While staying at Panajachel, we went on a Lake Atitlán boat ride, which was beautiful! As we buzzed around the lake looking at the majestic volcanoes, we stopped at various villages along the shores of Lake Atitlán.
Video Tour: Boat Ride on Lake Atitlán
Take a look at the boat ride and the places where we visited along the shores of the lake:
When we arrived at our fist destination of Santa Catalina, we saw a baptism taking place! The people were singing a Christian song at the service they were having down by the water. Our boat man waited for us as we got out of the boat and spent about half an hour at this location.
We watched women weaving cloth right in front of our eyes. The women have been weaving this cloth generation after generation, and each tribe has unique colors to wear. The wall hangings are beautiful and often have “Guatemala” woven into them.
I love seeing all the bright colors of the merchandise:
We stopped and watched women making corn tortillas from scratch, frying them on a large flat skillet the size of a table. People would come here to buy their tortillas.
Each town that we visited had at least one church. San Antonio had two churches side-by-side in the whitewashed Spanish style of architecture. Most of the beautiful churches are Catholic, as the Evangelical churches tend to be simpler buildings.
As you can see in the video, at San Antonio we climbed up a hill and down a narrow alleyway where roosters crowed. You can see the destitute poverty of the area as houses are crowded up against each other.
At the third stop, the rain fell heavily (since it was rainy season), and we ended up eating lunch. A couple of hours later when the lightning and thunder stopped, the boatman was allowed to take us back to Panajachel.
Stay tuned for out next installment of our Guatemala Adventure series, and like our MK page to not miss any posts!