Haraz and Lima

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Haraz and Lima

We arrived tired in Haraz on our over night luxury bus from Trujoillo at 6am. We had met a couple of nice guys from Canada who recommended the hostel Carloline, so we all jumped in a taxi and headed there as just like many other places we arrived not having a clue where we were heading. Greated by a dutch man who had married a local girl called Carloine, the place seemed nice and we got invited to the neighbours party that evening which they had already been celebrating for two nights.

We arrived and went straight to bed, as the over night buses are never a good nights sleep and this combined with altitude sickness (as we were now at 3000 meters above sea level just in the town its self). Later we headed off to explore the town to find what a poor area it was, the condition of the roads were the worse we have ever seen with litter everywhere. The town smelt of urine and children were playing in the street. In fact we saw one toddler that looked like it have pooed it self and its parents had just turned his trousers around the other way!

There were stray dogs everywhere and it became more terrifying to go out at night with them fighting, howling and bonking each other. So not wanting to spend too much time in the town we tried to book up for a one day hike to Lake 69. There needed to be six people for the transport to run and unfortunalty there wasn’t enough so we waited a day in the hope that more would sign up the following day.

That evening we went next door to the party with an Australian couple and the Canadian lads. We were welcomed in by the locals to a barn style room where they had a band playing in the corner. They seemed to play the same tune all night long but everyone seemed to love it and were up dancing the minute the music started. There must have been maybe 100 people drinking and dancing and we immediately got a beer put in our hands whilst trying to string a sentence together in our broken Spanish with the merrily drunk locals.

We found out later that when joining a group for a chat, the person talking would drink from the glass and then pass the beer onto the next person would who wait for them to finish then pour another for them and pass the beer on to the next person inb the group. So not realizing this, upon leaving Matt still had a beer in his hand and some locals tried talking to him outside, he thought they were asking for the bottle back as we have had his before in shops (as the cost of the bottle is as much as the beer). So he necked it, handed it back and left. How rude he must have looked, now we know they were probably trying to welcome him into the group and share the drink and all he gave them was and empty bottle!

The next day instead of the hike we were told of a small walk we could do that would give us a good view of the town, however we seemed to be on a bit of a downwards run of luck and never made it. On the way up we were barked at by two dogs on the roof of a house which started another off and a large aggressive dog came charging out of the ally. We turned and ran for our lives! Jo had never been quite so scared or ran so fast. Matt was in front of her and turned to see the dog at her heals and went to kick it, which stopped it for a second allowing her to get out of the ally way. Jo was screaming at the top of her lungs for help as a local man just watched. The dog stopped chasing us and Matt realized he had lost he watch in the mayhem. He walked back a little and found it smashed on the floor - bloody dogs!

So we attempted to take another route up, but again the dogs started, this time on a local man who had four of them around him. From this we learnt that picking up rocks and looking like you were about to stone them worked at keeping them at bay. However by this time Jo´ legs and nervs had had enough and we were now looking for a pub for a stiff drink.

After trying to recover for the rest of the day we arranged to do the Lake 69 hike the following day with another couple. Still not enough for the arranged transport so we were given a small map and told to catch a taxi for the two and a half hour journey there.

6.00am the next morning we were up and on our way. We were told to negotiate a price with the taxi driver and ask him to wait or return for us six hours after dropping us off. We were told not pay him until we got back or he made not return to take us home and we would be stuck in the middle of nowhere. This turned out to be the easy part as Matts spanish was suprisingly improving to give directions and haggle with the driver. We got dropped off by the best driver we have had the whole time we have been traveling and were pointed in the general direction.

We were aware that we were going to find it hard because of the altitude with less oxygen in the air every breath is harder, but this was ridiculous. We had been told it was a moderate hike and were thinking we must be so unfit as the path we had taken just went up and it was taking its toll. After three hours of continuous climbing we reached a shelter which was on our map, the problem was that we were told when we got to the second lake which we hadn’t yet reached we would be half way. The hike up was only meant to be three hours up and two down and we hadnt even made it half way. We should have been more on the ball when we saw three men coming down the track with large back packs, walking sticks and Ice axes.

However determined it wasn’t going to beat us we battled on, it was so hard the other girl had turned back after two hours. The path had disappeared and we found ourselves climbing over boulders and following cairns(stacks of rock) as our guide. We hiked for another hour around the lake that we thought was the half way point. At the same time we decided we should be heading back we heard the distant rumbling of a rock fall. The sound ever increasing as it echoed in the valley we began to worry. We were so tired and the weather looked like it was turning. We finallt realized that we had gonew the wrong way after reaching a height of at least 4700 meters. You find energy from somewhere when the adrenalin kicks in due to the rock slide inffront of you. After a 3 hour exhausting decent we saw the sign that we had missed for Lake 69 on a nice flat path. We had accidently started the three day mountaineering trek to Mt Pisco!

We went to bed with splitting head aches and woke up the next day and Jo was hardly able to move. We decided this was going to be a rest day. We headed for the hot pools for some relief, but this wasn’t as good as we had hoped as the pools were pretty dirty and some how ended up in a dark cave for 15 minutes. The caves and water were all naturally heated by the Mt.

The following day the transport from the hostel was running to Lake 69 again so we decided to give it another go. Going with 13 others this time we let them lead and indeed they started heading in the wrong direction, just as we had done so we put them right now not feeling quite so stupid. The trek was worth doing and the scenery was breathtaking with a stunning turqiose lake at the end of it. The trek its self was easy compared to two days ago and we got up it in two hours. However on the return the heavens opened and we got soacked through. With a two an a half hour bus ride back Jo was freezing and decided to take her wet clothes off and rap herself in the emergency survival blanket we bought to keep warm on the way back.

That night was caught the over night bus to Lima after having a bit of a fuss with the hostel and the transport they put on to get us to the bus station we almost didnt make the bus.
The bus arrived in Lima earlier than we expected at about 5am and we then had to try a few hostels before we found somewhere to stay. After finally finding one with a room, which up until know had not been a problem we went straight to bed and didnt get up until 12miday. We spent the rest of the day until 10pm at HUGE indigenous markets buying small things such as tables!! Deciding we would move hostels the next day as it as dirty and expensive.

Lima was a pleasant surprise after hearing it had a population of 9 million and our experience of how grotty Huraz was. We stayed in the Miraflora area which was safe with lots of tourists around and had plenty of bars and restauransts around the main park.

On our second day in Lima we decided after hearing so many bad things about the 22 hour bus journey to Cusco or the 6+13 hour journey via Nasca, that we book a flight to Cusco. After sorting that out as Jo was adamant that we should be flying this portion of Peru, we spent the afternoon along the very modern water front complex of Larco Mar and into the Colonial-ish district of Baranco. After walking most oft he day we decided to treat ourselves to a nice meal on a restaurant overlooking the Ocean and relaxing in the cinema. For anyoine that is intrested, District 9 was a pile of $hi...... Not the best film we had ever seen but a story of Fecking Prawns.

We decided we had seen enough of the new areas in Lima so we headed for the Historic centre. The Lima Chinese quarter was famours so we headed there for a good feed in a buffet chinese resteraunt, after stuffing our faces we wandrerd round China town for a while with the busy hussle and bustle of every day life.
After walking of our egg fried rice and Chicken Chow Mein we had a fantastuc guided tour of San Franscisco Cathedral. Some pàrts of it were still in use by the San Fransiscan Monks, the place was amazing and well kept or restored with some items dating back to 1600s, the Libary had texts this old and were just scremaing Fire. The best part of the tour was seeing the 25´000 remains in the catacombs, the Bones were pilled high in some places and yet more that had not been uncoverd dating back to pre1800s before Lima had a grave yard.

We left and it was starting to get dark so after the warning we had received on central Lima after dark we decided to make a move for the colectivos and head for our nights entertaimntyment. On the way back to the Miraflores area we could see the lights and water of our next destination, a large, very fancy but S4 each (90p) water light display. We spent a few hours touring the different water fetures some with accompanying music, one in particular Matt got a little wet as you try and get in and our of the platform before the water turns back on. All very impressive and not what we were expecting here, more in Disney land or Alton Towers. Finally back to the nice central tourist area, had a bite to eat and retired for the night.

A planned day of visting the gold museum didnt work out as the money we had on us was spent in a lovely restaraunt that caught our eye! A nice relaxing day and seeing some more of Lima suburbs from the window of a colectivo, sometimes not knowing if we were on the right route or not.

For our final day in Lima we decided to breakfast early and head into the centre again to see a few more items we missed. After a very impressive visit to a church with a good guide and to see the chair the pope sat in on his last visit, we headed for the central square, took a few photos of the Peruvian goverment palace but sadly missed the changing of the guards. We decided to take a tour of the Lima cathedral as it was so large and got a great guide, we chatted in spanish and English about the cathedral, the remains of Franscisco Pizaro, the wood carving that took 25 years that is still in amazing condition 400 years on, and generally about Lima abd Peru now and then.

Our final evening meal in Miralfores, a cake stall later run by the women from the Church and an ealry night for our 3am airport taxi the next morning.

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