Volcan Payan & Guatemalan Central Bank

OK so yesterday I went on to climb the Volcano. You can do it either in the morning or in the evening. I didn´t know what to expect, but I figured it´s better to climb the volcano in the evening hoping for better views. At first it was an easy hike, but after an hour or two we passed a sign, that warns you of a dangerous fumes, and possibly flying rocks and lava. We kept on moving. Then as we got close to the top we ended up walking on the volcanic rock, that was really hot, and I waafraidid of three things: 1) Eruption, 2) That the rocks will crack under me, and 3) that my soles are going to melt. In addition, many of the rocks were really sharp, and you could see, lava flowing through the cracks, and hot places, where once you put something it waburningng. Then it was getting dark, and we were still at the top, to get out of the rocks, we had to walk for another 10min through the volcanic rock, and I really felt adrenaline kicking in. We left after 30min in this environment, and I was glad we did.

Now the funny thing about the cash in Guatemala. About 5 days ago or so, I´ve heard matravelersers complaining that there´s no cash in ATMs. It couldn´t believe as I was getting my money a day earlier, but then more and more people told the stories how they walked around the city, checking every ATM and there was nothing. Apparently, the government decided to renew money since they are falapartppart. However, instead of doing it over time, and replenishing the currency they went for extreme measures. Therefore, they took out of the economy majority of the bad notes, and after that decided to put the new ones on the streets. However, they run out of paper to print the new money. As people realized what´s going on they started holding on to even more cash increasing the demand even more. Now, it seems to be OK.

I got to Guatemala City today, and will spend one night before heading up north. I wanted to skip this city as it´s not to interesting but the buses to Rio Dolce go through Guatemala City anyway so I decided to make a quick stop.