Boquete and Volcan Baru

Early on the morning of the 29th we headed to the domestic airport, and then flew out to David. Once in David we walked around the market a little bit. It was cool, but mostly similar to other third world markets I've seen before. soon we took a bus (we got on while it was moving) to Boquete. We arrived at out hotel (which was paid for by the airlines due to a scheduling mistake by them), and began to do research about the volcano. We soon learned we should rent equipment and head up that night, spend the night on the volcano, and then hike down in the morning. SO we found a hostel to rent us the equipment, and headed up around 2ish. It's important to remember that we woke up around 4:30 or so to catch a 6:30 flight to David this morning, so we were all already very tiered.

As we were dropped off we saw a sign that said 15 KM to the volcano, which was concerning, because we were told it was 11 to the summit, so if it was 15 to the volcano we would never make it in a day.we were walking, and eventually asked a local farmer how far to the volcano's peek, and were told 135 KMs, which was again concerning. Soon after this we came to the ranger station, and found out that it was only 13.5 KMs from there to the summit. So we paid out entrance fee, and began our accent to the top. It was gruellingly steep, and every step was very difficult. There were places with at least a 70 degree incline. We walked for a few hours, and eventually Sarah noticed that the landscape was similar to Scotland, except without sheep. Luckily about ten minutes later we came across a heard of sheep being ;lead down the mountain. It was actually really crazy, and one of the coolest things I've ever seen. It kind of reminded me of the bulls I saw on the bike path in Holland, except less dangerous.

After the sheep we continued to climb, and it became obvious that Mike was the weak link in this group. He began to become very slow, and was struggling around every curve. we began to take more and more breaks, and around 6 it became obvious that we could never make it before dark, so we decided to high tail it for the next hour or so until sundown and then take a break before dark. Mike couldn't have been struggling more at this point, but he pressed onwards. Around 5 minutes to sundown we had just walked up this incredibly steep section, and so we decided to call it dinner time prematurely. We sat for a while and ate and laughed. Over all our spirits were high, but the cold was coming, so we needed to bundle up with winter coats and hats. Around 7:30 we headed out to continue on our journey. It was really cold, but moving was keeping us warm. The stars were out, and everything was making creepy forest sounds. After about an hour Sarah's flash light ran out of batteries, and Mikes followed soon after, so we were all sharing mine, which made things even more difficult. We came across a cat, which kind of freaked us out a little bit. and continued our slow accent in the dark.

Around 9:30 after numerous breaks we finally found the campsite. We were tiered, sweaty, and horribly in need of a good night sleep. I began to attempt to build a fire, but because of the altitude, and because there had obviously been many other travelers who had made fires here, there was no dry wood available to make one. We tried with the wet wood, but had no success, and eventually just called it a lost cause, and went to go to sleep. I began to build our tent in this shelter that was at the campsite. While building it I accidentally fell through a hole in that platform, and only caught myself from falling the 10 or so feet to the ground with my arm. However, by catching myself I think i hyper extended my shoulder, I thin threw myself back on the platform and laid there in horrible pain for a while. I then finished making the tent and tried to go to sleep.

Once in the tent we all tried to go to sleep, but were having a hard time doing so. I was still wet from sweating so much during the hike, and since it was below freezing at night, I was shivering, and in a lot of pain from my shoulder. Eventually I had to be switched into the middle because I was so cold we thought the body heat from Mike and Sarah would help me. It did, but only minimally. I then began to feel Sarah shivering, so the two of us huddled together and tried to keep each other warm. Eventually we did fall asleep for an hour or so, but we then had to get up to get to the top for sunrise.

We packed up the tent, and began to hike in the dark the rest of the way up the volcano. We got up to the top, and it was really cool. We could see both oceans from the top, and see into south and north America. Unfortunately it became unbearably cold and windy up there, so we had to go down a little bit to get some shelter from the buildings on the top of the volcano. I think it was like a radio or television broadcast antenna or something, but there were a bunch of different buildings up there, and we sat behind one to block the wind. We stayed up there for about an hour and a half, and just kind of enjoyed the view, but after a while we began our decent.

On the way down we were going much faster, but we were constantly twisting our ankles, and slipping on loose rocks. It was less physically demanding than the way up, but was much more taxing on your ankles and feet. I believe we were fine for about 8 or so KMs, but then we began to break down. Sarah was first, she began not speaking to us, and became kind of irritable. Next was Mike, with about 3 KMs left he began to guess that around every corner was the end. Even I became a little tiered towards the end, but eventually we made it. It was actually kind of cool walking down, only because it was crazy steep that it was hard to believe that we had actually done this. Honestly I was kind of proud of Mike that he was able to do this, and didn't quit, because I can imagine he must have had a terrible time the day before.

Once we arrived at the ranger station at the base we learned that there was no way to get back, which was concerning. Luckily we convinced one of the rangers to drive us to a main road where we were dropped off, and then caught a bus back to our hotel. We then fell asleep for a few hours, but forced ourselves to get up, get dinner, and then we were back in bed by 8ish.

Overall it was 2 crazy days, but probably the most memorable part of this trip so far.