Volcán Barú night hike

So, last night I did a spur-of-the-moment hike of Volcán Barú, Panama's highest mountain. (But you already knew that, because of course you followed the link, you big nerd you). On a clear day you can see both the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean (again, you already knew this). Unfortunately, it wasn't a clear day for us, although we did see the Pacific Ocean. I'm going to spice things up a bit, and this trip report will be done in bullet form!

• 6 pm (wed): two guys from my hostel, Nir and Omer, invite me to join their hike up Volcán Barú. Which stars in 5 hrs. I quickly grab dinner, shop for supplies, and do a quick internet stop. You know, the essentials.
• 8 pm (wed): bedtime - got to get up in 3 hours!
• 11 pm (wed): wake up for the hike, but it's a flase start - it's cloudy and rainy so we're going to wait and see how things are in an hour or so. Back to sleep!
• 12:40 am (thurs): it's a go! Quick run to get some caffeine and emergency snickers rations, then off we go
• 1:23 am police escort to the volcano - there are no cabs at this hour, so some cops give us a ride to the start of the trail for a couple bucks. I thought they were going to make us ride in the cell part.
• 2:08 am: we make it to the ranger station (the official start of the hike, but the road's so bad cabs / cops dropp you off further back) - 1.5 km down, 13.5 km to go
• 3:10-3:30 am: tea break. That's right, even while scaling a mountain we can still sit down and have a cup o' tea
• 4:15 am: and then there were two - Omer decides to head back. Nir and I continue on
• 5:39: I can finally stop holding my flashlight - it's light enough to see where I'm walking without it. This is great, although I do miss the starscape - it was probably the most stars I'd ever seen - great view of the Milky Way. Even saw a shooting star!
• 5:59 am: 2.5 km to go! I am exhausted, and the last part is probably the steepest. Still, the end is in sight!
• 6:49 am: we reach the top of the trail only to discover that the real summit is another 20 minutes away
• 7:07 am: I hit the real summit - I'm the king of the world!8:19 am - after enjoying some breakfast, meeting a soldier who offers us tea and takes two of our sandwiches (tea seems to be a common theme for this trip), and meeting two new hikers who will join us on the way down, we head back down whence we came
• 12:33 pm. 11 hours after we first starteed hiking we are all done! I beat a hasty retreat to our hostel, where a hot shower and a soft bed await
  

bullet points are great and all, but still, they don't replace pictures (below)

1.5 km into the hike - 13.5 more to go to get to the top! Note that it is indeed quite dark - I wasn't exaggerating when I said "night hike!"

a little thing like being on a mountain at 3 AM won't keep us from having our tea

I made it to the top! By "King of the Hill" rules I think at that point I was the ruler of all of Panama (since this is its tallest peak). I'm glad noone tried to tackle me off though - that wouldn't have been so fun.

we couldn't see that much below us due to the clouds, but we did get some good views of the clouds themselves

neat view of a nearby mountain

cool flowers growing along the trail

all done! Definitely ready for a shower and a nap. Those really sharp ovservers might notice that this is the same sign I was by when I said I was 1.5 km into my hike. One of the people who was hiking with us was picked up by someone with all wheel drive and gave us a ride, so we didn't have to walk the last 1.5 km. My feet were very happy about that development