No words.. just photos :)

Photos.

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I visited the wonderful series of natural stepped, turquoise pools of Semuc Champey. The best place to stay is Lanquin, just 20 minutes away by car from Semuc Champey. And here in Lanquin there is really just one place to stay, and that’s El Retiro! Besides many hammocks El Retiro has many beds in small houses and huts along a nice river. Their restaurant has a great menu and the breakfast is amazing! And almost every night there is a small party going on, even in low season.

From this hostel you can easily book a full day tour to Semuc Champey. During the hole day you will visit a great cave, do some tubing, jumping’s into the river and finally relaxing in the pools.

Enjoy some photos from the place.

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Just a short bus ride away from Antigua - about 7 hours by a direct shuttle - is Lake Atitlan, a large endorheic lake (one that does not flow to the sea) in the Guatemalan Highlands. We arrived in a village called Panajachel from where we took a small boat along the lake to a smaller village called San Pedro de Laguna. We found a nice little ´new´ hostel called Yo Mama’s - run by an American girl. The hostel is just a couple of months open and has still some child sicknesses but the atmosphere is amazing. Laid back and really quiet.

My and the girls - Laura and Nicole from the states - went for a small walk and ended up in a kayak, discovering the lake shores, searching for a small beach. But we didn’t found the beach so we headed back again and did something all travelers love - doing nothing! Yes we just hang around in the hammocks and chilled for some hours.

The next day we took a small boat again to get to the other side of the lake to a place called San Marcos de Laguna, which only has 3000 people living there. The most places over here are closed because of the low season, but the rocks from where you can swim and dive were still open. It’s just a small walk from the village and has several small rocks where you can relax and dive into the lake. Here we hang around again, chilled for a bit, and finally jumped from the 5 meter high rock. There was even one higher - about 10 meters - but we skipped that one. After the action it was time to go back to San Pedro for diner and some well deserved beers.

Chichicastenango

Another highlight of Guatemala is the famous Chichicastenango market, so we took an early morning bus from San Pedro all the way to Chichicastenango. We got dropped of at the market and started to walk around, and in some way it made me feel like being in Bolivia again, in La Paz on the hugh street market. Everything from clothes to food was available here.

But the Maya market can’t win from the Inka market - it’s smaller and the prices are higher. But never the less the market was nice and I bought enough souvenirs to make my backpack even heavier.

The same day the shuttle took us back to Antigua where we checked in at hostel Jungle Party for a night.

Photos Lake Atitlan and Chichicastenango

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Despite of the fact that Honduras has closed their border for some days and no one knows how long it would take before they open again, me and two other guys from my hostel decided to take a flight! As said we got a special offer of only 89 US dollars (excl. tax) for a round trip to San Salvador.

We left Leon in the morning to make our way to the international airport of Nicaragua, near the capitol Managua. While in the bus I thought about my last time being here and suddenly everybody looked very suspicious! Anyways, we made it one and a half hours before our flight to the airport - save! At 12:42 the airplane took off and within one and a half hours we landed in San Salvador - save.

Once we landed in San Salvador we took a taxi to the capitol because the airport was 40 km out of town. The taxi was expensive but took us to three different hostels untill we finally found one where we wanted to stay for the night. The hostel was not as good as we were used to, so it´s not worth mentioning this crap place. We just stayed here for one night and took an early Ticabus to Guatemala City the next day. But putting both feet on El Salvador’s ground made it country number 11 on my list!

Guatemala

Me, Charlie and Diego went on a Ticabus from San Salvador all the way to Guatemala City - dropping us off the border for the usual stamp rituals. From there we continued to a smaller town just 45 minutes away called Antigua. We checked in at hostel Jungle Party - a living place right in the center - and went for exploring. It`s a nice little village full of small houses, churches and lovely people. The streets remembered my of Villa de Leyva in Colombia - big stones coverd the streets making walking on it a nightmare.

So here I was in Antigua, Guatemala, country 12 on big list! It´s wonderful to be here and it really feels like a wonderful country already.

Volcan Pacaya

Ever seen real lava? I didn’t.. Until I made the hike up to Volcano Pacaya! It’s a one and a half hour hike up to where you can see the lava coming out off the mountain. How amazing is that! It’s so impressive just sitting a few meters away from the lava. It´s so dangerous sitting there that it´s totally amazing.

So yet another amazing experience on my list!

Booking tip: Ash Travel! Cheapest in town I think. Don’t worry about security, there is enough security on the mountain.

Enjoy the photos!

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