Celebrate the Month of Museums in Guatemala

Guatemala museums

May is the MONTH OF MUSEUMS. There are many great museums throughout Guatemala. Here is a listing of some that you should definitely have on your “to visit” list. GUATEMALA CITY *Casa Mima – 8a av. 14-12, z. 1, Mon-Sat., 10am-5pm; tels: (office) 2253-6657 & 2232-6902, (museum) 2253-4020; beatrizquevedo@casamima.org, casamima.org Museo Arquidiocesano de Santiago de Guatemala – 7 av. 6-73, […]

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Panajachel Feria (Fair), October in Guatemala

by Ana Flinder photos: Vicoria Stone.  Panajachel’s patron saint, St. Francis of Assisi, is honored in October with a combination of town fair, cultural dances, religous ceremonies, pyrotechnics and parades Next month brings another great opportunity to experience Guatemalan culture and festivity in a way that is very easy on the visitor, especially with the spectacular backdrop of Lake Atitlán. […]

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Ayuda – for the Health of Dogs and Cats in Guatemala

Interview by Susanne Kennedy.   Though homeless, sick, injured or starving dogs and puppies are still conspicuous in villages surrounding Lake Atitlán, the situation has been greatly improved by the tireless efforts of Selaine d’Ambrosi and her animal welfare organization Ayuda Para La Salud De Perros y Gatos. She explained how Ayuda helps these dogs and puppies as we walked […]

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The Bird-bound, Labyrinthine, “No Name Gardens” of Atitlán

Guatemala’s exquisite botanical colony plays push and shove with weed and water — and sometimes with people Everyone knows that cacti need little water. But in Guatemala’s most spectacular garden, the cacti are more watered than other plants. This is hardly the fault of the gardeners. They are not the ones doing the watering. This botanical garden abuts another Central […]

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Raging Bulls and Aging Saints

Gathering in front of the church, Santa Cruz

Time for the annual fair in Santa Cruz la Laguna The feria in Santa Cruz la Laguna is one of a kind. No other Atitlán fair is more classical, more Guatemala-in-the-rough, and more “we’re-not-in-Kansas-anymore, Toto.” There are two Santa “Cruces”: the upper, traditional town and the lower, lakeside district; they are a twain that meet at fair time like they […]

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Bird-brains to Watch Birds in Vaudeville

Martin and Zorn augur larks and laughs for Panajachel theater season

Martin and Zorn augur larks and laughs for Panajachel theater season David and Barbara Ramey were wrong about one thing. When the dramatists and retired lobster trappers began snowbirding to Panajachel years ago, they doubted that the Atitlán Basin could support a theater company, much less supply the talent. That was before they discovered the pent-up comic acumen of Jennifer […]

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Fun at the Fair

Deer dancer provide a cultural experience. (photo: Harris & Goller - viaventure.com)

Panajachel to host patron saint festivities in October St. Francis of Assisi was, among other things, the patron of animals and the environment. So it is fitting that fair week in the city named for him, San Francisco Panajachel, will include a ceremony to bless the animals. The environment will also be a theme, with many organizations involved in the […]

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Time Is Short and the Water May Rise

Can Panajachel gird up in time for the next flooding? From space, Panajachel resembles a fan on a long, broken rod. This fan abuts Central America’s deepest waters—Lake Atitlán. It looks as though the city, in mortal fear of the lake, wants to escape up the skinny gorge that forms the broken rod. In fact, the lake is the most […]

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A Walking Tour of “Old” Panajachel

Panajachel is firstly a walking city. If you drive in it, you soon tire of the paucity of two-way streets. And every rocky contour of those streets registers on the pant-seat of every chicken-bus rider. Tuktuks look fun, until you actually ride in one. And much of Pana is not overly bike-friendly. So, unless pogo sticks catch on, feet remain the preferred vehicle.

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Just call me Indio

One of Panajachel’s most colorful and asked-about personages, tourists and locals know him as a master craftsman who sells his own handiwork. Self-promoter, religious huckster, iconoclast, “loco”—Francisco Quiej has been called all these things; none is anywhere near the truth. “Indio” is what he calls himself, even though his fellow Mayas consider the term an insult. This renaming took place […]

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