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I was in Guatemala and Honduras for three months if you’re wondering why this blog is suddenly back from the dead. I was mostly attending language school trying to improve my Spanish but I also hiked volcanoes, explored ancient Mayan Ruins (Tikal, Copan), jumped off cliffs, did drugs with hippys, and a buch of other crap. If your looking to do any travelling I highly reccomend Guatemala as a very a cheap and very fun place to go.

Guatemala is only 5 hours from Los Angeles. If you book in advance and on slow travel days tickets are very cheap. Mine was $320 roundtrip. The best time to go is in the off season, January thru April, because it starts raining in late April and continues thru August. However, don’t let the rain stop you if a summer trip is your only oppurtunity.

BY THE NUMBERS

84: Days spent out of the country
3: Volcanoes hiked (one of them was active! I kid you not I poked a stick into a lava flow and the guide roasted marshmellows)
3: Rivers swam in
2: Countires visited
1. Languages learned (mas o menos)
1: Sea swam in (could have been 2 but Jen got sick on the way to the Pacific coast)
2: Lakes kayaked
12: Cities stayed in (explored but didn’t spend the night in 3 more)
1: Cave spelunked
2: Ancient Mayan ruin sites explored (Tikal and Copan, the “New York” and “Paris” of ancient Mayan civilization respectivily)
1: Limestone bridge swan in
3: Saunes sweated at (1 was natural volcanic vapor)
7: Facebook friends added (met many other people from all over the world)
12: Number of dogs and cats that I am now on a first name basis with (Jen loves animals, this is mostly her doing - Alfombra, Pulke, Anoche, Chipotle, Feo, Goosey, Bootsie, Suki, Susana, Grimly, Lucy, and Ella)

…$3400: Aproximate number of US dollars that I spent including airfare

I hit up all the highlights but there was still a ton of stuff I wanted to do but didn’t have the time or money. Screw Europe! Don’t bother bother with the Paris’ and Amersterdams of the world unless you’re old and rich. It’s way more worth your while to go have an adventure.

Right before I left for Guatemala the hard drive of my Macbook Pro ate it. I stupidly didn’t buy AppleCare when I bought the thing and it is now way out of warrenty. The HD failed only two days before I left for Guatemala so I was forced to just throw the thing in storage and deal with it upon my return.

I returned. After evaluating all my options-Applestore, private Mac repair shop, or DIY-I decided to just buy a new hard drive from iFixit.com and attempt to do it myself. I had never attempted a hardware repair on a laptop before but they have these detailed illustrated guides on iFixit that made it look pretty easy. I got the drive in the mail today and it only took me about a half hour to unscrew everything and swap the drives. Installing Mac OS adds another hour and I’ll of course probably never recover all the programs and stuff I lost.

Total cost was $174.92 for a 300GB drive (triple the space of my old one!) including shipping and a couple of specialty screwdrivers I needed to order (also available on iFixit).

So far I’ve sunk $274.92 into repairing my Macbook Pro. One more injury and I’ll be over the cost of AppleCare. If I count my wonky mouse button, something I would repair if it was still covered under AppleCare, it would have already paid for itself.