Advertisement
Published: March 3rd 2006
Edit Blog Post
Some Lakes with long, unmemorable names
The start of our five day trek, our campsite is just in front of the lake. Determined to escape the desert, we travelled into the Canete valley and to the town of Lunuhana. The taxi dropped us off in Imperial, a district of Cañete, amid a swarm of market traders. Seconds later, a colectivo materialised. Colectivos are a cheap way of getting around: they consist of a man, a van and a lad who hangs out of the side door screaming the destinations at passers by. Lunahuana´was our destination, 30km up the valley, and I don't think it was possible to cover those 30km any faster. Tyres squealing, taking the racing line the whole way, the canyon walls flashing by alarmingly close at times, we clung on and exchanged nervous glances. At one point we saw dazed, bleeding passengers standing on the road, their collectivo having left the road in spectacular fashion, ending up in a ditch.
Lunahuana' was a tiny village. It's home to some fantastic rafting, and a little further along the valley is Huancaya, "..one of the most beautiful valleys in Peru." - we couldn´t tell you though as we didn't have time to find out. We found a hostal, then a restaurant for some dinner. Mel had been feeling pretty ill all
Lima
The roar of traffic day but managed some food. I went for a set menu - soup and a main meal for 5 Soles (80p) and kind of wished I hadn't when a chicken's foot floated to the surface of the soup. Tasty stuff! Shortly afterwards Mel came down with a magnificent bout of food poisoning, and once able to be parted form the toilet we decided to go to a big city to recover.
Lima it was then. A city that looks lovely if you have the money to live in the right places, and not so great if you don't. We stayed in Miraflores, an area close to the sea and, yet again, it could have been anywhere in the world. It had a stripy lighthouse though, so we like to think it was like Plymouth. We went into the centre, had similar thoughts and decided on an overnight bus to the mountains.
Huaraz could not be anywhere in the world. The women dress in the big colourful skirts and big hats you see in the guide books, not just for the benefit of tourists. It is surrounded by the Cordillera Blanca, and has three other mountain ranges very close
by. "Touching the Void" and "Alive" (the one about the plane crash surviviors resorting to canibalism) happened in this area. Although it was destroyed in 1970 by an earthquake it seems to have recovered well, with only the cathedral still being rebuilt. It is now a major mining town and tourist destination.
Eager to get to the mountains, but aware that we were knackered just walking up the street (the altitude really doesn't help), we booked ourself onto a Chavin de Huantaur tour. This included a long, but stunning, bus ride over a 4200m pass and walking round some old, important stuff. There's quite a lot of this kind of thing in Peru.
Our tour guide started talking slightly after leaving town, and three hours later was still going. It was all in Spanish, but even we could tell that he was repeating himself. When we got to the ruins we tried our best to interepret for a while, and then decided we could do a better job ourselves.
A summary of Chavin according to Jim and Mel: Chavin was built in 2800BC, well before the Incas and was used to sacrifice stuff and worship the gods.
On the way to Chavin
This is a lake we stopped at on the way up to the pass. We got off the bus to have llamas and lambs thrown at us, and then we got to pay for taking photos, so enjoy. People came from far away and filled the building with beer. Very ugly peple lived there, until a wizard turned them to stone and stuck them on the wall. A few years after the first building they decided it lacked fun and built a swimming pool and a soup altar to worship the God of Soup. If people were naughty they were put in a cave and eaten by vampire bats (this bit is true). Something better came along and everyone went off to worship that instead. The End.
We were feeling a little more ready for the mountains, and after a quick acclimatisation hike we were off to Laguna 69 and the Santa Cruz trek. There was a big group on the first day, and then it was just Epi; our guide, Paulfiño; our donkey driver, Sonia from Germany, Erik from Holland , us, and four donkeys. We had this silly idea that we would be walking along with the donkeys all day, but we actually hardly saw them as they were alot faster than us during the day and then went off to eat at night. Apart from when one of them decided they liked Jim and
Huraz
This is the view from the top floor of our hostal, Churrup. It´s a fantastic place with leather sofas and a log fire,if your passing through. tried to come in the tent! Such a way with the asses.
It was a trek of pure luxury and lots of cloud. At the highest point of the trek (4750m, not there yet Luke) we looked out on the imaginary 6000m+ mountains surrounding us, and how beautiful they were. Imaginations had to be used again when we went to the mirador for Alpamayo, voted the most beautiful mountain in the world in 1960.
We weren't allowed to lift a finger to help; we were given our lunch on plates with proper cutlery, then steak, wine and seats for dinner. A very nice change from the noodles, crackers and wishful thinking that normally accompanies us on treks. We were even given bowls of hot water in the morning, which one cow enjoyed almost as much as us, as he munched through our soap.
The scenery along the valley was stunning, with steep sided cliffs on either side and a surprising selection of flora and fauna. To be in a glacial valley, walking among cacti and prickly pears isn't a normal experience, and humming birds are now as passe´ as a condor to us.
Five days later
Just after the pass
A traditional house that people live in and farm from. and we were glad to be heading back to civilisation, only it had disappeared and had been replaced by an entire city having a waterfight. Huaraz has been having a carnival for about a week and Tuesday was the waterfight day. Groups of 50+ wandered round looking for people to soak. Gringos obviously made for an excellent target, and we were soon very, very wet. We found it was quite safe to stand by a policeman, as they were all bone dry. They discovered it wasn't safe to stand by us and ran away. We got wet again. Even standing in shops wasn't safe, we reflected, as we left the Kodak shop, dripping and once again humiliated.
Yesterday was the culmination of the carnival. Masked groups of people had pretend funerals. Accompanied by marching bands, they swept through the streets to the river, weeping and dancing in a parade, then a eulogy was read and the coffin dropped into the river. Whoever had the best funeral was the winner. See, now it's been explained it all makes sense doesn't it? We hereby name the festival "Death by Drowning".
And today the town is completely normal again. We guess
Time for the Geography lesson
We couldn´t get over how high up the mountainsides they were cultivating land. We did hear rumors that this was a major coco growing area though, quite high to go checking. it's time for another night bus.
Goodnight all,
Lots of love,
Mel and Jim
Advertisement
Tot: 0.1s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 14; qc: 67; dbt: 0.0637s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
Dad K
non-member comment
Literary criticism
Stand aside Bill Bryson! And hostel's got an e. It's about time those birds learnt the words, though. Is the song "Breathless"? Looking forward to the next unputdownable instalment! Hasta la vista!