There's this awe-inspiring beauty that you find when you witness
the raw energy and capability of Mother Nature.
From photographing these kinds of subjects,
there's just the excitement that you get and the adrenaline rush that you get.
There's an addiction to it and you never want to stop chasing it.
Welcome, to Fuego.
Diego! Give me a hug.
How are you?
Good man, how you doing? Thanks for coming to get us man.
You ready to get packed up and go see a volcano?
So, we got in late last night, now Diego's picked us up and we're gonna head on out to Antigua
which is kind of at the base of the Agua Volcano.
It's kind of the gateway to the Fuego Volcano in my mind.
And then we'll start our trek up the mountain
to Acatenango where we're going to have base camp
just below the summit of Acatenango tonight.
My name is Mike Mezeul II and I'm a photographer.
On this trip I'll be heading from Dallas Texas
down to Guatemala to document one of the world's most active volcanoes
the Fuego Volcano.
I guess you could say that I'm more of an extreme nature photographer than anything else
because I find myself in precarious positions photographing volcanoes, tornadoes,
extreme weather anywhere across the world
and I'm absolutely obsessed with it.
So we just got to the start of our trail.
We've got some awesome porters, Luis and his father that are going to help us because, let's
be honest, at elevation, they are way more in shape and way stronger than we are.
We're probably pushing close to 12,200-ish maybe.
All right, vamos.
Hard to breathe right now.
You know, you're at elevation, you're close to 13,000 feet,
you feel like you're sucking wind through a straw,
you're tired, you're hungry
but you can hear the explosions of Fuego and you want to get around that final corner
where you can see Fuego right there in front of you erupting.
Wait for the eruption, because, uh, that's the show.
It's starting to steam at the top.
Oh, see the lava, see a little bit of the red on that one.
So we just wrapped up day one.
It was a long day, we got greeted though with some amazing explosions.
But then we kind of got skunked by the weather, that dictates everything out here.
So we're gonna get some sleep
and be ready for an early morning, tomorrow morning to hike over to Fuego.
Dude I am tired, I am hungry, I'm cold, but I'm happy,
because we are literally staring right at Volcan De Fuego,
one of the most active volcanoes in the world.
All right, hey when you get to this spot here man, lean on the wall.
My passion for photography and to photograph, you know, starting off with the sky
and then eventually volcanoes and so on,
started back when I was a kid.
I was that kid at elementary school who would never socialize with other kids
because I was too busy laying on the picnic table watching
the clouds go by.
All right guys, good morning, day two, it's been a long and exhausting morning
hiking from base camp down the valley to Fuego
and now we're hoping for an eruption.
I fell in love with the sky at an early age
and that only developed into, you know, falling in love with storms.
And then when storms took over my life I became more and more passionate
about, okay, what other powerful events does this world have?
And that, you know, led to volcanoes.
The Fuego Volcano is one of the world's most active volcanoes.
It actually erupts, on average about 20 to 40 minutes apart.
It is terrifyingly beautiful because it can be quite deadly but at the same time
it's got just this look to it that
it's just astounding
and it's beautiful and you can't take your eyes off of it.
Fuego means fire in English
and also it's
called Chi'gag on the native language from Guatemala
and it means where the fire is.
Diego is an incredibly talented photographer from Guatemala
who specializes in photographing the Fuego Volcano.
We have this friendship, that, it's that kind of connection
where people have the same feeling that you have.
Not only has Diego become a wonderful friend but he's actually imperative to
me being able to photograph and have access to the Fuego Volcano.
So every time that he shows up here in Guatemala, it's like it's kind of exciting because
he feels the same thing that I feel when I see an explosion.
It's very easy to have this friendship.
We woke up this morning, 3:30 in the morning
with every intention of going to Fuego to get the shot that I've been trying to get
but currently Fuego's fogged in so we'll have to sit and be patient.
Maybe it's better to camp in the valley, because if we camp in the valley then
that makes that hike so much easier
to just go up for sunrise and down and then back up for sunset and down.
And we can just really focus in on, hey let's get as much as we can get from up there.
So we're packing up from base camp today, going to go to Antigua, freshen up
and then we'll return in a day and we'll camp down this time
in that valley that's between Acatenango and Fuego
and that's going to give us a lot better access to the summit of Fuego.
So we just got off of Acatenango and now we're
going to go meet up with Luis, who was one of our porters
and they've invited us over to have a traditional
Guatemalan meal for some lunch.
It would be really, really nice to kind of bring in another angle to the life of Fuego,
essentially, and that's the people that work on it
and document the hard work that they do.
I cannot believe how heavy that is.
And how, you know, Luis's dad is what, you know, 70 something?
And how, you know, the bond that they have together, how they work together as a family
in order to have a livelihood.
I want to show that aspect of Fuego too, like
you know without their help, you know, none of this is possible really.
So they've been kind enough to allow us to come over and
share a meal with them and hear some of their stories.
So we just got to the trailhead for Acatenango we're going to head on up
this time we're gonna go down to the valley between Acatenango and the Fuego Volcano
for a little bit better access.
We've picked up one of Diego's friends, Lucia and if the opportunity presents itself
she's going to pose with Fuego in some native cultural Guatemalan attire.
To do this job well and to create a story that actually has power and substance to it,
it takes a lot of work, it's not easy.
There is no easy way around it, there are too many early mornings, late nights,
long hikes, you know, freezing in the wind and the rain,
all of that for shots that you'll never get.
Really close to 50 mile an hour winds trying to blow us off the ledge right now,
but we're going to stay a little further back.
I don't like to run right up to the volcano
without knowing, kind of, what its behavior is doing.
You know, when you go out, it's easy to
get so focused in on creating an image or telling a story
but I think the most important part of all of this is keeping a healthy respect
for what it is that you're looking at.
It is imperative to, you know, keep your head
on a swivel and to be aware of your surroundings there.
Yeah? Just be very careful please to... Yeah.
So we are as close as we could physically get to the Fuego summit
and she's erupting right there.
The crater is about 500 meters from us here .
Super windy and now we got beautiful light coming in from the side,
we just need a big explosion.
Come on, come on, now's the time.
It's like a 20-minute window.
Dude, come on, this is gotta, freaking freezing man.
It's a mix of emotions for sure because you're on an active volcano and you're staring at it,
it's right there next to you.
It's this battle of, how long do I wait here and, you know, risk everything? Versus,
how close can I get, to get the more powerful impactful shot?
Yeah as long as it's doing that, it's just releasing its pressure.
Tonight was our first night back on the summit of Fuego.
So close, but you know, another, another fail and, uh, kind of heartbreaking in a way
but I mean we had beautiful sky,
I mean just gorgeous sunset. It was everything I wanted and envisioned and
just Fuego didn't erupt. It didn't have that big eruption and uh, it was exhausting.
But I'm just gonna have a delicious pad thai meal for dinner tonight and regroup,
get in the right mindset to go and
hike back up there tomorrow morning for sunrise and
see uh, see if Fuego cooperates.
All right.
Headed back up.
You know I believe a good image or a powerful image is not just one
that has compositional elements or a moment in the frame
it's also a reflection of all the hard work and the dedication
and the passion that that photographer has
for what he or she is capturing.
Yeah good man, just uh, back to the summit of Fuego,
on the bottom of the ridge this time.
You know, when you go out and photograph these events
you have to accept that you're going to fail,
over and over and over again and know that the end result is going to be worth
all of those failures.
You know, if you don't fail,
you don't appreciate
that moment when it actually happens in front of you.
Oh that was sweet.
Yes!
Ultimately with my work, I want people to see the beauty of this world.
You know, it's so easy to be distracted by
electronics, the television, our phone, our computer.
There's so much out there that if you just put all that down and take the time to embrace it,
you'll realize how beautiful this world is.
And, through my images I want to inspire people to get out there
to take a minute to embrace this world that we all share.
And for me, that drives me even harder to go out there to capture these images.
So we came down here to Guatemala to document the Fuego Volcano and it was an adventure.
Did we get the shot that I ultimately envisioned?
Probably not, but that's the nature of the beast.
You know, you have to go up there with expectations of reality
but be patient, be perseverant and eventually it will come.
That's what leaves me wanting more.