This paper will examine those travel narratives by British and American travelers of the nineteenth century which include a meeting with the president of Guatemala, including George Alexander Thompson (British [1828-29]), George Washington Montgomery (American [1838]), John Lloyd Stephens (American [1841]), meeting the "Indian" revolutionary, Carrera, and William T. Brigham (American [1887]). I'll examine underlying attitudes and the view of Guatemala presented in those sections, as well as how the traveler achieved access to the highest officer of the land and with what motivation and results, if any. I will briefly compare these earlier presidential visits to one made by a group of American tourists to the president of Costa Rica in the 1950's, documented in "Land-Yachting Across Central America," a travel narrative detailing the multi-nation trip by a large group of Americans traveling in Airstream trailers, or "land-yachts."
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