Hello everybody, We are here on our last full day in Placencia before we catch a boat to Puerto Cortez, Honduras, and on to Tela and La Cieba. I have two things to cover here, since we didn't write anything about Tikal. We're sorry about the lack of recent pictures but the computers here are either security-locked against uploading photos or slower than a peg-legged pirate in a sack race. Method Man was right: Tikal is awesome. We caught a bus out of Flores, Guatemala on the Wednesday before we left Guatemala. After about an hour trip we were inside the national park rain forest, which is somewhere in the vicinity of 500 square kilometers. It's another twenty minutes to the section of ruins you can access, but a beautiful drive. The rain forest has all the weird animals you would hope for; orange caterpillars, sky-blue butterflies, giant flying insects that can bite you through your shirt, and more. Pretty birds, giant scary spiders that seem like they might have mutant powers (other than their skill at always turning out fuzzy in a photo), and odd roars that sound like King Kong being tortured. The ruins are over 2000 years old in most cases and well preserved, considering most of them were swallowed by the forest until late nineteenth century. The highest temple, IV, is still being worked on and is not accessible, but we climbed one in the Mundo Perdido that gave an amazing view of the surrounding land. It's pretty impressive to see almost the entire parks tree tops with a half dozen giant structures poking out their heads. Its no wonder the priests of the Mayas felt the temples were sacred and closer to heaven. I think more cathedrals and churches need to be open air, if they want that nature/man combo that feels like real religion. Then again, the city view of 7-11 from the alter may not re-create what I felt here. Anyways, Tara was eaten alive by bugs and I was almost adopted by a family of Howler Monkeys (which we didn't see any of until our way out, but were well worth the wait). A tidbit for the classroom or the office, we were told that only monkeys in the Americas use their tails to climb and swing. It's pretty cool to watch. Summary:Tikal, monkeys, pyramids, good. Bugs, bad. On our second (or third?) day in Placencia, we got a boat to take us out to Laughing Bird national park, which is a small island (I mean less than a basketball court) where you can snorkel in protected waters all around the reef. The coral reef around Belize is the second largest in the world, stretching into the Caribbean north of Honduras and further. We saw tons of pretty fishes. Some had dragon scales and looked hungry for man flesh. Others were solid black with glowing blue spots, like they were dressed up for Club 54. Some were fearless and played chicken with us, others hung low on the brain coral (picture a brain, in the water, and I don't mean Russ). Tara saw a Barracuda, I sang Barracuda. Also, if salt water was cocaine, I would have a problem. I am a filthy nose breather and constantly sucked up water, which would make me toss my head, filling my air tube with not-air, known as water. I had a clean sinus after the trip. But it was beautiful and my first time snorkeling. We had a blast. If it wasn't expensive, we would go out just to sit on the island and enjoy the sights. I promise pictures sometime soon. We hope everyone is doing well and please sent us an email or a message post when you can to let us know how everything is going. Travelingmonkeys, out.