WE WERE ON GUATEMALAN NEWS!!
Hello everyone, and welcome back to my blog! I just got back from my trip to Guatemala not too long ago, and I wanted to share with you all what I did and saw in that country. It was my first time ever in Central America, and I was very pleasantly surprised. I honestly didn't think I would end up liking the trip as much as I did.
Day 1: Travel to Guatemala City
My friends and I went for a total of about nine days, but the first day I was basically just traveling. I was coming from Toronto, while my friends were coming from North Carolina.
Since there is nothing much to report on Day 1, I'm going to fast forward to day two.
Day 2: Guatemala City + Antigua
This morning, we woke up in Guatemala City, the capital, and we decided to go and look for a place to have some breakfast. We went to a restaurant called El Adobe. And honestly, the restaurant was so cute. We were also really lucky, because we actually got the last table that was available at the restaurant at the time. The food was surprisingly great! I don't know why, and I hate to say it, but before coming to Guatemala, I just had the impression that the food wasn't going to be anything super special, or anything that I would love, but this first meal already proved me wrong.
After breakfast, we wanted to visit the Popul Vuh Museum, but it was unfortunately closed that day. However, if you travel to Guatemala City, I would recommend that you try and check the museum out, because it is like pretty well-known in the capital. Walking around the area of the museum, we noticed that there was a lot of bamboo everywhere, which I personally loved, because I know that back home in Hong Kong, we use bamboo for a lot of construction. Also, I remember as a kid, I used to eat bamboo with Japanese mayonnaise as a snack.
Since the museum was closed, we made our way back to the hotel, because we planned on going to Antigua later that day, and all our luggage was still stored at the hotel. From the hotel, we ordered an Uber to take us to Antigua. There was so much traffic that day. I also learned that many drivers in Guatemala will prefer to just have their windows down as they drive, instead of using the air conditioner. So, not only was it really hot, but the air was also quite polluted from the excess of exhaust fumes. This was something I didn't like too much.
Once we got to Antigua, we immediately checked into our Airbnb, which was in a great location. We dropped our bags off, and went out to just start walking around. At this point, we were dying for some coffee. We ended up finding a café called Caffea Café Especiales. Apparently, at one point, it was voted as one of the top 100 best cafés in the world. The coffee really was was amazing. I know Guatemala is known for having basically the best coffee in the world, but you really need to try it yourself to able to appreciate that.
After meandering around a little while longer, we decided to visit one of the most iconic landmarks of Antigua, which is the Arch of Santa Catalina. Close to the Arch, there is also a beautiful church you can visit, called Iglesia de la Merced. In this area, there are also a lot of shops you can visit. Check out my YouTube video for more footage of the coffee shop and the church.
For dinner, we went to a restaurant called El Criollo. There, we got authentic, Guatemalan cuisine. I personally ordered the Jocón, which I very much enjoyed. It was a very solid 8/10. It was rice with chicken and carrots in a green sauce. I don't even remember what was in the green sauce, but this entire dish as a whole was very, very savory. Again, I was pleasantly surprised with the quality and taste of the food.
After dinner, we went to a "speakeasy" bar called El Chico Negro. Honestly, I would not have called this a speakeasy bar, but it was still a nice spot to finish our night. We had a few tequila shots there, before heading back to our AirBnB. If you want to see what this bar looked like, there's a shot of it in my YouTube video.
Day 3: Pacaya Volcano
This day was actually my birthday! What did I do for my birthday in Guatemala? Hike a volcano, of course. We did the Pacaya volcano, which was a pretty easy hike. It only took about an hour and a half to get to the top of the volcano. There, you have both a shop and a restaurant. The shop, The Lava Shop, was really cool, because a lot of the souvenirs there were made of the cooled lava from the volcano itself. I got both a fridge magnet and a necklace.
After buying our souvenirs, we went to the little restaurant set up near the shop, called Pizza Pacaya. As the name of the restaurant suggests, pizza is served there. The unique thing about it though, is that their pizza is cooked using the lava from the volcano. I did not expect the pizza to actually taste that good. I loved that the crust was so crunchy!
After hiking this volcano, we went back to our Airbnb to shower and to rest. When we headed out again, it was dinner time. This time, we actually found a Taiwanese restaurant in Antigua. We walked in, and I didn't expect anything much, because obviously, Chinese food is not necessarily Guatemala's specialty. Again though, I was proven wrong. Everything they served us was delicious. I also have to really appreciate the fact that this restaurant had their signs and menu items listed in traditional Chinese characters. I find that a lot of Chinese restaurants overseas default to using simplified Chinese characters, but in Taiwan, just like in Hong Kong, traditional Chinese characters are used. So, I like that they actually observed this in their Taiwanese restaurant.
After dinner, we went to another speakeasy bar, and this one actually had a speakeasyy feel. It was so cool, because the bartender clearly cared a lot about the presentation of each of the drinks he made. You can see videos of the bartender preparing our drinks in my YouTube video.
We left the bar relatively early, because we had to prepare for our BIG volcano hike the next day: Acatenango.
Day 4: Acatenango
Our pickup this morning was at 7 AM, outside Wendy's in Antigua. We boarded a bus, and rode for an hour and a half, before stopping for both breakfast and gear rental. I definitely recommend renting hiking poles, if you don't already have your own. Then, we got back on the bus, which dropped us off about ten to twenty minutes later at Acatenango.
This hike is no joke. It usually takes people about six to eight hours to get to base camp. Now, I am someone who exercises very regularly, almost every day. Thirty minutes in, I was already exhausted. I really wasn't sure if I would be able to complete the hike. You have to be mentally very strong to talk yourself into continuing. I think what really made it difficult for me, was the fact that I had to carry my own backpack. The backpack that I used has a 45L capacity, and it was filled to the brim. The seams were literally almost ripping apart. That's how full my backpack was, and it included 3L of water. I'm carrying all of this extra weight on my back, and the straps are literally digging into my shoulders, not because the backpack is badly adjusted, but because it was so heavy. If I didn't have that extra weight, I would have been able to complete the hike much more easily.
Hiking this volcano does carry some real risks. The terrain is very slippery due to the volcanic ash. I already had good hiking shoes from Salomon, which is a very reputable brand. However, I was still not getting a lot of traction on the volcanic ash itself. My feet would keep slipping, especially during parts of the trail that were steeper. There were also many
parts in the path that were both narrow and slippery, so falling off the volcano was definitely a concern.
Another thing that was very difficult for me during this hike was the altitude. I did take altitude sickness medication before and during the hike. My friends and I were instructed to take one every six hours, which is what we did. However, I could still feel the effects of the altitude: tight chest throughout the entire process, trouble breathing, and also numbing in my extremities and face. All of that was extremely unpleasant to have to deal with, when you're trying to complete a hike that's already so long and strenuous.
The WORST part of it all is that we did this hike so that we could see the eruptions of Fuego Volcano, which is an active volcano close to Acatenango. It is said that Fuego erupts every 15 to 20 minutes, and when you see videos of its eruptions online, they all look amazing. Unfortunately, when we got to base camp, we had zero visibility. It was so foggy! We could hear Fuego erupting frequently, but we couldn't see it. This means that we didn't even get to enjoy the view that we worked so hard to try and see. That was really the most disappointing part: having no visibility. On the instances we did have visibility, Fuego wasn't erupting.
To top it all off, our cabin at the base camp was pretty awful to be honest. Not only was there no light, but there was also no window. So, as soon as you closed the door, everything was pitch black, even if it was still light outside. I saw some of the other cabins at base camp, and some of them did have a window. However, these cabins had no bed. Although we had no light and no window, we had a bed. I didn't understand why the cabins couldn't all just have at least a window and a bed.
Nothing will prepare you for the temperatures up there, and I'm saying that as someone who has lived in Canada for more than ten years, and has to go through Canadian winter every year. It got cold up at the volcano SO fast. I ended up putting on three thermal layers, a sweater, a light down jacket, and my rain jacket over all of that. I was wearing a tuque, as well as woolly gloves. For my bottoms, I had two thermal leggings, a pair of wool leggings, two pairs of long, wool socks, and a pair of long pants over all of that.... AND IT WAS STILL COLD. By the time it was night, there was actually frost outside.
The bathroom situation was also horrendous. It was not next to the cabin, which normally would be fine. The problem was, the path you had to walk to get to the bathroom was narrow, downhill, and slippery from the volcanic ash. Next to this path was a drop off. You really didn't want to make a wrong move here. To be honest, it was quite treacherous. Even just going to the bathroom while we still had daylight was already not fun; Imagine having to go in the middle of the night. I had rented a headlamp, but because there was so much frost and fog blowing around, even with the headlamp, visibility was pretty low.
Day 5: Acatenango + Lake Atitlán
After spending a night at base camp, we were ready to descend the volcano. Breakfast was at 7 AM, and at 8 AM, we began our descent. I was really scared to descend the volcano, given how slippery it already was on the way up. Thankfully, going down didn't seem as slippery as going up, even though it started to rain in the middle. After hiking down the volcano, the bus took us back to the place where we rented our gear, so that we could return everything, clean up a bit, and rest for a while, before hopping back on the bus to take us back to Antigua. I was SO relieved to be done with the hike. Honestly, it was not an enjoyable experience, especially since we didn't actually get to see the Fuego eruptions like we had hoped.
I will say though, since coming back, every single workout I've done has felt extremely trivial
compared to the Acatenango hike. Now that I know I can do something like that, I've been increasing the intensity of my workouts, and my mental talk during my workouts sound like, "you can do this, because that hike was so much worse, and you survived that." So, that's one good thing that I took out of that experience.
After we got back to Antigua, obviously, we went straight to our Airbnb to shower and rest, before calling an Uber to take us to Lake Atitlán. It was a three hour ride, and I was surprised at how quickly it got dark. We arrived at Lake Atitán at 7 PM, and it was already like completely dark. It felt more like 10 PM. We stayed at a village called San Catarina Palopó, which is a little bit remote, but our Airbnb was super nice and had a hot tub.
It was a great stay, but because it was so remote, it was difficult to get food. We didn't want to go out at all after Acatenango, and it was hard to find anyone who would deliver food to us. We spent the majority of the night just trying to get food delivered. In the end, we found someone willing to deliver pizza and drinks to us. We hopped into the hot tub while waiting for our food. The four-cheese pizza was delicious. It sounds so basic, and you can literally get this pizza order anywhere, but it was still way better than a lot of the pizza I've had in Toronto. Again, food in Guatemala was surprisingly great!
Day 6: Lake Atitlán
On this day, we explored Lake Atitán a little bit more. We took the lanchas to different villages of Lake Atitlán. I'm someone who was prone to motion sickness, especially on boats, and these lanchas were no joke. They were so bumpy on such choppy waters. Your butt is just getting all that impact. Acatenango: legs destroyed. Lanchas: butt destroyed. I put on motion sickness patches, but I still felt a little bit queasy, especially when the boat would stop and just rock on the water. That was the part I hated the most.
We decided to visit two other villages in Lake Atitlán: San Juan and San Pedro. San Juan was really cute and colorful! There were also a lot of interesting shops, and I ended up buying art there. Specifically, I bought a painting of Fuego Volcano. For lunch, we found a rooftop restaurant called El Patrón. The views of the lake there were very nice. I ordered the grilled fish, and was low-key a bit upset over how delicious it was. Before this trip to Guatemala, I did a short trip to Halifax, which is in the east coast of Canada. Halifax is supposed to be known for having good seafood, especially when it comes to lobster. However, I actually did not think the seafood in Halifax was all that great, and somehow, this grilled fish in Guatemala turned out to be way better than the seafood in Halifax!
After we finished exploring and walking around San Juan, we took a tuk tuk to San Pedro. You really need to hold on when you're taking the tuk tuk, as not all of them have doors on the sides. You don't want to fall out!
San Pedro was, in my opinion, a little bit less cute than San Juan, as it seemed more run-down. However, there were still some colourful buildings here and there. We basically just went there to buy a few things to take back to our Airbnb afterwards, since it was so remote. When we were done exploring San Pedro, we took a lancha back to the nearest village near where we were staying, and then took a tuk tuk back to our Airbnb.
For dinner, we had leftover pizza and drinks we got from San Pedro. We had so much leftover pizza from the night before. Then, we went in the hot tub again, and just chilled for the rest of the night.
Day 7: Travelling Day
This was a bit more of a boring day, because it was another traveling day. First, we took an Uber to Panajachel, which is the village closest to Santa Catarina Palopó, where our AirBnB was. This particular Uber ride was very interesting, because the driver recognized us! Apparently, we were on Guatemalan news/TV the day before. At first I didn't believe him, but then he asked, "Weren't you guys on the boats yesterday?" Unfortunately, no matter what I searched into Google, I could not find this news clip of us. I ended up believing him, because it was so specific ,and also, the three of us look very distinct from the other people in Guatemala. So, it's hard to mistake us for somebody else. In addition, the day before when we were on the lanchas, there was a family that started talking to me. By the end of that lancha ride, a lot of people were waiting in line to take selfies with me, because they'd never met someone from Hong Kong before who could speak Spanish well. I don't know if that has any relation to why or how we ended up on Guatemala news/TV, but it was such a funny coincidence.
After the Uber dropped us off at Panajachel, we took a three-hour shuttle back to Antigua. Once we got to there, we had a little bit of time to kill. So, we went to McDonald's because apparently, Antigua has a very, very beautiful McDonald's. It was pretty nice overall and very big actually for a McDonald's. There, I ended up getting this special item: tostada con loroco. I didn't know what locoro was at all. Turns out, it's a climbing vine with edible flowers that's native to Guatemala, San Salvador, and other Central American countries. The most similar comparison I can make to loroco is okra.
After McDonald's, we hopped into yet another Uber to take us back to Guatemala City, where the airport was, since we were going to be flying to Flores that night. The flight from Guatemala City to Flores was very short - about 50 minutes. When we got out of the airport in Flores, we realized that there were actually no Ubers around. Thankfully, our Airbnb hosts arranged a ride for us to take us directly from the airport to the Airbnb. This is important to note though, if you plan on visiting Flores. There are no Ubers, so you will have to arrange taxi service.
Day 8: Tikal & Flores
I woke up at 1:50 AM. Why? Because we were going to get picked up by a taxi at 2:30 AM to bring us to the meeting point for our Tikal tour, where you can see Mayan ruins. It was so early, because we wanted to see the sunrise from one of the temples in Tikal. Once we got to the area, we had to hike in the dark for about 30 minutes. During this part of the tour, I learned that scorpions glow green in purple light. It was also my first time hearing howling monkeys in real life. At first, I didn't even know what the sounds were. I knew they were coming from an animal, but I couldn't tell what animal at all. It sounded very demonic, and nothing like what I envision a monkey to sound like at all.
To watch the sunrise, we went up Temple IV, and just our luck - We again, had ZERO VISIBILITY. So, we actually couldn't see the sunrise at all, because everything was covered with fog and mist just like Acatenango!!! Needless to say, that was extremely disappointing.
However, I did enjoy the rest of the tour, where we got to see a lot of the other Mayan ruins, temples, and administrative buildings that were built here.
Our tour guide was very informative, and was able to deliver a lot of information in a way that was entertaining. So, I really appreciated him for keeping things interesting.
After the tour was over, we got back onto the bus, and we made a small stop at a restaurant for a quick breakfast and bathroom break. After that, it was just a bus ride back to Flores.
Once we got back to our Airbnb, we took a shower and rested. When we were ready to head out again, we took a tuk tuk back to Flores Island, since our AirBnB was not on Flores Island. We were able to find a restaurant by the dock for dinner, which meant that we had some magnificent lake views with our meal.
After that, we went to a rooftop bar that doing a happy hour: two drinks for the price of one.
So, we decided just to hang out there, and enjoy the views and drinks before heading back to our Airbnb to finish packing, since we would have to be back at the airport later that night to return to Guatemala City. This was basically our last day in Guatemala, as we would be flying home the next day.
Day 9: Return to Toronto
Similar to Day 1, nothing much to report on this day, but thank you SO much for reading until the end of this blog post! I hope you enjoyed reading about my experience. If you plan on visiting Guatemala soon, or have been there before, don't hesitate to drop a comment and let me know what you think of the country!
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