The water slide

I only bring this up because I got shit for not remembering it in my post about Tikal....friends here would consider this to be one of the best memories we had on our weekend excursion...so here goes:

At the zoo, off the island of Las Flores, there were actually 2 very large water slides available to zoo-goers who were interested in twisting and turning and dumping into the lake. Fun right?? Hmmm...

First things´s first, the slide must have water. So we turn on the water and oh! we find none other than a giant snake on one of the slides. This prompts the zoo guide-guy to remove it of course because you can´t have 26 Americans and 1 Swede heading down a slide with a snake on it! No! The snake should be in the water where they land!

Next: switch to alternative slide where there are no snakes but it seems that we now have a water pressure problem. Imagine if you will a giant water slide that hasn´t seen water in probably some time and the water that is coming down is a slow trickle so that it dries before the first turn. I know this is tough to imagine...but bear with me...

Next: American girl (we´ll call her Rachel...the one...the only) graciously decides ¨Hey! I´ll be the first volunteer to go down!¨ I say graciously because we just witnessed the snake incident and this slide hadn´t been fully inspected for life, therefore, she would encounter it, if any, on her way down.

So: Rachel climbs aboard...bathing suit and all and launches herself. We hear the sweet sound of ass being scraped against the tube. She stands up, a little bit of the slide still attached to her ass and she walkes to the turn...we figure if she passes the turn she´ll go down the rest of the way right?? Well...not really. She ended up taking a nice, curvy walk down the slide at which point i believe she launched herself into the lake.

Ok: We give it ago again, but this time a few of our trip friends had an idea to fill up an empty trash can (oh yeah...a random trash can found in a random Guatemalan zoo) with water to assist Rachel in her 2nd attempt down the slide. So...plan: fill it with water and send it with her...you know that extra ¨push¨ idea. Actual: the trash can has holes---that´s ok we´ll chew gum and cover the holes! Good--gum works.

Rachel and trash can water make their way ¨easier¨ this time and we hear a splash! woo! At this point slide 1 is free and clear of reptile or otherwise life and we think, as a group, we should give it a try. Rachel decides to try this one out too and by no means do we argue for a) she´s been in the lake twice now and b) we just saw a snake come off of it...no one was lining up. So Rachel goes and it was successful! She even said it was fast at the end...we didn´t believe her. She goes again...only this time she´s literally flying down the thing so fast that we could hear the echo of her splash back up the slide...WHAT!?!?

Another person in the group decides to go and on his knees (we have no idea why) and we hear a huge splash...ok! this is a water slide...in a zoo! Corinne goes next...it takes her literally 2.5 seconds for her to reach the water...they all love it...but one thing is for sure people are going faster and faster down the slide.

After about 10 people went...I decided ¨sure! I can go down, no matter that some people have red welts and scratches on their faces from the slap in the water¨ So I head down and scream a little, pray somewhat that I wouldn´t die, before launching literally 15 ft. off the slide and into grassy Guatemalan MUCK. Like, thick dark, snake-ridden muck. Woo! The top of my bathing suit came completely off, the bottoms were almost rapped around my next and my boob slapped the water so hard I actually stopped breathing underwater in the Guatemalan muck. Wow.

Got up...hiked my ass out of the water and left the zoo. Forever remembering the zoo slides.