Lake Atitlan is sometimes called the world's most beautiful lake, the massive caldera of a volcanic eruption that is set at an altitude of about 5,000 feet and is surrounded to the steep walls of the much higher land around it and several much higher volcanos, including Volcan San Pedro, the reason Atitlan is on this KE Adventure trip’s agenda. Our time at the lake on the tour is rather limited, so my plan is to return to it later for a few days to explore it more thoroughly.

The road to the towns around the southern and western sides of the lake is apparently too rugged for our minibus to handle, so we dropped down a couple thousand feet to the town of Panajachel on the lake on a spectacularly steep road from the Pan-American Highway and took a 45 minute boat ride across Atitlan to San Pedro de La Laguna, home for the next two nights . The mechanical troubles with our bus earlier in the day caused us to arrive just after dusk, so the first ride across the lake was in the dark, and the dock in San Pedro was a rickety series of wooden planks I half expected to collapse under the weight of my large North American body. Wow, this whole day is turning into a bit of an adventure. Luckily, though, neither I nor any of my trip mates fell into the lake.

San Pedro La Laguna is one of the places in Guatemala jokingly referred to as Gringotenango. Tenango means "place of" in at least some of the local languages, so it’s a fitting nickname for the town on the lake most overrun with backpacker type western tourists and filled with the types of establishments that cater to their tastes. There are places like it all over the world – Goa, Kuta in Bali, Phuket and Koh Phi Phi in Thailand, and one hundreds of other places that are virtually identical other than physical setting and native culture . Our hotel was pleasant enough, though, and my room faced directly onto the lake. Our breakfasts and dinners, though, we quite standard international fare including one dinner at an Israeli-run restaurant named Shanti Shanti. You can’t get much more international than the cuisine of a nation made up of migrants from a worldwide diaspora. I want to try some more Guatemalan food!

With so little time at the lake, several people on the tour decided to spend their single day there exploring some villages around the lake by boat rather than climbing our last volcano. The seven of us who chose to climb were transported to the trek’s starting point about 500 feet above Guatemalan style, that is standing up in the back of a pickup truck while holding on to an overhead bar. It reminds me a little of “strap hanging” in urban mass transit systems. As they say, “when in Rome…….”

The hike’s starting point at the entrance to the San Pedro Volcano reserve was a rather low 5,500 feet, and although an extremely prominent 5,000 feet above Lake Atitlan, San Pedro’s peak is only at 10,000 feet (3,050 meters), quite low compared to most of the other peaks on our itinerary . The lower elevation combined with our late start made for an unpleasantly hot first half of the climb, definitely my sweatiest climb of the trip.

The hike started out quite gently and wound up some distance through coffee plantations and cornfields before entering the forest in a grueling set of steep switchbacks on a quite well maintained trail about 4,500 vertical feet to the top, an upward slog which took me nearly four hours. My seriously overheating self was especially slow on this one. I have to admit that despite feeling a sense of accomplishment when I got to the top for having completed the last of the volcano climbs I also felt somewhat disappointed. The way up was almost entirely in forest, the peak largely covered with trees preventing good 360* views in all directions, and by the time I arrived after the late start Lake Atitlan was largely obscured by afternoon mist and clouds.

Anyway, I made it! We descended a few hundred feet to have our lunch where our cook Mario had boiled some water for tea and hot chocolate . Yes, once the clouds and mist started swirling things got quite chilly near the summit. I feel as though I made it down the mountain in record time (at least for me) the trail being well maintained despite being steep.

In the morning we crossed Lake Atitlan again back to Panajachel and had a several hour bus ride back to Antigua. Why does such a short distance on the map take so long to travel? You have to see Guatemala to understand. Our farewell dinner of the trip in Antigua was at an Argentinian steakhouse named Angie Angie where we said our farewells to our fellow trekkers and our three guides over the last two weeks – Luis, Mario, and Alejandro. I had another full day to relax in Antigua before I continued on to my next destination, but my twelve fellow passengers all transferred to the airport in Guatemala City at various points in the morning for their flights back to the U.S. or the U.K.

I guess it’s time for me to assess my two-week volcano climbing adventure . This was my first trip with KE Adventure Travel, a British tour company based in the Lake District with a focus on trekking and other active-oriented trips. The running of the tour, though, was entirely contracted out to a local tour operator in Antigua named Old Town Adventures. On the whole I thought the trip was well run and was surprised to find all meals included in the price, making it a comparable value to other tour companies like Explore and Dragoman with whom I have traveled despite a somewhat higher daily sticker price. The itinerary worked for me being focused almost entirely on hiking half a dozen prominent peaks because I have time before and after the trip to explore some of the cultural and other attractions in Guatemala. If I had flown in and out immediately before and after the tour, though, I suppose I might have felt somewhat unsatisfied in not being able to get a better feel for the culture of the country. As far as the treks themselves go, I suppose I might be a little spoiled by the scenery of places like the Himalayas and Andes where the scenery is more open and the long-distance trekking more varied. Most of these volcano hikes were up steep trails through the forest with great views only at the tops. On the other hand, though, I got to see a significant volcano eruption from a short distance away, likely a true once-in-a-lifetime experience that not many people will have, the luck of being in the right place at the right time. So I think it was a good trip overall and will likely travel with KE Adventure again in the future.