Antigua, Guatemala

Antigua is like no other place we have seen so far in Central America. The former capital of Guatemala, Antigua is a beautiful little colonial town surrounded by volcanoes. All streets are cobblestone, there's a big park in the center of town facing a huge cathedral, brightly painted storefronts and restaurants line the streets. The town feels like it was built in Europe and then transported whole to Guatemala.

The reason why Antigua is the former capital, is that it has an unfortunate habit of being destroyed by earthquakes every hundred years or so. So there are ruins here too, but they are mostly from the 1700s. There was a huge earthquake in 1773 that pretty much wiped out everything. We toured a big convent today, which was built for the Capuchin nuns of Santiago. It was the largest and last one built before the aforementioned earthquake. It was beautiful, some of it had been rebuilt so we could see what it used to look like, but most of it remained in charming ruined form. There is a wedding there this evening, so we got to sneak around while they were setting up and check it out. Guatemalan weddings are a lot like American weddings, it turns out, right down to the rented chair covers and wedding cake in the shape of luggage.

The main reason we came to Antigua was to climb Volcan Pacaya, which is about 30km outside of town. Pacaya is an active volcano, in fact it's so active that some days you can't climb it because the sulfur fumes are poisonous and corrosive. Not to mention the lava. This was the first active volcano that either of us have climbed, so we were both very excited at the prospect of seeing some real, flowing lava.

We started out from Antigua with a microbus full of other adventurous young adults just like ourselves (we had a theory that they put all the younger people together and let us go first, because another bus showed up 10 minutes after ours and all the people on it were older). Or maybe they put us together because we are the most annoying, because there were certainly quite a cast of characters on this bus. There were 4 girls who had been studying together at a Spanish language school for the past month. They shared a love for gossiping about American tv shows, inside Spanish jokes, and singing brief snippets of popular bar songs repeatedly (think Don't Stop Believing and Bohemian Rhapsody). There were 2 surfer frat dudes who had just graduated from Appalachian State in North Carolina, and were on a surf tour of Central America with the eventual goal of buying property on Costa Rica's Nicoya Peninsula...or going to grad school. There was the pair of ill equipped French-American girls who showed up for the hike wearing ballet flats, without water or rain jackets. There was the British geologist who had started his travels in San Diego, where he and his wife had purchased a 1980s Chevy van and driven it all the way from there to Antigua. The van was nicknamed Sanchez. His wife had chosen to get a massage instead of climb the volcano. Clearly the wrong priorities, though I do like her taste in van names. There was the kid from UGA, we will call him the Anti-frat guy. He was a chef, traveling for an unknown period of time, whenever he ran out of money he would get a kitchen job for a few weeks and then continue living the dream. Not a bad idea really, although he admitted to currently being down to less than $120. At the top of the volcano he declared that he wasn't sure if it would be better or worse if he was on mushrooms.

This is the group we drove with from Antigua to the volcano. When we got there, the scene before us was unlike anything I've ever seen. Hundreds of small children crowding around our van trying to get us to buy walking sticks, marshmallows, and plastic rain slickers. Their sales technique was simple but effective: "Stick, stick, stick, 2 for 5." That's 2 for 5 quetzales, which is approximately 62.5 cents. Quite a deal. We had been told ahead of time the sticks come in handy so Annie bought 2 from the smallest child she could find. Best 62.5 cents ever spent, since we spent a fair amount of time clambering over sharp, hardened lava rocks and the sticks were a much better thing to touch the rocks with than our hands. There were also a smaller group of children and adults trying to sell us a horse to ride up instead of walking, which meant that while we walked up the trail we had to watch out for large mounds of horse poop. No one gave in and rented a horse, but by the time we got to the top the girls in ballet flats admitted they would have if anyone else had gotten one. Ah peer pressure.

Anyway, the hike itself was not too bad. We started at about 4pm in an attempt to be able to see the sunset from the top, however it was too cloudy when we got up there to actually see it. There were pockets of volcano smoke where in fact you couldn't see much of anything more than about 3 feet in front of you - you could taste the sulfur though. But after we got high enough the haze cleared and we saw some amazing views. We could tell we were getting close to the top when the ground started to feel warm under our feet, and soon we made it to the top, where the actual lava was. (2 notes. 1,It wasn't the actual top of the volcano, since it's too dangerous to go up there. And 2, it was a slight disappointment that the lava wasn't externally flowing on the day that we hiked, but it was right below the surface of the rocks and we could see it though the fissures.) In fact, the lava was so hot and so close that our guide, who had previously climbed a tree and machete-hacked a bunch of branches off and made us carry them up the volcano, showed us how you can put the tree branches in the fissures, and they catch on fire and make a popping noise as they burn. Every time we threw one in, our guide would clap his hands, shriek "SKY FIRE", and get really excited. He turned out to be quite the pyro. And an excellent guide. The 2 surfer dudes had purchased marshmallows and a stick to roast them, and the Spanish school girls had brought graham crackers and chocolate, so we got to roast marshmallows at the top of the volcano from the lava and eat smores. Amazing, surreal, and awesome. We got to hang out at the top for about 30 minutes all by ourselves until the other (older) groups caught up to us. It was a very cool experience up there, you were at once both hot and cold, because the winds were always changing and either warming you up with lava smoke or chilling you with wind and rain. It was like being in a outdoor sauna in San Francisco in June. It was great.

We made our way back down the volcano, and it was excellent timing because we made it over all the sharp lava rocks before the sun went down. When we made it all the way to the bottom, the small children were there to reclaim their sticks, and then show us their breakdancing moves. One of the surfer dudes decided to show the kids how to do the worm, and then he was promptly shown up by another kid doing some great headspins and moonwalking.

Somehow, on the ride back to Antigua, the cd playing in the car was full of 90s dance hits, so the whole bus joined in singing along to the sounds of Billie Jean, Queen - I've got to break free, Toto - Africa, etc. It was somehow the perfect way to end the hike.

*Finally we have some photos on here from the top of the volcano. We have more pictures of the actual lava and views from the top, but they can't be uploaded right now, sorry. Soon!