A Two-Day Travel Guide to Lake Atitlán, Guatemala – Panajachel, San Pedro and Selina Hostels

Do you love spontaneous adventures, travel tips and stories that will inspire you to pack up and go? Well, welcome to the Wigging It Travel Podcast. I'm James, your host, and each week I bring you travel tales, practical advice and interviews with travelers from around the globe. Whether you're planning a big trip or just dreaming about one, you'll find everything from hidden gems to epic fails because travel is not perfect and that is what makes it beautiful. So grab your backpack and let's wing it.

New episodes every Monday, wherever you get your podcasts and on YouTube too. You can find Winging It, a more fantastic travel podcast from around the world at voyerscape.com. The link is in the show notes. Let's go and explore the world. Hello and welcome to this week's episode. And today I'm talking about Lake Ataslan in Guatemala, which is where I headed from Antigua. If you've been following the podcast, you kind of realize I'm going every other week, kind of in order of my trip in Central America. So this was...

the middle part of Guatemala. Had a great few days in Antigua climbing the volcano, checking out the town. It was time to move on to the lake and then eventually to Tical, which will be the next episode. In Lake Atatlan, I decided to stay at Panahachel, which is the main hub for locals and backpackers and the easiest place to get to. I actually stayed there because I need to get out of there to Guatemala City Airport to go to Tical. So for me, it was a shuttle bus for 15 US dollars with Gecko Explorer online and it takes around two to three hours. For my stay here,

I actually decided to stay at a Selena hostel, which is a huge chain of hostels in Latin America. This was recommended by a few travellers on my podcast. So I want to tick that off and stay there. But my word is expensive. mean, I'm paying around a hundred to 120 Canadian dollars a night for a cabin and that's with a shared bathroom for me. Pricy bit of a treat. And I was hoping to really enjoy my stay there. The amenities are great.

When you get there, they've got all the things you can imagine. So they've got a pool area, a bar, restaurant, top notch wifi, a great breakfast, good coffee as well. And it's right in the centre of town by the waterfront. So it's a great location and a great hostel, but the vibe was lacking for me. Not many backpackers about. The highlight was bumping into a friend of mine who was on the hike with on the volcano. So for me.

Worth it if you've got the money, it is a very easy hostel to stay in but for price of that I think there's much better value in Panahatchel or any of the towns around the lake. On the way to Panahatchel you do stop off at a few viewpoints, some great views at top of the lake. My word this day was dreaming, 20 degrees warm, not cloud and sight, great colours, unbelievable. As I checked into Selena Hostel I walked out of there straight away pretty much and got on to see the town. I went straight to the waterfront.

to see the viewpoint of the lake. There's a couple of places down there. You will get hassled a little bit by the locals trying to get you to go on a boat. I'll come to the local boat in a minute, but for now you can walk along the front, take in the views, and there's a little beach down there as well to chill out. Very, very nice. And I must admit, it's kind of given me candor vibes actually. The lake is pretty awesome, it's pretty big, calm water. Do know what? Being by the lake, being by water, you just can't beat it, can you? Great feeling straight away. Love being there.

and it's time to go and check out our first coffee of course. Guatemala has lived up to the hype so far and a very popular place in town to go for a coffee is Cafe Loco. Put that in your maps. It's a must have. You can buy coffee there, coffee beans, they'll grind it for you as well. You can sit at the bar, have a coffee, you can order the beans online and get them sent to your house. South Korean family owns that, very welcoming, great to chat to, very popular with backpackers and locals. And if you stay at a Selena hostel, they'll give you a free welcome drink.

and they have a bar on the waterfront. Good sunset views, bit of a drink, bit of a dance if you want to, quite popular, bit loud for my liking, but hey, not too bad for free. And Selena will offer these sort of activities throughout your stay and you can book anything there. Could be like a tour, a coffee tour, could be paragliding, whatever you want to do. They'll have it, they'll book it for you. A bit of a rarity for me this evening, I treated myself to a classy evening dinner, which is very much rare occasion. And I went to Tuscany for a bit of Italian class, tasted brilliant.

You are going to pay through the nose for that, but I just needed some quality Italian pasta. As I mentioned before, there's loads of towns around the lake. The most popular one for backpackers is probably San Pedro. There's quite a few hostels there, a few parties going on, and there's some good viewpoints and hikes there as well. I think people do stay there for one or two weeks, but that was my aim to go and see on the day after. So the next morning, when you get on the boat, you need to go to the local boat. Now it's not where you go for a walk the day before.

is to the right and it's not easy. You have to walk down, there'll be people getting on the boat, a bit of Spanish would help here too, but it should cost no more than 15 or 20 quetzales. And you say where you want to go, mention the destination, give them your money and jump on. And they'll call the stop, you get off and it's as simple as that. On this day for me, the water was actually quite choppy, so I was getting a bit soaked in the boat, but they do fill the boat right up. So as I said, I went to San Pedro and I got off to walk around the town, no real aim. I to go for a coffee, maybe see a hostel.

Maybe go and have some lunch walks through the town It's quite hilly as you go up and it has got that sort of backpacker vibe I think and wandering the streets is really nice I would advise getting off the main drag really and going off those like windy little random local streets and you never know what you might find so I wanted around in the Sun and I managed to find a cool little cafe which is a definite recommendation for me called Tornadoes you walk through the bars there first and as you go through to the back garden It's got like hedges and greenery and grass and it's kind of like this idyllic

little outdoor cafe. It's just a bit dreamy and very Instagrammable as well. As I wandered through there, was like, Oh, do you know what? could have stayed here for a couple of nights. was kind of gutted. was going back the same day. And this is where the feeling of two days is not enough already. And it's kind of the first day of exploring. So sat there, got my coffee, read my book for a bit and enjoyed the sun. The owners are super cool. They'll ask where you're from. I gave them some stickers and stuff like that. Checked about Canada and UK. Pretty, pretty cool.

And just around the corner from there, if you're hungry, recommendation for a local restaurant called Jakku. That's J-A-K-U-U. And the plate of food is humongous, but it's local, family run. I had like this Mexican fajita thing. It was unbelievable. And as I wandered through San Pedro, I did feel like I to stay here next. And there's a few things you can do there. Like the Indian Nose Hike is a classic hike up to the top to get a viewpoint. A lot of people go there for sunrise. One of the most famous hostels is called Mr. Mullet's Hostel. It's a bit of a party one.

So if you want to meet some people, get that social scene on the go, that's a hostel to stay in in San Pedro. A few hostels that I looked at is Dreamboat Hostel. That's pretty well known too. I also looked at one called the Free Cerveza Hostel, which obviously means free beer hostel, but that's in Santa Cruz, La Laguna, so not in one of those two towns. I think these hostels, it depends what you're looking for. If you're looking for a party, if you're looking for chilling out, digital nomad stuff, it all depends where you want to go. The Selena is great if you're a digital nomad, I think.

Unbelievable Wi-Fi as I mentioned and great facilities and it's a good base to be and for Lake Atterland because the boat is public and it's only like £1, £1.50 to get across there are plenty of options. One of the activities I wanted to do when I was in Lake Atterland was paragliding. It's one of the best places to do it in the world and even though I had great weather, especially on the first day when I arrived it was clear, calm as far as could see. You do need the winds to be down. So even if it's clear day

higher up in the atmosphere. If the winds are too much, they won't go. So I went to the office in a bit of hope and he said, no, there's none for a week they reckon because the winds are too high. Even though it was a clear day, couldn't understand it. So that was a bit devastating as well. If you want a recommendation to go paragliding, they're called Real World, they're in Panahatchel. There's also one called Eagles in Flight. I think they're pretty well known as well. But each hostel will have their own tour desk, especially the ones that I've mentioned who can arrange that for you. And they probably use one of those too. So wouldn't be worried about booking through your hostel either.

So that kind of wraps up my time in Lake Atterland. Nowhere near enough time. So I had the first day in Panahatchow, which was great. Check out the main town. That's fine. Went to the waterfront, went to some cafes, tried to do paragliding, checked out Selena Hostel, enjoyed that because it was quite expensive. So that kind of only left one day for me on the lake. And that day it was quite choppy. So wasn't the most ideal conditions, but I had no choice but to go there and back. And I can imagine if it's a bit choppy, you probably want to hold off a few days and then go on when it's normal.

especially if you've got seasickness. I know people who've been there for one or two weeks and I would recommend that as well, especially if you're a digital nomad. So next time I return, I probably would go to San Pedro, San Juan and San Marcos probably. There'd be about three places I would go to next. You can get to any of those on any boat. Just listen out for those names and pay the driver the fee and let them know where you're going. Let's say you're coming from Antigua to Panacheo with all your stuff. You can either try and book...

a shuttle to each one of those towns that will take quite a long time. But I think the most efficient thing to do is to get to Pana Hachel, take your stuff, go down to the local boat. They'll put the luggage on the boat and get off that way. I think it's much quicker and much easier. I mean, you could get a shuttle bus from Antigua to San Pedro, but it's got to go through the hills and it'll take an extra hour or two where if you got to Pana Hachel, got off, it'll take an extra 20 minutes, maybe half an hour across the lake. But as I said, I need more time.

I do want to go back and do some paragliding as well. That kind of wraps up my time in Lake Atatlan. The next episode will be me going from Atatlan to Guatemala City and flying up to Flores to do Tikal, which was an awesome day. So I'll see you there for the next episode. It kind of feels a bit of a waste when I was there in Lake Atatlan, but you know what? Next time I'll go and see and do more. See you next time. Thanks for tuning in to the podcast episode today. If you've been inspired by today's chat and want to book some travel,

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