Pacaya Volcano Day Trip from Antigua

This was one of the best tours I’ve been on. I read a lot of reviews before I booked and they were mixed so I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I was excited to climb an active volcano and roast marshmallows on it. The hike up was tough at times but you can go at your own pace and take breaks when you need and it’s fine. It took about an hour to get up. It was all definitely worth it for the view and the marshmallow roasting experience. Our tour was an English tour, but because my partner knows a bit of Spanish it wasn’t in English and when it was English it was only bits and pieces. At the top there was a lava shop with cute jewellery made from lava. I would have loved to buy something because it was a unique gift and prices were good, but only took cash. So if you want to buy souvenirs there make sure to bring cash. Overall it’s an amazing and unique experience and lots of fun.

The visit to Pacaya is a must do in Guatemala. We were accompanied by our 2 and 6 years old kids and they had as much fun as we did. It’s very important to have very good physical condition if you plan to hike the volcano. Otherwise, make sure to rent a horse from the very beginning as the physical effort is intense due to the altitude.

First time walking so close to a volcano. It’s very unique experience and we definitely recommend this hiking tour. Horse riding was a best thing we did for our kid. It wasn’t easy hike in the beginning. Our guide Michael Angelo was super nice and helpful. He even dropped off the hat my child left in the bus at our hotel. One of the best things we have done!

Our driver and guides were spectacular. The hike is not difficult and the views are amazing. The drive back to Antigua on the new road around Volcan Agua was also beautiful.

We had a very wonderful experience with this tour . The tour guide was also very informative and good . I would love to come back and experience this again . The hike was not that hard and the view was amazing

Wow! What a special day. The hike is tough for a novice like myself, but the views and the experience are so worth it. Who else can say they roasted marshmallows on a volcano! Davis and Luis were great, patient and answered all of the questions we had. You can tell they truly love the mountain and chatting with everyone about the adrenaline rush of the experience. I had a blast! One of the best days that I'll remember forever. Note: Make sure to bring snacks if you get hungry, because this one ends a little after 1 p.m. Also, try to bring a friend because it's a little on the pricey side for just one person, but that also may have just been due to COVID times.

Both tour guides were amazing! Very informative about the volcano, but also about the culture and history of Guatemala. Prompt pick up at the hotel. Beautiful views. Highly recommend.

Great tour! My wife and I had an excellent visit to the Volcano. I walked and my wife took a horse. I'm in decent shape and the walk was fairly hard for me. The air is so thin and it gets very steep at the end. Our guides were fun and we had a good time chatting while going up the Volcano (I can speak Spanish). They speak English but don't expect them to be fluent. We were fortunate to see a small eruption. That was really cool. Then we roasted the marshmallows. It was a great time.

We were picked up right on time at the hotel in Antigua by our driver and about 1 hour later we were introduced to our tour guide at the volcano's base. Kids swarm around us to sell/rent walking sticks and we were offered horse rides. After a quick stop at the basic restroom we started our walk followed closely by horses and their jockeys offering 'taxi for the lady' but after 15 min they went away. From that point we really enjoyed our excursion, our guide was from the area and shared a lot of information. We watch and hear! the nearby Fire volcano sending ashes into the sky from different look outs and made our way to the Lava Store in about 2 hours. A few meters from there we eat our marshmallows and walk the last hill to the last look out before going back to the car and come back to Antigua. We reached town around 1:30pm, so it's actually a HALF day trip rather than a Day trip from Antigua. From the last lookout we saw people walking closer to the crater. The guide explained that this trail was closed and recently opened by authorities and that it was a different excursion. It looked more demanding but definitively that was the excursion I would liked to do to see the lava pool. In summary, we had an enjoyable morning and one day a would like to come back to see Pacaya closer.

The weather was quite chilly and visibility was very low so we couldn't see anything. Nevertheless, the massive lava flows were pretty cool and digging down to feel to still hot lava after a 2014 eruption was awesome! Low points: no water provided even though the paperwork says it is included. The guide in the bus gave us 5 minutes of his time to start the ride, then spent the rest of the trip there and back sleeping and talking to the driver. That was incredibly lazy. The hiking guide pushed us super hard to use horses which were a separate charge--from the locals. He made it clear we had a short time frame. They took us to a hokey little shop up the mountain and after the guy showed a group of ten plus people a video on his 2 camera screen then pleas for some money for artisans were quickly made with no proper explanation of how that would be done, and then the guy literally said We need you to leave because we have a new group coming. Alrighty then! I personally appreciate the idea of helping the local community as tourists but when booking a tour its more enjoyable to not be pressured at different points to cough up more money. Clearly renting the horses from the locals is a big part of the deal between the tour company and the aforementioned. Maybe the tour company would be better served by charging us more and taking care of the local horse owner's, etc., as part of the service. And don't rush it so much. I feel like it was all about sending me to your cousin Lenny so he could get some money out of me, and that the Volcano was just the cover.