Transfer: Airport to Hotel

Upon arrival in Nicaragua’s Managua Airport, you would be met and transferred approximately 2 hours to your accommodation for the night in Leon.

A Historic Walk of León

Enjoy a guided walk of León, Nicaragua’s cultural heart. Visit Basilica Catedral de la Asunción, widely regarded as Central America’s largest cathedral. Climb to the cathedral’s radiant white rooftop and the city opens beneath you with volcanoes brooding on the horizon like ancient guardians. Inside the Museum of the Revolution, a former Sandinista ‘guerrilero’ will recount stories around the upheaval of Nicaragua’s revolution.

Transfer: Leon to Jicaro Island via Masaya Volcano

You will be transferred approximately 2.5 hours toMasaya Volcano, followed by another 1.5 hours to Asese Port. From Asese Port, you will board a boat for 15 minutes to your accommodation at Jicaro Island.

Masaya Volcano & Artisan Market

A brief hike brings you into a first-hand view of the laval formations at the rim of the active smoking crater of Masaya Volcano. Browse local artisanal markets and observe as they demonstrate how to make maracas and colorful hammocks. Visit the Nicaraguan White Villages atop Catarina Hills for a panoramic view of Apoyo Lake, Granada City and Cocibolca Lake.

Granada & Islet Kayaking

Uncover the charm of the colonial lakefront city of Granada. Walk up to the bell tower of La Merced church for a view of the central plaza, Mombacho Volcano and Lake Nicaragua. Explore the marketplace and then hop onto a kayak to explore Las Isletas, where you can learn how village residents utilize age-old fishing techniques, as well as exploring local cafes and shops.

Transfer: Jicaro Island to Suchitoto

You will be transferred approximately 15 minutes by boat to Asese Port, followed by 1 hour to Managua Airport, where you will board your flight to San Salvador in El Salvador. Arriving into San Salvador, you will be transferred approximately 2 hours to Suchitoto for the night.

Immersion in Suchitoto

Framed by Lake Suchitlan and mountain ranges, Suchitoto is home to several art galleries and eclectic restaurants, as well as an opera theater and arguably the country’s most beautiful church.

Transfer: Suchitoto to Concepcion de Ataco via Cihuatan & Joya de Ceren

You will be transferred approximately 45 minutes to Cihuatan, followed by 1 hour to Joya de Ceren. From Joya de Ceren, it’s another 15 minutes to San Andres and then 1.5 hours to your accommodation in Concepcion de Ataco.

You would be met and transferred to your accommodation for the night. En route, we will make a sightseeing stop at Cihuatan before crossing the border to Honduras.

Lost City of Cihuatán

Cihuatán was a large and powerful city located near the Lempa River at the extreme south of the Mesoamerican cultural area. Unlike the grand ceremonial centers of the Maya highlands, Cihuatán was a thriving urban hub with a complex street grid, plazas, pyramids, ballcourts and palaces, suggesting both political authority and sophisticated city planning.

Pompeii of the Americas

Buried under volcanic ash from the eruption of Loma Caldera, Joya de Cerén is often dubbed as the “Pompeii of the Americas”. This UNESCO-listed site is an excellent window into the everyday life of the Maya farming community around 600 CE. We will also visit San Andrés, once a major Maya ceremonial and administrative center with a complex urban planning and religious system.

Transfer: Concepcion de Ataco to Copan

You will be transferred approximately 4.5 hours and crossing the border into Copan in Honduras.

Copán: Paris of the Maya World

Step into Copán, one of the most opulent and artistically accomplished cultural centers of the ancient Maya world. A UNESCO site, Copán dazzles with intricately carved stelae and hieroglypic stairway that chronicles centuries of dynastic history. The on-site sculpture museum deepends your understanding of Maya artistry, revealing the ingenuity behind each finely carved monument.

We recommend that you book early to secure having your Copán tour guided by David Sedat, a renowned Maya expert who unearthed Copán’s most exciting discoveries: three royal tombs, including one which held the remains of Yax K’uk Mo’, the dynastic founder of Copán. If you are keen, we can also arrange dinner with David Sedat at his home at an additional cost.

Macaw Mountain Bird Park

Explore the dazzling Macaw Mountain Bird Park, a lush 9-acre sanctuary dedicated to the care of rescued and endangered tropical birds. Guided by the park’s experts, you will meet scarlet macaws, keel-billed toucans, and other exotic avian species, learning about conservation efforts while enjoying the vivid colors, playful calls, and tactile joy of interacting with these magnificent birds.

Transfer: Copán to Antigua via Quiriguá

You will be driven approximately 3.5 hours with border crossing into Guatemala into Quiriguá for sightseeing. Thereafter, you will be driven approximately 4.5 hours to your accommodation in Antigua Guatemala for the night.

Quiriguá’s Monumental Stelae

Step into the ancient splendor of Quiriguá, a Maya city famed for its towering stelae and masterful stone carvings, built in just 65 years between 745 and 810 AD. Once the capital of a thriving state, the site boasts twelve monumental stelae, enormous zoomorphs shaped like mythological beasts, carved calendars, temples, a palace, a ball court, and a central plaza. The largest stela rises an astonishing 35 feet and weighs some 65 tons, its intricate hieroglyphics chronicling Quiriguá’s history and its relations with the great city of Copán in Honduras.

Option 1: Antigua Street Eats

Shoes and appetite ready, we will stroll along the cobblestone streets through beloved local comedores where culinary magic happens. Sample Guatemalan classics like chuchitos (tamales), pupusas (cheese-filled corn tortillas), rellenitos (fried plantain with beans) and even pigs’ feet for the daring! Explore Antigua’s bustling community market (open Mondays, Thursdays and Saturdays), where the scent of exotic fruits, vegetables and spices fill the air!

Option 2: Textiles of Guatemalan Villages

Journey into the surrounding lesser-visited villages that cradle Guatemala’s rich textile traditions. In Santa María, you will rub shoulders with indigenous women dressed in vibrant traje much like their Maya ancestors did. Wander through the historic streets of San Pedro and Ciudad Vieja as you experience local village lives. Visit a weaving cooperative in San Antonio, where skilled artisans transform traditional back-strap looms into brightly-coloured textiles. If time permits, you can stop stop at an organic macadamia farm in San Miguel Dueñas to sample the local produces.

Antigua Walking Tour

This afternoon, enjoy a walking tour that reveals Antigua’s rich tapestry of culture, architecture, and history. Step inside the Cathedral of San José, San Francisco El Grande, and La Merced to admire intricate altars, gilded carvings, and centuries-old frescoes, and visit the tomb of Guatemala’s first saint, a quiet testament to devotion and local faith.

Transfer: Antigua to Lake Atitlan with Sightseeing

You would be met and transferred approximately 2.5 hours to your accommodation for the night with sightseeing along the way.

Artisanal Village of San Juan

Set sail across Lake Atitlán to the serene village of San Juan La Laguna, a vibrant Tz’utujil Maya town framed by sweeping lake and volcano views. Ascend the hillside past artisan shops, galleries and visit a cozy café to savor some of the region’s finest coffee. Visit a women’s cooperative to witness traditional backstrap loom weaving, where natural plant dyes are transformed into scarves, blankets, and even iPad covers! The village is also a haven for naïf painters, whose whimsical works capture local customs, folklore, and the surrounding landscapes in vibrant color. Conclude at an artist’s studio before returning to your hotel by boat.

Into the Maya Highlands

Today’s journey brings us into Almolonga, a valley so fertile it has earned the nickname as “the Garden of Central Market”. Its produce market bustles with gorgeous vegetables and locals dressed in colourful traditional garments.

A further drive away, in Zunil, lies a town where Catholic devotion and older Maya cosmology coexist in delicate balance. You will visit the enigmatic Maximón, a Maya deity to whom locals offer gifts of cigarettes, alcohol and colorful candles. Step into the town’s striking Catholic Church, the local cemetery and a weaving cooperative where huipiles bloom with intricate embroidery.

Head to San Andrés Xecul, where a dazzling yellow church façade erupts in symbolism of saints, flowers, vines, and animals. Stroll across the town into its humbler church replica, alongside which you will find ceremonial grounds where locals perform Maya rituals with sweeping views of surrounding valleys and pine forests as the backdrop.

Transfer: Lake Atitlan to Flores via Guatemala City

You would be met and transferred approximately 2.5 hours to Guatemala City for sightseeing, followed by your night flight to Flores. Upon arrival in Flores, you would be transferred approximately 30 minutes to your accommodation for the night.

Essence of Guatemala City

Guatemala City reveals itself in layers. In the historic center, the Cathedral Metropolitana rises over Plaza de la Constitución, its neoclassical façade bearing silent witness to earthquakes, conflict, and civic rebirth, while the astonishing Relief Map (Mapa en Relieve) renders the entire nation in sculpted topography.

You may choose to visit one of the following museums: Museo Popol Vuh (closed Sundays and public holidays) with its exquisite Maya ceramics and funerary arts, Ixchel Museum (closed Sundays and public holidays) with its luminous archive of indigenous textiles and clothes, Miraflores Museum (closed Mondays) which display artefacts from the ancient city of Kaminaljuyú, or the National Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology (closed Mondays).

Wonders of Tikal & Uaxactún

Journey deep into the Petén jungle to Uaxactún, one of the Maya world’s most enduring cities and home to the earliest known astronomical complex in Mesoamerica. Enjoy a traditional lunch prepared with local ingredients and visit Tikal National Park, where you can stroll through plazas once ruled by divine kings, with colossal temples piercing through the emerald canopy and the sounds of birds, howler and spider monkeys echoing through the air.

Transfer: Flores to Placencia with Sightseeing

You would be met and transferred approximately 2.5 hours to Melchor de Mencos for your border crossing to Belize. You will visit a few sightseeing spots before you are transferred to your accommodation for the night. The distance from Xunantunich area to your accommodation is approximately 3.5 hours.

Xunantunich & Macal River Canoeing

At the river’s bend where Belize brushes Guatemala, Xunantunich rises from emerald fields like a memory carved in limestone. The name means “Stone Woman” and it features six major plazas, as well as 25 temples and palaces at its center. Ascend to El Castillo temple, its 40-meter summit lifting you above a tapestry of ancient platforms and ceremonial sites bathed in lush greenery.

Slide a canoe into the jade-green Macal River and drift beneath arching branches, paddling past sunbathing green iguanas and flashes of toucans overhead. The forest closes in gently as you glide towards San Ignacio and disembark near the historic Hawkesworth Bridge, carrying with you the quiet grandeur of stone, river and living jungle.

Placencia at Leisure

Flanked by a shimmering lagoon lined with mangroves to the west and the turquoise expanse of the Caribbean Sea to the east, the Placencia Peninsula invites a day of pure leisure. Wander along silky white beaches, feeling the soft sand between your toes as waves lap gently at the shore, or stretch out under the sun with a refreshing drink in hand.

At an additional cost, we can also arrange optional Blue Hole Adventure Flight, where you can soar above the iconic Great Blue Hole with its perfect, ink-blue circle of coral reefs that stretch over 300 meters with a depth of over 120 meters!

Transfer: Hotel to Airport

You would be met and transferred to the airport for your onward journey.