Panajachel and Our Trip Around the Lake

Jeff and I spent two nights in Panajachel (a small lakeside town in Guatemala’s Western Highlands) this past weekend. We stayed in a very nice little hotel called Posada de Los Volcanes. We had booked ahead and requested a room on the top floor, so we had an OK view of the lake (and an even better view of some chickens).

Our chicken view

Though the view wasn’t all we’d been hoping for, the room did not disappoint. It was great. It was clean, it had comforters, it had screens(!) on the windows so it was bug free, and the bathroom was by far the best bathroom we have had the privilege of using while in Guatemala.

Sooo nice to have comforters!

While in Pana, Jeff and I enjoyed our bug free room, Pana’s fairly large market, and some interesting restaurants.

Our first meal was at an interesting little Chinese restaurant called Chinitas.

Chinitas welcomes you

It was a nice change to get some Chinese food and the hippie atmosphere was a good laugh.

Notice the hippie beads behind us and the pillows we are sitting on

Other highlights of our Pana trip included dinner at an OK Italian restaurant,

Us at the Dos Mundos Italian restaurant

shopping the market for good deals,

A little girl in her machete shop

being cutely harassed during meals by small Mayan children selling goods, and by hungry dogs and cats,

A cat wanted some of Jeff's cheeseburger

and enjoying a delicious pizza meal accompanied by amaaazing, live musical entertainment at the Circus Bar (a restaurant recommended by Lauren’s Uncle Ian).

Heading out to Circus Bar

Such delicious pizza at the Circus Bar!

Though we enjoyed all of these activities, the best thing that we did in Pana (by far), was take a boat tour of the lake.

Jeff and I knew before we even arrived in Pana that we wanted to take a boat tour around the Lago de Atitlán. We had heard that the lake is one of the most beautiful places in the world and we found out first hand that the rumors are true:

Our first view of the lake

We decided we would take a public boat tour that leaves every morning at 8:30am from Pana and stops at 3 different lakeside villages before returning to Pana at 2:30pm. The cost is only about $8/person.

Jeff and I had no cell phones with us and no alarm clock in our hotel room though, so we asked the front desk of our hotel for a wake up call at 6:30am. We wanted to make sure we had more than enough to time to dress, eat breakfast, and walk down to the lake before the tour left.

Things unfortunately did not work out that way…

When we woke up it was already after 8am. We had gotten no wake up call!! We knew there was absolutely no chance we could catch the public boat. We were feeling a little discouraged and decided to head to breakfast and discuss our options there.

Over a delicious breakfast of banana pancakes, fruit, and coffee for Jeff and a bagel with cream cheese and a crazily large orange juice for Lauren, we came up with a plan.

Mmm Mmm banana pancakes

Told ya it was big!

We decided that we would just head down to the lake and see if we could find a water taxi to take us and drop us off at one of the ports across the lake. We were hoping we could just build our own tour through the use of water taxis.

We didn’t even get that far though, because as soon as we left the restaurant we were approached by a man offering us a private tour of the lake by boat. The tour would take us to three different lake towns and would leave right away! Without a moment of hesitation we said yes! and soon enough we were seeing our boat and meeting our Captain.

Say hello to our Captain!

Our lancha left Pana at just about 9:30am. The views of the volcanoes and the river were even more amazing from the boat than they were from the ground:

Even the clouds are spectacular!

The ride across the river in the lancha was amazing. Great, spectacular, wonderful, (etc.) views, great weather (we couldn’t have asked for better weather), great ride. It felt awesome to be out on the water. It was our first time on a boat together too, which was fun.

In the lancha

We were almost upset when we pulled in to our first stop, San Juan La Laguna, 20 minutes later.

Almost.

Our welcoming to San Juan La Laguna

San Juan was a very quiet lake town. Not a lot of people around. One Mayan here, another Mayan over there. That’s about it.

There was a ton of greenery and a lot of beautiful artwork though. We spent about an hour there just walking around enjoying the relaxed atmosphere (an unusual trait for a Guatemalan town).

Our second stop of the day was San Pedro La Laguna. Just a short boat trip away from San Juan (maybe 10 minutes).

The view from their dock was amazing:

San Pedro was a much more bumpin’ town than San Juan.

It had a beautiful church at the center of town,

some neat wall art,

and a good sized market, but nothing to get us overly excited.

We only spent 30 minutes in San Pedro and it was more than enough. Nothing we hadn’t seen going on here.

Though we did spot a pink church:

Our third and final stop of the day was Santiago Atitlán.

Santiago was by far the biggest of the three lake towns we visited. When we pulled in we were greeted by a huge fountain, a singer, and a bunch of boys wanting to be our guide for the afternoon. We heartlessly turned the boys down.

But we did take a moment to enjoy the fountain (or at least Jeff did):

Jeff is super tall in Guatemala. Almost giant status.

After fountaining we hired a tuc tuc(yay!)

Us in the back of the tuc tuc with our new friend, Lonnie, the elephant.

and went in search of Maximón, a Mayan folk saint…and a huge waste of time.

We found out that Maximón equals the biggest tourist trap ever after a 30 minute tuc tuc ride, the purchasing of a cigar (to give to Maximón), and the purchasing of our entrance in to see him. We would have a picture to show you, but Maximón’s attendants charged $1.25 a picture so we opted out. But it’s not that hard to get a mental picture – just imagine a shack with a small wooden man inside, filled with lots of smoke, flowers, and chanting. That was the house of Maximón.

Thankfully, the whole trip to Santiago wasn’t a waste, as we made it out with some interesting, beautiful, and overall great pictures:

We had to pull the tuc tuc over for this view!

Mayan women washing their clothes in the lake

Wowing view from the town

If you ever get the chance to visit this lake, you absolutely, positively, should.

It was an experience beyond breathtaking.

Our pictures don’t even come close to doing the lake justice. You just have to see it with your own eyes.

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