Salamá

About Salamá:

Salamá sits in the middle of Baja Verapaz and is ringed almost entirely by the department’s own municipalities: Purulhá to the north, San Jerónimo to the east, San Miguel Chicaj and Rabinal to the west and Santa Cruz El Chol to the south-west. Only at its southern end, along the Río Motagua, does it touch other departments, with Chuarrancho in Guatemala and Sanarate and Morazán in El Progreso. Guatemala City is 150 kilometres away by the usual route: the CA-9 to El Rancho, the CA-14 north as far as the Cumbre de Santa Elena, then the RN-17 down into the valley. A shorter road runs south over the Motagua at La Canoa, but it is slower, and when the bridge has been closed traffic has been sent round by El Chol. The municipality covers 776 square kilometres and 154 named places, from 9 urban barrios and 23 colonias out to 65 aldeas.

Being the department capital shapes daily life more than anything else. People from every corner of the municipality come into town for the Hospital Nacional, the schools and colegios, the banks and the municipal market, whose stalls spill out into the surrounding streets. The Universidad de San Carlos runs its Centro Universitario de Baja Verapaz here, and the town has the supermarkets, hotels, cafés and restaurants of a regional centre. Out in the countryside the living comes from maize, beans, peanuts, tomato, snow peas, sugar cane, fern and cattle. Potters in Trapiche de Agua turn out comales and ollas, and Llano Grande, which has its own bank branch, serves some twenty villages in the south. Around 70,000 people live in the municipality, most of them ladino, with an Achi’ minority of more than 11,000.

The valley floor is warm and dry, and eight in ten communities in the municipality lie within the Dry Corridor. Most of the town’s water comes from the Cachil micro-basin at the aldea of El Carmen, and the rest from a dozen wells, mostly in the colonias of Barrio Hacienda La Virgen. When the springs drop at the end of the dry season, the upper part of Barrio Alcantarilla, Santa Elena, El Calvario, San José, Hacienda La Virgen and Colonia Vista al Valle go short, and the municipality runs a tanker plan every year to keep them supplied. That is why the newer projects put their own well at the top of the brochure. To the north-east the land climbs into the Sierra de las Minas Biosphere Reserve, where Chilascó, La Unión Barrios and Niño Perdido grow vegetables in cool cloud forest and the Salto de Chilascó falls more than 130 metres, one of the highest waterfalls in Central America.

Dominican friars founded Salamá in the 1550s, and their great estate in the valley, irrigated by tunnels and channels to water vineyards on this dry ground, was sold in 1829 to Marshall Bennett, Francisco Morazán’s mahogany agent, who renamed it the Hacienda de San Jerónimo. The town became capital of the old Verapaz department in 1833 and of Baja Verapaz when the department was created in 1877. The baroque church of San Mateo, a national monument, faces the central park with its gilded altarpieces and carved pulpit; the Puente de la Libertad, first built in 1845, still crosses the Río Salamá on a wooden deck; and the Templo de Minerva of 1916 stands on the Cerro de la Cruz. The feria of San Mateo runs from 17 to 21 September. Buyers are mostly from the department itself: families moving in from the aldeas, people working in the hospital, schools and public offices, and households trading a house on a busy central street for one in a gated colonia.

Houses in Salamá:

The centre of town is Barrio El Centro and Barrio El Calvario, a few blocks from the park and the market. Around them, and especially in Barrio Hacienda La Virgen and Barrio San José, the town has grown into colonias such as Valle Dorado, Vista al Valle, Valle del Sol, Piedras Verdes, Las Brisas and Valle de las Rosas, while the colonias at Los Pinos and San Juan keep extending it beyond the edge. In El Centro, Hacienda La Virgen and San José homes and shops share the same streets, so a big house on a through road often sells as much for a business as for a family. Offers run from small Hábitat-built houses in Colonia Los Pinos to family homes in Hacienda La Virgen. Before you settle on homes for sale in Salamá, ask whether the water comes from the municipal line or a well, how many hours it runs in March and April, and whether the house has its own cistern.

New Developments in Salamá:

Planned, gated housing has arrived in Salamá. Paseo Las Lomas covers 80 manzanas inside a perimeter fence and sells both lots and finished houses in more than ten styles, with its own financing and a monthly maintenance fee. Casa Salamá is a gated condominium of 95 two-level houses of 106 square metres, with a guard house and cameras, a clubhouse and pool, paved streets and a well of its own. In the aldea of Payaque, about 14 minutes from the central park, Las Fuentes de Payaque sells serviced lots with water from its own well, drainage, power, paved streets and a clubhouse. Ask any developer who will run the well and the drainage once the project is handed over to residents, and what the monthly fee pays for.

Land and Lots in Salamá:

Lots come up both in town and in the aldeas around it. In Barrio El Calvario, around sector La Tejera, central 10-by-20-metre lots are sold for building, and Paseo Las Lomas offers smaller plots such as 7 by 16 metres. A little further out, flat lots of around 500 square metres with registered deeds sit about 15 minutes from town, while some rural parcels come with no services at all and can be reached only on foot. The municipal land-use plan sets aside areas for urban growth and points industrial use towards San Ignacio, so before you buy lots for sale in Salamá to build a home on, ask the municipality how that specific plot is classed.

Rentals in Salamá:

As the seat of the department, Salamá has a working rental market. Compact one-bedroom houses with a garage are let in colonias such as Valle del Sol, and large houses on the main streets are rented as offices. In the centre, furnished apartments above a commercial plaza take short stays. The hospital, the university centre and the departmental offices bring a steady flow of people who need somewhere to live for a term or a posting. If you are looking for a house for rent in Salamá, ask whether water and rubbish collection are included and how the supply holds up in the dry months.

FAQ:

• How do I get to Salamá from Guatemala City?

  Take the CA-9 Atlantic highway to El Rancho, turn north on the CA-14 towards Cobán, and leave it at the Cumbre de Santa Elena for the RN-17 down into the valley, 150 kilometres in all. The route over the Motagua at La Canoa is shorter on the map but slower, and it has been closed at the bridge at times.

• Is water a problem in Salamá?

  In some streets, yes. Toward the end of the dry season the upper part of Barrio Alcantarilla, Santa Elena, El Calvario, San José, Hacienda La Virgen and Colonia Vista al Valle run short, and the municipality supplies them by tanker. A house with a cistern or a project with its own well is worth paying a little more for.

• Which municipality is my plot really in?

  On the edges it is not always clear. The official boundaries do not match how communities such as El Tunal, on the San Jerónimo side, Cuchilla del Nogal and Santa Bárbara El Carnero, toward Purulhá, and El Aguacate, toward San Miguel Chicaj, are actually served and administered. Confirm which municipality collects the IUSI on the land, and check the finca, folio and book numbers at the property registry before you sign anything.

• Can I buy land near the Salto de Chilascó?

  Chilascó lies inside the Sierra de las Minas Biosphere Reserve, declared in 1990, so land there carries the reserve’s rules on clearing and building on top of the usual title checks. Talk to CONAP about what is allowed on that particular parcel before you agree a price, especially if you plan cabins or a business for visitors.

• When is the feria of Salamá?

  The feria of San Mateo runs from 17 to 21 September, with 21 September as the main day, and brings the Convite or masked dancers into the streets. On 3 May there is a celebration on the Cerro de la Cruz, south of the centre, where the Baile del Venado is danced.