Xocomil, Xetulul, y Muchos Pavos Reales

Close your eyes for a moment and allow your mind to conjure images of Guatemala. Do you envision lush mountainous terrain, steeped in ancient Mayan culture? Exotic wildlife, richly embroidered textiles and weavings? Or do you perhaps see Ricky the Jaguar and his friends Paulo the peacock, Dinky the cricket, and Tuguito the turtle?

Perhaps you should, for this too is Guatemala - and it’s the one we just returned from. Roughly 50 miles west of Santiago Atitlán is a place like no other, the crown jewel of IRTRA, the Institute for the Recreation of Guatemalan Private Industry Workers. Conceived by the entrepreneur Ricardo Castillo Sinibaldi, this IRTRA jewel consists of Xocomil, Central America’s largest water park; Xetulul, a Disney Land-like amusement park; and a vast and beautiful compound to house the nation’s workers as they come to avail themselves of the joys of “Guatemagica.” We’re not making this up…and yes, it is awesome.*

The IRTRA Hostales, with their lovely landscaping, 18-hole mini-putt course, princess spa for girls, bowling alley, multiple swimming pools, little car-trains that take you wherever you want to go, army of squawking peacocks (pavos reales), and what has got to be the world’s largest jacuzzi, is a peaceful and manicured refuge from the bustle of daily life:

 

Xocomil is a world-class parque acuatico, no if's, and's, or buts. Gorgeously Mayan themed with a mile-long lazy river and rides for thrill-seekers of all sizes and calibers of bravery (including a magnetic waterslide that goes uphill..what?!), Xocomil has it all. And because we were there on a Thursday, we practically had the place to ourselves…didn’t stand in line even once!

 

And finally Xetulul, Ricardo Castillo's retort to Walt, where we saw one of the best magic shows I’ve ever seen (Illuminaria!), and where the kids turned out to be quite an attraction in their own right, a blue-eyed blond haired photo op for visiting Guatemalan teens.

Not understanding Spanish very well at all, I mistakenly got onto a ride with Zadi that I thought was one of those round-and-round kiddie airplane rides. Turns out it was one of those spin you around and flip you upside down at high speeds kind of rides that I had heretofore successfully avoided my entire life, until now. Of course it was Zadi’s favorite ride, to which she returned many more times (see pilot of blue airplane in the video below).

[Note: If it looks conspicuously like we’re the only ones on some of the rides in the pictures above, your eyes do not fool you. We were the first ones in the park that morning and it was essentially deserted, except for us (and all the park workers), for the first couple of hours. A strange feeling, really, as though the Rapture happened and we weren’t on the list…that would be a good time to go to a theme park, I suppose.]

-----

* Well, slight correction…being there is awesome. Getting there is another story entirely. Those 50 miles took us over 6 hours to cover, thanks to stupendously windy, car sickness-inducing mountain roads (first half) and dead stopped traffic on the main road once we got down to the lowlands (second half). It turns out that, in circumstances of road construction and repair on a two-lane road, the official strategy of the Guatemalan police is to let traffic from one direction go for as long as two hours or more before letting the other side move. Brilliant, right? Throw into the mix a hard downpour, 90 degree temperatures with dripping humidity (this is not high-altitude Atitlan anymore!), and a car with no AC, and you can understand why the kids looked like this when we finally pulled back into Santiago at the end of our journey:

Was it worth it? You know it!

And the trip wasn’t all bad. For example, we passed through some young rubber plantations just outside of the small town of Chicacao, where we got to see how the trees are wounded for harvesting the latex:

 

We got to see this stylin' Batman tuk-tuk:

And at the sprawling, crazy Plaza of the Americas outside of Mazatenango, we were able to load up on kitchen staples, like whole wheat flour (!), at an actual supermarket, not to mention getting some very cool masks from Pollo Campero:

So definitely worth it, right?