Cobblestone Street and Motorcycles, Antigua Guatemala

Antigua Guatemala's streets still follow the grid laid out by Spanish colonial planners after the city became the capital of the Kingdom of Guatemala in 1543. Cobblestones, cut from volcanic rock quarried in the surrounding highlands, remain in place across much of the historic center, which UNESCO added to its World Heritage list in 1979. Single-story colonial buildings with tile roofs and thick adobe or masonry walls, built low and reinforced after repeated earthquakes destroyed the original capital at Ciudad Vieja and damaged Antigua itself in 1773, line these narrow rights-of-way. The Sierra de las Cruces range and nearby volcanoes, including Agua and Fuego, rise directly above the city's edges, a proximity that has shaped both its layout and its long history of seismic and volcanic damage.

Photo taken in February 2020.