Showing 1-12 of 12 results
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Guapo Guatemala – Chiabal, Laguna Magdalena & Chajul, Sierra de las Cuchumatanes
Blog: Trans-Americas Journey - 8 November 2011
North of Huehuetenango the Sierra de las Cuchumatanes mountains, the highest non-volcanic range in Central America, rise into the sky. This spectacular bit of Guatemala is home to high altitude plateaus, tiny windswept villages and a naturally infinity-edged lake that almost no one visits.The Cuchumatanes are also home to two new community tourism guest houses that get you into the terrain and into the culture. Chiabal The blink-and-you’ll-miss-it village of Chiabal is perched on a wide, sheep-speckled plateau at nearly 11,000 feet.
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Drunken Horse Racing – Sierra de los Cuchumatanes, Guatemala
Blog: Trans-Americas Journey - 2 November 2011
Though we missed the world famous annual drunken horse racing in Todos Santos local guide Rigoberto Pablo Cruz (rigoguiadeturismo@yahoo (dot) com, good English spoken) knew that locals in a nearby town were putting on a smaller race so we jumped in the truck and drove about an hour out of Todos Santos, climbing up to more than 11,000 feet (3,352 meters) into the Sierra de los Cuchumatanes mountains. A soft dirt straight-away about an eighth of a mile long had been cleared through the center of the tiny, dusty town where, weirdly, there was a porta-potty in front of nearly every house.
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Party Town – Todos Santos, Guatemala
Blog: Trans-Americas Journey - 31 October 2011
Todos Santos Cuchumatán (commonly called just Todos Santos) is a stronghold of some of the most spectacular traditional dress in Guatemala and living Mayan customs like using a small sweat lodge called a chuj. It’s also a town that likes to party. Their annual free-for-all drunken horse race, held on November 1, typically involves dozens of riders all of whom are too drunk to walk let alone ride a horse down a muddy road at break neck speed. A picture from this insanity is on the cover of the 2007 Lonely Planet guide to Guatemala.
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Volcano Trekking – Santiaguito Volcano, Xela, Guatemala
Blog: Trans-Americas Journey - 19 October 2011
Instead of sitting around Quetzaltenango (aka Xela) with frozen toes we decided to head to a much warmer location–like up one of the active volcanoes that surround the town. There are a lot of guides and tour companies in Xela, but we signed up for an overnight trek to watch steam, ash, firey hot rocks and molten lava spew out of Santiaguito volcano with a volunteer-driven/not-for-profit company called Quetzal Trekkers. They have offices in Guatemala and Nicaragua and their profits are used to support local programs for children.
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Sacred Spaces – Xela (Quetzaltenango) & Laguna Chicabal, Guatemala
Blog: Trans-Americas Journey - 17 October 2011
The drive along highway CA 1 (aka, the Pan American Highway) out of Guatemala City through the mountains toward Quetzaltenango (aka Xela) takes you through the town of Hupalupa. At 10,334 feet (3,150 meters), this spot is marked as the highest point on the Pan American Highway. Also known as Xela About 3,000 feet lower lies Quetzaltenango which, thankfully, everyone calls Xela (pronounced Shell ah). Xela has become a base for two pursuits: learning Spanish and scrambling up volcanoes including the still-active Santiaguito.
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Finca Chacula, rural and authentic
Blog: Nono in Guatemala - 24 August 2011
When myparents told me they were going to come for a visit in August, I startedthinking about where we should go. When I found the website of the PosadaChacula, I knew I had found the perfect place for us.
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Volunteering at Loma Linda
Blog: Say Yes to Tacos - 6 July 2010
I just made it back home to VT, after a long day of travelling from Mexico to Portland, a few job interviews in the Pacific Northwest, 10 fantastic days in Seattle with Ana, 5 days in New York with Tom (a friend from Vassar) and Oscar (a friend from Guadalajara), and a long, green train [...]
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Volcano-hopping: Tajumulco and San Pedro
Blog: Say Yes to Tacos - 5 July 2010
I´ve had an eventful few weeks. Made it from San Cristóbal de las Casas in Mexico to Xela, Guatemala. Stayed there for three weeks with a wonderful family and brushed up my Spanish at a local language school. Also, did a killer sunrise hike to the top of the highest point in Central America, el [...]
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A Little Language…Learning Spanish in Xela, Guatemala
Blog: A Little Adrift - A RTW Travelogue - 30 May 2010
One of the stories that is most often “wow-ed” at from my round the world trip is my time volunteering teaching English at a monastery in Nepal. It’s really quite fortunate that people are so interested in stories of my young monks, because I love talking about them! Volunteering in both Cambodia and Nepal are two of the most memorable and rewarding parts of my past travels and I was really eager to find similar volunteer opportunities in Guatemala. So with the percolating and warm memories of all of the kids ...
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Impressions of Guatemala
Blog: Itinerant Londoner - 27 June 2009
My first trip to Guatemala in 2007 was extremely brief – I spent just two days there on a brief visit from Mexico to see the Mayan city of Tikal – but it remains probably my best travelling memory. Tikal is the most amazing place I’ve visited, and viewing the sun rise over the jungle [...]
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Learning Spanish in the Guatemalan Highlands
Blog: Itinerant Londoner - 23 June 2009
After spending a week studying Spanish in Xela, I made a last minute decision to switch to PLQ’s sister school up in the mountains. It hadn’t been part of my original plans, but on speaking to some of the students who’d studied there it really sounded like an experience not to be missed, and so [...]
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Earthquake! Volcano!
Blog: Itinerant Londoner - 21 June 2009
I got my first reminder that I was staying in hotspot of geological activity when my whole classroom began to shake in a little tremor one afternoon. It was just a small one, but getting to feel my first earthquake was a pretty cool experience. There’s been a couple of others since I’ve been here [...]
Showing 1-12 of 12 results
