San Pedro and Lake Atitlan

 I woke up nice and early to make sure that I had packed everything for my trip to Lake Atitlan. The shuttle was meant to collect me at about 8:30am. The shuttle then went around Antigua for a bit longer collecting others on the way. By the time we left it was about 9:30am.

The journey to Lake Atitlan took about 3 hours – we were taken straight to San Pedro which is where I had booked a hostel for the night. When I arrived, I saw how the hostel literally was on the lake – and the hang out area had a place from which you could jump into the lake!

   

The view from the hostel was beautiful – looking across Lake Atitlan to the smaller towns and mountains on the other side.

I spent a few hours walking around San Pedro and decided that as Monday was a day off anyway, I would spend one more night in San Pedro before heading back to Antigua on Monday evening. The town itself was not very big – the main street was full of market stalls – often selling the same thing! There was also a strong sense of religiosity with many walls having large signs with quotes from the bible.

Having walked around town, I decided that I would take a Kayak and explore the lake. Amazingly, the cost for hiring a kayak for one hour was only 10Q (less than £1!) and so I hired one for 3 hours – planning to kayak around the Lake as far as San Marcos and then come back to San Pedro.

  

Taking a kayak out onto the lake was very peaceful. I enjoyed just sitting in the open water in the peace and quiet and slowly making my way around the towns – San Juan and then San Pablo and eventually San Marcos. At San Juan there was a house which was half in the water which seemed a bit strange to me! But no one was living in it!

  

 As I had taken so long to get around the first couple of towns, I rushed a bit to go to San Marcos. As I went around the lake, I saw people bathing on the edges and some were even fishing. I asked them if there were many fish and they said that there weren’t many – and the ones that were there were only small. The edges of the Lake were a lot dirtier than the centre – I guess it’s because people were bathing and washing things on the edges.

  

I returned by about 6p.m. and had a shower – by which time it was time to break my fast. I met someone who was also from England who had been on the same bus as me from Antigua and we walked around town at night. I ate at a Mexican place – the quesadillas were very tasty. Later on that night I met a couple who were also on the same bus as me from Antigua and we spent a few hours in the hang out area of the hostel.

As I had planned to go to a place called the Indian Nose the following morning for sunrise, I made my way to bed soon after midnight.