Antigua

Hola From Guatemala!

I should note that I wrote this post weeks ago (this was published on Dec. 20) and am only now uploading it to the blog. I have added dates so the timeline makes a little sense.

I am currently sitting in my room at my homestay house in Antigua, Guatemala. I have been in Guatemala for about a week and a half now.

My flight left Vancouver at 8:30pm on November 12^th (happy birthday to myself). I went from Vancouver, to San Fransisco, to Houston, to Guatemala City. Each flight and layover was just short enough that I couldn’t get a decent sleep the whole night. I did manage to fit Deadpool 2 into my Vancouver to San Fransisco flight though, so that was nice. I arrived in Guatemala City in the late morning November 13^th where I took a private shuttle to Antigua, about 45 minutes away, depending on traffic. Guatemala City is infamous for adding unexpected hours to trips due to congestion.

Well before coming to Guatemala I had signed up for a week of Spanish lessons. The school provided the shuttle from the airport, 5 days of one-on-one lessons, and 7 nights with a homestay family. The homestay gave me a private room and 3 meals a day while a stayed. This was a very soft landing for me in a country that is not always easy for tourists.

Antigua is the most popular tourist city in Guatemala. It is filled with hotels, hostels, restaurants, bars, and Spanish schools. The city is expensive for Guatemala but still reasonably cheap for a Canadian. Antigua is a beautiful old (antigua actually means old in Spanish) Spanish colonial town. The streets are all cobblestone and the buildings are very colourful. The town itself quite safe, enough that I have felt comfortable walking around on my own after dark. I still stick to well lit streets and avoid excessive drinking.

My homestay house has been very full while I have been here. In addition to the family of 5 there are 2 visiting family members (they live in Ottawa!) and 3 other Spanish students. I eat my meals with the family (never the whole family) and the other students. The students are two ski instructors from Colorado and a retired university professor from Pennsylvania. The professor has been coming here for years and knows the family and Antigua very well. I was very lucky being placed with this family as they speak excellent English. The father has a very good technical understanding of both Spanish and English which has been very helpful for my learning. The family cooks high quality, varied meals. While there are some staples like re-fried beans and rice, I don’t think I’ve had the same meal twice during my stay.

My Spanish classes were split into 2 parts. I started with grammar and vocabulary from 8:00am to noon. After having lunch at home I returned to the school for conversational class from 2:00pm-4:00pm. I lucked out here as well by being assigned a teacher with over a decade of experience for the grammar and vocabulary portion. The high intensity, full day schedule was exhausting but fulfilling. It is incredible how much information you can absorb over only 30 hours. I started with some simple phrases (How are you? I am good. Where are you from? I am from Canada.), then covered some basic rules of the language, then started filling out my vocabulary. Spanish seems like a relatively easy language to learn, especially with its very consistent rules for pronunciation. Unlike English, nearly every word is pronounced exactly as it is spelled. Although at this point my Spanish is not extremely useful I think I have a good foundation to build my vocabulary on as I travel Central America.

Although school has taken up the largest portion of my time I have managed to get out into the city and have some fun. I have taken some free dance classes, been out to bars a couple of times, and even met some locals. The city itself is interesting enough to wander around in and there are plenty of great restaurants to try. In another world I could easily see myself coming here and spending most of my time in Antigua, taking tours out to attractions around the country (looking back a month after writing this I would not want to stay in Antigua for that long). One aspect of the city I haven’t really explored is the culture and history. There are plenty of churches, museums, and art exhibits which I have almost completely ignored. Unfortunately I will not have time before I leave. I wouldn’t mind coming back for another pass at Antigua before the end of my trip.

The other big activity I have done here was a hike up Acatenango, a volcano located near the city. The top of the volcano has a stunning view of the surrounding area along with Volcan de Fuego. Volcan de Fuego is an active volcano which erupts almost continuously. I will write a separate post about that hike.

Tomorrow (November 24^th) I will be taking a bus to Rio Dulce, spending a night there then taking a boat to Livingston on the Caribbean coast. I will be meeting my friends Eric and Katie in Livingston and traveling with them for a few weeks. In a way this is the “real” start of my trip as I will be leaving the extremely tourist friendly Antigua and my stable homestay family to explore the rest of Guatemala.