Tourists in Antigua

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This morning we got ready and headed over to the main hotel to eat breakfast before we split up into two groups for our tour of Antigua. The tour was really interesting, we learned some pretty interesting facts about Antigua and got to see tons of cool sites including the main cathedral, an ex-nunnery –which is said to be haunted, and even went to a chocolate factory. At the chocolate factory we learned the facts about how they make chocolate and even got to taste test some! All of us bought some chocolate products as souvenirs before heading out again; it was a really hard choice to decide what to buy because they had all sorts of products ‘choclified’. We broke for lunch and Brandy, Megan, and I headed to Mono Loco to grab a quick bite to eat. I got the soup and it was so good, exactly what my stomach needed. After lunch we had to high tail it back to the hotel to pack up our stuff and head to the main hotel; we loaded up the bus and headed to our next and final location: Panajachel. It took a few hours to get there but when we did, the sights of Panajachel really caught my eye. The street was lined with vendors selling tons of souvenirs and some selling food; this street had it all! Apparently just down the street was the lake and I couldn’t wait to get down there. Once we got our bags unloaded from the bus it was time to check in which proved to be yet another gong show; all of us crammed in the front trying to figure out who we were going to room with. Jacqueline, Shannon, and I decided to room together so we got our key from the front desk and began our ascent to the third floor –sans elevator. Lucky for us there were 3 lovely workers who helped us take our bags up the stairs. Our jaws dropped as soon as we walked into the room; it was huge! There were 5 double beds positioned throughout the room and a small bathroom in the far corner. At first we thought there was a mistake because clearly they wouldn’t put 3 people when you can definitely fit 5; there was no mistake, we just lucked out with a giant room. We hung out in our room and sat in amazement when one of the other volunteers came to visit and she was taken aback by our huge room as well. Jacqueline had made plans with her friends to go out to eat so it was just Shannon, Amanda, and myself left. While Shannon was in the washroom Amanda and I were sitting on the beds when all of a sudden we heard this flapping noise coming from inside the ceiling… Both of us flipped our shit but then to help calm ourselves down we said that it must be because our room was right on the border of the hotel so it must have just been a bird that was on the side of the building… yeah… that was it… A few minutes later we heard it a second time and this time we knew it was in the ceiling and not just noise traveling. We grabbed our stuff and headed out faster than you can say Adios! Amanda, who had been to Guatemala before, knew of a really nice restaurant up the street so we pushed our way past all of the vendors that continually tried to get us to buy something from their store and made it to the fancy restaurant. We were greeted by the waiter who led us to a quaint little table by the window; the whole set up was so romantic, they lit a candle and everything. All three of us had a good laugh about how romantic it all was. A quick once over of the menu and we had made our decision; we all ordered the same pasta dish, very romantic haha. The pesto pasta that we ordered was pretty good but in my personal opinion it was overpriced for what the food tasted like… I guess you pay for the experience and ambience more than the food, right? The pasta made my stomach feel wonky again so I was more than happy to begin walking back to the hotel. On our way back we spotted this cute life café with baking in the glass case; obviously we had to go in! The girls wanted to grab some hot chocolate but because of my stomach I was too scared to have any, though it did look really good. The cakes that the café had on display looked delicious and I knew we’d be back; they had tres leches cake people! The mini sign that sat in front of the tres leches cake to let you know that it was tres leches (as if I needed a sign to tell me that…) had a description underneath the name. The description was epic, it said, ‘My milk cake brings all the boys to the yard’ oh my gosh, I almost died laughing, that description is the best description I have ever seen! After the girls had finished their hot chocolate and we took pictures of the best cake description ever we went to the hotel. Trying to sleep after hearing the freaky scurrying noises from the ceiling is just slightly impossible… Tomorrow is another clinic day!

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