Hike Acatenango, I double dog dare you...

I wasn't sure whether or not this hike was going to be for me. I was a little nervous as I haven't hiked since spring of last year. This is the hardest trek near Antigua, and it's also the tallest peak in Guatemala. If you look in the photo above, the guy to the left of me is Kaleb. We were in Spanish classes at Máximo Nivel for two weeks together and we both have the same sarcastic humor and intolerance for laziness in the classroom. He is leaving today, July 2nd, and as his last Guatemalan hurrah he thought "I'll climb a super difficult volcano, and then get on a plane and fly home... oh and I'll talk my sarcastic chunky classmate into coming too."

Needless to say, the Volcano is not in downtown Antigua, so we had to take a bus about an hour into the countryside. The first time I was in Guatemala I learned that in most rural homes the women cook over wood fires, and it is a daily job to get wood to do this. The biggest downside to women and children cooking over a wood fire is that it's kind of like working in a coal mine. You get particulate matter into your lungs which leads to lung disease, and a shortened life span. This is one of those many large problems that developing countries face. When I saw this woman carrying her firewood on her head, I thought I'd add it to this blog.

About half an hour into the trek, you find yourself at a remarkable large restaurant. They serve things like crêpes, coffee, and Pepitos (small sandwiches). You look over fields of maize back towards where you started. Luckily you can't see the top from here, because if you could you might give up as you are 30 minutes into a 5-hour walk. I'm going to be honest, there are not a ton of photographs of my hike up because I kept my head down, listened to the first Witcher book, and kept moving forward. I regret this now because the scenery in the cloud forest was incredibly beautiful. In the Q’eqchi’ Maya language the people say that “The forest draws the clouds / the forest catches the clouds” (li kiche’ naxkelo / naxchap li choq).” Lucky for me though, I hiked up in almost perfect clarity but did manage to catch one quintessential cloud forest photo.

Because this is such an uncommon ecosystem, let me throw a little environmental biology your way. These forests process water by lateral cloud filtration. Said more simply, it means that the clouds form from moisture off the ocean that condenses when it hits the mountain forest. Water droplets collect on the foliage and are thus trapped in the ecosystem. In many forests, like the one on Acatenango, cloud filtration accounts for upwards of 50% of the annual precipitation. Of course, once I got back I had to Google how lucky I was to have NO rain on the entire journey. The average total precipitation seems to range from 699cm (275 in) to 978cm (385 in). “The extra water-trapping capacity of trees through cloud filtering can be as much as 60 percent” notes John Roach of National Geographic News. If one uses these numbers to understand the clouds' impact on the forest, it means that 978 cm would be reduced to 394cm if the trees were removed for any reason. Pretty cool, huh?... makes you want to hike 18 km straight up and straight down, doesn't it? 🤣

Two hours in, after you've mostly passed through the cloud forest, the group stops for lunch and a break. The tour company did a great job packing a huge lunch for us: BBQ chicken, rice, and salad. The guides even carried ranch dressing for the salad. One huge upside of going with a hiking company is that you do not have to carry a tent or sleeping bag as those are at base camp for you. You do however have to carry all of your food which is totally reasonable as there were 16 people in our group: 3 Americans, 2 Irish, 2 New Zealanders, one Columbian, and a tonne of Israelites. I had no idea that Guatemala is a popular tourist destination for Israelites. It was amazing to hear them speaking Hebrew as a living language because the only time I hear it in the US is in a synagogue or in a documentary.

Now if you ever do this hike, they.... whoever they are, the bloggers, tour companies, guides, fellow hikers.... will tell you that it's easy after lunch. They are lying. Not that the photo above is a perfect example of how steep the trail was, but sometimes when you travel by yourself you have to take the photos that someone's willing to take of you.

What they are not lying about is the fact that the scenery is still so lovely. All at once, the cloud forest melts away and you find yourself in a tropical high forest. There are grasses, ferns, and low scrubby trees. Again, I came home interested in this ecosystem and read a brilliant paper on what forms treelines in tropical high forests. They are so different from their taiga brothers in the US and Canada because they have a relatively stable yearly temperature that mimics winter at night and summer during the day. Just a preview, by the time I get to base camp the temperature will be 0 degrees Celsius.

As you can see, I made it up. My amazing reward is the view and a cup of extra sweet hot chocolate that really hit the spot. My tentmate ended up being Grace. She is a fun, spicy Columbian woman who lives in Texas but comes to Guatemala to visit her kids a few times a year. She took this shot of me drinking cocoa in the fog before it magically cleared and we could see the Volcano Fuego.

One of the big reasons that you hike Acatenango is because it puts you a valley away from the highly active Volcano Fuego. Volcán Fuego literally means fire volcano, and it lives up to its name, erupting every 10 to 20 minutes.

Here is a video of the first eruption that I saw after getting to base camp. If you listen closely, you can actually hear the booms. It sounds a little bit like an empty dumpster getting roughly tossed onto the ground. You can also hear everyone's reaction to the eruption. There's nothing quite like standing across from an erupting volcano to make you feel very small.

For those of you who would rather just have the photo version, here is a picture of another eruption. When I look out at the scene from the camp, I think to myself "Who put the most perfect tree in the foreground of this photograph?" If you look out along the ridge towards the volcano's top, there is actually a side hike that allows you to go about 800 m from the rim. If you do it, you can actually feel the Volcano vibrate underneath your feet. You know that I wanted to do it, but it was an additional 3 hours of hiking and I just didn't have it in me.

What I did have the energy for was to hike out and see a different view of the Volcano before sunset.

Obviously this is before the sun was setting but I did get at least a few good sunset photos.

When I came back to my tent, I was setting up to have a bit of a rest or just a lie down before dinner. If you ever get to come to Guatemala, you will find there are street dogs everywhere! The magical thing is that they're called street dogs but they don't just live on the street, they also live at the top of volcanoes. Let me tell you, if this dog was anywhere in the United States, Mike and I would have three dogs now. She was the most amazing pooch ever, and she could sense me as a dog lover at 1000 yds…

Yes, that is a wild Volcano dog curled up on my lap, taking a nap. As soon as I got home, I actually Googled whether or not you could bring a dog from Guatemala to the United States, and the answer...no. It is literally impossible because there are no labs in Guatemala certified to do rabies tests. You know me. I thought, if Mike and I do this hike again we could totally bring a leash and take that dog straight home, but it's not to be. Luckily she seems to have a pretty good life with hikers to share her time with.

You might have been reading this thinking, okay where's the lava! Well, you just have to wait for it to get dark. Sorry about the super grainy photography but remember it's just my cell phone! If you think that an eruption every 20 minutes is amazing, the Volcano is even more active at night.

Sorry there's no video but it just came out like a big black blur with tiny dots of red. I wondered why the Volcano was more active at night so I Googled it. Unfortunately, Google left me hanging! My gut says that it must be a temperature differential but I can't find any confirmation on that so I guess I'll have to do more research. You all know me, once I get an idea in my head that I don't have a firm answer to, it's on like Donkey Kong with Google Scholar. I've been watching Fuego from my window for two weeks now, so my assertions are practically empirical peer research🤣

In the morning they got us up at 3 o'clock so that we could see the sunrise. I was lucky that I got this photograph because it was a hard trek up to the summit on loose ash and gravel. I'd just stood upright when I whipped up my camera for this shot. About 5 minutes later, dense clouds moved in and that was that. Time to climb down for breakfast.

After breakfast, which was cereal and strawberries, we had to pack quickly and start the climb down. I was a bit sad to leave because the environment and views here were just astounding.

As you can see, this morning was much foggier. But honestly, not a single person complained because we didn't get rained on! On our way down this time, we did run into a few other groups and I felt really bad for them because I worried that they wouldn't have a view at the top today or tomorrow because of the bad weather forecast.

Here is my tentmate, Grace. She was completely exhausted because she was the only one who went to Fuego last night so her hike was 8 hours, not 6 like the rest of us. The amazing thing is that one of the dogs that loves to follow hikers up and down the mountain decided to take a nap at the same time that Grace did.

As you can see, we all made it back to the starting point in one piece. We sat around for about 45 minutes waiting for the yellow bus to pick us up and take us back to Antigua. In that time Grace managed to lose her banana to one of the Volcano dogs, which was a riot.

I have to say I was very excited to have a shower and to wash my hair because it was quite a dusty hike. Well, a bit dustier because 10 minutes from the bottom I took a slip and fell. Of course because it's volcanic rock it was like sliding on pavement. I swear, I hiked thousands of miles on the AT and never got road rash like this! But seriously the view was totally worth the penalty!!

Just one last gallery for those of you who love flowers. I took a couple of shots of some that I think only grow around 13,000 ft. Oh, and a shout out to the backpack that I rented. You didn't give me blisters, break, or lose any of my stuff in your unfamiliar pockets!