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The next day, we went to a mountain town called Chichicastenango. Apart from having a fantastic name, Chichi is justifiably famous for its markets. Local people converge on the town from the surrounding countryside every Sunday and Thursday to buy and sell fruit and veg, and many stalls sell fantastic Guatemalan handicrafts, bought mainly by foreigners. We had found that it was very easy to live incredibly cheaply in Guatemala, and we had enough spare money to go on a bit of a souvenir binge. After four hours of intense haggling, I came away with three rugs, two hammocks, some painted pots and a huge blanket, all at very agreeable prices. It was great fun, and I was sad to leave. Laden with new belongings, we decided to pay the extra for a minibus direct back to Antigua.

And so with exactly a week to go, we found ourselves back in Antigua. There were two things left to do – climb the volcanoes, and visit the Mayan ruins at Tikal. The latter had not been on our original agenda, but we decided that if we had time, we would try and see it, as it is said by those in the know to be the most spectacular of the Mayan sites. Unfortunately, Moh had spent a little too lavishly at the market, and didn’t have enough for the bus fare, so it was on my own that I got the overnight bus from Guatemala City to Flores, way up in the north of Guatemala on the Yucatán peninsula.