Volcano huff and puff

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Ah Monday, day of rest for the dynamic duo. And a rest well deserved. The weekend was spent trekking up the highest volcano in Central America, Volcan Tajumulco, whose summit is 4220 metres above sea level.

We took the trip with a tour group called Quetzaltrekkers, a little outfit run by volunteers right out of the Casa Argentina where we've shacked up. Most of the money they make goes to funding an organization that helps street kids in Guatemala. And wouldn't you know it, one of our guides was Quebecois!

Food and camping equipment was split up amongst the 28 people who intended to take on this mountain and warnings were given about altitude sickness and chilly temperatures we would encounter on Friday evening. We were sent off and told to meet back at the tour's office at 4:45 the next morning where we would be grabbing a pickup truck to the bus station.

We emptied and re-packed our bags taking only the essentials: warm clothes, rain wear, hiking boots and chocolate. The real weight came from having to schlepp four and a half litres of water for both drinking and cooking.

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The following morning (if you could call it that) I discovered how difficult it is to engage in social niceties at that time of day, with absolutely no coffee in your system. The cast of characters who had signed up for this trip included a group of 12 from the UK who had just finished their university degrees and were taking a "break year" organized trip around latin america, a lanky Norwegian who ate more than anyone I've ever seen, a Texan massage-therapist, and a Saskatchewan soccer player to name but a few. It's fairly amamzing how spending two days with people in the same challenging conditions almost unavoidably creates new friendships. The conversations ranged from serious politics and American history, to fart jokes, travel stories and drinking tales. By the time we left I felt like I had known half of these people for months.

The chicken bus we took from the station dropped us in San Marcos, a little about an hour outside of Xela. Here we filled ourselves up with a big breakfast of cornflakes, eggs, beans, tortillas and coffee (finally!) and jumped on a second bus, packed to capacity, that would bring us up to the foot of the mountain. As the driver threw our packs down to us from the roof of the bus, I let my eyes drift up and up and up. "Bring it on!" I thought to myself.

As we set off on what would be a four hour uphill climb with cautious enthusiasm. Then the altitude hit us like a ton of bricks. An uphill walk that I could normally have done with minimal physical effort was suddenly a major challenge. My lungs ached for air and my heart felt as if if was going to pop out of my chest, all perfectly normal we were told.

When we finally got to our base camp it felt like no small victory. We changed out of our damp clothes because the temperature had dropped so quickly and the wind at this height was constant. The mountain has two peaks, a smaller one on the left and the real summit and volcano crater on the right. After setting up camp we trekked up the smaller peak to watch the sunset, unsure of whether we would even catch a glimpse at all because the clouds were so thick. Even without the weight of our heavy packs the small hike was no picnic. Everything had to be done at half the speed you usually do it at particularly because we were warned not to get all sweaty which would make us freezing cold once we got to the windy summit.

The clouds luckily cleared once we got to the top just long enough for us to catch a beautiful view of the valley in the fading orange glow of the slowly sinking sun. Just as quickly as they had cleared the clouds rolled in again and the cold set in with a vengeance. The only time I felt remotely warm all night was when I was right next to the fire. We crashed around 9:00pm in one of the smaller tents with a guy named Nicholas from Abitibi, QC. His English wasn´t great and we were pretty well the only two that spoke any French, which worked out. I wore every piece of warm clothing I had to bed, including the wool toque I borrowed from from Quetzaltrekkers.

The temperatures weren´t even sub-zero, but your blood gets so thin at high altitudes that sometimes you can never seem to get warm. I´m not even sure how much I slept or whether I did at all. Either way we were up at 4:00am before the sun ready to hike the big peak in the dark. Tristan, our guide started us on the way up but must have veered a little too far to the right. We found ourselves scrambling up a steep slope over loose rocks and heavy underbrush. Some of the girls with the big group had never trekked before and were obviously nervous as hell. Someone got sick from the height and Amy, our second guide had to go back to base camp. Then the second person got sick. If Tristan had to go back with her we wouldn´t be able to make the summit, big disappointment for everyone, but we couldn´t just let her go back on her own. To make everything worse, the batteries on Tristan radio had crapped out. Just then someone looked up and saw another tour group on what looked like a path moving directly above us. Once we made it to that path the going got a whole lot easier and we decided to follow this group to the top on our own. In the end Tristan and the second illness ended up making the summit as well.

The sunrise was like something out of a movie. As we began the walk you could see the millions of stars above and the lights from the towns below looked just like their reflection. When the sun finally came up the clouds beneath us made it seem as though we were looking out over an ocean.

We toured the rim of the huge crater and slowly made our way down the side of the mountain in the ever brightening {and warming} sun.

We were served a traditional Guatemalan porridge called mosh when we got to basecamp for breakfast. It´s made with cornmeal, oatmeal, milk, sugar and anything else you can think to throw in like granola. Usually more liquidy that what we think of as oatmeal this stuff is wonderful and warming if you can handle the texture {some find it too slimy for their taste}. Add a little pineapple jam and you´re in heaven.

After breakfast we packed up and began the much easier trek down the mountain. I was amazed at how much lighter my pack was just because I had gotten rid of all the water. The descent finally allowed us to enjoy the scenery we had missed the day before because we couldn´t focus on anything further than two feet in front of us. We finally made it back to the road covered in the black dust that covered the entire mountain, squeezed onto yet another full-to-the-brim chicken bus and made our way to lunch at the same comedor.

When we got hope the only thing we could think of doing was floppin down for a nap, which I promptly did after washing the layer of black crud off myself. The group decided to meet up again in the evening for victory beers at the Salon Tecun, which boasts that it´s the oldest bar in Xela. We discovered their idea of a black and tan called a mixto which is just dark and light beer mixed together in a big pitcher. I´ll stick to the plain old Gallo next time. That´s the standard here.

All around this experience was wonderful, and highly recommended. Being forced to spend an overnight with a bunch of people you´ve never met makes it much easier to form new friendships and meet lots of really diverse personalities.

I was almost sad to be moving on, but we did the next morning start our trek to Coban. A story for the next time.

VANESSA

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