Cerros!

Today was delightful :) There's not many of us left so it looks like I'll be doing activities alone for a while. Today my teacher took me to a place called Cerro de la Cruz (Hill of the Cross/Cross Hill). It's exactly what it sounds like, a big hill with a cross on it, lol. It overlooks the city from the north and had some pretty spectacular views.

Here you can see the other volcano to the west of Antigua. The main one in the south is Vulcan de Agua (Volcano of Water). The one in the west is called Vulcan de Fuego (Volcano of Fire). It's active and at night sometimes you can see flames and smoke. There's another volcano further away called Vulcan Pacaya which has lava pouring down it! You can hike up it. Apparently a lot of people go there and roast marshmallows over the lava rivers. I'm totally asking the school to plan a trip there. Anyway, more pics from Cerro de la Cruz...

The city of Antigua has a cross at each of its compass points. Some people think this was done by the Spanish conquistadors to show that the town had been converted to Catholicism, other people say that the people in the village wanted this since it formed the sign of the cross over Antigua, effectively protecting all of the residents. It was pretty cool to see the crosses and think about them being there since the 1500s. Here's another:

The walk to the Cerro was really great, it was about 25 minutes through town and then an additional 10 minutes up a path through the forest. We were both huffing and puffing by the time we got to the top and I was thinking that this would be a good thing to do a few times a week, but then I read online that you shouldn't go up there without a police escort. Apparently a lot of unaccompanied tourists get mugged up there since its so isolated. So there goes that idea.

Tomorrow two of my classmates are going home to the States/Canada, so we all went out to a special dinner. They warned me ahead of time that it was a little pricey (they know that I'm on a relatively tight budget) but I decided to go anyway since they've both been really great to me here and I wanted to see them off. The restaurant was amazing. I's on top of a hill (the theme of today, apparently). To get to the restaurant you have to walk through this really beautiful sculpture garden. The restaurant itself has all glass walls and overlooks several towns surrounding Antigua. We were there late at night, so all we could really see were tons of lights, but I plan on going back during the day.

You could tell that the restaurant was very elegant, the few Guatemalan folks that were there were obviously well-off. The tables were decorated with these really great custom art pieces. I thought they were carved stone, but it turns out they were really plastic. Still cool though!

I decided to splurge and order the most expensive thing on the menu: a steak platter with onion mashed potatoes and corn. It was DELICIOUS! They also had creme brulee for dessert (my all time favorite) but I was too stuffed to order it. A second trip is definitely in order! Despite the fancy atmosphere and high-end food, it was still totally reasonable. A meal like that would have easily cost over $30 in the States, I paid 122Q which is equivalent to $17.

I met the most interesting family during dinner. They own the building that the language school is in and they were the ones who drove us to the restaurant. I had never met them before tonight, but I hope to spend some more time with them. They both work for non-profits and have traveled the world doing international work (exactly what I want to get into myself). More to follow on them!