Guatemala’s festivals mix Catholic devotion with Maya roots — the great processions and sawdust carpets of Holy Week, and the giant kites flown beside Sumpango’s cemetery on All Saints’ Day.
Photo: SantiagoGG, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Holy Week in Guatemala, inscribed on UNESCO’s Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2022, fills the streets of Antigua and Guatemala City with processions organised by religious brotherhoods, over carpets of coloured sawdust and flowers.
Six months later, on 1 November, the town of Sumpango in the same department of Sacatepéquez holds its giant kite contest beside the cemetery — a custom recognised as a Cultural Good of Guatemala.
Festival de Barriletes Gigantes
On All Saints’ Day, the town of Sumpango gathers at the football field beside its cemetery for a contest of giant kites — vast, intricately patterned discs that teams spend months building, judged on their artistry and on how well they fly.
November 1, 2026Calculated
Semana Santa
In Holy Week, Guatemala walks with its saints — purple-robed cucuruchos shoulder huge processional floats through the streets of Antigua and Guatemala City, over carpets of coloured sawdust and flowers that take hours to make and vanish as the procession passes.
March 21 – 28, 2027Calculated