Gringas Alert!

This weekend provided a wonderful mix of much needed rest and adventure. All the guide books state that Pana is a tourist town. I did not see this to be true during the week. Friday morning, however, as the buses from Antigua trickled in, Pana became more and more crowded. While I was studying by the lake and walking around town I saw more and more Gringos and Guatemalans who were here for the weekend. The town was now crawling with people who did not know where to go and were being taken advantage of by the venders. It amazed me that after only 5 days in Pana, that I felt like a local. Today the town is back to the normal hum and level of business.

Lena, Kathryn and I were all very tired. We all agreed to sleep in on Saturday. Well, let me qualify, wake up around 5 or 6 from the noises but remain in bed and dose off and on until 730. We agreed to speak English with each other so we could have some fellowship and rest our minds. English was like music to my ears! I was able to communicate without thinking! With the goal of exploring the other towns on the lake and enjoying a boat ride across the lake we agreed to meet at the docks at Pana. There are several ways of accomplishing our goal and we were just playing it by ear. You can take a big slow boat that goes to several towns during the day, you can take a lancha...a small private boat... to one town, you can take a lancha to several towns. The lanchas are much faster that the big cruise type boats.

Remember that there are many tourist in Pana on the weekends, so the docks were crawling with tourist and venders. No sooner had we met each other that a lancha driver pounced on us quoting us a price of 450Q per person to take us to three towns on the lake. It was then we learned that the lancha were faster than the big boats. We said no we could find cheaper. He persisted with the price trying to convince us it was a great price. We walked away to discuss what we wanted to do. Within 30 seconds the man was back quoting us a price of 350Q a person. We negotiated with 350Q total. He agreed. We may be gringos, but we know when were are being taken advantage of.

We went down to the boat and met the driver Luis. We were off to San Pedro. The lake is much bigger than I realized taking about 30 to 40 minutes to cross from Pana to San Pedro. As we neared the San Pedro, Volcano San Pedro appeared to get taller and taller. It reminded me of the landscape in Hawaii. In both landscapes you can see the tracks where the lava flowed. Here though the land is more rounded. In Hawaii, the land is more jagged. The volcanoes ascend right out of the water. The shore is dotted with the towns.

San Pedro is the next biggest town after Pana. It is where the hippies moved when Pana became too touristy. San Pedro has a small tourist market between the two docks by the shore. We decided to climb up the steep hill to the main part of San Pedro. San Pedro has at least 4 Baptist churches. We also found a local market with fresh vegetables and fruit, traditional clothing and yarn to make traditional clothing. The buildings were not as colorful and the town was not as busy as Pana. The big find here was the art work. It was here that we saw the traditional artwork for the first time. We looked in several galleries before returning to the first one that had the artist painting right there. Once again they locals start with a high price. If you stick to your guns you are able to get a good deal most of the time. At the appointed time we returned to the docks to find Luis. Luis was no where to be found. We instantaneously thought that he had left us. Within a minute though, Luis popped out from a big boat that he had tied his boat to.

We then continued along the shore across the lake from Pana to Santiago Atitlan. This provided a different view of the volcanoes. Here we could truly see that Toliman and Atitlan were indeed two separate volcanoes. Toliman actually has two peaks like a camel. We asked Luis where to eat lunch. He recommended Pescados. The directions he gave were it is straight ahead. As soon as we stepped off the boat we were hounded by locals trying to sell of bags, bracelets, scarves, etc. They were very aggressive. As we continued on our way to the restaurant, we walked through the market. There was more selection of things to buy, but the people were so aggressive that we decided not to buy anything there. We did find the restaurant at the top of the hill.
This was the first experience where the difference in the dollar and the quetzal was very apparent. We walked into a very nice restaurant where the waiters were wearing white button down shirts and black neckties. We chose to sit outside on the patio. The table was covered with a white table cloth and another coral cloth in the center. It was also here that for the first time I was truly struck with the difference between gringos and the locals. I will discuss this further in another post. There were two boys about 10 years old who were hanging around the resturant. They would simply come stand by the table and stare at you. After a minute or two they would ask for 1 or 5 Q. Even after you said no, they would continue to stand there staring. One of the boys appeared to have diplegic cerebral palsy walking with a crouched gait with significant internal rotation and adduction. He was asking gringos if they wanted to see his house. If you gave him 5Q, he would take you to his house. We did not do this, but witnessed several others do so. Also there was a group of kiddos that had two chicks that had been dyed hot pinked and neon yellow. A gringo couple who was also eating at the restaurant asked if they could take a picture of the chicks. They proceeded to take the chicks out of the plastic bag put them on their table. After taking a picture of them, the couple gave them 10Q. We all had a wonderful meal. I had black gill fish that was breaded with breadcrumbs and lime. The cost of the meal was $7.

When we arrived back to the dock, we asked Luis to take us to San Antonio Palopo. This is a town on the same side of the lake as Pana. This town is not a common tourist town. The town is sitauated on a hill so everyone can see a lancha coming to the one dock from a long way off. As soon as we docked there were two women selling their products. They were pretty aggressive as well. The one woman did admit which of the scarves were handmade and which were not. After getting by them, we climb the steep hill to find a shop with several looms set up and women working throughout the shop. It was amazing to see the looms and their work was very high quality. We then continued up the hill to the church. As I was walking up the hill a local comes running down the hill with her arms spread wide to show the large piece of colorful cloth she wanted to sell. This town was like a game of shoots and ladders with staircases and walkways that led to deadends while others led to a lower level of the town.