Story time
Its known by many names: The Hike up Acetenango, The Acetenango incident of 2023, The hike to hell. Whatever name you choose to call it, one thing remains true, it was brutal.
I started this adventure not wanting to go, and looking back that was a justified feeling more than I could ever have guessed. It was like $40 for this hike and I didn’t even have budgeted money for it, so I had to move money around to even have the funds to consider it. This was supposed to be a hard 5 mile, 4 hour, hard hike with a night on the mountain then an hour hike to sumit and see an active volcano before hiking a few hours back down the next day. As I see it, if you choose to go to do something like this, you are either fit, insane or called by God himself. And as tempting as it is to believe I went for reason two, it was much more so the last reason on the list that had moved me to such a decision. God told me there was going to be miracles on the mountain and I wanted to see them. So I found the money, paid, packed and got myself ready to hike a volcano.
I got up, and me and those of us who were feeling particularly adventurous, fit, and insane, piled into the vans that were to take us to worst 24 hours of my life.
The vans took us to the house to start the hike. It was really cold and overcast. All the more reason to ask some questions like “is today really the day for this” or “I wonder if the weather will improve”. Not a soul did and I am convinced the tour guides did not either. They gave us lunch to pack in our bags to eat later. Then we were told we should buy gloves and hiking sticks or we will suffer (Anahs version). (The fact we even might need them alluded to tha fact that I would be suffering reguardless). So, because they were extra money I didn’t know about, with basically no money I got a stick and gloves through spending money that was not for this adventure. It started to rain as we started our hike, just a light rain. So I put on a raincoat over my puffer coat.
As we started off, three things were obvious: The golves and stick were the greatest investment I have ever made, I need to take better care of my body, and we would need 2 groups because of speed differences. In a bout of what I can only assume was insanity I chose to go with the fast group. I was by no leap of imagination particularly fast, but what I was was fast enough, so no one stopped me. IT WAS VERTICAL HIKING. If you built stairs at that vertical incline you would be sued for endangerment at best. My legs are weak and small and that has never been more clear to me than on that day, but my will and grit have never been promiminent so I carried on. It was not my job to get me up this mountain, it was God’s. I had let if know that if He wanted me there it was going to be His strength that would be the thing getting me there. Spoiler, He held up His end of the deal.
As we got to a little house on the very start I was trying to remain hopeful that the weather would change for the better. I decided to pray the rest of the time for the rain to stop on top of my nonstop strength from God prayer. The next section was stairs with like 2 feet step up verticals that varied GREATLY. I can’t. If it wasn’t freezing cold with pouring rain I would have used my hands and feet together to climb, but due to weather I was doing single leg deep squats for like a quarter mile. The stars died into muddy vertical watching trails. Which I thought was a blessing for only about two minutes before I realized my error. It was just as bad. The only thing that was worse about it was like it was like that for almost the full rest of the hike. The higher we got the colder it got, the more the rain soaked through my clothes, and the more my legs slowed and tired out. The fast group had gotten way ahead of the other dispite my wavering ability to keep up. By the time lunch hit we had only gotten about halfway and it had already been like 3 hours. Our clothes and bags started lettingvthe water through dispite rain coverings. God bless the ones who held to joy and optimism with two hands because I had already hanging by a thread. Each stop was good and horrible and it was never ending. We carried on and to keep the negative out of my head all I could do was pray for strength so when people checked on me in my hobbling disheveled state saying “How are you” I would gather what little air was in my lungs to say “God is my strength” and just keep hobbling. Hours passed and it was just freezing rain. My gloves were sopping and cold but the cold wind was worse so I kept them on. People’s hands and feet stopped feeling, our bodies were giving our all to keep us warn in our layers of wet clothes. Every view we had was just a white out of clouds. I wondered in I just rolled down the mountain if I could get a helicopter to come get me off the mountain and genuinely considered it a couple times. I doubt a helicopter would/could make it up in this weather. We we thought ourselves better than a helicopter I can’t guess. By this point we were not allowed to turn around so we had to keep going up into the angry clouds on the unforgiving mountain. We finally got to the last strength of volcanic sand and the wind was brutal over the darkening barren landscape. Still uphill, but our hands struggled to hold the walking stick and our legs struggled to take each step. I had been trying not to be visibly limping but had given up not to long ago. We got there in like 8/9 hours a day the place to stay was a tiny tin Hut with plastic wrapped mattresses squished together lining the floor.
Me after the stairs when I found a cool tree
The house we stopped at
Going up
The barren volcanic part
The closest “real” bathroom was a 30 min walk down the mountain. We stood huddled on the time strip of floor near the beds foe about 10 min taking it in and wondering what to do next. We were supposed to go eat soon but no wet clothes were allowed on the bed. We all decided warm was better than food and tried to take and hang our stuff and get dry clothes on. God protected my clothes from the water but nothing else so I was able to change. I donated the clothes I could spare to those whose clothes and packed were soaked all the way. God had me bring enough extra clothes and had told me to pack emergency blankets too. The two people with the hands and feet in worst condition were in my Hut and I gave them the blankets first. Our bathroom activity was running in the dark cold rain up the trail a little and going there. They kindly decided to deliver our dinner to us because the weather was “complicated”. We did our best to keep warm under the circumstances. My cabin was very in shock and generally displeased. We tried to crack jokes to keep up moral and cuddle close to keep warm. The other group was hours behind us and had to climb some of it in the dark. We were told we would not summit if the weather did not get better by 4 am. It did not get better. In the night the ceiling dripped, someone threw up 8 times, someone had trouble breathing enough that we almost planned an emergency night run down the mountain and nothing dried. We woke up to the same weather to head back down the mountain. I had prayed though a lot of the night and God gave me joy from nowhere. We learned that at the luch checkpoint, half our slow group turned around and had gone back down.
Moring came. We ate breakfast, I kept my PJs on (there were the only dry clothes I had) put on my wet jacket and bag and wrapped emergency blankets around both hands. My heart was full of gratitude for what God had done and the good I could see. I again was in the fast group and the rain was lighter. Let me tell you, I was RUNNING down this mountain. My group laughed and joked and the tour guide scolded us for our speed. My body was sore but not enough to keep me on the mountain for even a moment longer than necessary. God had gotten everyone up safe, the people who should have had hypothermia did not, the girl who couldn’t breathe was okay and we were are capable of walking. None of that should have been true.
We made it down in 4 hours which is another miracle. I was cold and wet and hurting and still running on the joy of the Lord by the time we all got down. We returned equipment and got back in the vans. It didn’t feel real and simultaneously it felt like it would never leave me.
Once back at the Hostel the others were waiting for us with soup, snack, love and help to do our laundry and shoes and dry our bags for us. I still tear up if I think about it. We learned that we had gone up during a tropical storm. God had kept us safe. He lessened the wind and the rain for us to safely go both ways. God’s was going through the literal storm with us. I ate and changed and showered and was still very much in shock.
The snacks
The bags drying 
The shock continued. I wanted to play on my phone before bed and the sight of a cloud literally spiraled me into tears. The same thing happened the next day when I saw my breath in the air outside. I had to pray and process a lot. I could barely walk and my mind was in disarray, but I was safe and warm now. I thought I could get over it fast but realized I needed to go through my feeling first when the thought of rain while I was on the roof sent me running into the building in sheer panick and fear. I was in a bad place on that day and Jacob prayed for me which started me on my journey through mental Acetenango.
I realized that Acetenango and my life felt the same to me. A never ending struggle that you never get free from and the good is nice but there is so much bad that you are not saved from and its exhausting. God opened my eyes to the way I was viewing my life and I had to start both healing and hoping which both were hard.
Acetenango happened, but I am not on that mountain. And not everything will be an Acetenango. God has and will use this for my good because He loves me.
I am still here and still following God and He has so much good in store for me. But also that was a rough experience.
(Disclaimer. Some people were in much better headspaces and had different more positive experiences than me from the group that I went with)
