Today we took a trip out of Antigua to walk to the top of an active volcano! After a nearly sleepless night we were up bright and early so that we could eat and be downstairs to meet our transportation ( a micro bus- aka van). We picked up two young couples, one from Spain and one from Israel, then we started out to the volcano. It was a bone shaken, body beating trip out of Antigua! I am not sure why there are not car body parts lying around all over the place! Has anyone ever heard of suspension in a car? Well put that idea right our of your head! That must be the first thing to go! It was nice to hit the highway, sorta - there are few stop signs and little or no signal lights and drivers simple go where they want to go. If you can imagine riding with your fingers crossed you would be right on target. At any rate it was a drive of about 1 to 1 1/2 hours to reach Pacaya. The driver took us up as high as a vehicle can go. He parked at a small village where we bought walking sticks from small boys and started up the volcano on foot.
I made the attempt to climb Pacaya on foot. It was soon obvious that I would need to ride a horse to the top so I made a couple of new friends. Cinnamon was the name of my steady steed and his handler was Sevin (pronounced SeBin). Sevin was a nice young man of few words but he and the horse have an understand of the job to be done. Sevin gave advice when needed -- such as stand and lean forward so the horse could climb a portion of the mountain that was straight up. Sevin never appeared to be out of breath and I was working up a sweat staying on the horse. The only thing to hold on to was the rather large pomel or the back of the saddle. The stirrups were just barely short enough for me to get my feet into and only offered some protection from scraping on the mountain side.
Our tour guide was named Arturo. He did an excellent job with his small group. Since the other two couples were younger and more agile Arutro stayed with Don and I to be sure we stayed safe. Don had the stamina to make the whole trip on foot. When we reached a point at the top where we could see old lava flows and the ground was flat with green space for the horses we were ready to complete the trip on foot. The horses would rest and eat and for a price would return me to the bottom of the volcano. It had taken and hour and a half to climb this far.
Arturo was full of encouragement and determined that I would make it to the hot lava. From our vantage point we could see red places where the rock was super heated! Arturo took my hand and zig-zagged me up and down the lava valley. He guided my feet and kept reminding me to ´go slow´. He managed to get me where he wanted me to be. He took my stick and calved off some lava and took my picture with molten rock on the end of my walking stick. It set the stick on fire but was a great experience. A little further up was a place where the rock was flowing down to the crater and Arturo got us as close to it as we could stand (extreme heat) and took our picture.
We rested a little distance from the hot rock but still sitting on lava. We ate our snack and shared with Arturo. We decided that 1 liter of water was definately the minimum amount one should carry to climb a volcano.
Going down was faster but certainly not easier. It is hard on the knees to be in a steady down hill walk. Riding straight down was no picnic either. Holding on to the back of the saddle and praying that I would not fall off I made it down the volcano. We had to find a couple of ´lay overs¨ to allow another group going up to pass. Don gave Arturo a tip for his special care of us. Sevin was paid handsomely for both the trip up and down on his horse. It was an adventure but I am done climbing volcanos.
