Amatitlán

Zona 1 de Villa Nueva, Villa Nueva, Guatemala

The “Volcán de Agua,” just west of Guatemala City, at sunset... Going ‘up north’ to visit Guatemala, where an old family friend has lived for years, was our vacation during the year we lived in Nicaragua. Her neighborhood is in the hills above Amatitlán. I’d just bought my first digital camera a few days before and I was still learning to use it. (We had moved to Central America with a film-camera, but getting film developed in Nicaragua was more expensive than back in the U.S., even though Nicaragua is the poorest country in Central America! The disparities between wealth and poverty are shocking...and some of the malls in Guatemala City are nicer than what you find in most ‘Gringo’ cities...and so I finally came into the digital-camera era in, of all places, “Guate.”) So, while dinner was cooking, a quick stroll...there weren’t many clouds, so I wasn’t expecting a very interesting sunset, and then--and then the sun went down and the volcano cast its 3,760 m (12,336 ft) shadow into the sky--time to learn to use the camera!!!

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"Agua" casting a shadow

The “Volcán de Agua,” just west of Guatemala City, at sunset... Going ‘up north’ to visit Guatemala, where an old family friend has lived for years, was our vacation during the year we lived in Nicaragua. Her neighborhood is in the hills above Amatitlán. I’d just bought my first digital camera a few days before and I was still learning to use it. (We had moved to Central America with a film-camera, but getting film developed in Nicaragua was more expensive than back in the U.S., even though Nicaragua is the poorest country in Central America! The disparities between wealth and poverty are shocking...and some of the malls in Guatemala City are nicer than what you find in most ‘Gringo’ cities...and so I finally came into the digital-camera era in, of all places, “Guate.”) So, while dinner was cooking, a quick stroll...there weren’t many clouds, so I wasn’t expecting a very interesting sunset, and then--and then the sun went down and the volcano cast its 3,760 m (12,336 ft) shadow into the sky--time to learn to use the camera!!!

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