Volcano roasted marshmallows and rockclimbing, Guatemala 22nd-25th November

I spent Sunday morning in Antigua, just generally wandering around and visiting a few of the markets there. It is a very pretty city (perhaps a little artificially clean for the tourists), with nice brightly painted houses. Plenty of artisan things for sale, which I haven't really seen since Peru.The main activity of the day however was in the afternoon, as I went to climb Volcán Pacaya. This is the only active (and it definitely active), volcano near Antigua and stand at 2500m. It takes a couple of hours hiking, first through woodland and then up the barren landscape formed by numerous lava flows. We hiked to just below the summit, where we could actually stand right above an active lava flow! I was a little worried as the solidified lava crust we were standing on didn´t seem that thick and I didn´t really fancy falling into 2000degree molten lava. We got stunning views of the surrounding mountains in the sunset, before getting down to the real business of roasting marshmallows on the lava flow. This was actually kinda tricky as you had to use a stick about 2m long and hold it at a fulls arms length, as the heat from the lava was quite unbearable at close range. Probably the best tasting toasted marshmallows i´ve had though. It got dark while we were on the top, which gave a whole other aspect to the lava as you could literally see it glowing in the cracks beneath your feet! the darkness also made climbing down the scree slope quite exiting, if a little dangerous.Monday was mainly a travel day, getting up at 3.45 to catch the bus to the city of Questzaltenango (but referred to by its Mayan name of Xela). This took a lot longer than expected due to the very poor state of the bus I took. It broke down about halfway there, but we managed to get moving again after about 20mins. However later on in the trip there is a huge hill, where the road climbs over 1000m We made it nearly to the top of this mountain before the bus conked out again. After being stationary for about half an hour the driver manged to find a way of getting us very slowly up the hill. This involved revving the engine then jamming the engine into gear, making the bus leap forward about 10feet before it cut out again. We progresses slowly like this till we got to the crest of the hill and thankfully the rest of the journey was downhill. I spent the afternoon in Xela generally trying to figure out what i`m going to do with my next week and a half or so in Guatemala. I had a stroke of luck in the afternoon however when I ran into a group of 4 Israelis in the hostel. They were talking about doing some rock climbing in the area and I asked if I could join them the next day. We managed to find one of the tour agencies that had a bit of gear we could borrow, as well as a few bits and pieces they had brought with them. However the real adventure was going to be trying to find the crag to climb on. They had read on a website somewhere that there was good climbing near Xela. However the only directions we had was to a junction on one of the roads running out of Xela and then the4 name of a small village on that road, from where we could apparently see where to go. So this morning we set off on a mini adventure to try and find this place. It started with a bit of a run around town, eventually ending up at some random roundabout where apprently we coudl get a bus along the required road. We successfully manged to get dropped off at the junction only about 15mins out of town. From there we started walking the unknown distance up the hill towards the village we`d read about. Fortunately we didn`t have to walk far as we manged to hitch rides on the back of a couple of passing pickup trucks. From the village we then climbed up through a boulder field to what turned out to be obvious crags above the village. However it turns out this was no ordinary mountain, but actually a very religious site for the Mayan people. This meant there were numerous prayer groups scattered amongst the boulder field. Some where quietly praying, but others were working themselves in fairly extreme spiritual states, meaning a lot of shouting and wailing. No one seamed to mind us wandering through and climbing the rocks though. We manged to find a few lines of bolts on the limestone cliff, however as it has obviously only been bolted by some lone enthusiast the lines were incredibly hard. Combined with 6months of non climbing made for some very sore fingers and arms! (that phot is me rubbing my aching fingers) We never actually manged to top out any routes, but still had a fun day at least attempting some F7 and above routes.I ended up walking back down on my own, walking through the boulders and then through the village. It was really nice to get out into the proper Guatemalan countryside, where obviously very few other foreigners go. I manged to get a ride on the back of a pickup all the way back into the city, sharing the open back with an aging Guatemalan carpenter and his family have a chat to them trying to explain where the U.K was! I also learn´t an important leason in checking the age of the driver before you jump in the back, as it when I thanked him after he looked about 12! Tomorrow I am setting off on a 3 day trek to a place called San Pedro on Lago de Atitlàn, which is meant to be very beautiful. After that i`ll head back here, before setting off to climb central America`s highest peak of Tajumulco for a couple for a couple of days on Saturday.
O