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Published: September 20th 2007
Up at 5am on Sunday(?!) for breakfast and then got an a bus with our tour guide for the Santa Cruz Trek. First local bus was packed, people just jumping on and off here and there. At one point there was 19 people! Bus (more like a mini transit) was tiny. Couldn´t see any animals onboard though, but then heard a bleeting noise very close by, turned round and a lady opened the top of her bag and out popped a lamb´s head! Bout time!
Got another bus for three hours to the start of the trek, drove through some amazing scenery and started getting very high! Had some coca leaves with a newly found catalyst (courtesy of Clive, dude in the hostel) to combat the headaches. Then arrived in a little quecha village in the middle of nowhere to meet our donkeys and Juan.
Took a lovely walk though the surrounding villages and were followed by various animals along the way. Lots of black fly though! Lovely and sunny in the day but then got really cold as the sun went down. Arrived at our first camp site just before dusk, loads more fly's and it was sooo
cold, (thermals on) but the view made up for it. Wasn't too hard walking up but was a little breathless. Lovely dinner cooked by our guide and then straight to bed at about 8pm as it was now below zero!
Felt shocking the next day due to altitude and lack of sleep (due to altitude), so was the last to leave camp. Started the 7 hour walk up! Had so little energy and was a huge effort once the climbing actually started! After 3 hrs breathing like I was going for a fast jog and only taking a step about every second (probably slower) got to the top of the mountain, where the others where waiting. Absolutely battered physically and mentally, just collapsed in a heap.
Jubilation was short lived as behind where they were sitting was the actual pass, towering behind them at 4750 metres! "Someone take me back down!" crossed my mind a few hundred times. Hauled myself up and walked to the bottom of the pass only to look at it for about half an hour thinking there is no way I'm ever making it up there!
Fortunatley got some motivation from some American
In the bus
Trying not to freeze, so cold up here!guy who had just come over the other way, so raced up the pass. Once at the top felt ok, but soon went downhill rapidly!
Another 3 hrs walking down the other side, collapsed outside my tent and went to sleep. Apparently wasn't looking to well by this point! No photo's of this day due to inability to find enough energy to get my camera out! But will add some the others took soon! The view was unbelievable! Best pics still to come!!
After a sleep, day 3 I was feeling fine again, despite being at 4200 metres still! An easy walk down with more fab views. Decided not to go to see another lake, so had a sleep for 2 hrs somewhere in the mountains. Even though I put factor 40 suncream on, burnt my face and now have a blister on my lips, live and learn!
Day 4 - Unfortunately the guy from the Spanish couple 'German' (pronounced erman not german!) came down with a really bad fever so we had to lead him out of the mountains on a donkey. Very rocky on the way back due to previous land slides, very rough! But
finally got back to civilisation in one piece, smelly pretty awful.
Got back and had a shower followed by pizza and beer, nice to be back to a sensible altitude of 3000 metres! deffinately acclimatised!
Got a bus to Trujillo overnight the same day and off to tarapoto tonight (16hrs- gonna have a rest!) which is in the jungle!
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Paul
non-member comment
All right Thomas, Hope all is well and your face hasnt peeled off yet!!I am very jealous Peru looks awesome,liking then pic of you looking like a terrorist, very suave!haha