hello and welcome to guatemala city just arrived last night and taking my first steps in zone 10.
i've been to guatemala city before but i've never been to this part of the city and the first thing
i've noticed is just how clean everything is i mean take a look around you could probably eat
a meal off this sidewalk i'm not going to don't ask me to do that but look this place is spotless
seriously impressive another place that will hopefully be impressive
is where i'm walking to now a place called avenida reforma where former avenue would be the
english way to say it the way i understand this district is it's the kind of place people stay
uh when they're international business travelers or people with a bit more
money you got a lot of really nice hotels nice restaurants i mean take a look at this place
camino real
and if you've seen many of my videos before you might be wondering what i'm doing in a district
like this i don't usually stay at the nicest hotels and i'm not an international businessman
however i am today uh joining a trip called fearless journeys uh this guy francisco started
his own tour company and there's gonna be a little group of us the trip starts today
so i think there's going to be five other people one of them christian who you're
about to meet has already arrived he booked us in this hotel in a beautiful part of the city
so i'm getting a very nice introduction to a side of guatemala that i might have otherwise
never seen francisco the reason i'm here welcome to uh welcome to youtube thank you
dan welcome back to guatemala uh you know i was only on your youtube channel because uh two and
a half years ago my first trip to guatemala i was looking for videos from guatemala cities
and yours was right at the top walking around uh the streets of guatemala made me feel comfortable
being here and then i ended up moving here like two years later for i've been here all years and
now i'm welcoming you back to guatemala so it's it's awesome and also here today is christian
hey everyone i'm i'm in from dc i've been here uh a little less than a day um francisco's a
good friend for over 20 years so it's awesome to see him on this journey and really see where
he's from and you've had one day so far in guatemala what's your first impression
it's awesome last night i got to see the city from above we had dinner and it was
such a magical view and i'm really glad i got that opportunity yeah nice people they're both american
i'm canadian of course and uh oh my god is that a is that a christmas tree
it's got to be 100 feet tall look at that thing there was a crane next to it yesterday so
i'm sure it takes like a few days to put that thing up but they must have finished it yesterday
put your hand i think
temperature check
all right so funny story i just bought three waters one for me and the gang
and you know in my mind i was translating how much i just spent in the canadian dollars it
was about like 40 cents per bottle very affordable but i was so busy translating
the currency that i forgot to get my change so i just walked out of the store
leaving behind about 85 catsalas and then the employee like kind of ran after me
and told me to come back so very honest uh i almost left a huge tip at that grocery store
but you know i don't know why that always happens to me when you're first arriving
in country sometimes you're distracted with what you're doing or seeing all the new sites
it's always good to uh pay attention especially on day one
there's something interesting for you that's called a chicken bus i don't know if the reason is
just because some people literally carry chickens on them i don't know the history of the name
but the buses in guatemala are famously colorful as you can see from that one
of course you can see i'm wearing a t-shirt today but it's not as hot as you might imagine
it's about 20 degrees celsius just a beautiful day for walking around
okay i will be honest as i was filming on my camera
someone in a car yelled out his window and pointed he was speaking spanish very quickly
but he was saying camera camera and basically he was telling me i got to be careful with my camera
um and that is another reality of guatemala there can be security risks in a big city like this of
course i lived in mexico city before i understand the dynamic when you're in a big busy city
there's a lot of good people but there could be some people who are looking to take advantage
of tourists as well so take precautions enjoy the city but be smart about it so the christmas
tree is tall but behind it is something that i think is even taller it is a obelisk that is
signifying the independence of guatemala and fun fact this year 2021 200th anniversary
of guatemalan independence from spain quite a quite a moment of pride for the guatemalans
of course that is september 15th independence day actually not only in guatemala but in almost all
of central america you know el salvador costa rica all these places the 15th of september
is a special time of year we have the first pollo campero sighting a very famous fried
chicken uh restaurant in guatemala i'm sure i'll take you there at some point on this trip
love that place staple i don't know is it fair to compare it to kfc or you think it's
something different than that yeah it's probably comparable i wouldn't quite say it's chick-fil-a
we've been walking for about an hour now i haven't seen a single other tourist
we got this beautiful place all to ourselves
this is not the guatemalan flag does anyone recognize this flag
i'll give you three seconds to guess what flag this is
oh no those tres this is the flag for costa rica you see avenue reforma has just changed to
avenida de las americas i believe it's called and this part of the avenue is dedicated to the
different countries of the americas not the united states of america but the global sense of america
which is you know countries of central america and even south america
you know a guatemalan would have to tell me if this is true but i have a feeling that
a lot of the countries of the americas really feel united they feel like they have a shared
history and a kind of shared culture and i think this avenue is just representing that
it's dedicated to the different countries of this region which is you know it's pretty cool
right here oh it's that guy he's flying
that is wild fight the drone
oh here it comes that is not me with the drone in case you're wondering that's this guy over
here who it's also not the guatemalan air force don't be confused yeah he is
definitely experienced i would not be messing around with the drone with all these uh hey
two years experience as a fpv no fpv where are you from canada
oh it's cool very cool
you guys might not know but that's super hard he's doing something called
fpv which is when you have the headset so you're only seeing the vision of the
drone and he's flying it with all these trees and statues you got to be super experienced for that
there's so many countries here we just passed chile we have cuba coming up
i'm not going to show you all of them or that would just be the whole video
but there's one place i can't i can't not include oh canada
look at this
for those who don't know this is actually um this is called inukshuk and it literally translates as
i was here and it's a sign from the indigenous canadians living in northern canada
they would pile rocks in the snow to show anyone else that i was here that someone was there
one other thing i should mention that is the pope john paul ii who has actually been to
guatemala before guatemala of course is a very catholic country as a lot of the americas are
so we have finished the los americas avenue and we're now at a place called plaza berlin
berlin plaza man this is a international part of the city that's for sure
but in the distance you can get a look at oh wow that's a nice looking house that orange one
peeking through the trees but what i was gonna point out actually are the hills behind
us so much of guatemala city is surrounded by hills and even volcanoes so much of this country
is mountainous and you can get a feel for that as we walk through this plaza this is the berlin wall
pieces of the berlin wall here in berlin plaza in guatemala so what do we got we got the peace sign
and i think that is a fist covered in chains so i would say oppressed people free people
nice bit of symbol symbolism there and what's this we have a
we got a butterfly i'm not sure what it's what it's on there but
this is just blowing my mind i mean you know this place has a lot of tourist potential yeah
the traffic's a bit crazy yeah it's a bit noisy but i gotta say i've really enjoyed this walk
through zone 10 and i don't even know maybe i'm in a different zone now but
this this is blowing my mind the berlin wall here in el the guatemala
it's just been an incredible first day in guatemala city
you know guatemala city is a destination that some people skip
they are actually shuttle buses that take people directly from guatemala city airport
to places like antigua lake atitlan which are very touristy parts of the country which i will also
be taking you to soon but i would recommend you if you like the hustle and bustle of a big city
don't miss guatemala city it's got more to offer than you might think and it also gives you the
unique experience of being one of the only people exploring it i mean look at this place
yep