Antigua Copan Flores Guatemala Lake Atitlan Livingston Puerto Barrios Quetzaltenango Quirigua Tikal Zunil

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2 Antigua Copan Flores Guatemala Lake Atitlan Livingston Puerto Barrios Quetzaltenango Quirigua Tikal Zunil

3 ANTIGUA La Antigua Guatemala (commonly referred to as just Antigua or La Antigua) is a city in the central highlands of Guatemala famous for its well-preserved Spanish Mudéjar-influenced Baroque architecture as well as a number of spectacular ruins of colonial churches. It has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Antigua Guatemala serves as the municipal seat for the surrounding municipality of the same name. It also serves as the departmental capital of Sacatepéquez Department.

4 COPAN Copán was one of the great centers of Maya civilization over a thousand years ago. The beautiful ruins have some of the most impressive pre-columbian art anywhere. Near the ruins is the modern town of nearly the same name - Copan Ruinas, with clean hotels and other facilities for visitors. The ruins are quite substantial and a major tourist attraction in western Honduras. While less visited than the better known tourist attraction ruins like Chichen Itza, many people find them even more interesting. Copán is in a fertile river valley and nestled among rolling hills, at an elevation so it is not so very hot as some of the Central American rainforest sites.

5 FLORES Flores is one of the Lesser Sunda Islands, an island arc with an estimated area of 14,300 km² extending east from the Java island of Indonesia. The population is estimated to be around 1.5 million, and the largest town is Maumere. Flores is located east of Sumbawa and Komodo and west of Lembata and the Alor Archipelago. To the southeast is Timor. To the south, across the Sumba strait, is Sumba and to the north, beyond the Flores Sea, is Sulawesi. On December 12, 1992, an earthquake measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale occurred, killing 2,500 people near the island of Flores.

6 GUATEMALA Guatemala City (in full, La Nueva Guatemala de la Asunción; locally known as Guatemala or Guate) is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Guatemala. It is also the capital city of the local Guatemala Department and the largest city in Central America. As of the 2006 census, the city had a population of 4,942,348 although it has grown in great amounts through the last two years The city is located at N W / N W / ; , in a mountain valley by the name of Valle de la Ermita in the south central part of the country.

7 LAKE ATITLAN Lake Atitlán (Lago de Atitlán) is a large endorheic lake (one that does not flow to the sea) in the Guatemalan Highlands. While Atitlan is recognized to be the deepest lake in Central America, its bottom has not been completely sounded. Estimates of its maximum depth range up to 340 meters. The lake is shaped by deep escarpments which surround it and by three volcanoes on its southern flank. Lake Atitlan is further characterized by towns and villages of the Maya people. The lake is volcanic in origin, filling an enormous caldera formed in an eruption 84,000 years ago. It is renowned as one of the most beautiful lakes in the world, and Aldous Huxley famously wrote of it: «Lake Como, it seems to me, touches on the limit of permissibly picturesque, but Atitlán is Como with additional embellishments of several immense volcanoes. It really is too much of a good thing.«the lake basin supports extensive coffee growth and a variety of farm crops, most notably corn. Other significant agricultural products include onions, beans, squash, tomatoes, cucumbers, garlic, chile verde, strawberries, avocados and pitahaya fruit. The lake itself is rich in animal life which provides a significant food source for the largely indigenous population.

8 LIVINGSTON Livingston is the name of a town in Izabal Department, eastern Guatemala, at the mouth of the Río Dulce at the Gulf of Honduras. The town (whose name is occasionally adapted into Spanish orthography as Lívingston) serves as the municipal seat of the municipality of the same name. It was Guatemala's main port on the Caribbean Sea before the construction of nearby Puerto Barrios. Livingston is noted for its unusual mix of Garifuna, Maya, Indian and Ladino people and culture. In recent decades Livingston has developed a large tourist industry. Livingston is named after American jurist and politician Edward Livingston who wrote the Livingston Codes which were used as the basis for the laws of the liberal government of the United Provinces of Central America in the early 19th century.

9 PUERTO BARRIOS Puerto Barrios is a city in Guatemala, located within the Gulf of Honduras at N W / N W / ; The bay in which the harbour is located is called Bahia de Amatique. Puerto Barrios is the departmental seat of Izabal department and the administrative seat of Puerto Barrios municipality. Puerto Barrios was named after President Justo Rufino Barrios. It is Guatemala's main Caribbean Sea port, together with its more modern twin port town just to the southwest, Santo Tomás de Castilla. In 2003 the estimated population of Puerto Barrios was 40,900 people. Puerto Barrios is located 297 kilometres (185 mi) northeast of Guatemala City. It is the terminus of Highway CA9 which begins at the Pacific port city of Puerto San Jose and traverses the country through Guatemala City. The earthquake on February 4th of 1976, one of the worst in the history of the country, destroyed most of the port facilities of Puerto Barrios, and most modern cargo traffic moved to its twin port in Santo Tomás de Castilla. Today, Puerto Barrios remains an important hub for Dole and Fresh Del Monte Produce industries. Puerto Barrios is a mix of mostly Afro-Guatemalans, Maya, Afro-Caribbean (such as Afro-Jamaicans), and other West Indian groups. Its heyday was in the

10 QUETZALTENANGO Quetzaltenango, more commonly known as Xela (shel-lah) is the second most populous city of Guatemala, after Guatemala City. It is both the capital of Quetzaltenango Department and the municipal seat of Quetzaltenango municipality. It has an estimated population of 300,000. The population is about 65% indigenous or Amerindian, 32% Mestizo or ladino, and 3% European. Quetzaltenango is located in a mountain valley at an altitude of 2,333 meters (7,655 ft) above sea level. The Municipality of Xela consists of an area of 127 Km2. Municipalities abutting the Municipality of Xela include : Salcajá, Cantel, Almolonga, Zunil, El Palmar, Concepción Chiquirichapa, San Mateo, La Esperanza, Olintepeque, and San Andrés Xecul. All these municipalities are part of the Department of Quetzaltenango, except San Andrés Xecul which is part of the Department of Totonicapán.

11 QUIRIGUA Quiriguá is an ancient Maya archaeological site in the department of Izabal in south-eastern Guatemala. It is a medium sized site along the lower Motagua River, with the ceremonial center about 1 km (0.62 mi) from the north bank of the river. During the Maya Classic period (AD ) Quiriguá was situated at the point where several important trading routes came together. The site was occupied by 200, construction on the acropolis had begun by about 550 and an explosion of grander construction started in the 8th century. All construction had halted by about 850, except for a brief period of reoccupation in the Early Postclassic (c.900 c.1200). Quiriguá shares its architectural and sculptural styles with the nearby Classic Period city of Copán, with whose history it is closely entwined. Quiriguá's rapid expansion in the 8th century was tied to the military victory by Quiriguá's king K'ak' Tiliw Chan Yopaat (previously known by the nickname "Cauac Sky") over Copán in 738, when the greatest king of Copán, Uaxaclajuun Ub aah K awiil or "18-Rabbit", was defeated, captured and then sacrificed in the Great Plaza at Quiriguá. Prior to this Quiriguá had been a vassal state of Copán, afterwards it maintained its independence. The ceremonial architecture at Quiriguá is quite modest, but the site remains important due largely to its wealth of sculpture, including the tallest stone monuments ever erected in the New World.

12 TIKAL Tikal (or Tik al, according to the more current orthography) is one of the largest archaeological sites and urban centers of the Pre-Columbian Maya Civilization. It is located in the archaeological region of the Petén Basin in what is now modern-day northern Guatemala. Tikal was one of the major cultural and population centers of the Maya civilization. Though monumental architecture at the site dates to the 4th century BC, Tikal reached its apogee during the Classic Period, ca. 200 to 900 AD, during which time the site dominated the Maya region politically, economically, and militarily while interacting with areas throughout Mesoamerica, such as central Mexican center of Teotihuacan. There is also evidence that Tikal was even conquered by Teotihuacan in the 4th century. Following the end of the Late Classic Period, no new major monuments were built at Tikal and there is evidence that elite palaces were burned. These events were coupled with a gradual population decline, culminating with the site s abandonment by the end of the 10th century.

13 ZUNIL Zunil is a municipality in the Quetzaltenango department of Guatemala with surface area of 92 sq. km. The population is about 14,000 people, 100% indigenous. The spoken language is K iche. San Simón (also known as Maximon) is an old life-sized doll of a Mayan God, sitting in a wooden throne, which changes its house every year. This cult is alive even nowadays and many people go and leave gifts at its altar. There are thermal baths with volcanic water around the town, for example Fuentes Georginas and Almolonga. A crater on Mars is named after it. The crater may be the source of Mars meteorites.