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In Pictures: A city living under an active volcano21 July 2023ShareSaveBella FalkFeatures correspondentShareSaveBella Falk(Credit: Bella Falk)Antigua is blaze photo studioGuatemala's most popular destination – but the picturesque city sits on an active tectonic zone. Travel photographer Bella Falk captures a slice of life.Antigua, Guatemala, is a Unesco World Heritage city and the jewel in the country's crown. Smaller, safer and much less gritty than the capital, Guatemala City, Antigua is renowned for its picturesque streets lined with rainbow-painted colonial buildings, grand historic churches and convents, and a thriving cafe and restaurant scene. Bella Falk(Credit: Bella Falk)Antigua's most famous landmark is the canary-yellow Santa Catalina arch, which dates to 1694. It was built to enable the nuns of the closed order of Santa Catalina to cross from their convent to the school on the other side of the street without being seen in public. Today it's the most photographed monument in the country and an icon of Guatemala. Bella Falk(Credit: Bella Falk)Antigua's Central Park is the beating heart of the city. Enclosed on all four sides by elegant colonnades and 18th-Century buildings, it's a lively square where locals come to meet friends and relax. Here you get a clear sense of Guatemala's fusion of cultures: Indigenous Maya in traditional dress sit alongside denim-clad Guatemalans of European descent and visitors from around the world.Bella Falk(Credit: Bella Falk)Until the 18th Century, Antigua, then known as Santiago, was Guatemala's capital and one of the greatest cities in the Spanish Empire. But the city sits on an active tectonic zone in the vicinity of four volcanoes: Agua, Fuego, Acatenango and Pacaya. In 1773, it was devastated by a major series of earthquakes, so the government decided to move the capital to its current location and the city became known as La Antigua Guatemala (The Old Guatemala). Bella Falk(Credit: Bella Falk)One of the hardest hit buildings was the magnificent former cathedral. Constructed in 1545, it stood for more than 200 years before being toppled by the earthquake. Today its roof is open to the elements, the collapsed remains of pillars and carvings are piled in the eerie side chapels and pigeons nest in the alcoves.Bella Falk(Credit: Bella Falk)Now Antigua's enemies have become its friends: those same volcanoes that wreaked so much damage are major tourist draws. The star attraction is the 3,768m-tall Volcan de Fuego (Volcano of Fire), one of the world's most active. It has been constantly erupting since 2002, shooting incandescent lava bombs and clouds of ash into the air about every 15-30 minutes. Bella Falk(Credit: Bella Falk)Visitors who want to witness Earth's unstoppable power first-hand can hike up Volcan Acatenango, which stands right next to Fuego. Here, local tour companies offer overnight camping, so you can stay up late with a front-row seat to the action as Fuego explodes its red-hot guts into the night sky. Bella Falk(Credit: Bella Falk)Another agent of destruction-turned tourist attraction is Pacaya, about 50km from Antigua. Until 2021, it also erupted frequently, oozing sticky lava down its slopes. Today the eruptions have stopped, and guides like Rubi Santamaria take visitors to the freshly dried lava field, where she shows them how to toast marshmallows using the volcano's heat.BBC Travel’s In Pictures is a series that highlights stunning images from around the globe.--- Join more than three million BBC Travel fans by liking us on Facebook, or follow us on Twitter and Instagram. If you liked this story, sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter called "The Essential List". A handpicked selection of stories from BBC Future, Culture, Worklife and Travel, delivered to your inbox every Friday.VolcanoFeatures
