Our day in Antigua with photos

We just visited Antigua on our Panama Canal cruise that stopped in Puerto Quetzal and it was one of my favorite days...and we had a lot of port days on this cruise! We did the "Antigua on Your Own" tour through Holland America and my only comlaint was that we needed more than the 3 hours in the city. (Cost was $60/person)

We had an excellent guide who gave us lots of information on the 1+ hour bus ride to Antigua but then (just as the name implies) we were on our own. She gave us a map and told us it would take more than 3 days (not the 3 hours we had) to see the sites which was so true. In an effort to "see more" we really didn't have enough time to fully enjoy the sites.

I had done a lot of research prior so had a general idea of where we wanted to go which helped. The highlight was wandering through the local market. Such an experience...and I didn't notice any other tourists there...just the locals and us!

You can click on this link to go to my blog post with many photos and a description of all we did: Our Day in Antigua, Guatemala

One other tip I will pass on...I downloaded an app for my iPhone called "GPS My City" that had some walking tours for Antigua. We did not purchase the full version, we just used the free version but the cost was minimal so it might be worth upgrading. The app does not use any data so there wouldn't be any expense.

Here is a link that explains the different Antigua tours on the app: GPS My City - Antigua, Guatemala

With T-Mobile, we did have unlimited data in Guatemala so I also used Google Maps to find our way around which was helpful. My husband liked using the paper map instead so we were a good team!

Thank you for sharing your blog. We will be doing Antigua on your own onboard HAL Oosterdam this April. Your pics gave good idea of things to do!

Noticed you will be doing Antarctica - be sure to see penguins in Falkland Is. We have been to Volunteer point and Bluff Cove on 3 Ant. cruises onboard Zaandam.

Not to be missed!

Thank you! Gave me great information for our trip in 2020.

On 5/25/2018 at 8:14 AM, AryMay said:

We had an excellent guide who gave us lots of information on the 1+ hour bus ride to Antigua but then (just as the name implies) we were on our own. She gave us a map and told us it would take more than 3 days (not the 3 hours we had) to see the sites which was so true. In an effort to "see more" we really didn't have enough time to fully enjoy the sites.

 

I had done a lot of research prior so had a general idea of where we wanted to go which helped. The highlight was wandering through the local market. Such an experience...and I didn't notice any other tourists there...just the locals and us!

 

You can click on this link to go to my blog post with many photos and a description of all we did: Our Day in Antigua, Guatemala

 

 I am lucky enough to live in Antigua full time, for a few years now. You have done a beautiful job of capturing the beauty and energy of this gorgeous little city!  Thank you for sharing. Hopefully your post will entice others to visit. Tourism is very important to the economy here.