The next stop of the trip was Antigua, a nice little town in the highlands of Guatemala. It's a beautiful city full of charm and surrounded by volcanos. However, when we arrived we didn't see much apart from rain, more rain and then some rain. A tropical storm was hitting most of Central America and it stranded us in Antigua for the week.
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| Yup, there's a street under that river, somewhere |
But the rainclouds did have a silver lining. It made sure we stayed there long enough to do some much needed Spanish lessons. We booked ourselves for a week of one-on-one lessons, four hours a day, for five days straight. To increase my chances of improving my current repertoire of Spanish (which pretty much solely consisted of how to ask for a beer), I opted to stay with a local family in Antigua for some immersive learning.
But when I arrived at the house to find five other students there with the same intention, I soon realized I wouldn't learn a whole lot of Spanish there - although I did learn very quickly that 'huevos' were eggs and 'frijoles' were beans since they seemed to make up the majority of meals there!
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| I may not have learned much Spanish staying with the locals, but I did have a pretty cool view from my bedroom |
While studying for the week, we got to spend a lot of time in the city. It's filled with cobblestone streets, some cool buildings and lots of other students looking to relax over a pint after a hard day at school (including the bunch of Irish I'd met earlier in Guatemala). Conveniently, the city has some great pubs for said students in need of a quite (or not) pint. It did feel kinda weird to hear myself saying -
"I'll come out for a pint, but first I've got to be home for dinner at six and then I've got to my homework, but I'll be out after that"!
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| Near Parque Central, Antigua |
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| Café No Sé, definitely my favorite pub in Antigua |
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The (fridge) door into the Mezcal Bar in No Se
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It was only towards the end of the week, when the weather started to clear that we realized how good the view surrounding the city was. Three giant volcanos towered over the city, one of which, aptly named Fuego was easily recognized by the frequent dark clouds of smoke it would emit.
On one of the mornings, before school (which didn't start until 1.00), we headed to the Pacaya volcano for an up close and personal look. The volcano had just erupted in the summer of the pervious year so it's still pretty active, and the terrain still very recent.
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| One of the local dogs showing us the way. He stole my lunch later on - cheeky! |
Walking around near the top if the volcano was like walking on a foreign planet. It was totally baron, with steam vents and crazy rock formations all over the place.
We even got to toast marshmallows over the volcano - one of the things I had to do before leaving Central
America.
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| Mmm....volcanoey! |
Climbing to the top of Pacaya also provided some cool views of the surrounding volcanos
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| Edgar, Nico and I. If you look closely, you'll see a cloud of smoke from the volcano on the left which erupted while we were there. |
Unfortunately, one of the sad things about Antigua is that this where most of the group from Belize were going separate ways. Six of us had traveled together for nearly three weeks. Nicola and James were heading off on a three day bus trip to Costa Rica, Edgar was headed for the highlands of Guatemala and onto El Salvador, Elke would head back to Belize for a flight down to Chile and Nico and I hoped to keep traveling together until we reached El Salvador.
When you're traveling with people you're around them 24-7 and you get to know them very well very quickly so while you might have met someone only a week or two beforehand, it's still sad to see them go.
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| The gang's last night together |
Once the week was up and the roads had been reopened (there had been some huge landslides and lots of road closures with all the rain) we left Antigua, to spend a few days higher up in the mountains by Lake Atitlán.
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| Chilling by the lake. |
We headed for San Pedro which is a chill little town right on the lake. A nice change from the city of Antigua, and deserved break after a week of
partying studying. Lake Atitlán is surrounded by small towns, one of which is San Pedro. It's pretty easy to kayak from town to town, and there's some great hiking around the lake as well.
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| And of course, there's more volcanos here as well! |
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| Some great cliff jumps we found on while kayaking around the lake |
After a few days by the lake, Nico and I decided to head for Xela, the second biggest city in Guatemala and a great base for some good hikes. I was happy to have spent some time working on my Spanish - by now I could even order some food with my beer! Who knows, with my Spanish progressing quickly I might even be able for some traveling in Cenral America...
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