New things are happening! So our little Three Musketeers adventure through Guatemala is taking new twists and turns. The laidback days in White People Ville USA, Antigua, Guatemala, have come to a thankful close, and yesterday we went out with a proverbial bang worth of such a figure of speech: an afternoon hike up a volcano and ACROSS LIVE LAVA FIELDS. I have never experienced anything like this.
Jammed against the large white Eastern European man in the front seat of a mini-bus, we swerve back and forth across the winding turns of the Guatemalan highlands. Tumbling out of the van, we are met with a sea of little Latino boys' faces asking "Wanna stick?" Just like that. In English. There were probably close to 30 of them. Pushing our way through them and gently refusing, until we took some lucky bloke up on the offer and paid to get a walking stick, we waded our way through a pack of horses ready to rent to rich and overweight tourists. But we are/were Peace Corps volunteers!, we scoff. Bring me your worst volcano, Guatemala!
And Guatemala did. The hike was a bit much, at least the initial climb, which was straight up for about 45 minutes. My lack of cardiovascular stamina made itself shamelessly known. But the endorphines racing through my veins, the sweating, pounding screaming insanity of my heart was a welcome companion up this slope. I don't make any claims to be a great hiker. Then we reached the summit and got a spectacular view of the surrounding volcano country. This was only the beginning of our fun. Our guide, in a delightful mix of English and Spanish, said we were going to go Down There (pointing to a black smoldering death pit that would have inspired Dante to pen his Inferno (he may have added more devils and torture racks than we found)).
The initial instructions were not very reassuring. We are going to take some precautions, our wise and energetic guide tells us. These precautions involve testing the black crusty lava with a stick before stepping onto its brittle and razor-sharp black death-surface of cutting-fury that could easily collapse into smoldering foot shoved into liquid magma. I grinned. No form, no paperwork, no insurance, no warning. I looked up into the sky and saw a few eager lawyers drifting above us in circles, waiting to pounce to the ground with claims to sign. Smiling, we collectively thought, this is the stupidest best idea of our lives.
The first part was pretty easy. The rocks seems pretty sturdy (cold lava "frozen" in rippling flows). They were unmistakably sharp, and covered with lots of little brittle lava-blades that we could use to slip in our Mach 3's, should need be. Then things started heating up (literally). The cold, bitter, and steady wind we had faced at the summit mysteriously and alarmingly disappeared. Suddenly there was a steady, almost imperceptible heat from some source. We found out it was the ground we were walking on. The brittle, crusty black surface was radiating the heat that was undoubtledly glowing and churning below its fragile surface, eager to consume a nice gringo leg. Then the first sighting occured. A 20 foot crack in the surface, and a foot or so down the glowing orange-red plasma you'd associate with real Oh My God This Is Like Real Life/National Geographic Lava! We, of course, doubted it was really lava and did what any responsible, intelligent citizen would do and POKED IT WITH STICKS. Sure enough, the sticks caught fire. Man alive, we thought. Lava. Real honest-to-goodness lava. Passing steam jets and scrambling up more and more of the crusty surface, we were made nervous by the quickly setting sun (I'm no "explorer", but I'd rather not be trapped on a live lava field in the dark and have to make my way home). Our guide was On A Mission and we soon found out why: a lava flow bursting out of the ground like a geological tube of magma toothpaste. Orange, glowing, flowing, real lava. We all lost it. Lots of phototaking. And then, following our needs as responsible, intelligent citizens (see above), we POKED IT WITH STICKS. Turns out, yes, it was real lava. (Amusing photos to be posted soon).
I'm no lava expert, but I was shocked by how HOT lava is. You get close to the real stuff, and it's absurdly hot. I could hardly stand to be that close to it for more than a few seconds. It felt like jumping in an oven real quick.
The sun setting, we scrambled to the tierra firme, and made our winding way up to the same summit and began the night-descent to the van waiting below. The return trip was not that thrilling, and was taken up with a lot of laughing, reviewing of photos and movies, and wonderment about how stupid and awesome we are.
Today we made the transfer to Lago Atitlan. I had no idea how beautiful it really was until I spent more than 3 hours here (first trip to Guatemala). We will be here, wandering around the perimeter of the lake for three days, taking photos, hiking, visiting meditation centers, learning about herbal medicine, and maybe doing some kayaking. All and all, a wild pair of days. This vacation has been a trip! (idiocy of statement assumed).
2 comments:
You continue to remind me that I Have Not Yet Lived. How I miss you, my friend.
What? You have a bog? I feel so out of it now...my PC friend that as technologically backwards as I was now has a blog. I bet you have an iPod phone, too...and that you regulary update your facebook profile from it. AH! I´m disappointed in you. But have fun, anyways, in your travels. Say "hi" to your travel compañeros. Me hacen falta!!
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