Hike to Boiling Lake

When starting out on this hike, I truly didn't know what to expect. The average hike time to boiling lake is 3-4 hours one way, so in total roughly about 7 hours. I had mixed feelings about this time frame, a part of me was excited to put this one under my belt, the other was "are you seriously gonna enjoy walking for 7 hours through mud, water, and who knows what else" Turns out it was better than I could have every expected. On our drive to the start of the trail we stopped to take some photos of the view from this cliff (to the right), it was breathtaking. The scenery here never gets old. Once we got to the beginning of the trail, we strapped the backpacks, loaded down with some serious amounts of water and off we went! The beginning of the hike was not bad at all, it lures you in, just when you think oh, not so bad...bam... the hill starts. Up the side of the mountain are man made "steps" out of mud and tree branches. You have to be careful of the mud, if you not careful your foot will sink through and it will start to eat your foot. :) First hand experience talking , within ten minutes of the hike I sank down in mud up to the middle of my calf, it wasn't the most pleasant feeling to have much all in your shoe and socks but on the bright side, I "broke the ice" when it came to getting dirty. Trust me, we were all far from clean at the end. So the first leg of the hike took about an hour and twenty minutes. It was a gradual climb up the side of the mountain. When you reached the top it there was a flat surface which they call God's landing ( I will check on the term, but it is something close to that.) This was an amazing site to see. To look in every direction and see the tops of the mountains and the views below. It was very windy and pretty darn cold at the top. The picture below is at the top.

This landing is also where we breaked for lunch. Yes, we did bring subway... you can't expect expect us americans to eat nuts and berries on a 7 hour hike. We just weren't ready for that!

Coming down the other side of the mountain were some pretty intense steps. There are roughly 500 of them and some are about half my height which forced me to climb down them. While going down all I could think at one point was "holy crap! I am going to have to climb back up these." Mark was a great sport for all of this. He is not a hiker at all and held is own for the trip.We all got the best workout that we have had in quite awhile. The ones in the picture were the "easy" steps. They were quite narrow so you had to walk them sideways.

We were getting close to the bottom of the mountain when the man made trail ended. From here we climbed down a few streams before reaching the bottom. We walked through lots of streams throughout the hike, but this one in the picture we actually had to scale down the rocks to get around the curve in the top of the pic.

>At the base of the volcano is what they call the valley of desolation. This is where the the sulfar water starts coming through the ground and you encounter more lava clay and lava rocks then anything else. This was my favorite part of the hike. It was incredible to see boiling water and steam just running through the ground. I almost felt like I was in make believe land. Since when is water boiling in the ground where we can see it? Crazy!!! Check out the video below. The steam was VERY hot.

The view from the valley was almost overwhelming. To be in this valley where everything is dead and nothing can grow and to look up and see this site was hard to wrap your head around.

There is clay that you can actually grab from the ground and use as a mini facial. I had to try it! The best part, I got to wash it off in warm water stream. I am telling you... make believe land.
After leaving the valley of desolation, you climb up the side of the volcano which is steep but nothing compared to the mountain. Half way up there is a hot water whirlpool big enough for about four people to sit in. I didn't sit all the way in but definitely stuck my feet and legs in.


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These are some pictures from the lake itself. It is the second largest sulfar lake in the world. Again... make believe land that there is a lake, a big lake, that is just boiling! Some students have actually climbed down and cooked soup in the can or veggies in the can. They open the can and have it tied with string and drop the can half way in the water. I did not try this. I don't mind the hike but I am not leaning over a cliff above boiling water, just not gonna happen.

The hike back was pretty demanding. Going up the backside of the mountain with over 500 steps proved to be more than what my legs really wanted to do. By the time we got to the top both Mark and I had shakey legs. It was kind of fun to what the other's legs shake uncontrollably. So we realized on the hike back that it seemed tuffer than before, and we seemed to be going faster. Our guide, Victor, told us that we were making impressive time. I didn't know what that meant until the end. When we reached the beginning of the trail he told us that we made it back in 1 hour and 58 minutes! He said the best time he had before that was 2 hours 40 minutes. He was overly happy along with our fellow hiker Lila (she is an avid hiker). Mark and I just said " so why did we have to do it that fast? That is why our legs were so shakey!" Either way it's fun to say we did a hike that averages 3.5 hours in just about 2 hours!