We were up early Monday morning to get a last shower before heading out on the trail. We ate prepacked sandwiches from the hostel for breakfast and headed to Old Town Outfitters. We met Pierric, the other tourist hiking with us, signed release forms, and waited for our guide. It turned out to be sort of a long wait because the vehicle that was taking us to the dropoff point had a flat and no spare, so they had to find another vehicle and load the supplies before getting us. We were supposed to leave at eight and finally left a little after nine, but it didn't matter. We understand that with tours, this is sometimes just how it goes!
It is about an hour ride from Antigua to the village of La Soledad, where the trailhead to Vulcan Acatenango is. On the way we got to know Oseas, our guide, and learned about the villages we passed through. La Soledad is high in the mountains and is a small farming community. To augment their farming income, they have formed a guild of porters who, for $20US, will haul up to 50 pounds of your stuff up the mountain. After some debate, Tom and I had decided that we would hire a porter for the trip up to carry our water. The mountain does not have a water sources so all water has to be carried to the campsite, and we had purchased eight 2-liter bottles of water, plus our four 1-liter Nalgene bottles...a lot of weight!
Still, we thought we could probably get all of our stuff up ourselves, but we wanted to support the local villagers, much like we try to do with our business in Belize. We ended up with the porter carrying most of the water, and I carried a couple of liters for the trail along with our clothes, my sleeping bag, and extra outerwear for the trail. Tom carried his sleeping bag and our tent, a few extra clothing items, a bag of cooked pasta for our dinner, and three of the 2-liter water bottles.
We all got our bags packed and started up the trail at about 10:20. Pierric had also hired a porter, and Old Town hired a couple to carry up food and cooking supplies, so we ended up with a whole line of trekkers heading out - me, Tom, Pierric, Oseas, and the four porters. Despite their heavy loads, which they carried in plastic crates in string bags hanging from straps on their foreheads, the porters went ahead so they could "run" and Oseas led the three hikers. We started up the trail behind Oseas, with Oseas taking very small, very slow steps. I was surprised, for about two minutes, until I realized that I was panting and already tired. I looked back, and saw Tom also breathing hard and slowing down. I then realized that not only were we not used to hiking steadily uphill with loads on our backs on soft and rolling footing, but that we were hiking at 2250 meters, or about 7400 feet.
Lisa at the Old Town office had told us that it would take about six hours to get to base camp. We had privately scoffed at this, since she figured it was only about 8 miles. As we soon learned, the guides know what they are talking about and they know how fast middle aged flat landers can go up the mountain. The ascent starts through farmland at the base of the mountain, and mostly goes straight up the somewhat gentle slope...but it is steadily up. In about an hour, we arrived at the first rest area, at the base of the cloud forest. We were tired! We rested for 15 minutes or so, and started through the cloud forest on a switch back trail that was still a pretty steep climb. We soon found that we were resting at every switchback, which meant we were going about 100 feet at a stretch.
Suddenly we felt old and out of shape! After a few more official rest stops, we made it to he border of the cloud forest and the pine forest for our lunch break. The fog cleared and we ate lunch looking at the beautiful valley below and the surrounding mountains. Oseas told us that the rest of the trail was a more gradual climb, so we were looking forward to things being a little easier since we were rested as well. Tom also passed two of his water bottles off to Oseas and Pierric to lighten his pack, but the climb through the pines was still tough. Parts of the trail were slippery because the ground was mostly volcanic gravel, and the trail still went steadily up. At this point there was only one trail to the campsite, so Oseas and Pierric went ahead and we just took our time with both of us feeling our age and making very frequent rest stops.
Near the end, two of the porters met us as they were making their way back down the mountain, after having already arrived at the camp and setting up the tents. They said it was about 20 minutes to camp. We hiked for another 20 minutes, and Oseas came back to make sure we were okay, and told us it was only 20 minutes to camp. He offered to take Tom's pack, but Tom declined, wanting to get there with all of our stuff on our own.
After almost exactly six hours, we made the final ascent to the campsite at 3500 meters, or about 11,500 feet, in a breathtaking spot on the side of Acatenango facing Fuego, just above the saddle between the two mountains, where Old Town has carved flat tent sites in tiers out of the side of the mountain.
Tom and I collapsed, and Oseas and Pierric set up our tent. We also added layers, as the fog had rolled in again, the wind had picked up, and it was quite chilly, probably in the mid-50s, although we did not have a thermometer. At one point the fog cleared so we could see Fuego, just as it rumbled and spewed smoke out the top. We soon learned to listen for the rumble.
We had the top tiered campsite and Oseas had the bottom where he cooked, with Pierric in the middle. When Tom and I went to climb to our tent to drop our packs, we were dismayed to find that we had to rest a few times just to get up to our tent. We got organized, then climbed back down to Oseas's site for a yummy dinner of pasta, sauce, and cashews, with hot tea. Dinner was delicious, and just as we finished it started to thunder, and then the rain rolled in. We all scurried for our tents. It was only 7:30, but we were exhausted, so we did what we had to do and we had the light out and were nestled in our sleeping bags and ready for bed at 7:45. Our tired bodies spent the night wrestling with our minds, as we were both worried about the summit ascents scheduled for the next day, since neither of us had expected the climb to the campsite to be so difficult. I also spent the night listening for Fuego, knowing that if it rumbled when it was clear I would get a firework show of red hot ash and rocks spewing from the top. Unfortunately, I never saw it (besides in one of Pierric's pictures) because I hadn't realized that Tom had zipped down the outside fly flap over the door, and every time I opened the inside door I thought it was just too foggy to see, and didn't realize I was looking at the fly. I guess I was more asleep than I thought!
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