Volcan Pacaya

'Smoking pacaya'

Looking into the top of the volcano

Me at the top lookng a bit scared and windswept

This was a great morning's climb up to the top of the volcano, called Pacaya. It is an active volcano and is smoking all the time. A few days after we climbed it apparently some lava was spotted spitting out of the top and about a month ago there was a small eruption. The views from the top were spectacular, right out to the Pacific ocean and south to El Salvador. The weather was good to us all as some friends who climbed it the next day could not see a thing!

It was only a 3 hour hike up and down so quite manageable for us experienced folk. However, the last 30 mins proved a challenge as the ash underfoot was difficult to wade through and threw you off balance if you were caught by the side winds. It was similar to trying to walk up a freshly snow covered mountain - the lava and ash certainly slowed the pace down.

There are loads more volcanoes to climb around Antigua and Central America so expect more accounts of accents in the future.

Sorry for the delay in updating this weblog - going back to school to study is taking up so much time and then I have so much homework to do there is no time left to go on the internet!! However, all is going really well and I am loving learning a new language and meeting so many people here.