Day 13: Lake Atitlán

Saturday, July 19th, 2014

                 We designated our last day in Guatemala as a relaxation and celebration day. To celebrate the trip we decided to go to Lake Atitlán with Carlos, head resident Manuel and his girlfriend. If anyone was even the slightest bit hesitent about returning, I’m fairly sure spending a day enjoying the natural beauty of Guatemala acted as a sure-fire way of motivating the group to return.

The group after breakfast 

            Lake Atitlán is the deepest lake in Central America and is surrounded by three volcanoes and many villages where Mayan culture is still prevalent. “Atitlan” is a fusion of Nahuatl words that mean “at the water.”  The lake has been labeled the “most beautiful lake in the world” various times and, Aldous Huxley famously compared it to Lake Como of Italy saying, “Lake Como, it seems to me, touches on the limit of permissibly picturesque, but Atitlán is Como with additional embellishments of several immense volcanoes. It really is too much of a good thing.” We definitely agreed with Huxley, our last day in Guatemala was full of good things.

View from the road

Carlos picked us up at 7AM and we started the drive to the lake. The drive itself was absolutely gorgeous and we passed a lot of typical Mayan villages we hadn’t seen as a result of working in the city. We passed Chimaltenango, San Lucas, and Sololá until we reached our final destination of Panajachel. We took advantage of ourfinal opportunity to go shopping in the market places and then hopped on a little motor boat to sail across the lake to visit San Pedro (La Laguna).

The boat ride got a little wet

The view of San Pedro from the boat

We had been warned that a lot of tourists have been known for going to San Pedro and never leaving. Within minutes of just standing on the dock, we understood why. San Pedro is a little paradise on the southwestern shore of the lake. The town is packed with little shops, colorful clothing, tropical plants, and, of course signs advertising Gallo everywhere. We started off the most logical way, testing just how warm the water was-after all we were all a little wet from the boat ride anyway! We then went to a little restaurant recommended by a different resident for lunch and by the time we’d finished our smoothies and sandwiches it was time to head back across the lake, and head back towards Guatemala City only stopping to look at the waterfall and for dinner in Antigua on the way. It was a perfect way to spend our last full day in Guatemala.

Waterfall on the way to the lake