We picked up Lydia and company in the morning and made our way to Tecpan. An hour and a half later, we arrived and went straight to the cemetery to visit my grandfather´s grave (my mom´s dad). Afterwards, we kept going for another two hours to Panajachel. We arrived around 2pm, and would have arrived earlier, had it not been for the construction on the highway and the directional signs being removed as a result. We passed up the Panajachel exit by like 30 to 40 minutes, and had to make our way back, so we lost valuable time there. And [View Full Entry]

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After a rather uneventful traverse of Guatemala City I found my way to the Interamericana highway and made my way higher and higher into the highland volcano country. The ride was spectacular and punctuated only by a couple stops to warm my hands and snap photos and one stop in a small town where the road had been closed by a indigenous rights demonstration. I pulled to the front of the line of traffic and asked a couple of police officers what was going on. One told me I'd have to wait but just then his partner noticed another motorcycle squeezing [View Full Entry]

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lac atitlan, panajachel et on the road... guatemala 2002 [View Full Entry]

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Hello everyone! I recently went on a service trip with St. Camillus of Washington D.C. thanks to the friars here at Siena College and (I know you haven't heard from any of my travels in a while) I had an amazing time and an even more amazing experience. I cannot begin to thank the people of St. Camillus, the friars at Siena, Mike (our fearless leader), and the people of Guatemala for all of their hospitality and support during this trip. I could write a book about all of the things that we did in Guatemala while working for Habitat for [View Full Entry]

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Well ladies and gentlemen, it has been an exciting week! After meeting my old family in San Juan del Obispo things have been well. It was nice to see them after 10 years of absence, they are doing well. One of the sons is completeing his final year in architecture at University and going out to do his practicum, the other is just beginning university. The family is well, and still speaks no english... Kindof funny to me, but it was nice speaking spanish with them and they were quite impressed that my speaking abilities had increased significantly, even though it [View Full Entry]

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Panajachel is the biggest of the towns surrounding Lake Atitlan, in the south of Guatemala. We came here with our travelling buddy Julius and a new French guy named Alex. The lake is surrounded by volcanoes, both active and dormant, and has spectacular scenery. Unfortunately, the town of Panajachel is quite touristy, but this also means that there are good choices of hostel. Ours was so private and friendly that we had to track down the owners in order to pay when we left town. The sunset our first night here was phenomenal. It was also a full moon, and although [View Full Entry]

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Have been in Guatemala for 4days now, it is great to be here.Anituga for new years was awesome dualing fireworks all night long.Took the time to climb volcan Pacaya was a good experince but way more then we planed for.Left the 2nd for lanquin to find a little slice of paradise would of loved to stay longer as it was beautiful senuc champey was stunning.So now here we are in flores getting up for a 5am bus to tikal tomorrow.Will try and again soon but there so much to do. [View Full Entry]

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The group all went on the boat trip, nice early start (except Michelle as ill). We had a breakfast stop in an amazing place. Would love to come back and stay here. It was called Hotel la Casa, he views were amazing, the food divine... It was a great start to the day. We then went onto Santiago Atitlan, went to the church. Here we had another odd experience. We went to visit Maximon, their god that looks after them. He resides in different houses and you can go any give him rum and cigarettes... He is a wooden statue that [View Full Entry]

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Heading off up to the lake From Xela to Panajachel which sits on the shores of the beautiful Lago Atitlan surrounded by volcanoes over 3500 ft high (that's not the biggest) we found a friendly local familly run hotel named Villa Lupita in the old town, with a view over the lake from the roof terrace. Know to locals as Pana, the town has a toursity feel,with lots of indigenous handy crafts, which doen't sound too appealing, but we found it really friendly and enjoyed our stay. Marcel discovered the Guatemalan tipico breakfast and thus ate it everyday thereafter consiting of: [View Full Entry]

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Wed 17th Dec 08 Just after lunch Fran, Brad & myself hired 3 mountain bikes & threw them on top of a chicken bus. We took the bus to a town at the top of the hills. We biked down the crazy road with extreme drops that leads back into Panajachel. There were some hairy turns & near misses with oncoming chicken buses but it was great fun all the same. It took about 10 minutes to reach the bottom. Then we cycled the 4 kms to the neighbouring town of Santa Catherina Pollopa. That night we had a really good [View Full Entry]

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