Guatemala 2018

Wednesday31stOctober

Second wake-up in the small inner courtyard of Don Pedro, and for once, we have breakfast next to our rental car!   The owner didn't want to leave it in the street. He even managed to squeeze 3 other cars behind us! The small courtyard isn't so small after all!  

The goal of the day is to go hiking on the Pacaya volcano... But before that, a mission awaits us: retrieve our 3 suitcases still lost somewhere on the planet... 3 suitcases? Not quite, because Christophe's was sent directly to the hotel... So two are still missing. No matter, we decide to go back to the airport to take matters into our own hands... Arriving there, in the airline's office, a pile of suitcases sits in the middle of the room... Among the dozen suitcases, our 2 prodigal bags are patiently waiting for their owners. Phew! Not sure we would have recovered them quickly without coming here...  

Back in Antigua for lunch, relieved to be able to enjoy our clothes, cables, batteries, toothbrushes, and other shampoos for the next few weeks!  

We join a small tourist bus to the entrance of Pacaya National Park, located about fifty kilometers from Antigua, which is a 2-hour drive. The ascent to the volcano is done with a guide to ensure a minimum of safety. We will also be accompanied by two German women. At this stage, I don't really have an idea of what I'm going to see. I just know that the volcano is active and that with luck we might vaguely see some magma... or maybe nothing if it's too dormant... Mystery...

In the meantime, we have to cover 2 kilometers with a 350-meter elevation gain. A horde of horses and their owners stick to our heels to convince us that it would be much more pleasant to ride on horseback instead of foolishly wearing out our frail muscles and, incidentally, our shoes... Christelle gave in, thinking there would be much more time to reach the volcano. Finally, it only took us an hour to discover the volcano.

And at the end of the path, suddenly Pacaya reveals itself to us and I can't believe my eyes, contrary to what we expected, from its smoking crater, a lava flow descends the side of the mountain!  

I'm bubbling with happiness! Getting as close as possible to a volcano's molten magma has long been a dream of mine! Finally, I'm going to be able to make it come true!

People are already at the foot of the volcano, at a good distance from the lava, but in the cloud escaping from the volcano's flank.

We arrive at the foot of Pacaya. All around the volcano, petrified lava covers the ground. We will have to walk partly on this unstable ground to get a little closer to the stream of molten rock...

This last short walk will take us near this magma hearth located at a distance from the lava flow. A group of tourists is already there and we are going to join them. Zoom in on the photo on the left to get a better idea of the scale. The small group is in white at the bottom right.

Here is the ground made of petrified magmatic rock. Very unstable, you need shoes with good soles to move on it like true tightrope walkers... Fortunately, the rocks are completely cooled and are not likely to melt our shoes!  

Here we are finally near the surface reddened by the magmatic chimney that ends its journey here. The main activity here is to entertain tourists by caramelizing marshmallows...   Our guide is busy bringing a rock reddened by the heat closer to cook the marshmallow...

It's my turn, I'm going to heat my marshmallow sticks! I want to feel the heat of this magma on me even more!

Time passes quickly and night falls upon us. The reddening of the sky by the liquefied rock further enhances the beauty of the site, but also our vulnerability to the uncertain activity of the volcano...    

I would have stayed here all night but my comrades are pressing me, we still have 1 hour of walking by the light of our headlamps to reach our return vehicle...

We are back in Antigua and it's bustling here! It's the eve of November 1st, so everyone is out to celebrate Halloween! Many people are more or less disguised, and good humor reigns on this All Saints' Eve!

The food stalls are located near La Merced Church. So we order our sandwiches filled with chicken, salads, and guacamole.

End of this second day. Tomorrow's day will be unexpected, curious, surprising, crazy, incredible but above all 'aerial': the Day of the Dead in Guatemalan cemeteries...