We left Antigua at 8am on Friday to head for Lake Atitlan. the journey took about 3 hours over some pretty interesting roads and even over a small stream at one stage. We arrived at Panajachel, the largest of the towns around the lake and after eventually finding our hostel (Sotz), dropped our stuff off and went exploring. We walked up and down the main road lookng for a place to eat lunch and to book a boat tour for the next day. We finally found a place with a...

The journey to Antigua was a lot smoother than from Flores to Semuc. We had good company on the bus and the roads were a lot smoother. We had decided to stay in Antigua for a few days as all the moving around every couple of days was exhausting. It was time to relax. We got to Hostel Holistico and settled in. The owner, Cesar and his friend, Sergio led us to a decent and cheap local restaurant, where they generously paid for booze for the group (there were 7 of...

Semuc Champey was a 9 hour bus journey from Flores. I was seriously regretting the decision to go there just a couple of hours in, as my butt cheeks started to go numb. Luckily, our time in Semuc was worth the torturous journey. We arrived into Lanquin, the nearest town to Semuc. The journey into Lanquin itself is amazing. We rode up steep inclines on worse than terrible roads, but against a backdrop of lush green mountains and valleys. At points the bus w...

Flores is a tiny town on an island on Lake Peten Itza. I could tell as soon as we arrived that I would like this little town with it's cobbled streets, tiny coloured buildings and lakeside location. We were dropped off at Los Amigos hostel (this hostel was great - it had a mini jungle in the middle with tables, chairs and hammocks around it, as well as a good food menu and decebt bar) and without really thinking things through booked ourselves onto a sunris...