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Willow and I took a ferry across a river today. We arrived mid-afternoon in our trusty Toyota, late as usual and in a pissy mood because we wandered onto twenty klicks of the worst road in creation before finding the “highway” again. There are four cars in front of us and the ferry is in. It is just an open platform maybe 60 feet long and 20 feet wide. On each corner is a little palapa under which there is a guy sitting in a tub running an outboard motor; working in unison they will power us across the river. After about five minutes, dude in a little truck pulls up to the front of the line, jumps out, and starts talking to the ferrymen. Turns out the little truck has a welder on the back, the ferry is busted. Welding helmet on, sparks flying, time passing, cars stacking up, temperature rising, vendors charging us God knows what for cold coconuts and melon slices...Sylvester saying bad things about ferries and heat and shitty little Latin countries that can't keep their shit working, you get the idea. Anyhow after an hour or so, the ferry is fixed, but by this time traffic is stretched out behind us and some genius starts a second line inside our line. I am thinking, “Is somebody going to direct traffic or is this just gonna be a free for all?” Needless to say, a fucking shitshow ensues, our line closes ranks to fend off the interlopers, a blue minibus has the angle on us and tries to cut; Willow says, like a true Canadian, “just let him in.” I do and sure as shit the guy behind him tries to follow, well I did call him a bad word…cunt, and dove into the line until our bumpers are rubbing and my driver’s side mirror pings off his passenger mirror. He gives way, just another day of driving through Central America. In cat years, Willow and I are about 700 years old combined, which gives us a pretty good vantage point. I am considering all the other cats that we know and love, who are in more or less the same boat agewise. A boat that is slowly filling up with water while the band plays a hopeful tune. So, do you go out and play shuffleboard with the others and await your fate? This mid-life crisis shit is hard so we rowed our little boat away....all the way to Lake Atitlán Guatemala. Atitlán is supposedly one of the most beautiful lakes in the world, and I believe it... name me another lake with three volcanoes. Ya, I didn't think so. Had my first hand-made Michelada on the shore while the sun set and Willow took a few hundred pics. The beauty of being off the map in Central America is you don’t need expensive equipment and years of training to risk your life in extreme sport, just take an old American school bus, drive it to Guatemala, slap some chrome on it, color it up in reds and blues, paint María Christina, or La Esmeralda on the side and Christo Vive across the top of the windshield. Load 100 people and animals on a bus built for 60, throw your extra luggage to the guy who rides permanently on top, crank the salsa music to eleven and put the hammer down, all the way down...all the time, and you may see God. We rode that “chicken bus” to a town called San Francisco to see the largest outdoor market in Central America. Willow snagged a hand stitched Mayan top, kind of a shawl sort of thing. I almost bought a “genuine” Ralph Lauren shirt for 35 Quetzales, but even for 5 bucks, Ralph Lauren is not my thing. You can buy almost anything, from a bag of puppies (at least I’m pretty sure they were puppies) to a hand-built coffin ready for occupancy. Just remember, keep your wallet in your front pocket and your hand on your phone and never, ever, pay the first price.