215: What it's like to live with A LOCAL FAMILY ON LAKE ATITLAN

In this video we take you with us to explore Lake Atitlan with its incredible views, endless hiking trails, talented artists, and a homestay that forever changed our lives. We have just arrived at Lake Atitlan and we are now getting on the public taxi to San Juan. So we're really excited to tell you about Lake Atitlan and our experience there. I had been to the lake about 20 years ago for a friend's wedding and had a great time and I was excited for Brown to get to see that. Atitlan has so many amazing things to do. It is a must-see if you're traveling to Guatemala especially because it's so close to Antigua. You can pair the two places together and have a great time in both. We just look back on this experience as one of the richest of our traveling days. I mean we've been a lot of places in the world but this was one of the best ones and we can't wait to give you all the details. And guys if you like videos like this how about hitting that subscribe button, hit the like button, share this video, leave some comments. We want to hear from you. We thank you so much patrons. We appreciate all of you and just wanted to mention your names and give all of you credit. Why don't we talk about where we stayed in Lake Atitlan because there are a lot of towns that you have the option to stay in but we chose one in particular and that was what we think is the best town on the lake. Normally to get this kind of information you got to join our online platinum program but this is a tidbit that we're passing on for free okay and the name of the place is San Juan. Yeah the town is really traditional. It's a Mayan town that prohibits foreigners from coming in and purchasing land. It's very pure in terms of it is all locals and we love that aspect of it for the cultural part of it but also for language. With the culture also comes the artwork, the language, the food, their traditions, everything. Yeah their town is known and the people are known for their weaving and then also their painting and artistic work. So all of the buildings had paintings on them which they were absolutely beautiful. You can look at a fabric and tell it's from Guatemala and that history goes way back to the Spanish. It's a reflection on the people and their culture and all of the women there dressed in traditional weaved clothing. They didn't wear western clothing so walking the streets was just a beautiful experience and because we were the only foreigners or one of the only foreigners staying in town we had them all to ourselves and it was pretty incredible. It's very family oriented. It's not diluted that experience by a bunch of westerners. It's one of the things that makes this place very special. Yeah the backpackers or visitors would come during the day light hours and then in the afternoon they would leave because the water taxis would stop in the late afternoon. So it was a wonderful experience staying in San Juan. If you want the backpacker experience and you want the nightlife and the bars and the parties there's definitely other places to stay. While we were in San Juan we actually decided to stay in a homestay with traditional Mayans and that was the most amazing experience. And I found it on Airbnb and you know we're in Guatemala let's save some money while we're traveling too. And I found this place and we'll leave a link down below for $12 a night. Like that's even cheaper than the places we've stayed in Indonesia. And I'm like why not be super cheap and let's book it for the whole week and get the one night discount. And you know what could be the worst thing that happened. It was a great stay. Our hosts Graciela and Diego are just the most precious people. This is like my Guatemalan grandmother is the host of our place and she is making breakfast for us. And this is the birthday boy. We just enjoyed being part of their family and the room that we stayed in was literally within their living space. You didn't have a This is our sink. These are the dogs. They come with the program. Here's Benji the famous dog. Here is our room which is big enough to sleep in. And then behind the dog which we'll see later is the shower. And this is the bathroom. Bless you. And then look at the view. Out here. Who says we don't have a good view? Right? Oh man that's beautiful. So we have a breakfast here with fried plantains, black beans, and eggs. And we have some coffee. Oh that looks so good. Diego has a really interesting business. He purifies water for the community and we'll show his factory here in just a little bit. So Graciela made these tortillas fresh. Wow. Graciela makes her own coffee here. Oh wow. You make it here. Wow. This is Reina. The other huge advantage of staying with Graciela was that she is a traditional weaver. We had the opportunity to see her weave and go through the process of how she winds her yarn, how she dyes it, and then how she actually weaves and where she does that which was absolutely fascinating. There were two really special events that happened while we were at the house. One was Brown's birthday. Is that the right country? I don't think so. But we told them in the morning that it was Brown's birthday and they were so cute. First of all Reina loves birthdays and wanted to make a big deal about the birthday and was upset that she didn't know about it in advance. We came back, I don't know, three or four o'clock in the afternoon. It was pouring rain and we were just kind of resting in the room and we heard this super loud music pumping through our door and we thought, well that's odd because the family is very respectful, very quiet. I mean it sounded like we had a band in our room. Really? But anyway probably 30 minutes later there was a knock on the door and Graciela was standing there with Reina. Look who's here for my birthday! And it was hilarious because there was a portable speaker that was in front of the door facing into the room and Graciela explained to us that Reina wanted to play the traditional birthday music for Brown for his birthday and was hoping that the music would draw us out of the room. Well you know we didn't end up getting out because we just didn't know that that was what it was. Reina was so intent on making sure Brown celebrated his birthday well and then they gave him a beautiful woven scarf that Graciela made. Treasure forever. Yeah. It was fantastic and just they don't have to do that. No. And you know that scarf she probably could have made three times what we paid in one day to stay there but that family is that generous and sweet. That was amazing. Just one of many examples of their of their kindness. The other really special event was that they invited us to go to church with them and I told Graciela we don't travel with any kind of formal clothes we only have casual t-shirts shorts and I said is it okay that we wear what we were wearing? She said I have something for you. Well she decided to dress me up in traditional Mayan clothing. Oh it was so sweet. It was amazing. You look great. And the number of people on the street that just were their mouths just dropped open when they saw us walking uh up the street to get a tuk-tuk to get to church on time it was really funny and just so kind of them. Yeah. Graciela gave me her clothes to wear and I just appreciated that so much. And we love going to church wherever we're traveling because it's just a great way to meet the local people and also to get exposed to the local culture. And through the services reflect a lot of the culture. It was a three-hour church service. But then afterwards they served everyone a cup of coffee and tamales. We were the only Westerners in the church. We're the only Westerners eating with them and I don't know how you guys like to travel but we like to be with the people. It just makes such a more rich experience and if you've never done a homestay you gotta try one. So just a really special experience that we will always remember. So the town of San Juan is fantastic to do a lot of activities even in the towns nearby but I think one of the favorite things that we loved was just walking around the town of San Juan. It was so cute as we said earlier the town people really take pride in their artwork and they also make chocolate and they have coffee plantations. We also spent some time where they grow the honeybees. Here are little beehives in this cooperative and they're showing you the different types and look how small these bees are coming in and out. That's crazy. So that's going to produce a different flavor, right? And they combine chocolate and honey to make a confection. How about that place that we went to? The women's cooperative. You've got to go to this place. It's women who are trying to make a business but can't afford to do that on their own so they've joined with I think it's 40 other women. They have a stage with all the weaving equipment and a demonstration and they demonstrate in a very simple way but it's very educational and entertaining how they do all of this and even down to the types of natural dyes that they dye their cotton with and after that I mean you've got to buy something because you're just surrounded by beautiful fabrics and they're less money than a lot of the touristy places because they don't have the overhead, the middleman. It all goes directly to these ladies and they all sell their wares in the store and they basically tag their products with their number and a portion of that goes to the store and then more of it goes to the woman who created the weaving. And I think they take turns staffing it also. They also grow their own cotton. Yeah. And use that to create their thread. It was an amazing experience. Another wonderful thing that we did was to climb San Pedro Volcano. It is the poor man's. It's the smart man's. The smart man's and it's just right there. The reason it's the smart man's Acatenango is it's only three hours straight up instead of five hours or six hours straight up. Acatenango is insane. And it's a one day deal instead of a two day deal and you don't have all this crazy stuff. You don't need special gear. Today we are going for a big climb. It's gonna be bigger than we think I think. Altitude 10,000 feet. We're excited. Hopefully we'll be able to climb the volcano and get a great view. We are in San Pedro. The tuk-tuk could not take us to the start of the hike because the rules of the tuk-tuks, they're not allowed. They're only allowed to drive around the town that they're from. So he can only drop us off at this spot. Since he's not allowed to drive us all the way up, we have to hike up to the start of the trip. So that's what we're doing. We need some extra exercise. That's right. All right we gave in and got in another tuk-tuk. Oh yeah we're donating to the local economy here. Got the tuk-tuk at least to the trail start. Time for pain. Adios. So far the path has taken us through coffee plantation and avocado trees. I stuck an avocado that was ripe in Ron's backpack. It'll be a nice snack along the way. You evil woman. Look how beautiful that is. We made it to the 2,000 mark. 1,300 more. We got the tuk-tuk tire steps. Wow we just made it up here. It's been about an hour of hiking and we got two more to go at least. A beautiful view. Oh all that only 200 meter elevation change. This is gonna... We're getting higher. This is gonna hurt. That farmer's in crazy good shape. 2,500 meters above sea level. Si, muy bien. Wow. How does it uh return it? Uh-huh. Uh three. One, two, three. Okay. Oh yeah. Oh that was awesome. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Oh that was really cool. What a wonderful stop. Oh my goodness 2,400. Still got 900 meters to go. These are really cool. It's a flower that looks like a chicken claw. It's amazing. Everywhere. 2,600 meters. That means we've got 600 meters to go. Boy it's tough. It's getting tougher. I heard it was tough but you know I was underestimating the altitude and the steepness. And how out of shape we are. Oh yeah. We just saw where the chicken claw comes from. That's super exotic isn't it? Oh this is really exotic. Flip it around. All right we're pretty toast right now. Man this is tough. You need to get in shape before you do this because it's uh the altitude kicks in. We can see everyone's sitting up on the rocks. We're so close. The guides have warned us that the rain is coming in so we need to go and the clouds are definitely here so hopefully it won't be raining on our way down. We made it. Yay. I think one of our favorite things that we did though was the Indian's Nose sunrise hike which we woke up literally at the crack of dawn probably 3 30 in the morning. Yeah that is the most bang for the buck and also with the least amount of effort to get up there. We were still hurting when we did this. That had an incredible view because unlike San Pedro you're up there while the sun's coming up. We were really hoping that the van that the van shows up for our trip up to the top of the Indian's Nose today. It's supposed to be a sunrise up there. The rooster's up. And so are we. It's not as high up but the angle's even better. You get a full length view of the lake instead of just a partial view from San Pedro. And on a really clear day you can see the smoke rising from Fuego which is near Antigua. And that was happening. And this just changes the light while the sun's coming up. I didn't want to leave. It was beautiful. Fantastic. But our guide who took us up there he was awesome and he's a coffee grower so he had to get to work. That's his primary job. He does this every morning. That was really special. You can tell Atitlan is a place for hiking. One of the best activities that you can do on the lake. We were able to from San Juan just take a an easy 10 minute walk to the bottom of Mirador and hike up that. And that was probably 30 minutes up. And it was a little bit lower than the Indian's Nose or a lot lower I should say than the Indian's Nose. But the view was really beautiful and it was an easy hike. Oh yeah we're up here on the mountain overlooking San Juan which is where we're staying. And just the colors and the artwork. I want you to notice this. I don't even want to walk on it. It's so beautiful. But just take a look at the painting. So here's the deal. Do all three of them but do that one first and then do Saint Pedro and then do Indian's Nose. Don't do Indian's Nose and then Mirador because it's the least impressive but it's quick and it's even cheaper. And that deck that they have up there with the painting was spectacular. One of the things that we loved to do while we were on the lake was actually take the water taxi to other towns on Lake Atitlan. It's a beautiful day in San Juan and today we are headed to San Pedro by boat. And the water taxi part was some of the best time that we had. It was just crossing the lake on the boat. Pick a clear day and just get on the boats. Just fascinating to see the towns up on the hillside and also see the houses along the side and just the whole lake life. Each of the towns had their own personality and you get to really experience that. One of our favorite towns was San Pedro. One of the reasons why it was our favorite was because a lot of Israelis had settled there and so the food was outstanding. I think we went back there three times to just have something to eat. Yeah and there you could book stuff, travel in, out, around. And that's where the backpackers hang out. I think the other town that we enjoyed was Santa Catarina and we were able to go to the botanical gardens from there as well. That was right off of Panajachel. The views were beautiful but overall we loved being in San Juan and spent a lot of time there. Thank you so much for watching. We hope that our information was helpful to you. See you next week!