Volcan Pacaya

From Antigua, we took a trip to Volcan Pacaya and it was absolutely incredible. When hiking up, I assumed that it would be just like every other volcano we've seen... looking at it from a view and maybe seeing some activity from far away. Well, we got so much more! When we first started hiking up, we did see some amazing views. There are two other volcanos that are even higher and the peaks of each were seated perfectly out from our viewpoints. Our guide was a local man who only spoke Spanish and so it was great practice for trying to comprehend. I understood some of what he said, but even when I didn't understand, he just kept talking. He must have been in great shape walking up that volcano 6 days a week! He wanted to practically run up it, but had to wait for the rest of us tourists. We could see activity from the top of the volcano in the form of smoke coming out.




When we got closes to the top, we were what we thought to be incredibly close to the lava field. We walked down a bit to get to a point for good pictures and movies. Scott got a good movie of the lava and some rocks falling off. As the tour continued, our guide kept taking us closer and closer to the lava. An Argentinian guy and I kept calling him muy loco, but we continued on. We were literally walking on volcanic rock that had active lava right below us. We walked up within only a few feet of the lava and felt the intense heat from it. I even held a stick that was in the lava and on fire. I thought I was going to burn my hand before Scott snapped the picture! It was truely an amazing experience.