I'm not going to lie, my friends and I wanted to look for adventure, but we were seriously under-prepared for what we were about to endure. The sound of climbing a volcano appealed to all of us, so we set out for Angahuan, a small town of 8000 people, only about 500 of which spoke Spanish.

When we arrived we were told we would need a guide and horses, but we could not afford this so we paid for a guide and one horse between the five of us and set out through dense pine forest after leaving the sleepy Indian village behind.

Upon emerging from the forest we saw it, the immense monolith pushing up through the solidifed lava flows, the spire of a church, the only remnants of a village that was wiped out by the last eruption in the 1940's.

It was then that the heavens opened, we donned our ponchos and proceeded amongst giant blue agave plants (from which tequila is made), and on to the ash field. Trainers and shorts are a bad idea for this type of walking, and being more accustomed to hiking I was not seeing much time on the horse. The going was tough, like walking on fine, powdery sand, uphill.

We trudged on, the peak of the volcano now obscured by clouds so that it was impossible to discern steam from cloud.

Soaked through and tired, we finally reached the base of the cone, and the final push was certainly going to be hard, a steep climb on soft, unpredictable ground. I had done this type of thing before, but never on a volcano. The others were novices at this type of climb, and incorrect clothing coupled with rain made our task harder. We felt about as hopeless as a man trying to open a can of beans with a spoon.

We pushed for the top amidst steaming fumeroles and igneous rock until finally we reached the top, shrouded in cloud, and peered over the edge into the mirky darkness, the belly of the earth. The firey chasm of this fuming volcano. Never has the sense of achievement been so great. We were each Edmund Hillary in our own right, and this was out Everest. We sang, and our spirited voices carried down the mountain to our guide who had stayed at the bottom with our horses, which could not make the steep final push.

Getting down was the best bit. Straight down, a streak of ash field that seemed almost vertical. It was like skiing without the skis, I have never descended anthing so fast in my life, I just put one foot in front of the other and hoped I would not fall.

At the bottom, all with ruined shoes and undampened, high spirits, we set off back to Uruapan and our hotel. Five poorly prepared Brits with one more tick on the life experience list.

By Paul Stafford