Then there was 9...

Our next stop was Antigua. A visit to this colonial town is a MUST for any traveler in Guatemala. Desgnated a UNESCO World Heritage Site, Antigua is a city in the central highlands of Guatemala famous for its well-preserved Spanish Mudéjar-influenced Baroque architecture as well as a number of spectacular ruins of colonial churches.


In addition to getting great advice from fellow travelers and changing plans at the last minute the thing I love most about backpacking is meeting new people. As Laura and I are very outgoing people, with lots of traveling experience between the two of us, I feel it is really easy for us to make new friends in the traveler's circuit. Due to our persuasive and positive attitudes we have convinced many a person to not only change their original itinerary but also their entire flight plans! By time it we were ready to make our plans for Antigua, Guatemala our group had grown to 9 people: Chloe and Gail, our South African friends from the sailing trip; Shaughnessy and Fred, our friends who from our tours in San Ignacio, Belize; Lia and Ereni, our Ausie friends from Croatia whom we convinced to forgo their return to Australia and instead meet up with us in Guatemala; and Bryan my friend from high school who is currently living in Nicaragua and had to be in Guatemala City the week before for work.

our 9-some: Top: Chloe, Gail, Fed, Laura, Ereni, me and Bryan; Bottom: Lia and Shaughnessy

Together we formed an incredibly fun group! 7 of us stayed in one dorm at The Black Cat Hostel, while the Ausie ladies stayed in another. The hostel had amazing food, cheap beers and a great vibe. The staff on the other hand left A LOT to be desired. They were all quite rude and incompetent, but I guess I am just spoiled after spending so much time at Bait in Buenos Aires.

There is starting to be a pattern in our travels where the trip there is treacherous, due to either hangover, bad road conditions, cramped vans/buses, etc.... This trip was no exception. I think the 8 hour drive from Lanquin to Antigua def ranks up there in my low point for Central America! That is until we arrived... and the situation that occurred became one of the highs.

here I am acting as translator between Chloe and Rual

After making it to our destination, we were ready to be rid of the car driver, as he didn't seem to be too fond of our group of 6. After all the luggage was taken off the roof Chloe turned to us all and said, "Guys, where's my bag?" We all immediately asked what she meant, and then burst out laughing once we realized that her backpack was not amongst our other luggage. Raul, the shuttle driver, looked quite annoyed as he called our hostel in Lanquin, El Retiro, to inquire if it was still there... Sure enough Chloe had left it at reception. The funniest part was when Raul said in Spanish, "¿Puedes creer que la gringa loca dejó su mochila alla!?" (Which I then translated to our whole group: Can you believe the crazy gringo left her backpack there?!" Raul told us he would bring the back when he came back to Antigua on Sunday (it was currently Friday).

the only pants Chloe could find to buy for our hike

Well come Sunday there was too much rain and he was not able to make the trip.... but he would be coming tomorrow. The only problem was that we would be leaving for Lago de Atitlán. Luckily Chloe and Gail would be returning to Antigua one night before they headed off to Honduras. What's another 3 days without clothes? Well when we called on Monday to confirm the drop off had been made at The Black Cat, Raul said that the people working there refused to accept the responsibility of the bad. This is after we spoke to several different employees multiple times explaining the situation (like I said incompetent). I think all has been resolved as Raul left the bag at his travel agency before returning to Lanquin. We are awaiting updates from the girls tonight when they arrive back in Antigua.

Once this whole debacle was sorted out (or so we thought) we headed to our hostel to meet up with Lia and Ereni.

Lia and I sharing a beer after we met up with the Ausies

Ereni, Lia, me, Gail and Laura ontop of the bar

Several beers and burritos later we headed out for the night and went to a local Irish Pub across the street called Riley's. Honestly I think I have been to ore Irish Pubs abroad now than in the States. The night was an absolute blast! We danced the night away, spending the majority of our time on the bar. Normally I find girls who do this a little slutty (sorry if I offend any readers), but the bar was so packed that when someone offered me their hand to pull me out of the crowd I gladly accepted it. It was great being above the hot steam of the crowd.... Additionally we had prime location to order cocktails as all we had to do was lean down. I had a mega crush on an Irish bartender so I offered to do a lot of the ordering. After a necessary late-night snack we headed to bed around 2am.

lovely ladies hiking a volcano!

Only to wake up at 5am the next morning for a hike up the active Pacaya Volcano. We've decided we can always makeup the sleep, but you can't make up the fun - YOLO (You only Live Once!) That is until we drop dead from exhaustion, hehe. Anyways in addition to the 6 girls who had been out the night before, my friend Bryan was pretty exhausted himself as her had to leave Guatemala City at 4:30 am to make it to us before the hike. All worth it. The hike was very nice and not too difficult (though I can def tell I am so out of shape!). After about 1.5-2 hours hiking on loose volcano pebbles/rocks, we reached the highest point that we were allowed to traverse (tours cannot go to the top as the volcano erupted last year and there is still gas and lava at the top). In addition to the great views we also got to check out some hot holes where the steam of the volcano seeped out. I got in one and boy was it hot! In fact it was so hot that we were able to roast marshmallows in one hot hole! They were quite possibly some of the best any of us had ever had! On our way down the girls were all drawn to a table with jewelery. The man at the table told us that all of the pieces were hand crafted with lava from the eruption last year. 15% of the profits went to building new homes for the people whose homes were destroyed. After hearing the amazing story we all decided we needed to buy a few pieces!

me and Bryan, a friend from high school

the warmth of the whole was so nice at the windy top!

roasting marshmallows

new awesome game we learned called "woop, woop, woo"

After a full morning of hiking it was time to return to the hostel, eat, shower, relax, explore the town and then begin drinking again :). We decided to check out a few other bars with some people from our hostel. Antigua has a lot to offer at night....The one thing that sucks is that every place closes down at 1am. After living 9 months in a country where 1am in the start time, it is hard to adjust to such an early night. We tried to take the party back to our hostel to play some drinking game of in the common room. This was quickly thwarted by the security man..

The next day we explored the town a little bit more and then checked out the local markets. As expected I spent an obscene amount of money on presents as well as tapestries for myself. What can I say, I love markets! That night we went out to dinner to celebrate our last night together as a 9-some.