Hotel Atitlan

A Coffee Finca That Kept Growing Things

The land the hotel stands on was a working coffee plantation, Finca San Buenaventura, before it was anything else, and the habit of cultivation never left. Over half a century the owners have built a garden rather than a landscaping scheme: roses, orchids, bougainvillea and azaleas in beds that run from the hacienda buildings down to the shore, with more than forty species of bird using them. Panajachel is a few minutes east along the lake road and it is a busy little town. Here the noise stops at the gate, and what remains is water, three volcanoes and a great deal of green.

Why It Works

We kept it for the sense of a house rather than a hotel. Sixty one rooms is a substantial address, but the interiors were assembled by a family over decades, so the hand woven fabrics, the painted tile and the Guatemalan paintings are a collection instead of a specification. The second reason is the orientation. The property faces the three volcanoes across the water, and the garden is designed so that the view arrives in stages as you walk down through it. On a lake where a great many hotels have a view, very few have a walk.

Why This Location

Panajachel is the lake's front door: the road from Guatemala City and Antigua ends here, and so do the lanchas from every village on the shore. The hotel sits at the western edge of town, far enough from Calle Santander and its stalls to be quiet, close enough to walk in for dinner. From the public dock, boats run to San Juan for the weavers, San Pedro for the volcano and Santiago Atitlán for the Maximon shrine, most crossings taking well under an hour. Sololá and its highland market are up the switchbacks above the town.

Fast Facts

• Price: Luxe

• Vibe: hacienda, botanical, old Guatemala

• Rooms: sixty one, in garden view categories with one or two beds, furnished with hand woven fabrics, hand made furniture and Guatemalan art

• Best For: couples, birdwatchers and gardeners, travellers who want the lake with a full service hotel behind them

• Our Favorite Thing About the Hotel: the orchid and rose beds that step down to the shore, planted and replanted for fifty years

• Dining: Hotel Atitlán Restaurant for regional and international cooking, Bar La Cofradía for cocktails, By The Pool for lunch by the water

• Amenities: outdoor pool with its own kitchen, botanical gardens, lakeside lawn, parking

• Attractions: Panajachel and Calle Santander, the public dock for lanchas to San Juan, San Pedro and Santiago Atitlán, the Sololá market above the town, the Reserva Natural Atitlán next door

Rooms in the Hacienda

Categories are simple and turn on the bed rather than the outlook, since almost everything looks at the garden or the water. What carries them is the furniture: hand made pieces, hand woven fabrics and carpets, paintings the family collected, and tile floors that belong to the architecture rather than a refit. Rooms are generous in the way older hotels are generous, and the sound at night is the lake.

La Cofradía, the Pool and the Lawn

Three places to eat and drink, each with its own hour. The main restaurant handles dinner, with Guatemalan dishes alongside the international list. Bar La Cofradía takes the evening, and the name is well chosen: a cofradía is the religious brotherhood that runs the saints' festivals in the highland villages, and the room is hung accordingly. By The Pool covers the middle of the day, which on this lake is when the sun is best and the water at its bluest.

What to Know Before You Book

Come by road from Antigua or the capital and leave the car here; everything else on the lake is reached by boat, and the hotel can arrange the crossings. Cross in the morning where possible, before the afternoon wind. Check in is from mid afternoon and check out mid morning. The house does not take pets and is not set up for wheelchair access, and the garden slopes throughout, which is worth raising when booking if steps are a problem.