Scrawl: Laguna Xicabal

Yesterday morning we got up at 5:15 to catch the 6:00 am minibus to Laguna Xicabal (pronounced shick-a-ball.) The director of our school had told us to get an early start, because the fog significantly reduces visibility by 11:00 am or so. But the company ended up being one of the best parts of the trip. The Americans that ended up on the 6am bus were some of the most interesting, socially conscious folks I've met here.

The laguna (lake) is nestled in the crater of an extinct volcano, and is one of the few protected parks in Guatemala. One of the reasons for this is that it is a Mayan holy site, and they close off the park for the first part of May to keep tourists from interfering in Mayan religious ceremonies. While the Lonely Planet guidebook significantly understated the time and intensity of the hike it was still well worth the climb. The lake sits at an altitude of about 8900 feet, so that once you climb to the ridge of the crater, you are well above the cloud layer, and have a spectacular view of Santa Maria (an extinct volcano, the largest mountain visible from Xela – approxamately 12,450 ft.) and Santiaguito, on its rear slope. Santiaguito has been the source of two of the most destructive eruptions in recent history. A book I'm currently reading quotes a letter by a German woman who was living on a coffee plantation about 40 miles away when the 1902 eruption occurred.

"...as Mrs. Heinrich Schmidt went to her room...she stopped and exclaimed 'Look! Look! It's snowing!' The two husbands ran over to her and found that the fine white flakes were ashes and pumice. Everyone felt great dismay, and all eyes turned toward an immense cloud that grew darker by the moment and came from the direction of Quetzaltenango. The steady fall increased, and soon every leaf and every head was powdered white and gray. It grew darker and darker...now we were surrounded by pitch-black darkness and the stench of sulfur and ashes. Sand and ashes were falling faster and faster...all day long we looked for sunlight but the darkness remained absolute....On the third night, we were terribly frightened. When I awoke the windows were tinged with red...lightning flashed behind the clouds of ashes. Shortly after six o'clock the day dawned leaden gray, but at least we could distinguish things again. Oh, God, what a sight! As far as one could see everything was gray and dead, like an enormous cemetery."

The fact that the mountain regularly expels smoke, though, is apparently a good sign. The pressure is released every half-hour or so. Previous eruptions came after years of inactivity, once the pressure finally built up enough to blow the top of the cone off.

Here are some pictures: As we began the hike - the view across the valley to the village, called "San Martin Chile Verde" by all the locals:

The ranger station.

Here's the view from the top - Santa Maria on the left, and Santiaguito, the small protrusion three quarters of the way down the slope. If you look closely, you can see a puff of smoke emanating from it.