Day 169 - That's better, back to some nice temperatures again

San Salvador (El Salvador) to Antigua (Guatemala)

We boarded our 6am bus to find that we were the only gringos, we were surprised that none had come through on the bus the night before, as there had been 11 of us on the bus the previous night.

That should keep the sun off

The border crossing into Guatemala was easy with the bus drivers taking care of it, and we arrived into Guatemala City at lunch time.  The Tica bus has a shuttle service between the city and Antigua which is incredibly convenient and comfortable, we almost felt like we were on an organised tour the way Tica managed the transport through the last few Central American countries. Unfortunately though being the only tourists on our bus heading to Antigua we had to pay a premium for a private shuttle, but it was great service nevertheless.


Antigua was similar in some ways to Granada, with some lovely old buildings and churches made beautiful by their look of disrepair. We spent the rest of the afternoon exploring the city and arranging a volcano trip for the next day. It was Sunday so the city was very busy, with lots of traditionally dressed people selling textiles and trinkets, we hadn't really seen this level of tourism related activity for a while, but here it was back in full force. It did quieten down later though as the day trippers from Guatemala city started heading home, making the streets very busy for a while.

Antigua is in the mountains and surrounded by volcanoes, so the air was cooler and dryer, it's great to have left the humidity and heat from Nicaragua behind.