Lake Atitlan

I woke up this morning to stand on my balcony, three hundred feet up a cliff over lake Atitlan. Three volcanos reaching to twelve thousand feet stand before me on the opposite shore. The night before I drove over an eight thousand foot pass in the mountains. The fog raced the sunset to see what would limit our visibility first. In the dark we descended to the lake at five thousand feet. There was a late night rummaging of gear in a parking lot. We would leave the cars here to find a boat to carry us along the lake to our hotel.

We were too late for the scheduled boat so Walter tracked down a private ride for us. I love arriving at night to a new place and the feeling of anticipation it brings. “What will this place be like in the morning light?” The moon, blocked by clouds, wasn’t giving much away except a hint of outlines of vast mountains. It was a warm night and the dark ride over fresh water was a dreamy kind of pleasant.

We arrived at a dock, stumbled off the boat to schlep our massive pile of crap up the stairs. The stairs wound around climbing steeply. I had my head lamp on, wondering, “Where are we going?”
At the top I found a beautiful hotel. Crashing out was imperative.

In the morning the place was revealed. The lake, a deep turquoise blue, the volcanos, small towns reaching up the slopes. I didn’t think we were too far up till I saw the tiny boats of the local fishermen below. I had breakfast with the gang on the deck in bright sun light. Pancakes and eggs. The view is in a club with few members.

The days plan WAS paragliding. But on the boat ride to town we started to encounter white caps on the lake. The spray sent Don into a tight embrace of the expensive camera. I told Keith we could forget flying as the wind was way too strong and exactly the wrong direction.
In a way this was good. The weather was decisively bad. We wouldn’t waste any time on parawaiting. We went back to our parked cars, rummaged through the gear, packed up for plan “B”, tour, by boat, the towns around the lake.

Keith wanted to interview Walter about the lake and it’s communities, but we needed to find a spot where the wind wouldn’t blow away the audio. We sheltered in a little bay that was slightly less windy. I got on the roof of the boat to hold the microphone over Keith and Walter’s heads.

Walter talked about the lake, that it was a crater from a massive volcano that erupted eighty five thousand years ago. The explosion was so powerful that all life in Guatemala was extinguished. The ash landed as far away as Asia.

As Walter started on about the local cultures, I, upon the roof noticed, a dark line on the lake followed by large closely packed white caps. The shit was heading for the fan. Moments later I was rocked about on the slick fiberglass roof, looking for the nonexistent hand holds. We had gotten what we wanted so it was time to get the gear under cover and head on.

The first town we went to Santiago, the Mayan people all dress in their traditional clothes. Each place ha s it’s own designs a patterns. The clothes themselves are hand woven on looms. The colors are bright, the designs intricate. I soon noticed that all the women would scatter at the sight of the camera. Don , the with monster camera on his shoulder, was playing the part of Moses, parting the sea of women. Walter explained that the local women had seen picture of themselves in galleries in town for, what is to them, very high prices. As they didn’t get a dime of it, them decided to dodge the cameras from there on out. This torture for the photographer. The bright colors of their cloths, the babies nestled in one arm, the wrapped parcel of goods balanced on their heads, make great pictures.

Walter knows the locals as a tourist guide and has friends that agree to have their pictures taken. At one stall a long the road a women insisted on dressing Keith in Local garb. SO on went a pink and white striped shirt, a brown, mini skirt (Which I’m sure has a more elegant Mayan name.) and a head scarf. Keith, at six five, two hundred and thirty pounds, blue eyed looked.... Well, no one would mistake him for a Mayan. When he was all dressed up, the women said something to Keith that got Walter laughing. When pressed for details He translated for us. “She says you have a face like a baby.” We wanted to shoot the loom and someone making the cloth the shirt were made of, but the place was too dark for the camera.

I broke down and finally spent some money. I got blue and black striped shirt with a few yellow stripes here and there. I was then elevated to coolest dressed person on the team. Eight bucks by the way.

Back on the boat we were off to the next town. (San Antonio, but not Texas!) The lake was still windy and we got splashed and sprayed as the boat bucked around. The monster camera got tucked away as the little camera was pulled out.

It’s hard to think of the little camera as a mere back up. In any other situation it would be the deluxe super camera. It was only in the light of the monster camera that it was over shadowed.

As we came close to shore I could see the women in the lake washing their cloths. Out on the lake the men were cutting reeds and fishing. The boat are carved from one huge tree trunk. Boards are set, to on the sides making the boat deeper.

We headed into town in two tuc tucs, a motorize three wheeled taxi with a rag top, no doors. In town there were basket ball courts. Keith got in a pick up game with the Mayan kids. A little tree on three game. None of the kids were even up to Keith’s shoulders. We then did the church/market thing before getting back in the boat to head back to the hotel.