Jaunted in Guatemala: San Pedro La Laguna
4/16/2007 at 4:14 PM
Tags: Budget Travel, Drug Culture, Jaunted Field Trips, Volunteer Travel, Guatemala Field Trip (all tags)
Claire Duffett lives in New York City and recently completed a 10-day trip from Guatemala City to Antigua, Lake Atitalan, Tikal, and the cayes of Belize.
Not a bad way to escape this downright dreary North East April weather, huh? Claire will be sharing her field trip experience with us over the next week. Enjoy.
Oh, and if you have any questions about traveling to Guatemala, now would be the time to ask.
San Pedro La Laguna boasts two primary appeals: scenery and drugs. Locals offer gringos a kayak and heroine in the same breath, we joked. Without judgment, they want to sell tourists what they want to buy. If rowing makes you high, so be it. If you require pot, LSD, or cocaine, you're in luck.
MORE
Personally, I opted for kayaking. Although I forgot to put sunscreen on my winter white legs, and could have used something to numb the pain that evening.
The town rests on the southwest bank of Lake Atitlan, cut into the bottom of the towering Volcan San Pedro. The lake, rumored to be an ancient sunken volcano, is 12 miles long by 7.5 miles wide, and reaches to 5,000 feet deep.
The drug culture in this town lends the place a laidback, no judgments air to which expats flock. The beauty of the landscape and the genuinely kind attitude of the locals and the travelers save San Pedro from the depravity to which most hedonistic towns sink. Foreigners seek San Pedro for self-discovery and escape, we learned talking to long-term visitors. Jen, our waitress at local hotspot Freedom, told us she left her hometown Montreal six months ago. "I told myself I'd come for awhile," she said. "Then awhile became forever."
A few travelers even come to volunteer. Many evangelical Christian families, mostly Tz'utujil-speaking Mayans, live on the outskirts of San Pedro. Volunteers study and teach Spanish, or provide health care education. Many spend extra time in other towns dotting Lake Atitlan, like Santa Cruz, Santiago, and San Antonio Polapo. These places offer the same beauty without the heavy tourist foot traffic of San Pedro or Panajachal, Atitlan's main port town.
Phrases like "Dios es Vida," (God is Life) in metallic silver letters adorn the hoods of residents' trucks, while our European waiter wore a T-shirt listing marijuana's many nicknames. The devout locals and liberal travelers strike a delicate balance and seem to tolerate and sometimes even enjoy one another. There are few reports of any altercations. Although we saw several "go home gringos" and "down with Bush" signs while walking around town.
San Pedro's youth is at the center of the struggle to retain the town's heritage among the ever-growing encroachment of European values.
Late one night, after watching a flamethrower at Freedom, we walked back to our hostel. On the path leading to the Santiago dock, we stumbled upon a school dance in the street. Parents set up a sound system and dance floor. Teenagers paired off for a fast-paced couples dance while adults stood to the side keeping a watchful eye.
The girls all wore traditional Guatemalan garb: long-sleeved lace tops and woven wrap-around wool skirts. While the boys all dressed like kids from my high school: jeans, polo shirts, and sneakers.
Leave a Comment
Not yet a member? Click here to become a member.
Already a member? Login below: