El Volcan Pacaya!

I just got back from my night on the volcano... It was amazing! I went with another student in my school - an Dutch man named Peet (I call him SoloPeet because every time he introduces himself in Spanish, he emphasizes that his name is just Peet.)

Here's SoloPeet and I ready to tackle the trail:




The hike was a bit tough with a huge, overstuffed backpack, but I made it without taking advantage of the dozens of "Horse Taxis" available up the trail :)

When we reached the top the view was fantastic. Here's the peak of the volcano - it looks farther away than it actually is:

Can you see the old lava directly in front? That's from a 2004 eruption!

We could also see el Volcan Agua (the one I can see from Antigua) from there:


We set up camp with the rented tents. I had to help SoloPeet because apparently he's not too experienced with tent-building. When I got around to mine, I learned that one of my tent poles didn't have the elastic string in the middle... so it was basically 10 pieces of tent pole... anyways, it made it MUCH more difficult to pitch my tent, but I rocked it! I was really proud :)

Then our guide, Leonel, set about starting a fire. It took a little time, my packing list, and SoloPeet's copy of his passport, but he got it going strong!


We stood around the fire for a while, eating sandwiches, having a beer, and waiting for all the other groups to leave the volcano so we could walk over and see some lava! The whole time we were there, we could hear the "boom boom" from the volcano, about every 20 minutes or so... When it got dark, we could see the fire at the top (sorry, terrible quality):


Finally, we walked over to see the big lava rivers flowing down the side of the volcano. It was like nothing I've ever seen before.





The sound was wild, too - it had this almost watery, but thicker sort of noise... just amazing.

Afterwards, we all went to bed. It got extremely cold, windy, and wet during the night, and I kept hearing things scampering around my tent. So I maybe got an hour or two of sleep :)

The next morning, Pacaya was still gorgeous:


After breaking camp, we were all set to hike up right next to the lava flow... unfortunately, I was in bad shape - Terrible cough, upset stomach, etc. - so I couldn't make it up the trail :( However, SoloPeet took my camera and got the pictures I couldn't!

Here I am watching them hike up:


SoloPeet did great capturing the lava!





I was sad to have missed being that close, but I still had one of the most incredible experiences of my life :)

The view of Volcan Agua on the way down was amazing, too:


By the time we finally got back to Antigua, we were POOPED! Then, because of the Holy Week Processions today, our bus had to drop us off on the outskirts of the city. I then had to walk clear to the other side in order to catch a tuc-tuc back to Jocotenango.

My view in the tuc-tuc:


Tired and filthy Emily ready for sleep and shower!


I hope you enjoyed reading about this as much as I enjoyed doing it! Love you all!