It’s An Adventure: Part 1

¡Hola amigos! I hope everyone has had a joyful and restful week. I was able to have a week like that recently when I was blessed to have my mom and aunt visit me!

After the summer season ended, the staff at Students International (SI) got a week off. What better opportunity to have part of my family come see this beautiful country I currently call home? We used a company called Martsam Travel (14/10 would recommend) and I would not have done it any other way (good pick Aunt Cheryl!). Since they were here from Monday to Friday, I am gonna break down the trip into 2 parts. Woohoo! More posts!

Day 1: Monday // Monday ended up being more of a day where I just hung out at home and prepped for the fam bam’s arrival. A driver from the company picked me up. I attempted to direct him to La Casa Grande (my house). Since we don’t use addresses around here, it was slightly a struggle. We drove to the airport where he then dropped me off and I spent two hours in a coffee shop, anxiously awaiting. I made a sign out of my placemat too. Once they both finally got there, we hopped in a car to head to Antigua (after many joyous hugs and hellos). That night, we stayed at Hotel Casa Antigua which was very nice. We ate next door because A. it was down pouring and B. it was dark out. It was a great first meal, filled with the authentic Guatemalan food experience (rice, beans, guac, and chile rellenos). I also got the privilege of explaining how plumbing works around here to both of them (aka no toilet paper in the toilet… mom was not happy).

Day 2: Tuesday // We woke up early and had a great breakfast at the hotel. Then we hopped in a car and met our tour guide, Maynor. He took us to the Azotea coffee plantation for a tour (this was a 3rd time doing this tour so if you have a chance to do it, definitely do). This time I also got to do the music tour there, hearing all about Mayan culture. Following this, we drove up to Magdalena where I got to do a tour of where I work at the community center and where I live. It was cool for my family to meet part of my Guatemalan family here. After Magda, we went back to Antigua, got lunch at Roots, and then looked around the ruins behind the Cathedral. I got to recreate some pictures I took when I was here 3 years ago which was super special for me. We got caught in rainy season again but that made it even more of an adventure. Then it was time for dinner and to bed to rest up for our next day.

Day 3: Wednesday // We woke up early to head out for 2 days at Lake Atitlán. Our tour guide was named David and I think he was our favorite of the three guides we had. We took the 3 hour van ride to Panjachel, checked into our hotel, and headed straight out for our boat ride. We rode across the lake to San Juan. There we saw a co-op of women where they make thread (that takes about 16 hours to make one roll), dye it, and then back weave it into goods to sell. Each of us got to try our hand at making the thread too which is A LOT harder than it looks. As typical women, we shopped and then after David bought us all choco bananos which are a staple here. We got lunch at a local coffee shop and then rode over to Santiago. We saw a church there and experienced Mayan culture through a figure they worship. We definitely loved San Juan but wouldn’t necessarily recommend going to Santiago. To take a break, we hung out by the pool for a little. Sunsets in Panja are also to die for so of course we headed out to a lookout point and watched our creator make a masterpiece. We had dinner at Chez Alex, which was a fantastic dinner and then headed off to bed.

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Sorry this is so long but I am just so excited! I will tell you more about the second half of our adventure in the next post! Can’t wait for you to read it!

xoxo Morgan

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