Guatemala: Lago Atitlan, Antigua...and a missed opportunity
When you’re traveling over the course of several months you have time to make a few mistakes, to drag your heels once in awhile and to hem and haw about your next move (sometimes, truthfully, just to savor the comfort and water pressure of a hostel). Our pace isn’t blistering, and we’re not simply hitting the highlights. We determine a meandering course that incorporates some of the main attractions, but makes plenty room for the unknown. So far, so good.
As I write I sit in one of those delightful little hostels with solid water pressure and a generous breakfast deal in Juayua ... El Salvador. We sped through Guatemala in all of 11 days -- a remarkable pace, especially considering we were in Mexico for more than three months. I can say I’ve been to Guatemala but I can’t say much else. It may just be the one that got away.
It all started with a border crossing debacle. We hoped to depart Mexico through a little town called Frontera Corozal - indeed, we’d read about the border post there and the GPS drew a thick blue line to guide the way. But when we arrived at this little pueblo on the Usumacinta River, it became evident Babo Conquista would not be making the voyage. The boats crossing it were slim, single-engine, canoe-like passenger things. No bridge or ferry for cars. We glanced across the river, thickly lined with jungle - thunder clouds on the horizon and an emblematic rainbow spanning Mexico and Guatemala. We would have to wait three more days and a few hundred more miles for Guatemala.
This directional misfire meant we’d enter Guatemala further south-west of the country’s most wild and scenic regions - Tikal and Semuc Champey, most especially. Accessing those places was far trickier now - a 500 mile round trip on slow, badly degraded roads. Christmas was fast approaching and chilling out for a few days on a volcanic lake sounded better than dodging potholes. We chose the easy road.
And that is how we came to languish in San Pedro la Laguna for a week. The AirBnB was a cozy apartment with Wifi and access to an oven for Tim’s Christmas shortbread. The family we stayed with was lovely too - Maria gave me Spanish lessons each morning and invited me to help make the family tamales on Christmas Eve. On Christmas day we reunited with a couple we’d befriended nearly two months before in Mexico, spending a lovely afternoon braaing with fellow over-landing strays (representing South Africa, America, Canada, Spain, Germany, Holland, England and Australia). Life on Lake Atitlan was easy and our energy plateaued before we even managed to hike one of its three volcanos.
By day five we awoke from our holiday lethargy, ready once again for the road. Next stop would be the beautiful colonial city of Antigua. We decided to negotiate the way there in convoy - a first for the usually solo-going Foolish Conquerors. After speaking to our new-found overlanding UN, we learned of an especially notorious stretch of road just out of San Pedro. For this, we wisely arranged a police escort and in the end the worst part of the road was the road itself: steep and unpaved with deep, wheel-devouring rivulets.
Back on the make-the-most-of-every day bandwagon, we arrived in Antigua with renewed enthusiasm. But Antigua was easy to love. This once capital city (hence it’s name: old or antique Guatemala) sits at the base of three volcanoes, neatly ordered in an extremely walkable city grid with beautiful, flourishing Spanish architecture and lots of ornamental stucco work (even the crumbling facades have a rustic charm). It is an UNESCO World Heritage Site for its unique take of Spanish Baroque style. In truth, however, what wooed us were all things familiar: the coffee shops, the international restaurants and our community of travelers. We spent our days eating pastries, exploring a handful of museums and churches and otherwise waiting for our next meal. Three days and we’d had our fill of familiar and, well, El Salvador beckoned.
And that is how a country slips away - bit by bit. You take a wrong turn. You get a little lazy. You get a bit further along the way and going back seems impractical. Had we been more dedicated explorers (less susceptible to the cushy niceties and willing to take on a few extra trials), maybe we would have done Guatemala justice.
This is why travel is far more about who you are than what you do. And that’s what makes it so damn hard.
