Day two began with everyone standing around blearily at 5.00am, drinking coffee. We had a breakfast of granola and hot milk, then watched Henry, Helario and Luis going about the business of packing sacks and loading them onto the mules. When it was almost done our party set out again for the 35km push to El Mirador, leaving the mule-train to follow. We passed through a really beautiful area of palms, which was the lushest, most exotic-looking part of the jungle we were to see. The rest was very dry, although it was dense, but probably only became really green during the wet season. We spotted the odd group of spider-monkeys in thr trees, and tarantula nests which were like thick tunnels of web with a sinister black hole in the centre. While riding the mule gave you more of an opporunity for looking around, you also had to take care to duck in time for any low-hanging branches. None of us knew that to pass underneath these you HAD to lean forwards and not back. Liza was the first to fall victim to one of these... her mule passed under a branch and she leaned back, finally rolling right off the mule and onto the ground. Everyone leapt to her aid, but she was fine. Then Stefan had the same problem except in slow motion. The mules were forever stopping to eat leaves at the sides of the path, so when his mule did this he wasn’t unduly worried. Until it started to edge underneath a low branch that he was already too close to duck under. Mules never go backwards unless you pull them very hard, and there were only a couple of us at hand who didn’t really know what to do. It continued to push itself under the branch, and Stefan was being edged towards its rear. Wondering what to do, he grabbed a higher branch in an attempt to lift himself up and drop down behind. But the branch broke, and the rest of the group rounded the corner just in time to see him sprawled at the mules feet as it casually munched on a mouthful of leaves. Liza shook his hand, delighted to not be the only one to fall off.
When we broke for lunch we encountered another group on their way back from El Mirador. They sat down opposite us and began to eat, and we all eyed each other. For a while no-one spoke, but then Maarten discovered that most of the other party were Dutch, so there was some conversation. One of their party, however, was a slightly mad American woman with a high-pitched voice, who we were extremely glad hadn’t ended up in our group. When Henry handed around chocolate-covered wafers she went to her muleteer to ask for biscuits, and then actually patted the poor guy on the head. There was almost an audible gasp as we couldn’t believe what she’d just done. “There”, she said triumphantly as she sat back down, “they can keep their chocolate!”. After lunch we continued plodding along, occassionally passing ancient Mayan tombs in the ground. Eventually after several hours more, we came upon a small ruin. It was late in the afternoon and we were quite tired, but it was exciting to see some ruins. There was a small pyramid and a building with a tunnel that was covered in wooden scaffolding. Some of the party explored the tunnel, and the rest of us watched some spider-monkeys who were swinging through the trees overhead. It was quite a big group, and one of them came over to look at us. He seemed extremely angry that we were there, and performed a little dance of rage, shaking the branches, snapping pieces off and breaking them into even smaller pieces. There was an archeologist’s camp near the ruins, with a couple of structures made of sticks. It was weird to imagine working out there in the jungle, with just the monkeys for company. We were very close to El Mirador itself, so we continued on and at length came to a large clearing with a sign saying that we’d reached the entrance of the site! El Mirador! There were some chickens wandering about, and a shack where the caretaker lived, and he came out to welcome us. Helario & Luis had already started to set up camp at a small campsite – the large one apparently being crawling with fleas. But our work wasn’t quite over... while Helario supervised the cooking of the turkey Henry took us to climb El Tigre, the tallest Mayan pyramid ever found. It’s over 60m high with a base of 18000 sq feet, and completely unrestored so you would be forgiven for assuming it to be a hill. We gasped and panted our way up its over-grown sides, where in places there were wooden steps to facilitate ascent. But the view from the top was well worth it – the land was flat and completely covered in forest canopy as far as the eye could see in every direction. We had a 360 degree view where there was not a single building or road to be seen anywhere. The only thing we could see were little lumps where other pyramids were buried in the jungle, some near and part of the El Mirador site, and some far off on the horizon, like Nak-be. We took group photos and watched the sunset. It was a nice way to celebrate our arrival, marred only by another ant-attack which was worst for me as I’d changed into a pair of Henry’s sandals due to problems with blisters.
When the sun had gone down we returned to camp by the last rays of light, and wolfed down our dinner. Then Henry revealed his special treat for us... a bottle of Johnnie Walker which he gazed at in its box with deep admiration. So we all sat around by candlelight and drank a glass of whiskey. The caretaker and a few workers came over to join us, and talked about the site and the National Park surrounding it. Apparently archeologists could at present only get permission for 6-months of work there, but there was talk of constructing a road through the area in the future. We were glad to have seen the site while it was still untouched, before it was turned into a major tourist attraction. As we talked big crickets jumped around the table, confused by the candles. One jumped into my (empty) cup, causing Henry to exclaim “Beef whiskey! Watch out for beef!” After a pleasant evening everyone retired to their hammocks to sleep, but I had an unpleasant surprise waiting for me. I turned out to be very allergic to something in the hammock – almost as soon as I got in I was wheezing, and after half an hour I had to get out again and get some air. I finally tried again in desperation, and managed to hypnotise myself to sleep, although my lungs were a mess of whirs and rattles. It would be a problem for me every night, despite Henry putting me in the tent again for the final night.