Wednesday 6th - Day13

Early start this morning for all of us as we had to be on our way by 6.00am. - destination Chicabal Lagoon. There we met our guide, Efrain. He claimed to by 80 years old and a Mayan priest. The latter was probably true, but he was only 80 in Mayan years. Their months are only 20 days so he was actually 60. Still brilliant at getting up and down the mountain.

We met Efrain at the base on the mainstreet of his village, San Martin Chiquito. Familiar flowers grow in his garden including geranium, fuchia, foxglove and monbretia, but we were treated to a spectacular flying display by a hummingbird.

We began the trek through allotments growing potaoes, beans and maize. These continued for some distance and height before giving way to lush vegetation. It was cold at first, but it soon warmed up. We had walked for about an hour when we came upon another field of potatoes and a football pitch and some wooden chalets. These very near the top of the mountain. It wasnt clear whether this was a community or whether it existed purely to cater for tourists.

We took a break here before pushing for the summot. It was still a lot further than we had thought, but the view from the top was truly spectacular, as we looked down upon the tranquil waters of this sacred Mayan lagoon, deep in the heart of the crater. There were viewing points here and we all took many photos before decending the 600 steps to the waters edge. Though we were glad to be going down at last some of us were very conscious of the fact that we would have to come back up again!

Efrain had given each of us a dried corn niblet. When we reached the waters edge he blessed the offerings and we threw them into the lake and made our wish. We then ate our lunch on the off-white pummice stone beach, before our guide took us off to view the burial site of an old Mayan priestess and her family. All of the time Efrain spoke to us in his Mayan Spanish dialect as if we understood every word. In fact we did manage to piece together his basic messages.

We left and began our ascent of the inner crater, but we were taken by a different route. Efrain would stop regularly to show us interesting flora, at one point taking his machete and cutting some long fronds from a pathside tree. When we reached the rim he stopped and asked Grace H to stand with her arms outstretched. He then brushed the leaves lightly down the front of her body before tapping them harder across the front and back of her legs. He worked up her body to her shoulders before laying the leafy flail on the top of her head, fronds hanging over her face. He then asked her to breath deeply in and out while he said a few words to cleanse her spirit. He repeated the same ritual with most of the group.

We then continued our decent. At the bottom he took a detour through a maize field. Someone likened it to a scene from the Borrowers, with the maize plants standing some 10feet tall, about twice the size of the local population.

At the bottom we said our goodbyes. We felt very priviledged to have had Efrain as our guide - he was a truly gentle and spiritual man.

Tomorrow we do another big volcano. which is a lot steeper and higher
Friday we have a rest day
Saturday we may not be able to edit blog as we are climbing Santa Maria so we do not know what time we will return.
We then spend 2 days travelling



Breaking news: Neil just refered to himself as an old fogey