History
History of
Jenna's River Bed and Breakfast
My name is Jennifer and I was born in Quebec. My parents and I left when I was 3 months old and I grew up in Italy, Spain and Morocco. I speak a few languages, I paint and I love to cook! I also lived in England, California, Israel and Canada… In 1990 I moved to Guatemala… that’s another story.
In 2006 I found myself looking after an old and dear friend of my father’s. I rented a big house in Panajachel which had 5 bedrooms and bit by bit started advertising room rentals. Mostly it was to fill the house with activity… we cooked dinners for friends, had silly Halloween parties and made a beautiful garden. When Andy went back to the States, the rent proved to be too high for me in that big house, so the next place was a four bedroom house close to the river of San Francisco which is the Patron Saint of Panajachel.
Now I had the name: Jenna’s River Bed and Breakfast and registered with Tripadvisor and other companies and slowly building up my business.
The house was lovely and the views down the river and of the Volcanoes was spectacular…. the problem became the river though. Hurricane Agatha came to visit us and the water rose to lap at my front gate! Time to get out of there!
The next place I rented to do the bed and breakfast was a lovely house down an alley in downtown Panajachel. The house was a three bedroom with an annex room which I fixed up and a lovely garden. Unfortunately the owner did not want to give me a long lease but preferred to increase the rent 30% each year… time to move.
The last location before I acquired my own piece of land which is where we are now was a large rambling house belonging to a Guatmalan family who live in Canada. This had 7 bedrooms, a small apartment and a yurt which I built in the garden.
The Yurts: a few years ago I went to visit my sister in England. While browsing in a charity shop I came across a couple of books on yurts and just loved the idea of them.
I lived in the yurt in the garden for 8 months and felt so comfortable in it. I have to mention it does have an en-suite bathroom with a sunken bathtub… From there the idea was born to get my own place.
I found an acre of land on a slope overlooking Lake Atitlan and over two years cut platforms into the hillside and built yurts with en-suite bathrooms each one with bathtubs with picture windows looking at the lake.
The story continues but hopefully Jenna’s River Bed and Breakfast has now found a permanent home!