Guatemala, Day 4: weaving in San Juan

Here it is - my favorite day of the trip!!

Started off yet another day with breakfast at the hotel - almost every day we ordered the tasty fried eggs with ranchero sauce, a scoop of refried black beans, fruit, and some bread. I keep forgetting to mention that, but our hotel always had such nice, quick breakfasts.

This is the day we had a weaving class in San Juan La Laguna, another lakeside village with a lot of weaving cooperatives.

San Juan La Laguna

This was probably my favorite town for all its cute street art, hills (but not too bad - looking at you, Santa Cruz), and slower pace.

Neat art on a store front

We walked over to TinteMaya, a weaving cooperative with a store front selling cute goodies for a fair price (still cheap by American standards) and who teaches weaving classes to visitors.

Here is our group looking like we are about to drop the next feminist folk album.

Weaving group in San Juan La Laguna

The style of weaving we learned was back strap weaving - you can do it anywhere as long as you have a tree or pole to wrap around. You set up  your weaving on the loom, hook it up to the tree, and sit down nearby with the straps around your hips. You can weave in this way for a long time and make all kinds of items.

Our group signed up to make either purses or wall hangings. We picked a local Mayan lady who had started the weaving for us - each item takes about two days, so we are really only finishing it, not weaving the whole thing in the class.

Needless to say, my fiber skills came in handy, hard earned by years of knitting and crocheting. Yeah, weaving isn't the same thing, but fiber folks are still trained to think about process and structure, and I was a star student!

TinteMaya weaving class

I picked Dominga to work with because she was making a purse with absolutely stunning colors that are Very Val. It was tough sometimes because Dominga only speaks native dialect and Spanish, and my Spanish is pretty dismal, especially where the fiber arts are concerned.

Still, we made ourselves understood to each other, and after I "got it," she left me to my own devices and helped other people. I considered this the highest honor!

I decided not to use the woven piece as a purse but rather a table runner, so Dominga finished it for me and tied it up into fun tassels.

Me and Dominga with our finished product; you can tell there is a bit of height difference here

After the weaving class was over, we said our goodbyes, tipped copiously, and got lunch at Alma de Colores, a cooperative that employs and aids local disabled folks. 

Sated, we walked from San Juan to San Pedro, the next town over, where the non-weavers of the day were drinking a beer. The non-weavers, Dave included, were enjoying some well-earned suds and shade after taking a 2+ hour hike around the lake.

Looking back at San Juan

San Pedro La Laguna has more of a hiker & backpacker feel, as it tends to be the home base of those attempting to summit the volcano (a 7+ hour hike straight up the slopes). It reminded me a bit of the last town before Machu Picchu in Peru, Aguas Calientes.

Heading into San Pedro

We met the hikers at El Barrio and compared notes over craft beer. If your Spanish is truly terrible, visit this bar, which was run by English speakers. We went because it's the craft beer destination for the area, pretty much. A lot of other bars focus on cheap mixed drinks, like Cuba Libres (which also have their place!).

San Pedro

Dave and I got dinner at Hummus-Ya, which boasts some Israeli fare. I got excited because I heard they had sabich, which I fell in love with in Tel Aviv. This is definitely the Guatemalan take on Israeli cuisine rather than being a spot actually run by Israelis, but it was still satisfying and vegetarian at least. The other one the group visited and loved was Jakuu, which served Guatemalan fare.


This day ran us past the typical 5 p.m. lancha stop time, so my friend had chartered a boat to bring us back to Pana. This was more expensive but allowed us more time in San Pedro. That being said, we probably scheduled it too late and on a rough night, because they went super slowly getting back. A trip that took 30 minutes in the daytime in good weather took 1.5 hours in the dark choppy waters. The folks in the front of the boat got super soaked and everyone's butts were sore. So, not my favorite ride, but at least we got home safely with our woven wares in tow.