guatemala city to flores - bus or fly?

I'm on a limited itinerary touring Mexico, Guatemala and Belize.. I can
only give about 2-3 days to Guatemala on the trip (unfortunately) and
it's my first time there.

I'm arriving straight into Guatemala City from Mexico City and have two
options:

- Fly straight away from Guatemala City to Flores
OR
- Bus from Guatemala City to Flores (around 10 hours)

The bus trip will leave around 11am, so the sun will be up and I will be
able to see sights as I travel.

My main question now: Is the bus trip from Guatemala City to Flores
scenic at all?

If the answer is no, then I'll fly, otherwise it might be nice to get a
quick taste of central Guatemala as I bus it?

I'll be deciding in about 4 hours, so any advice is much appreciated!

Thanks,
Peter
--

fiddlewidawiddum

"Stimp" <ren@spumco.com> wrote in message
news:slrne0nvt9.t10.ren@carbon.redbrick.dcu.ie...
> I'm on a limited itinerary touring Mexico, Guatemala and Belize.. I can
> only give about 2-3 days to Guatemala on the trip (unfortunately) and
> it's my first time there.
>
> I'm arriving straight into Guatemala City from Mexico City and have two
> options:
>
> - Fly straight away from Guatemala City to Flores
> OR
> - Bus from Guatemala City to Flores (around 10 hours)
>
> The bus trip will leave around 11am, so the sun will be up and I will be
> able to see sights as I travel.
>
> My main question now: Is the bus trip from Guatemala City to Flores
> scenic at all?
>
> If the answer is no, then I'll fly, otherwise it might be nice to get a
> quick taste of central Guatemala as I bus it?
>
> I'll be deciding in about 4 hours, so any advice is much appreciated!

That journey is not particularly scenic by Guatemala's standards. It's
lowland geography. You are tight on overall time, so I strongly recommend
that you fly.

I did it in december..
my bus left at about 21.00 so it arrived at 05.00
( it stopped a couple of times for inspections.. )

but i saw a few flights being offered for as low as 37 dollars.. normal fare
58 dollars..

if you can get such a low fare.. i would take the plane.


Stimp wrote:
> I'm on a limited itinerary touring Mexico, Guatemala and Belize.. I
> can only give about 2-3 days to Guatemala on the trip (unfortunately)
> and it's my first time there.
>
> I'm arriving straight into Guatemala City from Mexico City and have
> two options:
>
> - Fly straight away from Guatemala City to Flores
> OR
> - Bus from Guatemala City to Flores (around 10 hours)
>
> The bus trip will leave around 11am, so the sun will be up and I will
> be able to see sights as I travel.
>
> My main question now: Is the bus trip from Guatemala City to Flores
> scenic at all?
>
> If the answer is no, then I'll fly, otherwise it might be nice to get
> a quick taste of central Guatemala as I bus it?
>
> I'll be deciding in about 4 hours, so any advice is much appreciated!
>
> Thanks,
> Peter

The bus ride from Guatemala City to Flores is not very scenic. As
mentioned above, the scenery is hilly out of Guatemala City and then
onto El Rancho, then onto Rio Dulce where the bus usually stops and you
can buy a coke. It is all lowlands to Flores, just green hills. On a
limited time schedule---fly. The bus ride through Guatemala is fine
when you have more time and can stop. The main towns along the route
don't look too exciting from the bus window. They are not considered
"tourist spots", just regular people, regular towns. Flores and onto
Tikal area is where you want to spend your limited time. You can find
very good accomodations at the Hotel and Restaurant Tikal in Santa
Elena/Flores. They are located about 2 miles from the airport, and a
quick walk to the causeway onto Flores. They have nice rooms, hot
water and swimming pool, air conditioning. They can also get you out
to Tikal Park. They are very nice people. Give them a call at
926-0174 or 926-0175. Senora Dorita Cuellar.

My, how time changes things. My wife and I flew into Flores from
Guatemala City 25 years ago and there wasn't any place to stay that
might have be concidered nice with hot water and a pool. On the bus
from there to Tikal the driver consumed at least one 6 oz bottle of
white lightning and the previous bus rolled for perhaps similar causes.
Camp Tikal was pretty limited too but hey we didn't go there for the
accomodations. Having the opportunity to fly directly out of there to
G. City we bought the ticket. The fact that the wing tip of the
Faulker that we were in sliced through the nose cone of an old DC 3
parked beside the runway on our first attempt at take off made for an
extra exciting adventure. One couple from Kentucky was flipping a coin
as to whether they would get back on the plane or take the bus. 50/50 I
figured, we took the plane. There were about 25 travel reporters from
all over the world on that plane and the next day the picture and story
appeared in newspapers everywhere.

Isn't travel fun. I'll be driving in Mexico for three weeks at the end
of the month and I'm sure that it won't be dull.

Paul