down here gringo!". 1 for Hilux 0 for Land Rover. It's a long road ahead though my friend.

With them gone, we resume the business of progress. 2nd obstacle requires winching both vehicles. It is just knee deep muck.


The remainder of the day is a repeating sequence of driving, machete work, driving, foot recce, rut negotiation, winching. At this point, we are deep in the jungle. It's been hours since I've seen the sky and the broken beams of sunlight, now fewer and far between are beginning to fade as dusk approaches. The density and size of the jungle flora is just amazing. Again, right out of Jurassic Park. I've seen palm leaves that are 30-40 feet long!
While worn out at this point, spirits among the group are high. Bill, Lee and I know we are undertaking an epic journey that few will be able to experience.





We push on trying to make Dos Lagunas for dinner, Moza and rest growing ever present on our minds. As dinner time comes and passes, we drone on with barn-door syndrom like zombies wandering the night in search of the living. Mechanically chopping vines and moving fallen logs, there is little conversation in the impending darkness. Around 7:30pm if I recall, we come to what appears to be a never ending stretch of ruts that far outruns our Hellas. We are faced with a fork in the road, which as always is what we suspect a main trail and a well worn bypass, but which is worse? With only moments of ambient light left, James leads the area recce of potential bypasses, while Graham and I head out on the main path to see how far the ruts go. I grab my headlamp just in case. Graham and walk on for at least 500 meter expecting every next turn the to see the two paths emerge as they always have. As the night takes jungle, there is only complete and utter darkness. Having traveled much farther than we planned, I am thankful for having grabbed my headlamp, as movement would be impossible without a light. Eventually, around 700-800 meter, we come to the conversion of the trails, but now everthing looks so different. We decide to take the alternate trial back to recce that section. It is at this point that Graham and I realize almost simultaneosly that it was bad judgement to venture this far ill equipped. Isolated by near 1km and with no communications or safety of the vehicles by proximity, we feel like we have just dropped in the food chain. Pumas and jaguars are a reality out here, and snakes and spiders are nocturnal. My headlamp picks up large spider eyes like rain drops everywhere as we walk. I grab the biggest branch I can find to use as a club in case we are attacked. About 2/3'rds of the way back we can hear the others calling from the parallel track we came down, but they are too muffled. We call back hoping they hear us, as we now start to fear that they might push on down the track and leave us, unaware of our location. We know it's only 100-200 meters between the two tracks and for a moment we toy with the idea of cutting across the jungle to the other track as a short cut, but only for a moment. We collectively realize the insanity of a decision like that and the potential consequencies of it. Once again we turn around and head back to the junction that we already traveled across to wait for the others. There's a quickness to our pace now like business travelers trying to catch a train to an important meeting after all aboard is announced. About 10 minutes later we get there and just in time. James and the crew had already found a third recently made bypass and had negotiated the whole obstacle on the main track we had started our recce down, and they were in a bit of a panic as to what had happened to us. This whole excursion had taken 30 precious minutes from our ETA.

We remount the 110's with all due speed and head out, determined to make up time and get to Dos Lagunas. With Hellas lighting the way, we are now crashing through the jungle trail deadset on making up time. We are making great progress it seems until somewhere around 10pm when we come upon another double bypass mud rut section. Worn out, tired and starving, we impervious to things that would normally cause one to pause like bugs, mud, water, thorns, etc. We begin to joke about the Camel Trophy and how easy we have it in comparison. The Camel Trophy was no more challenging for certain, but it was the duration that gave us a second wind as this was only day one on the trail!

It took about an hour to get through that series of ruts and coming out of it we are enthusiastic that camp is only 5km away! We all load the recovery gear back up, and almost giggling, we remount and speed off determined that sleep is becoming a reality. Then we come across this:


Will this night ever end?

 

[Tucan viajero]

Great!

Isn't it funny how pictures never show how hard the trail really was? Maybe someday, with 3D or some sort of future holographic cameras...

 

[forsakenfuture]

Looking forward to updates.

 

[overlander]

Within seconds after seeing this deadfall obstructing our progress, we all collectively a bit deflated. This was articulated by James from behind the steering wheel with the words "You've got to be kidding me." Only seconds after our short halt, the flow of team members came pouring into our flood lights from either side to examine what the hold up was. Then there was a collective pause as we unknowingly began to transition throught the 5 stages of loss: denial, anger, negotiation, depression and acceptance. Denial didn't last long, with that huge forked tree highlighted by the flood lights sitting there in plain view. Can't deny that. Anger last only a few minutes, and was experienced as a group in silence, as if that fallen tree had committed an unforgiveable crime. Those few minutes though seemed to last for hours, as nobody had eaten dinner at this point, as the thoughts of James' well known cullinary creations that we had heard of now became unfeasable for this evening, and the emotional warmth and comfort of my sleeping bag began to drift away like a beach ball accidentally dropped into a fast flowing river. I can't recall exactly how we snapped into the next phase, but I suspect it must have been Byron, who was like an army ant throughout the trip. With his inseparable machete in hand, he began crawling through the tree and it's web of vines, hacking away to get a better look at what we were facing. This kicked everyone else back in to gear, and we all quickly mustered up an emergency dose of adrenalin that at least I didn't know I had left. Now we did look like a line of army ants that had found a dead grasshoper on the forest floor as we began the excavation of this tree.

Once we could see the tree in it's entirety, we began the negotiation phase. We tried to see if we could drive under it. Nope. We tried to see if we could move it. Too heavy, wouldn't budge. We looked around for any bypasses that the local had made. Forest couldn't be thicker at this point on either side. At this point, 20 minutes in to this obstacle event, work again stopped and there was silence. No more ideas; there was no way around it. It was zen like, as everyone lamented the amount of work that they were about to face just to get moving again. Hello depression..you suck. This is the point where I'm sure everyone has been at one point in their life, where you are completely exhausted, running on empty, and you negotiate hypothetically in your mind saying to yourself "I could go without food; I just want to go to sleep". We were snapped into acceptance by James breaking ranks and heading back to the tailgate of Romulus. This meant only one thing; Chainsaw time. Uggghhhh. I ask myself, "how does a tree like this just fall?" It's like one of those athletes that appear in good health that end up having a stroke unexpectedely.

This picture of Bill in front of the tree captures our emotional state.


After a quick discussion between James and Graham on plan of attack, James starts cutting into the deadfall. Clearing this is important not only for our progress, but for site access by the government archeologists. It must be done. As the first cut begins, James announces "it's a gum tree" and further explains that the sap will gum up the chainsaw, and it could take even longer then expected. Hey, we hit acceptance already, if the chainsaw chain broke, it wouldn't phase us at this point. That's the upside to reaching acceptance. It also protected me from the worry of hidden Fer-de-lances hanging all over the vines and branches of this deadfall, which was a real possibility.


At some point after midnight, we finally cleared enough of the tree to physically hoist up the ends of the remaining tree and push past. After another huddle, James and Graham call another huddle, and declair that while we are only a few km away from Dos Lagunas, it would be potentially several more hours and risk of more obstacles if we push forward, so we will make for a closer encampment called El Pulgero. He further explains that this is a more spartan campsite, but we could bed down and then make Dos Lagunas tomorrow morning. Sounds like a plan to me! And off we go.

We pull into El Pulgero within the hour. I can see hand made lean-to's through the camp ground. James explains that this is a chicalero camp. Chicalero's are native laborers that move through the forest harvesting the sap (the chickle) of the rubber tree to make things like Chicklets as well as other things. Anybody who has been to any tourist location in Mexico will know what these are.

We all dismount and quickly beging the process of establishing a bare bones no frills camp. Tables are setup, and Graham drops the down the S. African tents from the roof rack for Bill, Lee and I. I ask what he and James are sleeping in, and he explains that they don't use tents every anymore, only hammocks. While too tired to ask him to elaborate, this was somewhat of an epiphany for me. They do this every day and prefer hammocks. And they have a ton of experience with roof top tents and ground tents. I am going to follow up on this later for sure.

So Bill, Lee and I begin to setup our two tents. As we are clearing the forest floor of fallen palms for the tent, a large black scorpion is stirred and begins to move around. 10 hours ago, the unexpected appearance of that scorpion would have had dramatically more effect on this crowd, but at this point, it is shooed away to get on with the business of getting to bed.

After tents and sleeping bags are set, we all gather at the table. James has put out packaged sandwhich meats, slice cheeses and crackers. It was quick and delicious. That and a cold Sol cerveza was all I wanted and needed. My lesson on easy overlanding dining has begun. 30 minutes later, we have all retreated to our bed downs. The day has finally ended.

GEAR CHECK #03!: We dined with two Lifetime tables with tableclothes and several Snow Peak Hozuki LED lanterns. This combination proved over the course of the trip to be the PERFECT overlanding dining combination in my opion. As we ate, I asked Graham about the lanterns. They put out the perfect amount of light to see what you are eating, and created an awesome soft light for ambience. From my seated perspective at the table, I could also see how James sets up his kitchen area in the back of the 110. He has a hanging LED light that he explains is the Goal Zero Light-a-life and it put out an amazing amount of light. You could easily see what you are cooking and tell how well something is done with that over the stove top. I have since purchased some lifetime tables, and fully intend to acquire the Snow Peak and Goal-Zero lanterns for my own kit.

 

[hoffwil]

Keep it coming brother...it's been a few weeks now so I am losing the details in my memory and this story, documented so well by you, reminds me of the awesomeness...

 

[overlander]

25 Feb 2012- Day 4
Woke up to my first morning in the Peten jungle after a great, although short night of sleep in their African tent. NLX had provided cots as well (S. African made but can’t remember the brand) which in combination with my military sleep system bag proved a comfortable combination all around. Not as comfortable as my RTT back home, but good enough to be well rested. Outside, the morning chorus of jungle fauna transcended through the tent canvas, with the addition of a percussion section that included unknown items from one of the Land Rovers that no doubt involved kitchen gear. I felt a wave of excitement come over me on what it looked like outside the tent. At this point, all I’ve seen of this encampment is from the light of HID lights and heavily fatigued eyes.

Motivated by not only the jungle call, but also nature’s call, I threw my boots on and zipped the door open to be greated by a visual assault of green, brown and sunlight. The encampment clearly had a "hasty establishment" look to it with all gear and vehicles covered in mud and setup in whatever was the first available space. Throughout the site was the native lean to's made of collected wood and palm fronds.


James was already whipping up some scrambled eggs on the back of the Remus. Let there be no doubt, James and Graham take their business seriously and bring a work ethic with them!


So off I go into the perimeter of the encampment for a quick download with the memory recall of that black scorpion crashing into my mind. I wander over to the breakfast table where I find Byron and Karl sitting and taking it all in. The table is setup right on the trail which provides a vertical clearing allowing the sunlight to come through. As I sit, James brings over a coffee press fully loaded, and I can’t wait for that first sip of real C. American coffee. Last one I had was in Costa Rica and it was the best cup of my life. We all pass the carafe around and fill our melamine cups. My first sip was just awesome, but I am horrified to watch Byron, a Guatemala native, begin to add cream and sugar to his cup. “How can you do that to this coffee?”. I can’t remember if I screamed that in my head or out loud… no matter. This was a classic case of taking things you have for granted, like people living in Arizona that have never been to the Grand Canyon.



As we sat there drinking our coffee, a Toucan flew into the trees nearby. “Now there’s something different” I thought to myself. Unfortunately, the complete lack of optical zoom prevented any good shot from my Iphone, but Lee got a few shots with his DSLR.



About 45 minutes later after taking in the morning in 1st gear, we collectively decided to break camp and move on. Today’s objective was to reach the Dos Lagunas camp site, and I just remembered that today was also my birthday. What a great day already.

 

[baja scott]

To El Mirador Guatemala In Land Rovers

Is this all to the report? I have searched this site, but cant seem to find anymore beyond the first pages of the trip.

 

[overlander]

No, the report is not finished. I'm on a 30 day military exercise in Africa, and intend to finish the report when I return to CONUS at the end of August. Sorry for confusion!