Panajachel and San Pedro La Laguna

Our first diary from Guatemala!!

After a bumpy ride of 10 hours from San Cristobal to Panajachel, we could barely feel our behinds and were definitely feeling the horseride from the previous day! When we arrived at the border we switched shuttle buses and we had one extra person in the van so we were the lucky two to share one little chair. This meant awkward positions for about one and a half hours, let´s just say we weren´t worried about our sore muscles because we couldn´t feel them anymore.

Luckily the extra person got off in Huehuetenango and we both got a seat. Yay! All the cars and buses have ¨Dios me guia¨ written on their front windows which means that they believe God will lead them. This enables them to drive whichever crazy way they like, apparently, and takes a little getting used to to say the least. On lots of winding and narrow mountain roads.
We finally arrived in Panajachel on Lake Atitlan around 6pm in the pouring rain. (This makes us realise we are still at the end of the rainy season...) Our priority was to get money and to get somewhere dry, so we made our way to a little hospedaje in the main street. When she offered a room for 100 Quetzales (10 Euros) we said, we can´t pay that (=we don´t want to pay that) and she immediately went down to 80 which was satisfactory for us, especially when we saw the room which was the nicest smelling and looking one we had so far! Again we experienced the crazy roosters early in the morning, and we made an early start towards San Pedro on the other side of the lake.

In San Pedro, you get hassled by boys wanting to take you to a hotel as soon as you get off, and even though we had a choice we went to another one, which ended up being quite a hike through the centre, up the hill. For a basic room we each paid 20 Q so that was fine for us. But the next morning after Krista got about 6 drops from the shower, we decided it was worth making the trip down to our first pick, Casa Elena, where we ended up paying the same price.

The town is very laid-back and we haven´t done much apart from enjoy the beautiful location on the lake, which is situated between three volcanoes (not active at the moment). It hasn´t rained since our arrival and we´ve enjoyed sunny moment on terraces overlooking the lake, with very cheap drinks (3Q for a Cuba Libre!! that´s 30 eurocent!!) We´ve fallen in love with the cute street dogs which we want to take home with us, as well as the local people who are very friendly and smile constantly. They have little but they are so happy. We made a very good friend in a little girl called Rosenda who comes up to us constantly to sell us her banana/banana-chocolate bread, she´s definitely persistent and very smart.

We´re loving life here on Lake Atitlan but tomorrow we´re moving onto one of the bigger Guatemalan cities, Antigua.

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