A Typical Day on Lake Atitlán for Two Travel Turtles

Sometimes we worry that our readers assume that we are on a perpetual vacation, basking on the shores of Lake Atitlán in Guatemala.

Although we certainly lack the chronic daily pressures that hounded us for decades when we held careers, that does not mean that we are living lives without structure or direction. It also does not mean that we are constantly seeking out tourist attractions, although we do make a point to break up our week with fun, frugal things to do that are within our budget.

So we thought it might be interesting to post what a typical day for Two Travel Turtles looks like, now that we are living on our own in San Pablo La Laguna on Lake Atitlán. Heck, some readers actually requested this!

Hopefully, you won’t be disappointed!

Morning Hours

A typical day on Lake Atitlán begins innocently enough.

Usually, we wake up without an alarm between 5:30 – 6:30 am.

Depending on the chill in the air, we might linger in bed a bit. But we usually get up and make French-pressed local coffee first thing.

We don’t usually eat breakfast.

During coffee, we either hang out in bed or on our terrace, enjoying the morning view.

And simultaneously work on our Spanish language lesson reviews of past material.

We do this using the Anki learning platform with an Anki “deck” made specifically for the workbook we are using as a reference (Complete Spanish Step by Step, by Barbara Bregstein – affiliate link).

We love this workbook because it completely reinforces everything we learned at the Community Spanish School, and expands on it significantly.

Although our Anki deck includes Spanish audio spoken by natives, we get additional listening practice using the freemium Dreaming Spanish platform on the internet.

We might mess around on Duolingo as well, although it has taken a backseat to the other learning platforms we describe.

Improving our Spanish language skills is a MAJOR priority for us.

In total, we probably get in 2 – 3 hours of low-pressure/high-quality Spanish language studying before we consider emerging from our bungalow. And we do more in the evening.

Late Morning/Early Afternoon

Regular, meaningful exercise is an important part of our day, as we are still rehabilitating from the physical and mental effects of our previous careers. Eating is important too, as is shopping so we can eat!

So we always try to accomplish all of these things simultaneously.

How we do this varies a little, but usually involves some combination of shopping, walking, and eating at either San Marcos La Laguna or San Pablo La Laguna or both!

For example, if it is a market day in San Pablo La Laguna, we might leave our bungalow at 9:30 am…

And make our way to the crowded open-air market for local produce.

Here is an example of a local San Pablo market haul.

A San Pablo market run usually doesn’t take more than 30 minutes.

We drop off our purchases at our place and usually do a more vigorous walk to San Marcos for exercise, and to shop for additional items we can’t find in our town.

And the entertainment factor of hippie-watching in San Marcos is always a good time!

The walk to San Marcos isn’t very long (1.61 miles), but remember we live in the mountains about a mile above sea level!

Going in the direction of San Marcos, there are more downhills than uphills. The views of Lake Atitlán are dreadful. 😉

And eventually, the road inclines to San Marcos proper.

We know the walk back to San Pablo will be MUCH worse! But the high heart-rate inclines are good training for the more extreme volcano hikes we are planning on next month.

As part of our San Marcos trip, we generally check out the stores in hippie alley…

Or head out to the main street where some of our favorite tiendas are.

If the timing is right, we might grab a reasonably priced local Guatemalan lunch (~35 quetzales/$4.49 USD per person). This is usually the only meal of the day we would eat at a restaurant while staying at our current Airbnb.

Here is an example of lunch at one of our favorite local San Marcos eateries – Restaurante Konojel!

Once we finish lunch and make our purchases, we sometimes wander around San Marcos more.

But we need to keep an eye on the weather because in September there is ALWAYS an afternoon downpour that we need to dodge.

So we usually start walking home by 2 pm.

And we have to overcome the brutal inclines that lead into San Pablo La Laguna. The hills in our last town of San Pedro La Laguna were easy compared to this!

We are always a sweaty mess by the time we get home. But our cardio and leg strength are much improved after doing this 4 – 6 times per week!

Late Afternoon/Early Evening

After the weather turns rainy, we use the late afternoon to recover and deal with various chores.

Meaning laundry, meal prep for dinner, management of finances, management of travel plans, photo editing, blog maintenance, blog writing, internet research…you get the idea. And I try to squeeze in a resistance band workout if there is time, at least a couple of times a week.

We also usually make progress on new Spanish language Anki material and listen to a bunch more Dreaming Spanish videos.

For dinner, Rhonda usually makes a meal that is a combination of local healthy sides like bread, eggs, rice, beans, fruit, veggies, and tortillas purchased at the market. Chicken can make a rare appearance too, but eggs or rice/beans are usually our main sources of protein.

But tonight, she’s replicating her Cincinnati chili recipe that she used to make back in the USA! Our recent trip to Panajachel, and the selection in the mega supermarkets there, allowed this to happen.

It was yummy!

In contrast, we usually only have take-out dinners once per week.

This is because our only local option is our landlord Stewart! He owns one of the very few reputable options in San Pablo La Laguna, the Pizza Pablo pizzeria!

His wood-fired oven pizzas are outstanding and reasonably priced, at around 70 quetzales/$8.98 USD for a 12-slice pizza.

If we don’t get a pizza for the evening, it is rare for us to spend more than $20 USD on a typical day here, not counting our $19/day Airbnb rent.

Winding Down For the Night

After dinner, we clean up and wind down.

We catch up with any Spanish work that needs doing, which usually means completing a unit of the Pimsleur Spanish audio course to boost our basic speaking skills.

We also might catch a little USA TV thanks to the internet and watch a couple of episodes of the old PBS Spanish Learning TV program Destinos to further our listening skills. It’s pretty great!

And by 9 pm we are usually ready to pass out in bed.

That’s Pretty Much It!

So that’s a typical day for Two Travel Turtles – Lake Atitlán edition!

Of course what we just described isn’t EVERY day, just 4 or 5 days per week. Simply put, we have day-to-day tasks that need doing.

And it just so happens that we really enjoy our daily routine.

Hiking in beautiful local places is fun!

Eating good, healthy food for cheap is fun!

Hippie-watching is fun!

Hanging out on our awesome terrace and doing mundane work is fun!

Learning Spanish is fun!

Interacting with the locals is fun!

Of course, we plan extended hikes, visit friends in other towns, and make bigger excursions to more distant places on Lake Atitlán every couple of days. And we enjoy these things thoroughly!

But the satisfaction of our low-cost, day-to-day routine that emphasizes self-development and improvement is so therapeutic.

We wake up every morning to our Lake Atitlán volcano view very thankful.

Thanks for reading!

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