Been doing a bit of casual web searching as a way of easing in to trying to find some of the information I need despite my tendency to avoid thinking about these awkward issues. A couple of web sites turned up randomly by Google for tour companies in Guatemala suggest that the equipment requirements for day and overnight hikes are not that different. (This assumes the tour company supplies tents/sleeping bags, that is - at least one of these random ones does. I don't intend to take my own and am not necessarily intending to overnight hike in any circumstances, but I thought I'd mention this while it's in my head.)
Broadly speaking they appear to recommend closed-toed shoes, not trainers with a flat sole but trail running shoes are fine (though they do seem to say hiking boots are best). Now I come to write this I realise I didn't notice anything - maybe I wasn't paying attention - about shorts vs trousers, but let's ignore that for now. (Besides, I am not wearing shorts unless the alternative is dying of heat exhaustion or someone has a gun to my head. ;-) ) They also say you need a warm layer and a wind layer; based on some earlier poking around I did on Wikipedia, I am guessing this means something like a fleece and a thin (mostly) rainproof outer layer. They don't seem to be very explicit, but I'm guessing a similar thin outer layer for trousers is required too. They do say - not that this is new advice, though I have no idea where to buy clothes which satisfy it - that cotton is not recommended as it's crap if it gets wet.
In terms of travelling light, I do normally have some kind of jacket/fleece with me on these trips anyway, so taking a fleece with me (which I'd hope could be used in the evenings in towns etc if it's cold, assuming I can get one which isn't super brightly coloured) is no major hardship. So ignoring questions of cost, the extra stuff mainly comes down to this hypothetical shell layer, which I'd hope is not terribly heavy or bulky.
I'm pretty sure I can get a T-shirt style thing which isn't cotton which would be fine for normal everyday wear, and I think there's a chance I can find a pair of trail running shoes which are sufficiently non-extreme-looking that I could just wear them all the time - I really don't want to be lugging around multiple pairs of shoes if I can help it. I'm far from sure I can get a pair of trousers which aren't cotton which would be fine for normal everyday wear, so that might be extra bulk and weight to lug around, but maybe I'm being pessimistic. After all, I know bugger all about this stuff.
I am thinking I might potter over to the local Sports Direct tomorrow to see what, if anything, they stock. I had thought I might go right into town to find some slightly more specialised and/or larger shops, but I think SD is likely to be cheap-ish and I'm not trekking to the poles or anything; no harm in taking an initial look at SD's stock anyway just to ease my mind gradually into dealing with this stuff.
Something else which emerged from this casual bit of reading up is that the best time to do these kind of things is supposedly November-March, when it's dry. This isn't to say that I won't do these things in October assuming tour companies are offering them - I guess you need the wet weather gear regardless as there's always a chance of rain, and I did read something suggesting it's often dry in the morning so the shorter half-day hikes can be done then anyway - but in terms of sketching out an itinerary it does suggest that all else being equal I should prefer doing this kind of thing in the second half of the trip. But I'm sure the weather isn't that predictable and it may be dry in mid-late October some years or still be pissing it down all the time in late November in others.
While I'm rambling, I think I forgot to say that when I booked the flights, it would have cost something like an extra hundred quid (a 20% increase on the overall flight cost!) to have chosen my seats there and then. I really really do want an aisle seat if possible, but not badly enough to pay an extra 20% for the flights. I just hope I don't regret this when the time comes to fly. I will do the usual thing of checking in online as soon as the check-in window opens (I think it's 24 hours before departure) and it will probably be fine, but if not maybe I can use my crippling cheapness as a weapon in the fight against my fear of non-aisle seating. :-) I am also kind of thinking that as the flights are overnight, if I do have a shitty seat I could deliberately get minimal/no sleep the night before the flight so as to increase the chances of me sleeping through the flight.
[Next day]
OK, so I went out and checked out Sports Direct, because they're local. One of the two local shops had closed the basement, where I think most of the vaguely hiking type gear was, due to flooding. Anyway, I had a bit of a wander round and peered at the shoes and so forth. There did seem to be some shoes marketed as multi-activity which don't have a flat sole (apparently a big no-no as noted above) which while looking a bit chunkier than I'd like for day-to-day wear are probably acceptable, if not ideal.
I didn't actually see much in the way of shell jackets and fleeces but I found a combination on sale on the SD website which looks like it would be acceptable and drab enough to wear day-to-day as well - I don't want to be wandering round town in a dayglo jacket...
They had quite a few pairs of different "outdoorsy" trousers and I'm reasonably confident I can get something fairly acceptable looking for day-to-day wear - these may well actually be a big win and more comfortable than anything I'd have been wearing if I hadn't had to look into all this stuff.Tthey also had the waterproof trouser things which I think you wear on top (not instead) and they do seem sufficiently lightweight they won't bulk my bag up too much. Biggest worry was actually that even the "small" size trousers appeared (from just holding them up against me; I didn't faff trying anything on as I didn't intend to buy at that point) to be massively too long. However, I remembered a local tailor I'd walked past once or twice so I thought I'd wander over to see if it was still there; it was, they were open and they told me it would be £5 (a leg? or for a pair? but acceptable either way) to shorten them and it takes a couple of days, so that's probably OK. Having had a poke around on the web I think I may be able to buy a different brand of cheap trousers which actually come in a short leg anyway.
What actually seemed virtually nonexistent was any kind of fairly plain T-shirt, ideally long-sleeved, which isn't made of apparently-lethal cotton. But maybe I just didn't look hard enough.
I think I will be able to find some acceptable stuff at tolerable prices with a bit more shopping. If anything the critical path is getting some trousers, in case I do need to get them turned up. I'm thinking I'll probably trog into town tomorrow and have a look at e.g. Mountain Warehouse, as they appear to be relatively cheap and cheerful. If I can get some trousers purchased tomorrow from somewhere I should have time to get them altered if necessary, then I can if necessary dick around over the next few days buying other items.
I note some of the cheaper "outdoorsy" trousers appear to be polyester/cotton blends; a quick bit of googling suggests that there's some disagreement but that this is probably acceptable and won't be massively uncomfortable or kill me, though it depends on the environment. I have to remember that these guys are probably talking about really serious fucking hiking and I'm probably not.
I'm far from clear what would be a good idea as far as socks go, but there was no shortage of those in stock so I can easily pick some of those up at some point in the next couple of weeks.
[Time passes]
It does occur to me that maybe I'm getting overly exercised about this. I mean, it's supposed to be fun. But maybe not. Sure, the trip is supposed to be fun, and hiking (or whatever we're going to call it) is supposed to be some combination of fun and nerve-inducing novelty (for me), but shopping is not something I expect to find fun, especially shopping for clothes in the barren wasteland of the Venn diagram where my lack of expertise in hiking and lack of expertise in making tasteful clothing choice intersect. So I guess I should not quite so bothered by it, but not be surprised if I'm not particularly enjoying this.
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