Panajachel, Lagos de Atitlan, Santiago Atitlan

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Panajachel, aka Pana, is the busiest and most built up town around Lake Atitlan. We took a boat to a hotel, La Casa del Mundo, near Jaibalito, for breakfast. It’s built on a secluded cliff and Lonely Planet calls this place the most magical hotel in Guatemala and it’s certainly not too far from the truth! At every turn there was a Kodak moment and there were enough lounge chairs (I was educated that these are called Muscoka chairs) and hammocks to spend many lazy days here. Every room has a fantastic view facing the lake and volcanoes, a paradise if you ask me! There are four volcanoes around the lake: San Pedro, San Luca, Santiago and a smaller one I can’t remember the name of.

I had the best breakfast burritos before spending some time walking around the property to take pictures. When I got back down people were either relaxing or playing in the water again. The adjacent cove is 200m deep and Lake Atitlan is much deeper than that. I wanted to get into the water but there was still hesitation. Our tour leader came up with the great idea that one of our trainees should tow me around in the water with a buoy that’s attached to a long rope. We went for a couple of laps, and I likened it to tandem cycling in water since I had to work hard too when she was looking. :-) After that I got a life jacket and went swimming by myself. Initially the water was chilly but once I got used to it it was refreshing and relaxing.

Later we took the boat to Santiago Atitlan, a local village on the other shore of the lake. Almost all local women wore traditional colourful costumes and they have incredible skills balancing anything and everything on their heads. Like most other places, there was a church at the main plaza and many shops with plenty of crafts, textiles, paintings, jeweleries catered to tourists. Several kids stopped me and said “Maximon”. At the time I had no clue what they were talking about I later found that Maximon or Saint Simon is a wooden figure draped in scarves smoking a fat cigar. Locals make offerings (cigarettes, liquor and candles) to it and ask for blessings. It changes house every year and it’s an honour to have him at your place. It’s supposed to be quite hilarious as someone needs to constantly light the cigar since the wooden figure can’t smoke. I heard that a few years ago someone was not willing to give up the Maximon and at one point there were two in the village.

On the way back the water got a bit choppy and the ride was rather bumpy. Many people in the front row, myself included, got soaked. I was starving when we got back so we went looking for the street vendor selling cheap tacos. Unfortunately it was too early for them and we had reservations eating from street vendors sporting the sign “Super Tacos Bell”, so we ended up eating at a sit-down restaurant instead. The orders took a long time and we missed quite the spectacular sunset of the lake that night. I was shown some pictures later and it was indeed quite spectacular.

Quote of the day: “Du bist eine mousie. Ich bin ein wasserratte”

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