Antigua, Guatemala

We had another long 9 hour bus journey from Lanquin to Antigua, but after checking in and wandering around we instantly loved Antigua. The streets were pretty and the locals were very friendly.

We spent a day wandering around the huge market, walking through the different coloured streets and eating good food. We heard about climbing the volcanos nearby before getting here and we signed up for the Acatenango over night trip with Balam Tours for the next day.

The next morning was an early start, we packed lots of warm layers after being told it was freezing at the summit of Acatenango volcano, got our boots on and were ready for 2 days of walking up an active volcano!

We met our guides, Nelson and Alexander, at the Balam Tours starting point which was just over 2000m above sea level. We were given our lunch boxes for the 2 days, blankets, walking sticks and picked up any extra equipment we needed to borrow and then the 10 of us set off.

The day before the walk I woke up with a cold and soar throat, not the best timing as as soon as we began walking steeply I could feel my lungs and chest tightening and it was harder to catch my breath. I then fell to the back of the group (apparently not much far behind the rest) with Mary-Jo, who was also feeling the same, and Alexander.

We had our packed lunches above the clouds at around 2900m above sea level and after being refuelled we carried on the walk.

After 5 hours we made it to the base camp, the last section of the walk was much more volcanic but flatter so I made my way to the front of the line to not slip behind again. You could hear Volcan Fuego erupting as we got closer, it was amazing.

Balam’s campsite was amazing! We had chairs, camping beds and a wood fire waiting for us. All with an amazing view of Fuego.

The camp site was around 3700m above sea level. We sat watching Fuego erupt all afternoon and waited for sunset.

Sunset was beautiful. We were very lucky to be on this side of the volcano and with only 1 other group. As soon as the sun went down the cold hit so we went back to camp layered up and gathered round the fire for dinner, marshmallows and hot chocolates.

Watching Fuego erupt in the dark was amazing. Something we will never forget. Seeing a volcano erupt lava so closely was incredible. No words or photos can describe how it looked and sounded. We sat for a while watching before we went to bed early ready for the 4am wake up call.

I’m not sure what the temperature was but I’m sure it was below 0 degrees, it was freezing! None of us got anymore than about an hours sleep. I had the company of a dog (he followed us up and sat by the fire in the evening) that slept on the bottom of my camping bed which kept my feet warm!

Once we were up and layered up some more we headed off to the summit with our torches and blankets to watch the sunrise. This hour must’ve been the hardest part. Running on no sleep, low energy and unbelievably cold it was very tough. With a lot of encouragement from Joe we made it to the top, 3976m. We sat with our blankets and watched the beautiful view, the sun was rising and Fuego was erupting.

We were at the summit for around 45mins to see the sun rise. The wind then hit us and it was freezing cold, there was even frost on the ground. We managed to get a photo as a group before almost racing back to camp to get warm.

After breakfast and more hot drinks we started our descent back down. Slipping and sliding we made it back to the starting point in 2 hours and were ready to shower off the volcanic ash.

We had an amazing 2 days with Nelson, Alexander and the group. Climbing a volcano to watch an active volcano was one of the hardest but most rewarding things I’ve ever done.

The next few days we were staying in Antigua and we done the bare minimum. We relaxed by the pool, ate good food, wandered more around the town’s beautiful streets and walked up to the view point which was slightly clouded over.

After resting for a few days we were ready to go to our next stop, Lake Atitlan.

ELG