Originally published in Outpost Magazine

Central America's tumultuous history is reflected in its volcano-studded landscape. OUTPOST goes tramping from market to mountain top.

WHAM. The checker chip hits the board hard. My opponent, pleased, leans back and waits for my next move. The red and white surface taunts me as I slide my piece forward. Then he makes another move. Wham again.

I sit back and try to recover, mulling over what remains of my strategy. As I take a sip of my Orange Fanta, I see what I think is an opening and pounce. I jump one of his pieces and remove it from the 64-square playing field. My adversary, who is old enough to have taken part in all of Nicaragua's civil wars, returns with another fierce slam. In deep, syrupy Spanish he jokes with the spectators who have congregated in this dark, dingy store to watch the gringo play checkers. I look at the board and then at him, seeing in his tanned, wrinkled face that my forthcoming execution is unavoidable. He makes his final move and the game is over. "Muchas gracias," I say and take a last sheepish sip of my soda. Fortunately, I'm having better luck with the volcanoes.

Central America's landscape is dominated by a chain of volcanoes like cities on a map. Over millions of years the shifting and overlapping of two major tectonic plates - the Cocos and Caribbean - have lifted the earth's crust upward, forming a spine of hundreds of active and dormant volcanoes across Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica. Climbing them is a definitive experience for travellers in the region.

The cobble-stone streets of Antigua, Guatemala, meet my footfalls as we saunter down the roads of this well-preserved colonial town, dodging the occasional rickshaw as it zips past. Nestled amidst three volcanoes, it's many tourists' first stop in the country, and where I meet up with a group of 11 strangers on Toronto-based Gap Adventures' 17-day Volcano Trail excursion from Guatemala to Costa Rica.

A six-hour van ride takes us across the border to the Honduran town of Copan Ruinas. Outside of Tikal, Guatemala, it's the next best place to explore ancient Mayan ruins. Once a thriving Mayan city, which at the height of power contained nearly 20,000 people, it was abandoned by 1200AD. Tourists, crickets and stonecarved hieroglyphics of kings and warriors are the only regulars now. Evoking an intense impression of elapsed time, sprawling tree roots poke out of rock, seemingly creating a symbiotic relationship with one another. The semi-modern town outside the ruins is a mixture of stone streets, white adobe buildings and red-tiled roofs, with internet cafes on every corner, souvenir shops and restaurants hawking the best western food around.

On the map it's only a couple of thumb-lengths across, but it's 10 hours of bumpy roads to the city of La Cieba, departure point for the ferry to the Bay Islands. The ferry, however, is cancelled either because the captain was dead or the seas were too rough, we weren't sure. On his fourth voyage to the Americas, Columbus landed on the island of Guanaja, one of the three Bay Islands. Encountering a large population of natives, whom he believed to be cannibals, the Spaniard enslaved the local inhabitants and sent them to work in the plantations of Cuba and in the gold and silver mines of Mexico, until the islands were completely de-populated.

I hop into a taxi with Brian, a fellow traveller, to check out the Museum of Butterflies and Other Insects. Run by American Robert Lehman, it houses over 5,000 incredible butterfly and moth specimens pinned to the walls in all their stunning beauty. Wandering between the display cases, beer-banana traps and hands-on microscopes, we study more than 1,000 other insects such as beetles, wasps and cockroaches.

It turned out the captain wasn't dead, so we were again on our way, riding the two-hour ferry to the Bay Islands with dolphins jumping in our choppy wake. The Islands are a tourist haven, where cruise ships set anchor and water taxis scoot passengers from dock to dock and beach to beach. Over the course of three rain-soaked days we eat, drink and make merry in the plethora of local bars. In the brief respite between rains, we snorkel the coral reefs that rest within wading distance of shore. Bright blue, yellow and silver fish swim within touching distance as we dive among them.

On the return ferry I meet an Indiana developer who tells me that he is "currently building 90 condos on the islands at a steal of $200,000 US each." A sure sign of things to come.

With my crushing defeat at checkers behind me, I lay awake in my cabana all night waiting for my alarm to go off at 4:00 a.m., mosquitoes deftly dodging my every swat. When it's time to rise, I stuff my pack with a camera, sweater, and rain gear; only crickets break the silence on my walk to meet the others. Only five of our group are awake at this early hour. Our guide Pablo had warned us, "This is not a good time to go, lots of wind and rain." The others took him at his word and have elected to stay lost in the comfort of their dreams.

Ometepe, in the middle of Lake Nicaragua, is a sparsely populated island of 35,000 souls formed by two volcanoes. The still active Volcan Concepcion, which last erupted in 1982, rises 1,610 metres above the lake in an almost perfect cone. Volcan Madera, the smaller of the two and the one most often climbed, punches through the clouds at 1,394 metres. Lava once flowed so intensely from these two beasts that it created an isthmus between them, essentially joining the two volcanoes and creating a single island. The fertile soil that resulted from the eruptions is excellent for growing bananas, beans and maize. Coastal settlements scattered along its shoreline wake for the 5 a.m. fishing call as monkeys swing through the treetops. Lake Nicaragua itself is the second largest lake in Latin America, only slightly smaller than Peru's Lake Titicaca. The Nicaraguans call it "the Sweet Sea." In fact, it has everything it needs to be a sea, including the only fresh-water sharks in the world.

Pablo pulls up in the VW van that will take us to the base of Concepcion's trail. His Reebok t-shirt, designer jeans and Nike baseball cap don't quite fit my idea of proper attire for the rugged 10-hour climb ahead. "Buenos dias," he says cheerily, as we begin the bumpy ride along dirt roads as the sun's rays break through the dense forest. Heads bob to the Beatles on the airwaves of 103.9FM, and our group heaves a collective sigh of relief when our driver swerves, narrowly missing an oncoming local bus. Second and third-hand Bluebird school buses brought down from the U.S. serve as local transport for anyone wishing to take the plunge. Known as "chicken buses," probably for the livestock which often share space with paying passengers, they cruise the roads each with their own wild personality. There are only two constants: the strawberry-scented Christmas tree airfreshener dangling from the rear view mirror and Jesus stickers on the windshield.

Cows and chickens cross the road at random intervals and as we drive higher and higher, we avoid bigger and bigger potholes until the road itself becomes too narrow to pass. It's here, with both Madera and Concepcion in view, we begin our hike, following Pablo and his ever-ready machete as he slashes overgrowth from the trail. Looking up, clouds cling to the peak as if to hide a rumbling spirit - they must have looked like angry gods to the inhabitants who originally lived beside them.

As we continue up the trail, lowland forests give way to banana plantations, which give way to tall grass. Lizards, hearing us clunking along, cross our path and scurry into the underbrush. Pablo, who climbs the volcano four times a week, suggests we take a break and drink some water, as "it will get very steep soon. Only two more hours to the top," he says with a smile. Pausing to catch my breath, my legs are aching from the already steady climb. We pick up our packs and carry forward one step at a time. The muddy trail zigzags and mist engulfs us as we enter the damp cloud forest. The cool breeze, glimmering lakes and rich jungle that intermittently reveal themselves through the clouds camouflage the tumultuous history of Central America. I catch Pablo by surprise when I ask what he thinks of Nicaragua today. "All the people here want peace," he says, "it's the governments that cause problems. Like this volcano, the country can explode anytime."

We hike out of the cloud forest, soaking wet from the dense moisture in the air. Large ferns with sharp-edged leaves hug either side of the path as our guide hacks them out of the way. The temperature drops as the wind picks up sharply. We stop only long enough to throw on a sweater and our rain gear. Nearing the peak, the ferns disappear and make way for gravel that seeps into your shoes with every step. Rising sulfur smoke carries the strong smell of rotten eggs as we crawl on our hands and knees and peer over the edge feeling like the wind could blow us over on a whim. The clouds surrounding us congeal with the volcano's smoke creating a blanket of whiteness obscuring any view beyond 10 feet. Lying there, the earth is warm to the touch as if the boiling point is just below the surface. I can feel the country rumbling.

Lush forests, deep ravines and mountainous hills rise and fall, emulating the civil roller coaster that frequently disillusions the people of these countries. Whatever changes may lie ahead, I'm sure that Pablo will continue to climb his quaking volcano.