Volcan Pacaya - At Night!

We had our best experience in Guatemala to date this weekend! In case you don't want to read my long-winded account, we climbed to the base of Volcan Pacaya to see flowing lava at night! It was definitely exhilarating and fascinating, if not a little scary at times.

The trip was organized by a Guatemalan school teacher at CAG, which was great because it meant that the trip would include Gringos (Americans) and Guatemaltecos (Guatemalans), which is always much more fun than just us gringos. We left for Pacaya at about 4:30 in the afternoon, and there were about 20 of us to start. Then we stopped at a mall (which we were warned to watch our bags even if we were just taking a bathroom break) to pick up the Guatemalans who wanted to go. You see, we gringos all live in Zone 15, which is a really safe and nice, but expensive zone, near the school. Guatemaltecos live in other less safe but also less expensive zones throughout the city, so the mall was a meeting place for them. Anyway, true to being in Central America, only about 1/3 of the Guatemalans actually signed up for the trip by the deadline (what is a deadline and who uses them in Guatemala, anyway?!) and by the time the teachers and all of their friends got in the previously respectable school bus, instead of the 30 people expected, there were about 65 people sitting 3 to a seat with some left to stand for the 1.5 hour drive to the volcano. This morphed school bus into chicken bus, minus the produce and poultry. James and I weren't too bothered--considering his leg length, no one wanted to sit with us, so we got our own seat.

The bus ride was fine until we started climbing up the steep hills that covered the base of the volcano, treating the bus like an ATV instead of a shuttle....after grinding painstakingly up to the tourist center at the forest base, gringos paid about $6 per person for the climb and guatemaltecos paid $3. While we waited for each person to pay the entrance fee, we watched the local young children trying to sell walking sticks taller than they were to the group for about $0.75. James and I, feeling too proud to buy what amounted to a crutch, decided to place our bet on the odds of our fitness.

Also while waiting, we were able to get a good look at the group we were about to join to venture to the rivers of lava. Some people looked born to do this kind of stuff and predictably decked out: head light/lamps strapped on, hiking shoes and tall socks, wick-able material on, healthy food and drink, lightweight packs, metal walking rods, and high-grade cameras. Others looked like they were about to go to a party and got talked into coming from their friends: jeans, walking shoes, a t-shirt, and a camera phone in hand. Flashlight optional here. James and I were somewhere in the middle. We had bought hiking shoes before coming to Guate, so we were eager to test their quality, we had on comfortable clothing and jackets/umbrellas packed, some food and water, but old-fashioned flashlights (not strappable to the head and no blindingly bright light) and we were going sans walking sticks.

Finally, it was time to climb! It was completely dark out, and there are NO lights on the trails. Because our group greatly varied from 6-year olds to fit climbers, we obviously were going to go at different paces. Our mid-fit group only felt lost once when the fast group barreled so fast we couldn't see their lights any more and the slow group meandered too slow to see, either. We had to wait for about 5 minutes before a Guatemalan guide came back to fetch us. This would have been the prime time for a mugging, but it never happened. For the first hour, we trekked up through a narrow but steep dirt trail. It was fun to do this by flashlight, but we'll definitely be going back to do it by day because you are basically climbing through a jungle, and we wanted to see the rich foliage but couldn't.

When we got to a viewpoint to see the lava below, we all would have been happy with the view -- bright orange ribbons on a backdrop of black -- but our guides were not about to let us leave without getting close enough to touch the stuff. The last part of the journey was going steeply down to the base of the volcano. The earth below us changed from dirt trail to Mars-like, porous, crunchy and slick rockage. It was more of a walking slide than a walk. You had to go down sideways and sort of let your front foot 'give' so you can slide with it or else you'll slip and fall if you try to resist!

This is a picture of the flowing lava coming out of the ground. So neat!

Surprisingly, every person in the group made it down there, even the kindergarteners. Once we were near the lava, we were walking across huge dried lava beds-turned-rock to where the lava was still hot, moving liquid. There were no signs, no ropes, and no danger warnings that you might be stepping on lava. Since it was night time, you just had to look at whether or not the rock around you was a) glowing red through the cracks, and b) really hot, in order to determine whether this was a safe place to sit or stand. The lava wasn't flowing so fast you had to watch where you were walking, but it was definitely flowing and definitely incredible to see and be so near! There were even some people who brought marshmallows to roast from the lava heat! One of the coolest feelings was your front so hot but because it was cold and windy, your back was freezing! It was great to gather warmth from the earth. The lava was also mesmerizing; we stayed and stared for about 30 minutes. It made a sort of crackling sound, also, which was the top layer of the lava cooling and hardening as it flowed.

Here is some video of the flowing lava. Worth the watch!

We tried to get some pictures but it was so black that no one got anything worth putting in a frame. On the climb back up the side of the steep hill we slid down, we turned around for the most breathtaking view. Due to the lava reflecting onto the low clouds, the sky was red and the stars were hidden, but the clouds cleared out enough so you could see the enormous solid line of the slope of the side of the volcano up to the top. At the top, the clouds were sticking to the volcano top's opening where lava was churning, so the top of the volcano was a bright red cloud cap. Then, at the base of the towering volcano, was the black field of bright orange-yellow lava ribbons. It was really incredible.

The kids got a complimentary ride of a "taxi" which was, in reality, a horse.

We got back to town without incident, and it was 1:00 a.m. before we were back in our car. The next day we felt fatigued but not sore. We will be going back during the day for a completely different experience, but this was one adventure that made us feel so glad to have the opportunity to live in Guatemala!