Day 2: Antigua, Guatemala

Today was way exciting!!!
Luckily I was feeling all better when I got up (which was way early) so we headed to the volcano. Since our key broke last night, we were having issues and couldn't get out the front door, so our van almost left us, but luckily I ran up to it fast enough once it started moving that we could get on. The hour or so drive to the volcano was pretty uneventful, I ate some granola and fruit snacks. We started the hike up, which was really hard!! I climbed this same volcano a few years ago, and it was way easier. I blame the difficulty on my ever increasing age. Anyway, pretty soon Becky and I decided that we needed help, so we paid these guys to ride their horses up. That was a very smart decision, and fun, since I like to ride horses. I had to pop some pills pretty quick, though, since I am allergic to them. So we rode and rode, and the views were spectacular!! It was really cool to see the other 3 volcanoes in the distance, and we even saw one of them erupt! Once we had ridden the horses as far up as they could go, we got off of them. Becky didn't wanna go all the way to the top, but I did.... I had no idea what I was getting myself into. The climb was extremely steep, and it wasn't a normal path either. It was all the little lava rocks piled up together, and you just had to climb up them. It was hard because every rock that I touched moved, and all the rocks touched by people ahead of me also moved. It was fun trying to maneuver and not sink into the lava, but it was hard, and I got tired and sore pretty quick. As we got higher, we started to be able to feel the heat from underneath, it was such a cool feeling! When we got to the top and I could see the lava it was unbelievable! There it was, right in front of me, red lava actually flowing out of a volcano. It was extremely hot up there, and it smelled sulphury and little ashes and things were blowing in my eyes. As awesome as it was, I didn't linger long because my body just couldn't handle the temperature, smell, and ashy eyes. So began the descent....which was a lot like the ascent, except 100% harder. It is very difficult to climb down a steep mountain of little lava rocks that move and start to roll down as soon as you touch them. When I could I just scooted down on my butt, for a few minutes I tried going down backwards like it was a ladder but that was too hard because I couldn't really see below me, so I mostly just climbed down like a normal person. I slipped and fell several times, and ended up with a pretty big scratch on my wrist, and it hurt, but I didn't really mind because I at least had a battlewound. When I was about halfway down, I heard cries from up above yelling "Watch out!", in both Spanish and English, and I looked back, and a huge boulder, about half my size was rolling down the mountain straight towards me. I didn't know what to do, there was no way I was going to beat it down, so I did the only thing I could do and caught it. Yes, I caught the boulder, and used my body weight to hold this giant rock. And so I was just standing there, because I couldn't really move or it would crush me and push me down the volcano. Eventually a few strong guys caught up to me and held onto the boulder from above, and said that I had to move over to the side as fast as I could because they wouldn't be able to hold onto it from above for very long, so I let go and jumped to the side as fast as I could. The boulder rolled on down and I was saved. A few more slides and I made it down. And so we hiked back down and arrived back in Antigua.
We went to Pollo Campero for lunch and ate fried chicken and mashed potatoes, and had an amazing dessert that Krispy Kreme needs to get...it was a glazed donut with ice cream on top. Talk about delicious. Yum. Next we came back to the hotel and rested for a couple hours because we were very tired.
We headed back out and went to see an old Guatemalan movie about the Cold War and stuff. It wasn't very good, but I'm glad that we saw it.
Next was very fun. We went to this restaurant that had live Andean music - we LOVED it!! Not only was the music cool, but the food was delicious - we had a brownie with ice cream for dessert. This is also where I met my Guatemalan crush, Bill. Bill is 70 years old, originally from Nashville, but moved here to Guatemala to open the restaurant and play the drum in the band. He is awesome, and so cute when he's dancing, singing, and playing his drum all at the same time.
I can't wait to see what adventures await us tomorrow!!