LA-Guadalajara-DF-Guatemala City-Antigua-El Salvador

6/23-6/24
Right now we are sitting in the doorway of our hotel watching the city fly by. We arrived in Antigua, Guatemala this morning after a harrowing bus ride from Guatemala City though the hills to Antigua. We walked around the beautiful old city--complete with volcanoes erupting all around, 16th century old churches, (all were destroyed in an earthquake in the mid 1700's--some restored, some not), cobblestone streets and tuk-tuks--a three wheel transport similar to some I've seen in pictures from India. Not much to do in the city but walk around and check stuff out.

Food here is incredibly cheap and we ate like kings and queens at a really good restaurant that evening for heca cheap. We had some rum drinks, including the delicious coco y limonada con rum; made with chunks of frozen coconut, fresh lemonade and a healthy Guatemalan portion of rum. With dinner was some Andean music accompanied by a strange ginga girl of 18 on a violin--it sounded really good though.

With not much else to do in Antigua but climb volcanoes, (which were kinda erupting) we decided to move on to El Salvador. We booked a private tourist bus instead of jumping on a chicken bus to make our boarder crossing easier. This however was foiled when we arrived at the border. With only about 8 people in line we figured this would not take much time at all--and with or Guatemalan driver to help us get though the line it was going to be cake. After about a half an hour in line we noticed that each of these eight people had 20 to 30 passports in their hand. Needless to say it took a while....

6/25
At this moment we are in El Sunzal, El Salvador swinging in hammocks above our semi-rundown $15 a night hotel. We are happy.

Gracias por su tiempo

Honeymoom Coming Soon...

With Africa in front--almost winning the hosting region for honeymoon we pulled out last minute and decided to make the relatively quick hop over to Guatamala to start our Centro American holiday.

Departing on the 23rd of June, returning on the 23rd of July we will have one month to make our way from Guatamala to Panama--then from Pamana back to Guatamala. We will be traveling mostly on and a little off the PanAmerican Highway through seven countries consisting of; Guatamala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, and finally Belize.

Stay tuned for wicked good updates.

Dirty 30 on Mt. Whitney

I know, I know, we lag big time on posting, it's difficult to get around to it but we'll try and be better, we promise!

So, Micah's 30th birthday was August 22nd and what did he want to do? Oh, just climb the tallest mountain in the 48 contiguous states, that's all. What happened to getting drunk and drowning your sorrows in your old age? So, we found out that so many people want to climb the mountain that you must enter a lottery in February in order to get a pass to climb it. So I think this is my out, right? Wrong. They give out certain number of passes on the day you wish to climb to people who just show up to take the place of the no shows. So . . . that's right, we lucked out and got a pass . . . yipee.

So we camp at the base of the mountain on the first night, car camping, so we were in luxury compared to what was ahead. There was a beautiful river running behind our campsite that was filled with fish, but freezing! And guess what likes to eat fish in the forest? Bears . . . can I get another yipee.

So we explored the river and Micah found a rattlesnake, we didn't see any bears thank goodness. The area is really purty, as you can see. Almost all westerns were filmed in this little desert area right out of meth city, I mean Lone Pine, where we camped.

I didn't sleep very well because I knew what was in store for us the next morning, climbing 14,500 feet with a 39 pound backpack. Again, yipee.

To be continued . . . .

Rehearsal Time

The wedding rehearsal went smooth and then it was off to Peabody's in Montecito for some dinner and drinks for the rehearsal dinner. Here are some pics of the lovely evening.

We Tied the Knot!

So we haven't blogged in forever, so we are going to move in reverse order here but I figured I would start with the most important post of them all.

Micah and I were married on July 12th, 2008 in Montecito (Santa Barbara area) on Butterfly Beach with just our parents and siblings there. Our dear friend Reverend Chris Cote married us so his beautiful prego wife Marie came along as well as my own personal make-up artist Jen. Well, she's my best friend who happens to do make-up too.

The wedding was so perfect, we wouldn't have done it any other way. Here are a few pics that our wedding photographer sent us. We should get the rest by the end of this week.

Enjoy!

xo Mrs. Brooke Mattson

Finally . . . .

Some pics from SF! We had so much fun and we by far were the best dressed 80's couple at the bar. Thanks to Carson and Ryan for showing us such a great time!

Off to SF

We are off to good ole San Francisco tomorrow morning. We are going up for our good friend Ryan Gessay's 30th b-day. Should be a blast. Planning on seeing an 80's cover band on Friday night then on Saturday riding the trolley all around the city with Bloody Marys in tow. Who knows what the rest of the weekend has in store for us.