An arch decorated with the Dominican cross announces the traveler that he or she is entering San Jerónimo, Baja Verapaz. It is a busy street where pedestrians, bikers and cars go under the arch at the same time; that just stimulates the tourist to take a picture of a place that is well kept and clean, where the people put effort in receiving the traveler.

A few steps away from the entrance, using the main street, you get to the central park. It has a small gardened area in front of the atrium of the ancient colonial church. At one side of the atrium is the city hall, at the other side a monument dedicated to families, surrounded by benches for pedestrians and flowers, nothing is more pleasant for those who have been walking or driving for hours. But the place's jewel is right on the center, it is the old church of the Dominican hacienda, whose simple fa�ade does not seem to hold the great artistic treasures that the locals are afraid to loose, in hands of the artistic burglary that threatens the country.

When you go inside the church, its golden frameworks tell us about a glorious past when people dedicated their resources to the beauty of sacred places. Devotion molded the best talent in them, like the one that shows a transition between Baroque and Neoclassical styles. Besides, the proud local inhabitants show the painting of the Virgin of Guadalupe, painted on the 18th Century by the novo Hispanic artist Cristóbal de Villalpando that merely prepares you to view the beautiful Baroque high altar, golden by the love of past generations. This all serves to exalt the order of religious men that by grace of the Spanish crown owned a vast region in Verapaz, which was only one territory back then.

If the traveler is not that interested in art, behind the temple is another historic monument, the "trapiche". The construction of this ancient building started on the 17th Century, when the Dominicans dedicated the area to cultivate sugarcane.

The friars not only wanted to produce sugar, they also introduced olive and grape plants to produce wine and oil that were so important for the Catholic cult, since wine was used during Mass and the oil was used to light the sanctuaries.

According to farmers, the low region of Baja Verapaz was fit for grape since the low and high temperatures were alternated. However, as they say, the Crown ordered to kill the plants so they would not compete with Spanish oils and wines. The sugarcane, on the other hand, had better luck, and the friars acquired many African slaves to harvest it. They also ordered the construction of an aqueduct to operate the mills. The remains of the aqueduct can be seen near the small Calvary of San Jerónimo, at the end of Main Street.

During the times in which San Jerónimo became a sugar producing hacienda, there were few under Spanish dominion. The production was so good that at the end of the 18th Century, thanks to the utilities received from it, the Dominican convent of the Nueva Guatemala de la Asunción (New Guatemala of the Assumption) was built. A few years later, on the first half of the 19th Century, a liberal government expropriated the hacienda from the friars and it passed to common hands to give birth to the quiet community of San Jerónimo.

These and other details can be observed by the traveler of the 21st Century while going through the museum installed on the back part of the church. Local crafts are located on three different rooms, some that are no longer made, as well as typical outfits, replicas of Pre Hispanic steles, objects from the times of the sugar production and an idealization of the activities of the old hacienda, among other things.

The Sugar Manufacturers Association has afforded the rebuilding of the trapiche, under the supervision of the Anthropology and History Institute. An open area has been left to allow the development of entertainment activities; it has the valley and the trapiche as background.

Going through these places takes us to long gone times, when life was different but people tasted the flavor of wine and sugar as we do today.