I awoke the morning of our long bus ride to Lago de Atitlan with a volcanic stomach - my timing with this sort of thing is terrible. The torturous bus ride took 14 hours as we had to detour due to some protesters blocking the main road (this extended the trip by 4 hours). We arrived after dark at our secluded lakeside lodging, Em sat down to a 'family dinner' with the other guests (as tends to be done in Guatemalan accommodation), i went to bed after an entire day without food and feeling woeful. Occasionally when travelling I find myself wishing I was home, not very often, but this was definitely one of those days.
Waking the next morning and savouring the stunning vista of beautiful Lake Atitlan couldn't have provided a better antidote to my travelling woes. The lake was as still as a millpond, the birds singing sweetly and the abundance of flowers (especially orchids) just made the whole place magical. Welcome to Guatemala, where Mother Nature got truly creative. Aldous Huxley (of Brave New World fame) apparently described this place thus - "Lake Como, it seems to me, touches on the limit of permissibly picturesque, but Atitlán is Como with additional embellishments of several immense volcanoes. It really is too much of a good thing."
The waters of Lake Atitlan fill a caldera (a crater left after a volcanic eruption) which was created about 100,000 years ago when there was a rather dramatic volcanic bang. Geologists have identified the line of sediment that corresponds to this eruption as far as north as Florida and far south as Peru! Lake Atitlan doesn't have any outlets so all the water that feeds into it from rains have to seep into the soil/rock, consequently after several wet years in a row the water level has risen by about 6m. There are numerous low lying hotels, shops, jetties and patios that are visible below the water level due to the dramatic rise. Our hostel had something resembling the lost city of Atlantis below the water, which made for great exploring with goggles when taking a dip, which we did often.
Day two after my illness, Em and I decided to get up at dawn and climb Vulcan San Pedro. Silly move. I wasn't yet completely healthy and after 48 hours without absorbing much food or water my body quickly decided it didn't like climbing mountains. Em bounded up the stairs, but politely pretended that she was tired at points to help me along. The trek was about 3 hours straight up the side of the mountain and was quite the climb, it reminded me of Sri Pada in Sri Lanka.
Our guide Carlos, ambivalent to my condition, pushed us up the volcano at a rate of knots, despite me dragging the chain, we still past several groups and weren't overtaken by anyone on our ascent or descent. The walk provided a number of opportunities to savour the sights from high above Lake Atitlan, the clouds even kindly cleared for us when we reached the summit. Sadly (?), the volcano has been dormant for quite a while so no steam or lava was seen (although a volcano has recently erupted in Guatemala and we could see the steam exiting that volcano far in the distance).
Em and I totally feel in love with Lake Atitlan and our hotel, Casa del Mundo was so blissful that we camped there an extra night, a valuable thing on an itinerary getting tighter and tighter. The extra day was spent savouring their beautiful roman style patios that adjunct the lake, the warming morning sun and afternoon storms that frequent this part of the world. What a magic place.