on top of the (central american) world

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nobody signed up to go to lago this weekend, so i finally was able to climb tajumulco. not a whole lot to be said....i am going to let the pictures tell most of the story. the climb is pretty interesting. the entire hillside is strewn with boulders from eruptions hundreds of years ago. you ascend through living forests and dead forests (rumor has it that the government destroyed parts of tajumulco because of possible poppy growth on its hillsides...another rumor claims that all the trees died because of a pine beetle...yet another rumor says that chemical warfare was used against the guerillas that occupied the mountain during the civil war...so whats the real story?....saber.)

we camp 200 meters shy of the summit, and climb the adjoining peak, cerro concepcion, to watch the sunset. from the top of this hill you see incredible cloud formations, stretching clear to the pacific ocean. so far in life, my only disappointment with the natural world is that you can´t actually bound about on fluffy clouds....i´d have run right over to the ocean on saturday.

we wake early (4ish) the next morning, to summit before the sunrise. there must of been 200 people on the mountain this weekend, so you could trace the entire ascent by the headlamps shining in the dark. happily, most of the 200 turned out to be locals. normally i hate crowds in beautiful places, but guatemalans climb high places to be closer to the heavens for prayer and celebration, so it was actually pretty great to share this with them.

c-c-c-cold as hell up there before the sun, but we had taken sleeping bags, which sort of helped. when the sun finally did peak out from behind far off volcanoes the mountaintop exploded with cheers and clapping, as if the sun weren´t just doing what it always does. gorgeous sunrise, pictures don´t really cut it, but they try.

walked around the huge crater on the way back down, daydreamed about what it´d be like if the mountain decided to wake up right then.

i like the lago trek better...it´s more diverse, and certainly offers a more intimate glimpse of guatemalan life outside of the tourist hubs. that said, spending the morning milling around a campsite felt pretty great.

said i wasn´t going to write much....yet here´s a novel. oops. anyway... the pictures!

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