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Trish Dine

Volcan Pacaya


Today was a whirlwind of adventure and breathtaking sites. 6 AM morning mist covered the whole drive to the foot of the Pacaya Volcano. With the intentions to climb the whole way to the tippy-top of the volcano (my first volcano climb ever) and peer down onto the molten lava, I was sadly mistaken and found out that we would be a few hundred feet vertically from the tip, because it was “too dangerous.” Ironically enough a majority of us decided to pose on the dried, large remnants of the volcanic rock from the 2010 volcanic eruption of which I thought seemed pretty dangerous, but you know different folks different strokes. But largely throughout the climb, we determined everyone’s physical limits, some more so than others. Furthermore the change in volcanic surface was quite impressive with integrating levels of sand, volcanic ash, and rock. Not only did this remind me of the three levels of the religious belief system of the Mayans (underworld, earth, and heavens) but what further confirmed this was the height of the volcano starting from the ground, and stretching past the limits of cloud cover in the skys.

Most importantly, we walked across a ledge of volcanic ash that extended only 3 feet from the volcano surface. Not surprisingly this was also deemed something to be “careful crossing” but ya know some of us decided to run across it because ya know YOVO (you only volcano once). As our trip to the closest to the tip we could possibly be, we decided to descend a few feet to complete our journey with roasted marshmallows in the nooks and crannies of active (and pretty dang toasty) volcanic vents. This was my first blue marshmallow, first volcano marshmallow, and first attempted force-fed marshmallow. Basically this was a ‘firsts’ kind of day, and I’m very happy I got to experience it with my SANAmigos.

- Trish Dine


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