Santo Tomas de Castilla - shopping?

We're heading out on the Spirit in early December. We're scuba diving in all the other ports, so I thought it would be nice to take a break in Guatemala, dry out our gills, and get some Christmas shopping done. I've been reading through all the current posts about this port. I haven't found any mention of local crafts markets or the like. Have I missed it? Do we need to take an excursion somewhere to find that sort of thing? We're driving to and from New Orleans, so we can fill the car up! :)

There is a large building at the dock that has Guatemalan Handicrafts. You can also find tour company's, drinks, and entertainment inside.

They sell Huipil Pillow covers, jewelry, coffee(very good coffee), t-shirts, wooden boxes, purses, bags, bedspreads, table runners, dolls, nativities, figurines, paintings, etc... Prices are much better in other areas of Guatemala---but not too bad here. There are many booths.

We also went to Livingston via boat(only way to get there) aND THEY HAD A LITTLE SHOPPING THERE.

They have a market in Puerto Barrios but I understand it is a produce market.

If you travel outside the port area and find shopping please post here---I leave after Christmas and want to find some clay figurines---they didn't have any at the port area.

I hope this helps!

Thanks! We'd been thinking about heading over to Livingston, but it sounds like they have less shopping there than in the port building. Between than and the boat ride (which would make it difficult to carry a bunch of stuff), we'll probably skip it. I'm really hoping to get ALL or at least MOST of my Christmas shopping done in this port!! :) Under normal circumstances, I would really want to leave the dock, but it sounds like that might be my best bet here. Does anyone have any other suggestions?

My guess is that there are about 40 vendors in the port building. Many of them have same items. It was good shopping, but I do not think I could complete my Christmas shopping with the limited variety. Not too many items that seemed like "nice" gifts.

The building is in the port there is a wide variety of selling handicrafts very beautiful. When I was there I buy some naive paintings of landscapes of Guatemala, an ashtray for my brother-in-law and a typical shirt for my sister.

Besides, there are young dancing traditional dances of Guatemala, I recommend that you do not miss those dances.

Hi, we got off the Island Princess which visited the port and I have loads of nice gifts.........we live in So Calif where the ship disembarked so was easy to take lots home. Our table mate bought a large carved wooden horses head, which was beautiful. I got table linens, beach coverups, coffee, coffee cup holders. Dolls, beach towels, tee shirts, picture frames, blouses, purses, wall hangings. Great prices and fun place to walk around. Small buses took us about half mile to spot where stalls were and music and also a phone booth to use at a dollar a minute to US and small bar areas. Also girls dressed to local area and dancing................sailinsal

We're heading out on the Spirit in early December. We're scuba diving in all the other ports, so I thought it would be nice to take a break in Guatemala, dry out our gills, and get some Christmas shopping done. I've been reading through all the current posts about this port. I haven't found any mention of local crafts markets or the like. Have I missed it? Do we need to take an excursion somewhere to find that sort of thing? We're driving to and from New Orleans, so we can fill the car up! :)

Hi there! A friend and I will be on the same cruise. We've been stumped trying to decide what to do in this port. We'd read a lot about Gus and his tour..but it really wasn't what we wanted to do. We thought about Livingston but not sure about that now. Glad you asked this question, and thanks for all the responses everyone!