Travel Tales from the Americas: Under the Shadow of the Volcanoes

Following our whirlwind trip back to UK to celebrate Alan's big birthday we returned to Guatemala on 20th September for a rest! Indeed a rest was forced upon us for when we contacted Raymond, our Land Rover contact in Guatemala City, we were informed that whilst the Land Rover mechanic had fixed the problem of the white smoke and flames coming out of the exhaust pipe, he had identified that Lucy was sorely in need of new front brake discs and wheel bearings. So, he was duly instructed to carry out this essential work.

Guatemala City was not somewhere we particularly wanted to be, it's big and dangerous, however we did manage to find a very nice place to stay at a small hotel in Zona 10, reputedly one of the most up market and safest zones.

So, we chilled out for a couple of days and then went to collect Lucy from the mechanic's workshop an Friday afternoon, 23rd September, then reorganised and repacked everything in order to get on the road again the following day.

We set off on Saturday morning for Antigua. Lest anyone thinks we decided to swan off to the Caribbean for a further rest, Antigua is the former capital of Guatemala, abandoned in favour of Guatemala City after a devastating earthquake in 1773.

The 45 km drive from Guatemala City to Antigua was very much up steep hills and down deep valleys and as we breasted the last of the steep hills a great cumulo nimbus came out of the exhaust pipe together with smoke rings and all the other glorious pyrotechnic displays of Lucy in distress. We stopped for a little while and Alan cursed, Sue examined the ceiling but finding no comfort from the cursing or from the ceiling we continued on our way until we arrived in Antigua.

Antigua is a delightful old colonial city surrounded by a number of volcanoes, two of which are still active. The streets are all cobbled and there are lots of marvellous crumbling ruins, relics from previous earthquakes, and rather more gringos than we've seen before.

We arrived in the pouring rain and all the cobbles were wet, the puddles were very splashy and the first couple of hotels we tried were spartan, seedy and not very clean. Having had lunch in a very pleasant little Italian restaurant the world seemed slightly brighter and then we came upon a very nice little hotel called El Antano, a lovely old colonial building with a central courtyard and little garden area at the back. Alan struck a very good rate for the week with Carmen, the hotel manageress who rewarded us with what looked like the bridal suite and also arranged for a fridge to be delivered to our room.

The sun shone for us on Sunday and we spent much of the morning wandering around the Parque Central, which is the square in the centre, and generally familiarising ourselves with this lovely old city. In the afternoon we trotted up to the Hill of the Cross which is accessed via a very long set of steps that made us puff and brought us out on a promontory with a wonderful view over the city and the volcanoes beyond which were covered in cloud.

Church ruin, Antigua

Colums at Parque Central, Antigua

Street scene with marimbas

Cheeky fountain, Parque Central

Church ruin, Antigua

View of Antigua and Volcan de Agua from Cerro de la Cruz

We need to say a little about the public transport here. In this area of Guatemala the buses are mainly ancient school buses which have been brightly painted in various designs. They are know as 'chicken buses' because they apparently also carry livestock on the top, including pigs as well as chickens! We haven't seen any chickens or pigs so far but we did see one bus laden with market produce.

Chicken bus

Another chicken bus

.... and another!

We got up at 6.30 am on Monday morning to climb Pacaya, one of the active volcanoes overlooking Antigua. This involved meeting up with Alex, our guide, at the trekking centre and then being driven, along with three other hikers, for one and a hour hours to the village of San Franciso where we started our ascent. Here we also met up with our local guide who was introduced to us as Monkey (he earned that name as a child apparently because he was always climbing trees).

To begin with we had a very steep climb up through some vegetation on a path mostly made of volcanic dust which was rather slippery under foot. We were followed by some young lads with ponies just in case anyone found the climb too much and needed a ride! The total trip was only 8 km but we both found it quite challenging and were relieved each time Monkey stopped to show us various herbs and vegetation that were of interest.

Volcan de Agua poking through the clouds

Bored redundant 'taxi' driver, Volcan de Pacaya

On Volcan de Pacaya

One knackered old man, Volcan de Pacaya

Sue toasting marshmallows on lava field

Confused bug on lava field pretending to be a leaf

Pacaya last erupted in 2014 and we climbed up as far as the lava field which it had deposited below the summit. This was like something of a moonscape and the volcanic rock was still very hot to touch in places, apparently the lava is still molten only 10 metres below the surface. We could see the cone of Pacaya with the various larva flows coming down from the peak of the volcano from the various eruptions over the years. We did start to wonder when the next one is due!

Alex and Monkey brought along a picnic lunch for us which was very well received and also provided us with marshmallows to toast on the hot lava rocks. Then we had the long trek back down but by this time the cloud had come down so we had very little of a view on the way back but, all in all, it was a great day and we got some much needed exercise.

.... and then it rained

Alan managed to make contact with Raymond on Tuesday regarding the ongoing problem of white smoke coming out of Lucy's tailpipe and he put us in touch with Bill, the latest in the line of Land Rover experts we have encountered in Central America, who by a stroke of serendipity runs his business in Antigua. We went along to see Bill who turned out to be a very pleasant Canadian guy with a Guatemalan wife and two children, a boy and a girl. Between them they removed the inlet and the exhaust manifolds and the turbo from Lucy and determined that the problem was seals on the turbo unit, the very same one that was only recently fitted.

We were invited in to have lunch and we sat down with the family and the rest of Bill's team to a very nice meal of pork steaks which bill's wife had cooked. Bill said he would arrange to get new seals fitted to the turbo and his daughter, Alicia, then gave us a lift back to our hotel.

When we got back to the hotel Sue sat down to her first 'one to one' Spanish conversation class with Carmen, the hotel receptionist. Sue had been enquiring about Spanish language schools in Antigua and Carmen, who has been unfailingly helpful in so many ways during our stay, let it be known that she had previously been a language teacher and offered to give Sue some conversation practice in the afternoons.

Sue with Carmen

High school parade, Antigua

The girl with the big bass drum

Fuego, one of the two active volocanoes, started kicking off on Tuesday and several people informed us that they had seen molten lava spewing from the summit. We went up on to the roof top terrace in the evening to have a look but by then the volcano was covered in cloud so we didn't see anything.

Volcan de Fuego spouting steam

As we were without wheels we spent Wednesday walking around this delightful city and very pleasant it was too in the warm sunshine seeing various churches, convents and other archaeological stuff. Most of them are in ruins having been knocked about either by the hand of man trying to pilfer building materials or the hand of God trying to flatten things with earthquakes, of which there have been many in this part of the world.

Arco de Santa Catalina, Antigua

Convent de Santa Teresa

Temple of Santa Rosa showing earthquake damage

Yet another convent!

Nuns' cells within convent

Church ruin showing earthquake damage

Our acquaintance with Antigua continued on Thursday morning as we sat in the Parque Central people watching and, in Alan's case, taking clandestine shots with his telephoto lens. After lunch Alan went with Bill to Guatemala City to collect the turbo which had been reconditioned and had the faulty seals replaced.

Vendor in Parque Central

Local women, Parque Central

Local girl selling her wares

Local girl with her wares

Bird of Paradise flowers

Morning Glory and Golden Shower

We were finally able to collect Lucy on Friday afternoon and were very pleased to find that she appeared to be her old self again. In addition to refurbishing the turbo Bill and his team discovered that a valve in the cyclone was sticking and causing a build up of oil pressure which had caused the clouds of white smoke and also wrecked the turbo seals. This they sorted by replacing the faulty valve.

It was good to be able to get out and about again so we spent most of yesterday, Saturday, exploring a few of the villages around Antigua, some of which were quite pleasant and some scruffy but all giving us a fascinating glimpse of rural Guatemala.

Patchwork fields near Antigua

Public laundry facility, San Juan del Obispo

Detail of public laundry

Village church

Elderly gents in village square

Today is Sunday 2nd October and Sunday means Sunday markets, one of our favourite pastimes! We went to the market at Santa Maria de Jesus which is not a tourist's market, it's a market where the local people come in from the outlying villages and farms and sell their stuff to each other.

Market scene, Santa Maria de Jesus

Most of the women were in traditional dress as were most of the little girls. Their skirts are very elaborate, multicoloured with lots of ribbons, lacey bits and embroidered bits, usually worn with a little embroidered jacket or top.

We didn't buy anything but we hugely enjoyed wandering around and, since there were no other gringos there whatsoever, we were a far greater curiosity to the locals than they were to us. Alan took a lot of photographs and nobody was at all camera shy, unlike the people in the mountain villages of Mexico.