JAN 15, 2016 – After all the language lessons and hikes, I only had two nights left to spend in San Pedro, at lake Atitlán. My original plan had been to stay there longer, perhaps in several villages around the lake, but then I made the Spanish lessons a priority. During my day in San Pedro, I first hiked to the volcano with the same name – this one was safe to do as a solo hike – and then visited the coffee plantations and a local processing plant with a guide I had met on the summit. In town, I drank the best espresso I’d had in a long time, made from organic beans grown on the slopes of the volcano. Sadly, though, many people in Guatemala drink imported instant coffee. San Pedro is a weird place: It has a main street full of tourists, with restaurants, hotels, an American-owned party hostel and one or two clubs, but just a few meters up the hill, its inhabitants go about their daily business, largely undisturbed by the gringos. The cheap accommodation prices attract hippies and long-term travellers, but they don’t seem to blend with the locals much.
From San Pedro, I took a van directly to the airport of Guatemala City. I skipped the capital entirely in favor of volcanoes and language lessons. I don’t know what I missed, but generally I’m not a big fan of large cities without a functional rapid transit system, so it was an easy decision.