Lake Atitlan in Guatemala is firmly on the tourist trail, it’s a large lake in an old volcanic crater, a beautiful place surrounded by hills and volcanoes. It was great to go and spend a few days relaxing there after climbing Acatenango.
For most of the time we spent there it was very cloudy, so we didn’t get the amazing views and bright blue water that I’d read about. Regardless of the weather, it was still a great place to explore, relax, and recover.
Our first night was spent in the hub town of Panajachel, as we knew we would arrive too late to get further out onto the lake after dark.
Guatemala is a large country, and it seems to be easiest to travel by shared shuttle as there aren’t direct public buses to many towns on the tourist trail. The downside of this is being at the whim of the shuttle company and driver for timings. Our advertised two hour shuttle ended up being three and a half hours, arriving after dark and dropping us off quite a walk from our hostel. The driver insisted our hostel was a short walk down an alley and he couldn’t take us further. It turned out he was being honest, it’s just that he had translated the name of our hostel The Friends, into Hotel El Amigo. They both existed and were about 15 minutes walk apart, which felt a long way in the dark with our big bags and aching legs!
Our first day at the lake we were both still exhausted from climbing Acatenango the day before. Chris was feeling a bit ill, but I dragged him out for a nice breakfast and then to shop for supplies for the next few days. We packed up our bags and headed to the main ferry terminal, as we needed a boat to get to our next accommodation. The ferry terminal in reality was several jetties and lots of small lanchas. On our way through town we were approached by a guy asking if we were getting a ferry, I ignored him as I thought we might be scammed or charged a finders fee. Chris told him yes but that we knew the way. He cycled just ahead of us for a while before turning off, only to reappear on foot and ask us which town we were headed to. I gave in at this point and told him. He then led us all the way to the right boat, helped us to put out backpacks on the roof, and even strapped them on firmly so they wouldn’t be knocked off. All of this and then he just disappeared! When the captain arrived, I asked if he could drop us at the private dock for our accommodation and he agreed. We set off once the boat was full and went bouncing across the waves. When we got to our dock we were prepared to pay a bit extra, but we were just charged the usual public boat fee of £2.50. This was a real bonus as we’d been preparing to have to get a private hire boat for much more!
Our accommodation was a small studio bungalow, with a kitchen and a large patio. This was by far the most expensive place we’ve stayed in the whole trip (Guatemala was surprisingly expensive, especially around Semana Santa). We enjoyed having a kitchen and living area and ended up extending to stay four nights in total, it was great having space to relax and to cook. Chris made us a feast of nachos the first night and we had a nice relaxed evening sitting on the sofa (we hadn’t done that for ages, you don’t tend to get sofas in hostel rooms!). I was ready for a very early night and slept solidly.
Our accommodation was right by the lake, but the actual town of Santa Cruz was up a very steep hill overlooking the lake. The next day we decided we could do with stretching our legs so we set off walking up the road. We were passed by a regular stream of tuktuks, all carrying far more sensible locals who knew just how steep the climb was. It was good to walk it though, and stretch our aching legs. We’d heard Santa Cruz didn’t really have any amenities, but in reality we passed several small shops, a laundry, a couple of textile gift shops and an atm, not too bad for a small quiet town. The concrete houses clung to the hillside, with several brightly painted murals helping cheer up the grey. Once we reached the top of the town we found a small shop that seemed to have a little more variety than the others we’d passed (all of which mostly seemed to sell the same fizzy drinks and crisps). Having extended by a night, we needed to buy more food! We stepped inside and were greeted by a friendly local lady called Julie. She introduced herself and her young son Theo, who was wrapped to her side and looked at us with curiosity. We asked if we could take a look at the shelves, she agreed and then disappeared off, returning with baskets of fresh vegetables. She was so helpful and we managed to buy everything we needed.
We headed back down the hill and stopped off for a happy hour margarita at a lake front restaurant. When we ordered the lady looked at us like we were mad, but she did have large signs outside advertising happy hour and cocktails! We sat outside and enjoyed our drink whilst watching people come and go from the boat dock.
Once back at the apartment we weren’t quite ready for food so we sat reading for a while. Rain had started falling, making a comforting sound on the tin roof. The rain continued and then the power flickered a few times before going out. After a few minutes we realised it wasn’t coming back anytime soon. There were some candles in the apartment so we lit one and used our phones and headtorch for light whilst making dinner. It was very cosy.
The next morning was Easter Sunday and we were woken up around 5:30am by some loud explosive sounds. It sounded pretty terrifying! Chris checked online and it turns out they were what are known as ‘church mortars’, regularly used in Guatemala to celebrate a saints day or other religious festivals. They continued going off sporadically throughout the day.
We ventured out on the Sunday to visit San Juan, a larger town on the lake which is a bit more touristy. It was such a different place to Santa Cruz, really buzzing with people, both locals and tourists. There were street stalls everywhere and murals on the walls and the pavements. We enjoyed having a wander around. We found a really good food market with another very helpful owner who managed to find everything we needed for a spicy stir fry, something we’d been missing for a while. I even managed to find soya protein in one of the random shops in town, we’d not seen this since Costa Rica.
We headed back on a heavily laden boat full of tourists. Chris got soaked down one side when another lancha sped past and cut us off to get to a dock before us! It was good fun though (much more fun when not worrying if your bags are still safely on the roof!). Chris cooked up the stir fry, and we settled in for another evening reading and catching up on writing the blog.
On the Monday we explored a couple of different towns on the lake: San Marcos and San Pedro. San Marcos is home to a lot of hippies and new age culture. It was interesting to have a wander around the shops, seeing all the posters advertising different activities such as drum circles. We had a very tasty Pad Thai for lunch, although I’m not sure I can recommend the restaurant as we were both ill later that afternoon! We visited San Pedro, which is a backpacker hub and home to a lot of tour companies, cafes, and hostels, as well as a lot of Israeli expats and a surprising number of signs written just in Hebrew. We had another good wander around, before heading back to our apartment. There were quite a few more of the mortars going off that day, which we can only assume was related to the death of the Pope.
It was nice having some downtime to catch up on things and reflect on our travels. I was going through photos for the blog and it was great looking back at what we’d done in the previous two and a half months. Sometimes travelling can turn into a list of things to do and places to go, wanting to make sure you’ve not missed the ‘big thing’ in that place. When we look back though, it’s the people and the experiences that stand out. I’m glad we took our time to get up to Guatamala, especially as some counties (like Nicaragua) grew on us over time, and other countries (like El Salvador) we just wouldn’t have seen if we’d travelled faster by air.
