On the third day, Dana and I headed into Guatemala to see Tikal. Tikal itself is one of the greatest sites for viewing excavated Mayan ruins. The core site has a myriad of massive temples, including Temple IV. At 230ft in height, it is the tallest pre-Colombian temple in the Americas (although, others are being reconstructed that could be taller, and it certainly isn't the largest, as it is somewhat narrow). Apparently, the site spreads out for miles, and contains thousands of structures. To go into detail about how incredible Tikal is would not do it justice, and is far beyond what I desire to describe here. In addition to the mayan ruins, Tikal is a protected park full of wildlife. As you stroll around, you will see some water bowls scattered about the jungle floor to attract wildlife, which is apparently effective... The cavesbranch tour itself was only okay. The tour guide was very good. We picked him up in San Ignacio near the border on the Belize side. However, it was a bit too long of a drive for the amount of time that we got to spend at the site. They roused us up at 5:30 in the morning, so we could get there reasonably early; but then they had us leave around 2:30 in the afternoon, because if they had car troubles, they wanted to be able to fix it before it got dark. Guatemala seemed a little bit more dangerous than Belize. While at Tikal, we got a tour of the core part of the site, but it would have been nice to explore more on our own (as the site is huge); and we didn't even get to go into the museum, which was very disappointing. Although Guatemala looked (and probably is) very dangerous, there were armed guards at the gate to the ruins, which was quite a ways up the road of a large park, with a campground right near the museum and right outside the core site. I would have felt safe staying in that campground for a night. But, cavesbranch would not do an overnight tour (probably because they only seem to drive to Tikal two days of the week). I won't complain too bitterly; I got back alive! Ironically, the next day I went on a trip to Xunantunich and Cahal Pech, and the guide was from Guatemala. He was telling me how dangerous Guatemala was, and how he didn't plan to go back, even though he had some family there. He also said he had been encouraging Ian to do overnight tours to Caracol. That's another site I wanted to visit, but alas, did not see how to squeeze it in. When Ian begins to offer an overnight trip to Caracol, I'll be back for my next visit. The ride back was interesting. Dana and I were crammed in the backseat, with this little kid and his mother in front of us. At one point, the kid pulled a latch, and their seat tilted down, straight onto our legs, and then he released the lever, so it was locked there. He quickly decided it was way to far, as at that point he was laying back, so he pulled the lever to raise the seat back up a little. Sensing his opportunity, Dana put his knee into the kids back through the seat, and shoved. Their seat suddenly lurched forward. I agreed with Dana, and shoved my knee out there, to brace the back of their seat, so it wouldn't appear in my lap again, and Dana and the kid struggled for a couple of minutes to find an agreeable placement for the seat. During this whole time, the mother did nothing. Then the kid wanted to open the window, but it was very dusty outside. I just put on my sunglasses, and it didn't bother me. Dana closed the window, and proceeded to get into a window war with the eight year old. I believe Dana was the winner, but it's hard to be certain. We stopped right near the border on the Guatemalan side at a gift shop. The driver and the guide then left, as they wanted to go find a car part. The prices were not that cheap. I bought a belt, and a jade frog that I gave to Jasper. Then, as we waited for the van, Dana and I each bought a 40 oz. bottle of Gallo, the local beer. It was fairly crappy (tasted like cheap American beer). Dana later regretted not getting a Gallo T-shirt, but I wouldn't want to advertise such swill. The van showed up right after we sat down with our beers, so I asked if we could drink them in the car. "Sure, but you have to finish them before we cross the border, which is just up the road." So, Dana and I sat in the backseat of the van, and chugged. I think they were surprised that we were both done in the 5 minutes it took to get to the border. The buzz started to hit me just as it was my turn to go through customs; although, they pretty much just waived me right through. (On the way in, they spoke to me in Spanish, and I couldn't understand them, so I walked away slowly, backwards, until it became clear they weren't going to stop me, and then proceeded onwards). It was dark by the time we got back, and we rounded out the day with a few more Belikins, to wash out the taste of that Gallo.