The Adventurer's Son(37)
Off by seven the next morning, Roman left the rangers Q50 (about US $6) and two packets of cookies. Guatemalans tend to be generous and he liked to reciprocate. He had discovered that he was often in someone’s home, not just their place of business, “so I try and remember the manners Mom taught me. Mostly washing dishes voluntarily. That has worked well for me my whole life, everywhere.”
Two hours out of Dos Lagunas, the head ranger rolled up on his dirt bike to ask if Roman wanted a ride. “Older Guatemalan men I’ve met, the ones that seem like old cowboys, tend to be very warm and fatherly. The jefe and other older ranger were no exception. Concerned, understanding, helpful, interested, with a twinkle in their eye and a knowing smile about ‘aventura.’”
Roman accepted the jefe’s offer and hopped on his dirt bike. An overloaded ATV carrying two more rangers plus the Russian, and a fourth ranger on another motorcycle, followed. “It was fun,” Roman wrote, “but also probably the most dangerous thing I’ve done here. I constantly had to dodge vines, scoot back on the seat to reduce my profile so my knees wouldn’t clip trees, and brace with my arms while lifting my feet up to avoid the sides of the deep ruts we’d sometimes fall into.”
An hour and a half later, Roman had completed the first leg of the M to the central crossroads of the ancient Maya: Naactun. The site has a higher density of ancient sakbe walkways than anywhere else in Mesoamerica. While there, he met a team of archaeologists led by a Guatemalan named Carlos Morales-Aguilar, a preeminent researcher in El Petén. Morales-Aguilar enthused over the significance of Naactun, the center of civilization for ten million Maya a thousand years ago. Roman spent hours wandering around the excavations and ruins. With a new map sketched in his notebook, he headed for Nakbe, the middle vertex of the M.
This leg in the remote heart of El Petén is rarely traveled. The trail grew faint and braided. Unsure where he was, he at least knew how to get back. For days he’d been learning to differentiate machete scars from natural damage to trees, and vehicle damage to roots from horseshoe damage. He’d learned to tell if a poacher’s dirt bike had been down a dry, hard-packed trail based on the patterns of broken termite tunnels on the ground.
Sussing out the tangle of footpaths and old ATV trails with his compass and newly sketched map, Roman left trail-blazes for the Russian as he hiked. That night, his sixth since leaving Lou’s place in El Ramate, he set up camp under fragrant lemon and grapefruit trees next to a large aguada. An exquisitely excavated Mayan wall stood nearby, sculpted in angel-like wings and other human and nonhuman forms. The dry season is terrible for ticks and chiggers in Central America, and Roman spent an hour that night picking off parasites. The itchy rash on his feet, he realized, was not a rash at all, but dozens of tiny ticks, each raising an angry little welt. And they weren’t just on his feet. They were everywhere: ankles, arms, crotch, armpits, belly. “I took a small bath in DEET,” a potent insect repellent developed by the military, “which killed them. They were easy to scratch off.”
Up at six to boil water for the day, he pondered his situation. If he was camping at La Muralla, halfway from Naachtun, he would reach Nakbe by noon. But he couldn’t be sure he had been on the right trail and considered the risks that he faced. “Worst case scenario I got bit by a snake and died slowly. Not much I could do about that. Second worst was wandering too deep into the forest, got lost, and couldn’t find water.”
He noted that by staying on the “cleanest trails and leaving blazes, and never venturing more than two days from an aguada” he could avoid getting lost and not running out of water. He also recognized there were wild fruits, like the sweet chicozapote, and plenty of snakes and lizards. “I think I could have foraged a meal every day just walking, if I didn’t mind skinny grilled lizards.”
He also worried that he had misled the Russian behind him. He left two quarts of boiled water for the paunchy painter, then pushed on, arriving at Nakbe in time for lunch. He shared his fresh limes and grapefruits with the rangers. They were astonished with his trek, but wouldn’t have done what he’d done, not alone: too dangerous, they said. His story of the Russian intrigued and humored them, but worried them, too. They decided to head back to La Muralla to find him.
During his few hours at Nakbe, Roman toured the ruins. From the top of its major temple, he could see the partially cleared pyramid of El Mirador rising 250 feet above the flat expanse of jungle that reached to the horizon. It looked distant, but in little more than two hours of fast walking he’d be there.
One of the rangers, Miguel, needed to make a supply run to El Mirador and invited Roman along. The ranger, who carried only an empty pack, was pleased with their rapid time and surprised that Roman—carrying a big pack—had kept up. Miguel’s pace left Roman dehydrated and hot, with big blisters on his toes and heels. “Oh well,” he wrote in his journal. “Only one more day.”
At El Mirador, Miguel shared Roman’s story with a cook who offered him a dinner of “beans, tortillas, and some delicious scrambled egg dish. I gave her the rest of my limes. The rangers at El Mirador were also interested to hear about the Russian, and had a laugh.”
It was good to see that Roman interacted with the people at every stop along the way and even better to find that he shared what he could with them: he exercised good wilderness etiquette. I was delighted that he cared for the Russian, too, whom he didn’t know, but realized needed his help.