There is no road access to Livingston, Guatemala. The only way to get from Puerto Barrios to Livingston is by boat.
Boats to Livingston depart from the Muelle Municipal (municipal wharf) in Puerto Barrios. You can also get there from Rio Dulce and the jungle camps, upriver and, I guess, in better times, from Belize.
I made this boat journey twice. The first time I travelled from Guatemala City to Puerto Barrios on a Litegua bus, and a year later, having backpacked San Pedro Sula in Honduras, I crossed the border at Corinto to arrive in Puerto Barrios.
There is no fixed schedule. The boats go from the Municipal Wharf when they have a full complement of passengers, which doesn’t take long.
Don’t expect a nice ferry with toilets and a restaurant with a fridge full of cold ones.
These are the speedboats like you see on Lake Atitlan with their Yamaha engines.
The ticket price is 50 Q.
Loitering outside the ticket office are the usual touts wanting to offer their ‘help’, who try to intimidate you when hearing English and that you’d be a fool for not accepting their offer, as there is no way you can buy a ticket without speaking Spanish.
The ride is 30 minutes, and it’s open water, so be prepared for it to get a bit choppy.
A short walk from the dock brings you to the Hotel La Casa Rosada, where I stayed for about a week.
