Advertisement
Published: September 30th 2008
Edit Blog Post
San Franscisco Church
Satained glass windows Hi folks, in the imortal words of Sir Ed, we knocked the bastard off. We reached 4607 metres as the altitude meter shows.
But firstly where have we been, from lapaz we went to Puno. While at Puno we managed to meet Robyn several times, she has a good group with her and while she had dinner with her parents she made sure that she did not loose contact with the group as they were going out partying. Robyn is good and having a ball, as are all the CRIPTS.
We have all suffered with a variety of ailments and likely all altitude related, the ´runs´have been common but short lived, Sheena has perhaps been the most affected after reaching the high pass, but all are well now albeit sporting the odd blister, bruise and sore joints.
We left Puno and set out onto the lake, once we reached the reed islands we had to change boats as ours failed. We spent some time there jumping up and down on the reed islands before leaving for Amantani island. At the island we had a little climb, 400 metres or so till we reached our accomodation and then spent
Brains
LLama brains anyone? the night, as you can see from the photos we all played dress up.
After leaving there we were getting used to the altitude and headed for Cusco and the Lares trek - it was bloody hard but rewarding. The first day we reached 4100 metres before camping, one of our party vomited all the way up. we were warned that it might reach minus 10 that night but I think it only reached -1 or 2. Then it was up early for the longest day where we finally achieved 4600 metres - there is not a lot of oxygen there but to reach the top was magnificent and left us all feeling breathless but very happy. The views are stunning with glaciers, lakes, mountains, condors and snow. We had all had to carry up stones which we then deposited at the top. After spending a bit of time we started down hill descending 1200 metres. It started to hail and the world turned white, great fun really as it was coming from behind us and did not hurt much. Pete tried tobogganing and stopped just on the edge of a large drop, not a recommended practice. After 5
Ruins
Tiahuanaco Ruins hours or so we reached the camp just before dark, 18 kms that day. Bloody hard but absolutely magnificent.
We then walked to Agua caleintes and spent the night, had showers and we smelt much better - first in 3 days
Then the main event Macchu piccu- we started early 430am, got to tjhe bus stop and nearly caused an international incident as our guide kept a space for 14 people which meant that all the others in the queue got bumped further. After being called a f´n pussie by a jumped up little american boy we still got on the first bus'up the hill. Macchu piccu is magnificent.
Any way I need to go so I will update it further in a few days after we have been to the Amazon. I hopethe photos do justice to at least some of what we have seen.
Ian (cripts number 3)
Advertisement
Tot: 0.126s; Tpl: 0.019s; cc: 7; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0834s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb