My flatmate Robi and I decided that after two weekends of
being relatively boring, this weekend we wanted to go out and do something
exciting and memorable. We made a long list of possibilities and finally
settled on hiking the Volcano San Pedro. It was advertised as a strenuous hike,
but based on gut feelings and perhaps a little personal pride we both decided
we were up for it.
We got an early start on Saturday to catch a boat around 8am
(again boats do not leave at a certain time, they leave when they are full, so
8am is just a rough ETD). The direct boat to San Pedro took almost an hour. We
arrived at the dock and discovered that maybe it’s the boat driver, maybe it’s
San Pedro, but the price for the trip was a nonnegotiable 25Q each.
A man caught us at the dock and offered to take us to the
trail entrance and up the volcano for 170Q a piece. We were not confident that
we could get a better price anyplace else, but Robi had done his research and
heard that the hike itself was a flat 100Q and that you should never pay anyone
at the dock, but should wait until you reach the park entrance. The man was very
persistent and assured us that because the entrance was quite far from the dock
170Q was a good price. Robi and I said we had to think about it and walked a
bit further down the street discussing our options. Our conversation was
interrupted by a tuktuk driver who offered to take us to the head of the trail for
10Q each. Including the return trip in the tuktuk this meant that in total we would
pay 120Q for this hike, which was a considerable amount less than the 170Q
offered to us at the dock. We took the tuktuk with fingers crossed that online
sources had been accurate, and it would cost only 100Q at the entrance. We were
delighted to find at the entrance that the not only was the hike just 100Q, but
that that price also included a guide. Our guide’s name was Francisco and he
spoke Spanish and Tsusujil a Mayan language common in the San Pedro region.
The hike was HARD. It got very steep very fast. My Tuesday
night soccer games definitely had not prepared me for the intensity of this
climb. I had to stop with ridiculous frequency. There were two miradores (stopping
spots with scenic views) before the top of the volcano, and Francisco told me
that if I only wanted to climb to one of those and then turn around then I
would still have made it farther than a large number of groups that he had
taken up before. But I was not giving up. I was not going to say that I got up
at 7am to take a boat to a tuktuk to a trail only to decide that the hike was
too hard for me and turn around. Robi would often go on ahead and then climb
back down to us or wait for us further up the trail. For this reason Francisco
gave Robi the nickname Corazon del Leon (Heart of a Lion). After about the
third time that he suggested that I didn’t have to complete the climb, I told
Francisco in Spanish, “I may be slow. But I finish what I start. I am going to
the top.” He was pleased with my drive and cited the Tortoise and the Hare: “Despacio
y constante gana la carrera”. And that was how I got the nickname La Tortuga
Segura (The Safe Turtle). It was not quite as glamorous as Heart of a Lion, but
I was proud of it. I was not a quitter, and our guide knew that now.
Three hours later, 9,906 feet higher than we started, we
reached the peak of Volcano San Pedro. The view was breathtaking; it was
impossible to believe how high up we were. We picnicked at the top, Robi and I
giving Francisco a sandwich and some cookies, and Francisco sharing his tortillas
and beans with us. I decided that Francisco was La Puma Paciente (The Patient
Puma) for going so slowly with me all the way up. But he revealed that the hike
usually takes between two and a half and three hours so I wasn’t actually exceptionally
slow. He just had to be sure that his hikers were in it for the long haul
before they exhausted themselves very high up and had trouble coming back down
again.
After about an hour at the top we hustled back down the
mountain. Francisco’s friend was having a party that day, and he told her he
could probably make it by three. And of course there is always the high chance
of heavy rain in the afternoons. We descended with another hiker from Austria, Dominic,
and his guide Luis. Dominic did not speak very much Spanish at all, and his
guide was relieved to have someone to chat to on the way down. Luis told me that
he did not believe that I was from the US because my Spanish was so good. I
really think that it got noticeably better on the climb. Talking in Spanish for
what turned out to be five and a half hours straight certainly got conversation
to flow more easily.
We went tuktuk to boat to home to bed. I’ll be definitely be
feeling it in the morning, but I did not give up. I conquered Volcano San
Pedro. I can safely say that I did not have just another boring weekend.
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