Cory, Antigua, Pacaya, Paredon

 Cory came to visit me! He was supposed to get in at 11:30am but Delta (ohhh Delta) bumped him from his initial flight and then had maintenance issues and didn't manage to get in until 10pm. We then took a taxi to our hotel in Antigua.

The next day we got up and enjoyed a Guatmalan breakfast (sooo good) and then walked around Antigua until 1pm when we met up with OX Expeditions for our hike up Volcan Pacaya.

We then hopped in a shuttle and drove for about an hour to the base of Pacaya and began our climb. It took us a little over an hour to get to the crater rim. We hiked through some jungly forest and then the terrain drastically changed to slippery volcanic gravel (like Acatenango) and became extremely cloudy.  

 From the rim you could look down and see the volcanic field below. Two weeks ago Pacaya erupted and sent lava down into the crater. It used to be 100ft deeper than it currently is and apparently there used to be a very small cloud forest ecosystem that got entirely wiped out.

 Down in the crater you can feel the heat coming from the rocks and there are spots where sulfurous gases are coming out. The guide said in large quantities the gasses are toxic but in these amounts we were fine. The sign perched on the lava tells you that "you are entering the zone of risk." So risky!

 We roasted marshmallows over the hot spots. The marshmallows were pretty gross and most got fed to the dogs that followed us up the mountain.

 These guys make jewelry and stuff little pieces of lava inside. They hike up and down the mountain every day.

 Glowing rocks!! It was extremely hot in that spot!

As we left the crater we headed up to a different part of the rim and went along it. The clouds had seriously rolled in at this point. Cory and I took a bottle of wine up and shared it around at the top. (The guide may have judged us for this one.)

We made it down the mountain and back to Antigua. The next day we got breakfast and wandered some more before finding out way to the shuttle pick up point for Paredon Surf House. That ride took over two hours and had some crazy terrain. At points it looked like we were driving through the African savannah and I wouldn't have been surprised to see a zebra run by.

Paredon was really amazing. It was this tiny surf camp in the middle of nowhere and it had a beautiful little pool and really cool bungalows to stay in. They were open to the ocean (This was great for the first night cause there was a pretty strong breeze, but the next night was god awful hot.) 

 Gorgeous sunset from the hammocks. We were drinking margaritas. It was fabulous!

 Cory took a surfing lesson and caught some waves!

Basically all our time there was spent hanging in the pool, laying in hammocks, sunbathing, walking on the beach (There were all kinds of little sea snails to dig up), boogie boarding, playing in the waves or having some incredibly fierce naval battles with the pocket battleship game we found. (Cory won 3-2 but just barely. There will be a rematch. He will go down.)

The sand is black because its volcanic. During the day it gets blazing hot! When we wanted to get out to the waves we had to literally sprint as fast as we could to avoid seriously burning the bottoms of our feet.

When coming up from the beach, to avoid getting sand in the pool or the in the restaurant you dunk your feet in a little footbath. One night after coming back up from the beach Cory went to dunk his feet in the footbath and it literally exploded as soon as his foot touched the water. Turns out there were three humongous toads hanging in the footbath and when he put his foot in the water they all startled and one flopped on top of his foot. He freaked and the toads freaked and I almost died laughing.

After two days at Paredon we hopped back in the shuttle, ate dinner in Antigua and then took another shuttle back to Guatemala City. 

Climbing Acatenango - One of Guatemala's Volcanoes

Climbing Acatenango! This was a super strenuous climb and I definitely don't recommend it unless you've got major balls. Acatenango is a dormant volcano right next to Fuego, one of the very active volcanoes around Antigua. Acatenango is a little over 13,000 feet high and it took us about 6 hours to reach the top.  

View from where we began the hike.

There was a big group of us so we rode to the drop off point in an old school bus.

Here's the beginning of the hike. It was on this crappy volcanic shale/gravel that sent up huge clouds of dust and was super slippery. You would take a few steps and then slide back down some in the gravelly rocks. It also got all up in my shoes; not comfortable. 

 Our first rest stop had a massive hollowed out old tree. Sasha and I jumped in it for a pic.

Climbing through the jungly bit. This was my favorite part. 

 Next it was like the alpine forest bit. It was in the clouds and there was lots of scrubby brush and dead looking trees. The path went back to being the volcanic shale again. It was like hiking uphill on the beach for hours.....

 And then we came to this one part where it was a stupid cliff with no way around it. Turns out that our little group had gone the wrong path and was one the "new" (read hellish) trail. The guide didn't want to turn around so he scaled the cliff. (You can't see it from this picture but to the right is literally a cliff. If you fell, you would be dead or at least have quite a few broken bones.) He then tied a short rope to his ankle and told us to scale it one by one using the rope for stability. When it was my turn I literally crammed my hands in whatever holes I could find (i'm pretty sure there were some snakes but thank goodness none of them appeared) and cussed out the guide.  

 Then we got up to this part which is all bare volcanic plain. The fog was pretty ridiculous. At this point I was starting to deal with some altitude sickness issues: headache and nausea.

 Then we set up the tents down in the crater. It was crazy windy and cold. We spent the night in the crater in our itty bitty tent with the freezing wind shooting in every crack and literally blowing down the tent on top of us. Sasha and I huddled together for whatever body heat we could. I'm pretty sure one of us woke up every 15 minutes to curse or roll over. I was attempting to use a bag of trail mix as a pillow. As you might imagine, that didn't go over too well.

 That next morning the guide woke us up at 5am to climb the rest of the way to the summit and watch the sun rise. Theoretically you can see Fuego which is sometimes erupting and usually puffing smoke, but it was right cloudy so there wasn't much to see. I watched the sunrise from the side of the summit. You could feel the rumbling of Fuego down in your chest from where we were on Acatenango and the volcano was actually making sounds like thunder!

 Here's a pic of the crater and our tents at the bottom of it.

Us waiting to start the hike down the volcano. 

 Hiking back down. We were above the clouds and it was pretty cool looking. Then we went down the mountain on this path that was basically 45 degrees the whole way down. There were a few times I literally ski'd down the path because it was unwalkable. It took us 6 hours to get up the volcano but only 2 1/2 hours to get down; that's how steep it was.

Just about down the volcano! Feeling so relieved at this point. We then hopped back on the bus, drove back to the city and got home. No shower has ever felt better than the shower I took that afternoon!