Arenal, you´re just a--nother...

Dark, winding mountain roads at night, in the fog, in a volcanic countryside. High speeds. Red reflectors lining the road, lit up by the headlights, beckoning like a runway airstrip-- the illusion of flying melding with its metaphor. An accident on the other lane, and the driver wipes the inside of the windshield with a rag; as if he too just realized the potential consequence of manic latin american motoring. Turn onto a gravel road, the sole interior light flickering from a shorted circuit, in tune with the road. Each jarring pothole giving you a flickering chance to see this night´s companions: three germans, three americans. No names. And it strikes you as odd, for just a moment, that all this seems normal.

The driver pulls onto a bridge and stops, cuts the lights. To your left-- lava, spilling down a distant slope, like hot ashes dancing on the highway from a dropped cigarette.