Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday are official holidays. The supervisory body in charge of the banking sector in Guatemala (la Superintendencia de Bancos de Guatemala) announced that bank holidays would be observed in Guatemala every year.

Nevertheless, Thanksgiving or Día de Acción de Gracias (as it is known in Spanish this harvest festival) is observed and celebrated by the large U.S. expat community living La Antigua Guatemala; therefore, there are many places where one can have a turkey dinner.

Semana Santa

The following list comprises traditions that many people across Guatemala follow as Christmas approaches.

• El Quema del Diablo. “El quema del diablo,” or “the burning of the devil,” occurs every December 7th.
• Procesíon de la Virgen de Concepcíon.
• Día de Guadalupe.
• Las Posadas.
• Misa de Gallo.
• Decorations.
• Pyrotechnics.
• FOOD.

In many Latin American countries, Santa Claus is a well-established figure and they call him by the English term. In Mexico, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guatemala, Nicaragua, and El Salvador, Santa Claus in Spanish is sometimes called Santa Clós or Santa Cló to refer to the exact same character as in the United States.

Football

Guatemala is best known for its volcanic landscape, fascinating Mayan culture and the colorful colonial city of Antigua, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. But this small Central American country has a wealth of homegrown produce and talent.

Food items such as pork, rice, beef, cheese, chilies, corn, tortillas, and beans are the primary ingredients of traditional Guatemalan cuisine. Certain Guatemalan foods are commonly eaten on specific days of the week.

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While alcohol consumption is certainly not frowned upon, public drunkenness is.

It’s illegal to throw knives at men wearing striped suits in Natoma. Pedestrians crossing the highways at night must wear tail lights. The state hunting rule prohibits the use of mules to hunt ducks. Sexist laws such as Guatemala’s make it easier for girls to be forced into marriage at a young age.

The Most Popular Drinks In Guatemala

• Rum. Source: Link. The best way to enjoy a sunny day in Guatemala is by having a sip of the finest drinks the country has to offer.
• Horchata. Source: Link.
• Gallo. Source: Link.
• Ponche. Source: Link.
• Limonada Con Soda. Source: Link.
• Coffee. Source: Link.

Some of the animals you may encounter on land include jaguars, pumas, howler monkeys, ocelots, wolves of prairie, coyotes, lizards, armadillos, iguanas and several species of serpents (oil lamp, chorale, mazacuate and yellow beard).

Tigers are an Asiatic member of the cat family. Thus, there are no tigers in Guatemala unless there is perhaps a sample or two in some zoo.

So even if they don’t scare you, be sure not to pet them! Now, most dangerous one, that you can encounter in Guatemala even in urban areas is fiddleback spider. It is called Chilean recluse and is widespread through Latin America and the USA, even Finland.

The largest of Guatemala’s cats is the jaguar (Panthera onca), found in lowland parts of Petén, Izabal, and the Verapaces. Referred to as tigre by locals, it is known to sometimes wander into chiclero camps as well as kill livestock in cattle ranches that have encroached on remote areas.

Crocodiles, caimans and alligators in Mayan art & mythology of Guatemala. There are two species of crocodiles and one species of alligator in the Mayan regions of Guatemala, Belize, Honduras and Mexico. Its habitat is only in Mexico, Belize and Guatemala.

Guatemala is home to 18 species of venomous snake, including various pit vipers and coral snakes. If you encounter a snake while in the field, do not try to capture, kill, or play with it; most accidents occur while the snake is being molested, and the vast majority of snakes encountered in the field are non-venomous.

Jaguar distribution in Guatemala is estimated to cover 58% of the country and 47.2% of this distribution constitutes protected areas. The Maya Biosphere Reserve (MBR) located in the north of Guatemala constitutes the largest continuous block of tropical forest located in the protected areas of Guatemala.

The Guatemalan black howler, or Yucatan black howler, (Alouatta pigra) is a species of howler monkey, a type of New World monkey, from Central America. It is found in Belize, Guatemala and Mexico, in and near the Yucatan Peninsula. It lives in evergreen, semideciduous and lowland rain forests.

Scorpions are everywhere in Guatemala, Mexico, and Belize but do not sting unless provoked or scared. Most of these creatures are also in adjacent Mexico, Belize, Honduras, and El Salvador.

“From a far-off country they brought us a nice little elephant who traveled by land and sea She made La Aurora zoo her home and ‘Mocosita’ was her name,” the plaque reads. Mocosita arrived at the zoo on Jan.

Native Plants Of Guatemala

Home to more than 8,000 higher plant species, Guatemala also provides habitats for around 250 mammal species, 200 reptile and amphibian species and 800 types of birds. Elusive cat species like jaguars, ocelots, pumas and jaguarundi can be found in the country but are hard to spot.

Blue Scorpions The scorpion species Centruroides gracilis is known in Cuba as “alacran azul,” or “blue scorpion” in English. These scorpions can be kept together with other species of scorpions, so long as food and shelter are well provided.

Here are four of the top diseases in Guatemala.

• Lower Respiratory Infections. Lower respiratory infections killed about 10,000 people in Guatemala in 2012.
• Neonatal and Nutritional Issues. Neonatal and nutritional issues killed about 600,000 Guatemalans in 2012.
• HIV, TB and Malaria.
• Zika.

Cupiennius salei, commonly called the tiger wandering spider, is a large spider belonging to a group of wandering spiders found in Central America (also one of many diverse types that mistakenly get called banana spiders), although this species is specifically from Eastern Mexico, Guatemala, Belize and Honduras.

Guatemala and Mexico are two neighboring countries who share a common cultural history from the Maya civilization and both nations were colonized by the Spanish empire. In 1838 the union dissolved and Guatemala became an independent nation.