Antigua

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The city of Antigua is the most popular tourist place in Guatemala. It is very colonial and European-looking, and every second store is a jade shop (expensive!) or a tourist agency. The food here is good, though, and the Black Cat hostel where we are staying is great. The staff are very helpful and friendly, and we get an amazing free breakfast.

There are a lot of people in town that we know. Justin and Colin, old friends of Blair and attendees of our high school, are staying in our hostel, and Jude has some Aussie friends here as well. We also ran into some boys that we played football with in Tulum. Small travelling world! Or maybe not so small when everyone just goes where the Lonely Planet tells them to. We haven't been very good at getting off the beaten path in Guatemala. In any case, it is very fun to go clubbing with a large group of people, and the staff at the hostel are good at naming an appropriate bar for an appropriate day of the week (they also often come out to the party with us!). Bars here are very smoky, which we are not used to, but they are generally packed with tourists and locals alike, and have very cheap drinks, especially for girls.

We went on another horse-back riding tour, since Jude wanted to do one and wasn't there when we went in San Cristóbal. This one was less great, since the horses tended to be a little spooky - bad news when walking next to barbed wire fences. We walked through a lot of the city again, but had some great mountain views when we finally got into the country.

Jack, the hostel manager, recommended we go to a nearby used clothing flea market. When we finally found it, we rifled through rack upon rack of old American clothes, some of which are very good quality garments, and some of which are hilarious old T-shirts. It is probably fortunate that we didn't have long to spend here, as our bags would have been severaly weighed down.

We also greatly enjoyed a place called Café No Se, a restaurant/cafe/bar. At the bottom of the menu it was printed 'We don't serve F***ing Mojitos', and the wine list read 'OK wines.... $18. Better than OK.... $22' (money in Quetzals, here). They also publish and provide a free magazine which includes scathing articles about the US's influence in Central America, terribly insulting and dirty horoscopes, serious art articles, and current events in Antigua. It seems that the Lonely Planet writer did not ever visit this place when they wrote about it, as the entry in the guide is taken verbatim from a self-description of Café No Se. This is an ironic description including things like 'confused staff and unwanted pregnancies'. Lonely Planet misinformation strikes again!

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Photos

Riding
Volcano ahead!

Hilarious Sign
In Cafe No Se

Lamp
In case you couldn't tell...

Comments

[Elbish]

hola
bellas... holaaaa ay tienen que presentarme a sus amigos hee!!! en serio hahahaha (translate it) waaaaaaaaaaaaa it´s beautiful and so lovely that your having a go0d time, yeah such a go0d time... see iu.. with lo0ve you´re sister Elba

[Margaret B.]

hello
great views of Guatemala - rugged and beautiful. thanks for sharing. love m