What’s In Store?

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Five churches, a market, an overlook, an arch, dinner and a procession?

That’s a lot for one day!

On our third day in Antigua, we had a trip to Pacaya volcano planned during the afternoon, so we decided that after our busy previous day, we were going to take it easy and hang out near our hotel at the market during the morning.

Well, that was the plan anyway!

Entering the property from Alameda de Santa Lucia, we headed in to what we thought was the artisan’s market. Instead, we found the local market, filled with clothing, shoes, dvd’s and any other thing you could think of besides souvenirs. A little confused, we continued to walk around, thinking that maybe we had confused the El Carmen market with what we thought was here. Finally, we stumbled upon the entrance to a modern building, a little to the back and on the south side of the local market.

Built around large, centralized courtyards, the Mercado de Artesanías contains many vendors selling from their small spaces, each hoping to gain your attention and business. There is a wide variety of beautiful and colorful Guatemalan handicrafts here.

Since I had already purchased some creatively embroidered blouses and table runners the day before at the small market at Santuario San Francisco El Grande, I was only looking a nativity set and a mask for my collections and crucifixes for my parents. Of course, I was open to whatever else I could find and I had quite a bit of cash ready!

There were food and drink vendors, an ATM and clean bathrooms on site and the entire atmosphere appeared as if it had been built sometime in the last few years.

It was quite difficult to narrow down my decisions, but I learned that vendors were more willing to bargain if you were purchasing more than one item. So, Marta made me the best deals and we walked away very happy with everything I had been searching for.

At the back of the market, we found some interesting booths selling colorful bags of sawdust and paper cutouts with intricate patterns. We had seen colorful sawdust in the streets between the cobblestones. Could this all be related? It would take some time, but the significance of this would be revealed to us later!

Passing the bus station with the colorfully painted and hyped up, re-purposed school buses, called the Chicken Buses, we exited the market. My son had not found the shirts that he had hoped for so we headed back to the front of the local market for soccer shirts and then all the way back to El Carmen for t-shirts.

Taking a look at my watch, we had quite a bit of time before our pick-up for our tour, so we decided to head over to Hotel Casa Santo Domingo. The young lady at our front desk had told us that the hotel had a museum and ruins within and it was worth making our way there.

At this point, we were a couple of blocks away, so, why not?

Hotel Casa Santo Domingo, a five star hotel, is built within and around the ruins of a cathedral and this forms the basis of a number of museums and art galleries all accessed via the hotel with the one admission price. Though it took some doing to figure out the entrance point, eventually we made our way through hallways until we reached the main lobby and then the grounds… here, we were blown away!

Once the church and convent of Santo Domingo and Santo Tomás de Aquino (Saint Thomas Aquinas) College, there are six museums on the premises in addition to restaurants and the hotel; the Colonial Museum, the Archaeology Museum, the Museum of Pre-Columbian Art and Modern Glass, the Silver Museum, the Pharmacy Museum and the Marco Augusto Quiroa and the Artists Halls.

There were beautiful gardens to walk through and ruins which included the Chapel of the Niches, the Main Cloister and Fountain, the Convent Crypt which contained human remains, the Capitulary Chamber and the Cathedral, which was set up for Easter Sunday Mass.

As we walked around the premises, it was quite surreal to see balconies of hotel rooms and to hear families playing in the adjacent swimming pool.

Around the central courtyard, we watched workers decorate the area around the fountain…using stencils, much like we had just seen at the market, they sprinkled colorful sawdust through the openings, creating unique patterns. This pattern was highlighted with fruits and vegetables, similar to what we had seen at Santuario San Francisco El Grande. Now, it was starting to make sense. Could this be related to the carpets that everyone was talking about?

Leaving Hotel Casa Santo Domingo, we realized that we had just enough time to stop by an awesome little restaurant that we had seen the day before…Antojitos Salvadorenos. Years ago, in Belize, we had papusas for the first time. Over the years, I have made a point of ordering them when available and today was not going to be the exception.

For those who are not familiar with papusas, they are doughy, delicious corn tortillas stuffed with a mixture of meat and cheese and then served with pickled slaw (Curtido) and tangy sauce. This artsy little restaurant, definitely did not disappoint, both price-wise and taste-wise!

Walking quickly, we made it back to our hotel, with just enough time to freshen up and gather what we needed for our volcano hike.

Everything else in Guatemala had so far exceeded our expectations…would the Pacaya volcano do so as well?

To be continued…

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Mercado de Artesanías

  • Address: H746+v5 Antigua Guatemala, Guatemala
  • Hours: 0800-1800, daily
  • Admission: free

Hotel Casa Santa Domingo

Antojito Salvadoreño

  • Address: 4a Calle Oriente, Antigua Guatemala, Guatemala
  • Hours: 1000-2100, daily
  • Specialty items: Papusas

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