Spanish lessons at
lake Atitlán
Spanish lessons at Lake Atitlán
Published on 26/11/2025
If you found this article, you probably already heard, read or saw tiktoks about it: Lake Atítlan in Guatemala is one of the most popular places to take Spanish lessons for travellers in Central America. Of course we followed the trend and decided to book a week in San Pedro to be a bit more prepared for our trip. Personally I ended up loving it so much, I decided to add two more weeks at the end of our travels through Guatemala. This turned into another week and another week, so I ended up spending six weeks total in San Pedro. If this doesn’t make me qualified to tell you all about it, I don’t know what does.
Spanish school
The main attraction which has people stay so long is of course the Spanish School. There’s a ton of different schools around the lake, since it is such a popular activity. There’s different towns around the lake where you can stay (read more about the different villages here), but by far the most popular town to learn Spanish is San Pedro La Laguna. We went with Lake Atítlan Spanish School, which is one of the biggest schools in San Pedro and is located on the main gringo street (the street with all the tourist facilities, close to the bay). I do think most of the schools offer around the same services and activities, so pick whatever school appeals to you most. The standard package is four hours of class a day with a private teacher, a local snack in the break, free optional activities each day after class and an optional homestay, which I will tell you all about in the next segment. You can usually choose between morning (8.00-12.00) or afternoon (13.00-17.00) classes. You can also do more hours if you like, but for most people four hours of concentration is already hard enough, especially if you haven’t been in school for a long time! It does feel a bit like back to school: waking up early, going to school, chatting in the breaks and doing homework in the afternoon (you can choose whether you want homework or not). For some people this can be a bit of a deterrent, but if you like learning languages this is so so so fun. Since you have a private teacher, they also become like your friend. You basically spend four hours a day chatting, gossiping and swapping stories with someone from a whole different life, while they incorporate some grammar and vocab into the conversation. This way you don’t only learn the language, but you learn so many interesting things about each other’s culture and way of life. This was one of the reasons why I spend so much time here: if you’re looking for some more structure after travelling for a while, but still learning so much about a different lifestyle, getting a much deeper understanding than if you’re there for only a few days, this is a perfect way to do so.
Homestay
You could choose to stay in a hostel or other accommodation, but I 100% recommend staying in a homestay. The schools are in contact with trusted families, where new students come to stay every week. Most families house between 2 to 10 students, so you’ll be staying together with around four other students, solo travellers, friends and couples alike. There’s a few reasons why I would recommend this. First of all, if you’re trying to learn more about Guatemalan culture or you want to practice your Spanish, this is the perfect way to do it. I’ve stayed with two different families, and both were very helpful in explaining all sorts of things. They would also help a lot with our Spanish, speaking slowly and clearly, mixing with English to help us understand. Another reason, which is also very important: the food is AMAZING. The homestay includes three meals a day, so you won’t have to lift a finger. These are all home cooked meals, giving you a taste of Guatemalan cuisine. They are also more than happy to accommodate diets and had no problem cooking vegetarian food for me (although they often made some meat for themselves haha). Staying with other students makes it really easy to make friends as well, since they follow the same schedule of classes, you have all the meals together and you can go to the school’s activities together. Last but not least, while it is more expensive than staying in a hostel, you get so much in return for a relatively low price. A private room, three home cooked meals a day and a full immersion in the language and culture: I would definitely do it again.
Activities
As I said before, the school offers an activity every afternoon. This schedule changes every week, which is ideal if you’re staying for multiple weeks. The activities ranged from games around spanish words to salsa class to chocolate workshop to lectures to football games to cooking classes to a tour of the town, there’s definitely something for everyone!
Apart from the activities the school offers, there is no way you’ll get bored in San Pedro. Even after staying there for six weeks there were still some things I didn’t do. One thing I loved about exploring the lake was that there’s not much that you HAVE to do, which takes the pressure off. You can just look at what you find interesting and then there’s an infinite amount of things to spend a lovely afternoon with. Since there’s regular boats connecting all the villages, you can just show up at the bay, take the next boat and explore as much as you want. If you want to know more about all the possible activities at Lake Atítlan, you should read this article. But again, in my opinion nothing is obligatory. The most important thing is that you enjoy your time at the lake!
I hope this shed some light on what it’s like to take Spanish classes at Lake Atítlan. If you have any more questions, don’t be afraid to ask!