Summiting the 3,976 metre Acatenango Volcano is, without a doubt, THE hardest, most physically challenging, and mentally confronting thing I have ever done. This bitch was DIFFICULT. So, was it worth it, and would I do it again?
As mentioned in my Antigua blog, we were lucky enough to spend Dave’s birthday in beautiful Antigua. Dave’s folks (and my darling parents-in-law) wanted to do something a bit different for his birthday present as we were away, and the overnight hike up one of Guatemala’s highest volcanoes to (hopefully!) watch another active volcano erupt sounded like a wicked, not to mention a once-in-a-lifetime, opportunity!
We booked through OX Expeditions, a very well regarded agency, and the evening before we were heading off, we met our guide Jose and our fellow climbers (eight of us in total) for a pre-trip briefing.
Pre-trip briefing at OX
Here Jose talked us through what we could expect – and all of a sudden, my excitement became slightly more like nerves. We have to carry our own (approximately 15kg!) backpacks up a “category: difficult” hike that takes roughly 7 hours on the first day, and then another 2 to summit before dawn on day 2, not to mention the hike down? Eeeeeeppp….. ok, sure. We got this.
Dave was much more calm than I was, and told me not to stress out – that they probably overemphaises how difficult it is so it doesn’t seem so bad when you’re actually doing it. Yep, that sounds like something a tour company would do. And it wouldn’t be the top rated thing on TripAdvisor to do in Antigua if it were that crazy difficult… right?
WRONG. A big fat, WRONG. But I’ll get to that.
First back to setting the scene…. so the day after our trip briefing, we met back at OX headquarters at 6am to pack our tents, sleeping bags, our lunch and dinner (yes, we had to carry all that as well!) into our backpacks.
OX were great in that as Guatemala in general is not a cold place, a lot of the travellers and backpackers that want to hike Acatenango overnight do not usually have clothing warm enough for an altitude of 4,000 metres, so they have what is basically a dress-up cabinet full of old clothes, including beanies, jackets, long pants and the like that they loan out to people who may not have warm enough clothes.
Both Dave and I borrowed clothes, and I honestly think we would have frozen if we hadn’t – their clothes, although most were stinky and definitely needed a wash, were a godsend (if not completely fashionable!).
So after ensuring we had everything and everyone, we jumped in the minivan and ducked into the town centre for a quick coffee and some breakfast before starting the hour or so drive to the bottom of Acatenango to commence our hike. Now, one thing I am going to admit right up front, and which I am certainly not ashamed of, is that both Dave and I took up OX on their option of hiring a porter to carry our backpacks on the way up.
Only one other guy in our group took the option too, and I admit that whilst we felt a bit soft compared to our other (younger!) hike-mates, I was more than willing to part with $15 to make this apparently crazy difficult hike the tiniest bit easier. In hindsight, this was an incredibly worthwhile investment, and I was happy to support the local people by utilising their services! Actually on reflection, Jose our guide also used a porter (although his reasoning was he had already done the hike three times that week so he needed a break!).
But before I go any further, here is a bit of background on Acatenango and Fuego. They are next to each other, and both loom over Antigua but are about an hour by car from the town.
Acatenango stands 3,976 metres tall (just over 13,000 foot) and it was first well-documented as erupting in the 1920’s, but hasn’t erupted since the 1970’s. Fuego on the other hand, erupts often – yep, as in it spews molten lava into the air which then runs down the mountainside, and if you’re on the adjacent volcano of Acatenango, you get a front row seat to watch.
Our trip would involve hiking up and around Acatenango for about 8 hours on day one, until a flat ridge about a 2 hour hike from the summit, where we would set up camp and spend the night with a front row view of Fuego (in case we should be so lucky and it erupts). We would then wake up at 3am (yes you read that right) in order to complete the summit and be at the top for sunrise. Sounds relatively ok so far. How hard can a walk up a mountain be….?
Right, now you know the rough idea of what we were in for, lets see what it looked like!
The drive to the bottom of Acatenango was a quiet one, everyone seemed pretty somber (or maybe half asleep?) and my nerves were gradually increasing… meanwhile, cool-as-a-cucumber Dave was just chillin’ and feeling pretty good. As we drove we caught glimpses of Acatenango in the distance, although there were so many clouds around its summit that it was difficult to catch a good view.
The approach to Acatenango
Finally, we arrived at the small track where you start the hike, and after meeting our porter (turns out it was a horse…!) and hiring hiking sticks/poles (turns out they were highly recommended), it was time for a quick happy snap before we started so here is us with the mighty volcano Acatenango in the background… here goes nothing!
As we started, Jose explained how as we progressed up the volcano the landscape would through four entirely different ecosystems. First, farmland filled with corn fields, then cloud forest, then high alpine forest, and finally through the volcanic zone to the very summit (to be done on the morning of the second day before sunrise).
Ahhh yes, lots of smiles in literally the first section of the first section… the cornfields! We would learn within about three minutes of this photo that the first section is (with good cause) famous for being the most difficult (apart from the summit on day 2) and lasts about an hour and a half.
After hearing that, my nerves were no longer just churning in my stomach, but I hate to say it, churning in my guts as well. I apologise in advance if what follows offends anyone (it is definitely in the ‘too much information’ realms, but hey, I promised to keep this blog real!), but in the interests of transparency, I will go on…
Now, I have never before been one to understand the old ‘nervous poo’ but by about 30 minutes into the hike, I had to duck my head in shame, squeeze through some barbed wire, take my toilet paper roll and squat behind a bush between two corn fields… great start Kell, great start.
My hike-mates were good sports and didn’t give me too much stick. The first time. Uh huh, this was to happen another TWO more times before we would reach our camping spot in the early afternoon (and maybe another couple of times before bed …).
It got worse as we went up as well because the track got either more dense (the cloud forest zone) and I had to bushbash my way to find a teeny little space big enough so I wasn’t squatting ON a bush, and then it got waaaay less dense so I had to backtrack about 100 metres so I was not COMPLETELY visible.
Coming from a chick who hates the thought of going to the public toilet in campgrounds, and has never had to do number 2’s in the wild before (yes, I have used drop toilets, that’s completely different), this was a completely new experience for me. And… kind of liberating if I am completely honest! Hey, I literally ‘went’ all over Acatenango, no camping toilet will ever seem that bad again.
Righto. Enough about that. Here is us taking a break about half an hour in…
And here’s some more happy hiking pics! And some more breaks!
And here we are all crashed out about half way through the hike after smashing back our packed lunch. We had an hour to break, and pretty much everyone took advantage of the time to catch some shut-eye.
I would never have thought it would be so easy to fall asleep, but we all dropped like flies and got at least a quick nap. No wonder – by this point, we had been climbing for about 3-4 hours and were already pretty exhausted!
You can see by this time we are literally up in the clouds, and we (would have) had a great view over Antigua and the other nearby towns if the clouds weren’t there ;).
After lunch, it was upwards and onwards through the alpine forest. This section was not as directly uphill as the first couple of sections had been, and we were not shaded by the forest as much. Which was good and bad – good in that we got moments of breeze that weren’t lost in the trees, and bad in that we got lots of moments of direct sun!
Here is the group breaking in the middle of the third section – still some smiles in there despite the pain!
Finally, at around 2pm we reached the spot where we would spend the night, and as we rounded the final corner and majestic Fuego came into view, it made us all just stop and stare in amazement. We caught it at the perfect moment when there were no clouds… for a minute or two!
The volcano was BIG and clear and seemingly SO CLOSE to us, we were gobsmacked. And then, all of a sudden, we heard thunder rolling in… no wait, is that SMOKE coming out the top? Jeepers – Fuego just erupted a little bit! She knows we are here, and she erupted for us!! The clouds were continually rolling in front of Fuego then clearing, so it was a game of hide and seek for most of the arvo!
In the daytime it is super difficult to see whether there is any lava in the eruptions, so we were all hanging for sunset so we can see if any lava is involved in these eruptions!
With a few hours still to kill before sunset, it was pretty easy to waste time trying to capture Fuego and the other nearby volcano, Agua, in all their glory (I don’t think I succeeded!) on our cameras and of course, in a cheeky selfie or two! Oh, and setting up our tents of course!
We also spent a great deal of time trying to start our campfire…
And … success!
Within ten minutes of getting to our camp spot, we were all suddenly freezing and piling on all our clothes – in the below photos I have two pairs of pants on, two pairs of socks, my hiking boots, a long sleeve thermal top, another long sleeve top, a jacket and then a beanie and gloves – and if I went more than 5 metres away from the fire, I was still cold!
Whilst the sun was setting we had our dinner – pasta with a tomato and vegetable sauce – and it tasted like pretty much the best thing I had eaten in weeks. A good carbey meal is just what the doctor ordered it would seem!
Stunning Sunset Pics
And then the fun really began. Fuego was on FIRE the night we were there. Once she started erupting, she just kept on going, right through the night. Unfortunately, despite having all the camera gear (and no idea), I couldn’t capture any decent night shots showing the lava so one of the guys in our group promised to send me some…. I am still waiting, but will update when I receive them. But it was awesome.
We could literally see the molten lava running down the side of the volcano, and spewing into the air with huge plumes of smoke, and boulders. Definitely made the hike up worth it, just to see her in all her glory and to HEAR the immense bangs and thundery booms she would make throughout the night, BRILLIANT!
Whilst Fuego was putting on her show, we washed our pasta down with a swig of rum that was passed around and some red wine but nobody was too keen to have more than a couple of glasses – not after Jose informed us that our morning hike to the summit in the dark would probably be the hardest part of the whole trip…. Eeeeeeeeeep. I’ll be right back, just ducking into the bush for a bit with my toilet paper roll….
We sat around the campfire for another couple of hours watching and listening to Fuego but by about 8:30pm people started hitting the hay, and knowing the alarm clock was set for 3am, we were not too far behind. We were sharing a tent with a lovely guy Matt, and a girl, Emily from Canada. Both were keen hikers back home, and Emily and I kept each other sane during most of the hike during the day so we buddied up as tent-mates pretty quick.
What Emily only mentioned after we had set up our tent was that she had bought along earplugs because Matt snores… LOUDLY. And oh boy, snore he did! Now, I like Matt, I really do, but within about half an hour of him snoring like a trooper, I wanted to smother him with my non-existent pillow. And he did not stop. The whole night.
I am pretty sure both Dave and I got less than one actual hour of sleep that night – it was truly an agonising wait until 3am when we could legitimately get up, get dressed and start our day. And how would we start it? With a lovely, excruciatingly difficult hike – no wait, it wasn’t a hike at all, it was more of a vertical scramble up gravelly rocks – that made the day before seem like a walk in the park.
It was at this point, at 3:30am in the morning with my headlight strapped to my head, in the dark, scrambling up a volcano after pretty much zero sleep, that the tears started. Call it frustration that I found this part so difficult, call it exhaustion, call it anger at myself for being a sook…. Either way, there were tears and poor Dave was so good – literally holding my hand and practically dragging me up the last 2 hours of that darn volcano.
And yes, there was another emergency toilet stop. And there was not really much space to go ‘off the ‘rack’ this time – so I am sorry to the hikers who came after us. I really am. And I am sorry you have to read about it.
ANYWAY after the most difficult two hours of my life, the wind suddenly seemed to pick up and blow ice cold and I realized we could see the first rays of sun peaking through the clouds…. We had made it to the summit!
I burst into tears once again, but this time it was relief, gratefulness, disbelief at getting there – probably all rolled into one actually! But darn it, it was FREEZING! We quickly nabbed a good vantage point to watch the spectacular colours of the morning – and what a sight it was. Bright blues and pinks, golden yellows and oranges, all backlit against the awesome sight of Fuego!
We did it! Celebrating at the top!
After taking the obligatory snaps at the top and soaking in the views for another half hour or so, we were all frozen through to the bone so began the much quicker descent down to our campsite. What took us two hours to climb only took us about 30 minutes to descend… !
After a quick but heart breakfast of coffee and bagels, we soon broke camp, packed up all our belongings and began what I thought was going to be the easy part down.
Unfortunately two decades of netball and dodgy knees made this part almost as difficult for me as the summit climb. Despite wearing my knee brace for support, the steep downhill hike was agony on my knees towards the end, and certainly has made me more nervous for how I will go on the Inca Trail in June.
We took about three hours in total to make the descent and once again Dave wins husband of the year for sticking with me as I was walking at old man pace down the volcano with my walking stick!
By the time we reached the bottom of the volcano I could barely walk, but I was also immensely proud, and could hardly believe, the HUGE feat that we had both just accomplished. A lot of people do not actually make it to the summit and without Dave by my side pulling me up that last hike to the top, I honestly don’t think I would have finished it.
But wowsers, what a fantastic, exhilarating, challenging, growth experience to share together! What a special opportunity to see an erupting volcano and to camp overnight on another volcano, and to learn first hand about the local Guatemalan people from our local guide Jose. What an overpowering way to break down (literally, in tears), but then break through those physical barriers and overcome the equally as HUGE mental barriers to achieve the end-game?!
This was an incredibly memorable experience and I have to make a point of saying again what a great present this was from Dave’s folks – a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and we were blown away by their generosity – so thank you so much Catherine and Bernard!
But yes, this will most definitely be a once in a lifetime experience, as you certainly won’t catch me attempting Acatenango ever again!!
Upon arriving back in Antigua, the first thing we did was have a shower (probably the longest showers of the trip this far!!), and then we decided to splash out and splurge on a dinner at Hector’s, the most popular restaurant in town – an elegant little French bistrot. You know how we love us some French food!
With aching muscles and a raging appetite, we devoured our joint entrees of tuna carpaccio and roasted tomoatos with basil and mozzarella, before our delightful, medium rare fillet steaks were delivered to our tables.
Hector’s Bistro
Oh MY WORD. This dinner rocked, and was made all the more better by the fact we kept saying how much we deserved it! Spectacular overnight trip, spectacular company, and spectacular food – perfect way to wind up our time in Antigua, and in fact, Guatemala.
‘Cos not only had we just finished the overnight volcano trek and were completely exhausted, but we thought it would be a great idea to, later than night (or very early the next morning, we are talking a 2am departure), board a 16 hour shuttle to traverse through four countries before reaching our next destination – Nicaragua!
Until next time…!