Arturo ama lava

ANTIGUA, Guatemala - My trip to the Pacaya Volcano here started out with a story about a kidnapping in Fez, Morocco.

Chris from Berlin was traveling Morocco sometime last year with a friend when it happened to them. They had made some seemingly friendly and well-connected local friends over their few days there, and one day agreed to meet them at their house. Not long after they were inside they were told all exits had been closed off and that the two were now being held for ransom.

The two Moroccans didn't get physical, pointed no weapons at them and apparently handled the whole thing less like kidnappers and more like a restaurant manager detaining two people who couldn't pay their bill. Their biggest weapon was being Moroccan and the fear Chris and his friend had of who the police would believe if they chose to fight their way out. After a whole day of negotiating they finally gave the guys almost everything they had on them and were let go. They left Fez immediately.

The story left me pensive for the rest of the hour-long ride in a packed van of international tourists. I was in Morocco when this happened. But it's not just that, his experience is something a well-intentioned and overly trusting traveler could be forced to go through anywhere in the world. I've gone to strangers' houses before and never once felt like I was in danger, but you just can't know. When it works out it just adds that much to your experience. In fact, anytime someone can trust a stranger and it works out well, it's very reaffirming for one's world view about people in general. Maybe one just needs to keep in mind that the world isn't as mean or kind as he or she thinks it is.

Speaking of mean, I had to rudely ignore a bunch of very sad-looking children at the base of the trail to the volcano, all running up to us trying to sell walking sticks hacked from tree limbs. I said no to the first stick, and the kid holds up another one, which is exactly the same, and when I say no to that, he holds up the third one, also just like the others. He and the other 10 children did the same thing with every tourist there. Men also line up at the trail with horses, which they try to sell as "taxis," and then follow groups up the hill waiting for someone to fall or twist an ankle and request a horse. For that reason the entire trail is covered in horse shit.

Our guide was a very enthusiastic Guatemalan man named Arturo. He's native to the community where the trail started and said a lot has changed since he was a child. That's because the earth moves, spews and trickles there 24/7. The uphill (er, volcano) hike would take about an hour, half would be through forest and the other half on an empty black mountainside shrouded in gray clouds.

As soon as we were out of the woods it was like being on another planet. Black ash and rock everywhere, a sheer drop off on the right side of the walking trail and too much cloud cover all around to know how far or just where the drop would take someone. There was no sky, and somewhere in front of us you could here what sounded like large metal gears grinding slowly in the mist. We had to step over a line of jagged black rocks that interrupted the trail, Arturo said the result of a bigger unexpected eruption several years ago.

Soon we saw a red glow in the fog, a few minutes later we were standing in front of a slow moving red blob that shed steaming hot rocks left, right and forward. The clouds cleared overhead and we could see the smoking cylindrical peak of Pacaya.

I took my picture just a few feet away from the blob, having to run back after it was taken when it spat a hot glowing rock that rolled downhill towards where I was standing. We went around it after that and climbed up the side on a pile of tiny brittle volcanic rocks that sank under me and crunched as if I were walking in a bowl of cereal. At the top was a flowing river of lava, and some friends of mine in the tour group proceeded to cook marshmallows over it and gave me one. We sat there for maybe half an hour, some people made sandwiches, some people stood around throwing rocks at the lava river, and one German guy peed on it.

The clouds had gone elsewhere most of that time, but came swooping back up the mountainside just as it was time for us to walk down. The sun set quickly, I didn't have a flashlight, and it resulted in a long trip back down the mountain full of nearly disastrous falls and my feet covered in horse shit as a souvenir. At one point I was even separated from the group and wasn't sure where the front of the group was until I heard the sweet lifesaving music come from Arturo's cellphone speaker

Billie jean is not my lover
Shes just a girl who claims that I am the one
But the kid is not my son
She says I am the one, but the kid is not my son

When it comes to nature tourism, few things are better to me, more thought provoking or awe-inspiring than volcanoes. It's the living, breathing, moving earth. A perfect visual of the natural change our planet has undergone and how it continues to push forward. I've seen a few before but this was the first time I was ever able to get close to the lava.

I also couldn't help but be a little proud that my trip up the side of this volcano started in Alabama, even if that girl from Michigan (who hasn't asked me anything else about myself but continues to offer me a laundry list of tips/orders on how to be a good traveler, since I must be inexperienced at this) thinks it's funny. Everything I have done or will do on this trip started in Alabama. Bamaragua.