Live Volcano- Why not climb it?

We were suppose to work on a Saturday on missionaries in the CCM, but the Mission President was having some medical issues and had to alter our schedule. So.........Why not climb a live volcano?

 This is the start of it. A small village at the base of Pacaya. These people live off of the tourists that come to risk the threat of molten lava for a good hike. These young boys sell you a hiking stick for Q.5 (about 65 cents) A really small price for a useful tool!

They want you to rent a horse "taxi".

This is Cathy and she took them up on the offer.

Look closely at the pommel on the saddle. It is hand carved wood. I think the rest of the saddle is hand made too!

Here is part of our crew at the first stop. Bill in white is anxious to press on.

Looking up the hill you see a vertical corn field.

As we move up the mountain, you can look down and see this geothermal plant that sucks the heat out of the volcano, turns it into electricity.

In the middle of this view there is a high lagoon.

Well, I made it this far so up we go.

 I the distance you can 3 other active volcanos, Fuego, Agua and something-Tenengo.

Unfortunately the clouds are covering the tops.

Down in this valley is Amatitlan where we go to church

Many of the horsemen followed us up the mountain, but by now they realized that Cathy is the only taker and they returned to the bottom if the mountain  in search of other fares.

This is one of the village women that has climbed the mountain to gather wood to cook with and she carries it on her head down to her home.

As you can see we have gone up and are almost to the cloud level.

This is looking down on the lava flow that occurred last March. The dark lava is the new flow and you can see how it came down the hill!

Here is a vent from the volcano on the edge of the newest flow.

 This is enterprise. It's is a jewelry store that sells various hand made items that each have a little lava in them. This is what you call a difficult commute to work.

I made it this far and it feels pretty good!

 Looking downhill you can see Lago Amatilan.

Further down is the city.

I telephoto'd this to show an orchard on the side of a very high hill which is well below us.

Here we cross the lava flow in the bowl below the peak. It looks like plowed dirt but it is very hard and sharp.

This is the store up close.

You can't see it well but I am holding a Snickers bar that an enterprising Guatemalan carried up the mountain and sold to me for Q.15

The dog wants a marsh mellow.

That's right! we roasted marsh mellows over the still warm lava,by finding a hole in the crust and sticking white treat down under.

 This is the best and closest picture I got of the peak  from about 1000 ft. from the top. The notch you see at the top acts like the groove in a ladle to pour the lava down the mountain.

Looking down you can see many of the lesser peaks which are all over Guatemala.

Here is our group as we climb out of the bowl and it is as steep as it looks. We had to get back up to top of the bowl to begin our "decent"

A telephoto of the "roast" down in the bowl.

And here is the bowl from the rim.

By now I'm tired,so just enjoy the views.

Here is the final steps and believe me old knees like going up better than they do going down.

Remembering America from Guatemala

This is a young man in Central America, who may never see the United States. Some of his people treated us to a marvelous 4th of July and even though I don't have any pictures of the events of the day, I would like to share some of it with you in words.

It is night time in Guatemala and it is nice that I can see fireworks on the television and I remember watching them in person 40 years ago in our nations capital. The magnitude of the show has increased, but I think for me, the meaning has remained the same. Generally we think of our freedoms and the men and women who have fought to create and preserve those freedoms.

Today, however we were treated to a different view of that which I think we tend to take for granted. That may seem unusual in a country that is only twenty years away from a bloody civil war, but maybe it is because of recent conflict here, that perspective is different, maybe even improved.

This morning we had a Zone Conference for the Senior Missionaries. Being the 4th of July, the opening hymn was the Star Spangled Banner. The special musical number was a patriotic reading combined with "God Bless America." But the main speaker of the day was Elder Carlos Amado,and in his words came the meaning and the take-aways. Elder Amado is one of the most tenured General Authorities in the church and he is not an American.

He spoke of freedoms that Guatemaltecos don't have. He spoke of pioneers crossing the plains, and of pioneers throughout the world that are yet to come, for religious freedoms among others. He spoke of the one year he spent in Utah with his wife and the feelings he had for the people and the country and history behind it all. He reverenced that which we have, not in material things but in purpose and in ability to share what we have in terms of talent and humanitarian effort.

I especially liked his comments on work and how we are here to work. (Not only on our missions, but through out our lives and beyond.) How work gives us purpose and meaning and progress and vitality. This from a man who is 70 and about to be released from his current assignment to which he has been called and served well. He noted that his biggest challenge may be ahead of him as he moves from what others have assigned him to do, to choosing what he will do on his own. I have no doubt that he will choose well.

The other time well spent today was the breakfast that was served after the conference. I have been to many 4th of July breakfasts, but none like this. Each table for this sit down extravaganza was decorated with red , white and blue flag-like crate paper, complete with ornate centerpieces lined with breads and rolls. The bill of fare was nothing short of amazing. There was Belgian waffles, French toast, pancakes, three types of eggs,three types of potatoes and ham and bacon and sausage. Did I mention fruit? In addition to multiple sliced fruits in the buffet, each setting had a fruit cocktail with yogurt there to be enjoyed. While we were eating, there was American patriotic music playing and a revolving slide show depicting scenes from America and its storied history.

Now why is the food and decor important? Basically because they were prepared for us by people in Guatemala who have only some of the freedoms we have in the states, and who for the most part live on only part of the funding that we consider poverty level. They made us feel not only proud of our heritage, but envious of it as well.

For one of the most memorable 4ths of July, we thank our Guatemalan hosts!
    

Remember Us?

 Unfortunately I got out of the habit of blogging as we got somewhat buried in the clinic and simultaneously we were trying to learn how to speak, and even harder, hear Spanish.. We have gotten better, but realize that it will take a long time to get good language skills. It is time to get back to recording the happenings of our mission.

A while back we took a trip to Copan, Honduras with many of our fellow Senior missionaries. As Kacie said, "Isn't that nice. They are letting the Seniors go on a field trip." And  what a field trip it was. Because of the risks of the road we had to hire a police escort to get us to the border. Copan is not very far over the border and it is the location of one of the larger Mayan Ruins. We drove most of the day to get there and stayed in a local hotel which was quaint and "local".

Here is the group with Sergio, our guide, on the left.

This a "tuk tuk " outside our hotel.

That night Sergio, who was our guide, gave us a fireside on the ruins in general and the Central American Theory of  Book of Mormon location. It was extremely interesting and really set the tone for our trip to the ruins the next morning. For all of you Book of Mormon readers, you know that the directions given for all of the city locations, mountain orientations to the wilderness and the flow of the River Sidon can be challenging. Sergio made a very good case for Central America being the setting for the historical events of the Book of Mormon.

With all of that being said, I'll show you some of the ruins.

This is excavation of some of the water works.

This is a tiered wall about 75 ft high which was buried by ash and debris as seen on the right.

Walking where Mayans walked.

This is an estela that chronicles a former leader's life. The carving at the top that looks like a hamburger is seen on many such estelas and it has been interpreted as " It came to pass."

Here is looking over the edge of a very sharp drop off. Can you imagine Lamanites trying to scale this wall?

This is some sort of large plaza with surround seating.

This is some kind of ball court where scoring occurred  by hitting the three markers at the top of the sloped area. Conveniently, the ball would always return to the "center court area".

Artists' conception of how it looked on the day of the big game. Rumor has it that the captain of the winning or the losing team ( not sure which) would loose his head over the outcome.Perspective- this head is about 5 ft high.

This is a typical Mayan Arch as we are looking up at it.

Baptismal Font? It is at ground level and could hold water, and there are stairs going down into it.

Here is a reconstruction of a temple found underneath another  temple. This was a common practice of building the buildings of the conquering people on top of the buildings of the conquered. 

This shows a parrot with talons. These are common in some of the construction. Naturally, there were such birds in the woods surrounding the ruins, but they didn't look this fierce!

Well, that does it for this edition. We will try to write more often.