We arrived in the evening via ‘chicken bus’ (which was quite an experience along winding rubble roads with a bus full of friendly locals and a dodgy door!) and warmly greeted by our AirBnb host ‘Core’ who became our guide for the two days we spent here. The journey from Lanquin to Coban was straight forward enough, Coban to ‘Weywey’ (as the locals call it) was slightly more arduous.

Huehuetenango is the largest city we have been in since L.A and is set in the western highlands of Guatemala which are dry and mountainous. Not much grows here due to the lack of rain and water shortages are frequent. First thing we visited the Maya site of Zaculeu which was used for the 70s film Tarzan and has been mostly plastered in concrete for preservation. This ruin was one of the last strongholds of the Maya against the Spanish conquistadors in the 1700s. There were parties of school children running around the site celebrating carnival (Shrove Tuesday) with confetti in their hair ‘pica pica’ which Core says means itchy itchy!

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Core drove us an hour or so up into the mountains to the traditional village of Todos Santos Chuchumen where the locals all wear colourful traditional dress, fascinating, it was like travelling back in time 50 years or so. The children had bought decorated eggs and flour bags which they were pelting each other with (another carnival custom). We visited a local weaver to see a woman’s’ top being made with many colourful threads, a process which can take up to a month. On the way back we stopped off at Core’s friends small holding to see his stroppy drama llamas! Afterwards we drove down to El Mirador (the lookout) to see the sun set over the city and see the lights twinkle on as the sky darkened.

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Our second day (6th March) was brilliant, we left around 8am and set off for Laguna Magdalen in a hired pickup truck. After rumbling along the incredibly dusty and potholed dirt roads for a couple of hours we had to leave the truck behind as it couldn’t gain enough traction in the mud to climb the hills. We were more than happy to hike the last 2-3 hours to the lake through pine forests, small rural settlements and along mountainous paths. We came a cross an old man with a new axe, machete on his belt and a blood splatted cowboy hat, he couldn’t be happier to meet us! He was very friendly and remarked how tall we both were as he walked with us for a while before heading back up the hills with his sheep and faithful dogs in tow. It’s amazing how remote some peoples’ lives still are, he must’ve been in his sixties.

 

Laguna Magdalen had a very spiritual feel about it, so calm and quiet. We only saw one other family there and a sweet dog who followed us around for a while even sharing our watermelon and pineapple! We found a family home near the Laguna and kindly (for a small sum 100 Queztals) a man and his eight-year-old boy gave us a lift back down to our truck. The boy was more than happy sitting next to me in the front as I shared my grapes with him, even keeping a few, presumably to share with his younger sister back at the house. We returned to El Mirador before sunset to eat a nice lamb dinner at the coffee house there named ‘Café del Ceilo’ - Coffee from the Gods before heading back for an early night ready to set off for Lake Aitilan in the morning.