Santa Maria Volcano

During Semana Santa (aka Spring Break) I headed back to Guatemala. This time I went to climb Santa Maria Volcano just outside of Quetzaltenango.

The bus dropped me off in a small village at the base of the volcano and the driver told me to follow the dirt road and I would find the trail.

The trail was not that difficult to follow because it is climbed frequently by locals and tourists and also because there is a lot of trash (empty water bottles and wrappers) marking it. It took me about 3 hours to get to the top. Many Guatemalan families, when they climb the volcano, leave offerings of flowers (among other things) at the top.

I brought my backpacking gear and spent the night on the point of the volcano.

The sunset was not much of a show because of heavy cloudcover in the surrounding mountains. It was also quite windy which forced me to pick-up and move my tent to a more sheltered area of the peak later that night.I had the whole peak to myself from 5:00pm the previous day to 10:00 am in the morning. I was woken up in the morning by Santiaguito Volcano erupting below me just outside my tent. Impressive!

Santiaguito volcano erupts every 30 minutes and blows a nice bit of ash skyward. It sounds like a jet airplane flying overhead when it erupts. I couldn't see it the evening before due to the low cloudcover. I sat down later in the day and took some time lapse photos of it erupting.

The views in the morning were spectacular and worth the effort. The volcano line in Guatemala runs West to East and I was on the Western-most end. To the East are the volcanoes of Lake Atitlan, Antigua, and Guatemala City. Lake Atitlan was visible.

Tajumulco and Tacana volcanoes are the last volcanoes in the Guatemalan volcano line to the West. I would climb Tajumulco next. It is the highest point in Central America with an elevation of 4220 meters (13845 ft).