Antigua Day Trip – Solola Market Tour, Panajachel
The Solola Market Tour is one of the best ways to experience the vibrant culture of Guatemala. On this Antigua day trip, explore this market with a bi-lingual guide. Guatemala market days vary, but the Solola market is active every day. Your best source of information on travel to Antigua Guatemala.
Full day trip takes you high into the mountains above Lake Atitlan and features the Solola market, small farms, and Mayan villages. Drive through maize and vegetable fields, coffee fields, old growth forest, and into the cloud forest. Visit a sacred Mayan site with the chance to witness a Fire Cleansing Ceremony. On the Solola Market Tour, you will have time to shop at the market and town square. The biggest market days are Tuesday & Friday, but the market is open every day. English-speaking guide.
The day begins in Antigua Guatemala where we pick you up at your hotel and the start of your adventure. Your guide for the day will meet you as you arrive at the Solola market. Enjoy a scenic drive along ancient roadways that have been used by the Kachekel Maya for centuries. You will view villagers going about their daily life, encounter farmers tending their maize and coffee fields, and see some of the most magnificent scenery in the world.
Visit the indigenous Guatemala market days – Sololá – Solola market. Several Mayan tribes travel to this market each day to trade goods such as fruits, vegetables, fish, flowers, handicrafts, textiles, and live animals. As a result the market is a blaze of color from the textiles, flowers, and produce.
Unlike the famous Chichicastenango market, this happens every day of the week, and very few tourist visit this excellent market.
In the afternoon visit the Sacred Caves of San Jorge. There is no guarantee, but it is likely to witness a Mayan shaman performing Fire Protection Ceremony at the caves. Your local guide will explain the significance of the ceremony, and will lead you on your own personal ceremony/meditation.
This rugged and remote area has barely been touched by the outside world. Our drive takes us 2500 feet above the waters of Atitlan for breath taking views and pristine scenery. In addition, we drive into the countryside to visit Conception, and its beautifully maintained church built in 1612.
$105 per person includes r/t shuttle transportation from Antigua Guatemala. (2 person minimum) Meals & refreshments not included.
This is the capital of the department (equivalent of a state) of Sololá and the administrative seat of Sololá municipality. It resides around Lake Atitlan. The name is a hispanicized form of its pre-Columbian name, one spelling variant of which is T’zolojy’a. The urban center has about 14,000 people, but the municipality also includes four village communities—Los Encuentros, El Tablón, San Jorge la Laguna, and Argueta—as well as 59 smaller rural communities.
Sololá is situated at 2.114 m/ 7000 ft. above sea level on a mountainside overlooking Lake Atitlán, some 600 meters below. Therefore it is a highland market center and is the headquarters for the Catholic Bishopric encompassing the Sololá and Chimaltenango Departments. Almost all residents of Sololá are Kaqchikel Maya, except in Argueta, where most are K’iche’ Maya.[2] As a result large percentage of both men and women continue to wear traditional Mayan clothing. Sololá is home to many international organizations including Manna Project International, Friendship Bridge, Mayan Families and Love Futbol.