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Published: June 23rd 2009
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Gday Gday,
Here we are in Huancayo - the capital of the Junín Region, in the central highlands of Peru, located in Huancayo Province, of which it is also capital. Situated near the Mantaro Valley at an altitude of 3,271 meters, it has a population of 323,054. Huancayo is the cultural and commercial center of the whole central Peruvian Andes area.
After a few days in Miraflores, Lima, we are beginning to head in the general direction of Cusco. There are two main routes we could take, down the coast to Pisco and then across, or head straight inland through the mountains, which is what we´ve chosen.
It wasn´t apparent to us just how mountainous the area was in Miraflores, after all the smog limited how far we could see... We booked a coach and headed out of Lima on a lovely 6 hour trip of continuous climbing hair-pin turns through the hills. So heading out, the smog started to dissipate, we passed the outer slum area with random ´polished´businesses throughout - like a seemingly brand new massive John Deere showroom (for you Will... loves it). The hills here are crazy, they are so incredibly steep and the
landscape is continuously changing. All was great until about the 5 hour mark when we came to the highest pass before heading downwards to Huancayo, this pass was around 5200m and I experienced a huge pressure building in my head within about 10-15 mins, obviously not used to such altitudes I quickly shovelled a couple of asprin down to try and thin the blood - Jess was fine, as she was obviously experiencing a lower altitude... 😉
The bus was inevitibly delayed after the high pass so we arrived late and nearly missed our taxi pick-up that we´d arranged to take us to the hostel, this was around 8.30pm or so. We scored a 140 year old driver that cranked along at 10kph in 3rd gear, then stalled when he got to the ´lights´, it was quite humerous, but we got the the hostel in the end after the best part of a days travelling.
We stayed in Huancayo for most of the week and got to know a few travellers at the hostel - Nico, an Italian travelling guru who provided a wealth of handy hints etc. for us; Stephanie, from Germany who was good fun to
practice Spanish with; and Charlie, a student from the U.S. who was on a mission to learn Spanish in Peru. We met the pet parrot, Kintarro, at breakky (pics) - this bird was full of character and would have a go at your leg in an attempt to get your bread, he also screams ´hola!!´ which was impressive, there was also the pet dog, Kiko ´Loco´, who was a bit of fun also.
We threw ourselves into the mayhem of the local market packed full of fruit, veg, and meat - it was pretty crazy to see the volumes of food they turned-over on a daily basis, we´re talking walls of pumkins, all kinds of fruit, herbs, spices, spuds, and the meat section included hundreds of chickens hanging, pig bits and also cuy, aka guinea pig, cut in half innards on display for all to see. There were old ladies on the ground sorting through buckets of chickens, seperating the guts with bare hands amongst the grot, mmm mmmmmmm... You´d be slowly making your way down an isle, then a small nugget of a man carrying close to 60kg of spuds would crank past towards one of many trucks
being loaded, these guys are seriously strong for their size.
We took a walk up the hill from the hostel to visit a site called Torres Torres, which is like a section of valley with impressive dirt mounds formed over the years, a few kids and several random dogs followed us and acted as our guides (pics). Oh yeah, and the dog population in Huancayo is mental, there are stray dogs absolutely everywhere, you need to be careful of the cranky ones that like to have a go when you get too close to their patch... We enrolled in 3 days of intensive Spanish lessons with the hostel crew in order to get us by and to be able to progressively learn from the basic conversations we have with locals. Our Spanish guru was Erika, an excellent teacher that was a huge fan of Iron Maiden and loved a beer or five. Towards the end of our stay here we took a ride to Hual Huas, about 25 mins out by ´collectivo´, to check out a few artisanal places - walking down a back road we came across a house with the yard converted into a showroom to display
the items they make (pics), it was pretty awesome to learn how they processed the wool and coloured it by using the dye from flowers etc. - we scored a few 100% alpaca items and headed back - along with a small portion of stewed lamb they kindly insisted we take for energy. The collectivos here are minibuses that belt around the city on certain routes with a ´collector´hanging out the door shouting the destination, these are constantly crammed with passengers that hail it down from anywhere on the roadside, organised chaos but it seems to work quite well and it's a very cheap alternative to taxis - there are plenty more stories of crammed bus trips to come - can you imagine 22 people in a van, not a minibus - a van, travelling along dirt road cliffs...?
On the last day in Huancayo we headed to the bar at the hostel with Erika to celebrate the completion of the three days (pics), we sunk quite a few cervezas before heading over the road to an awesome resaurant where I smashed a plate of cuy (guinea pig), pollo (chicken) and trucha (trout) - Nik, they are mental over
trout here too, the fishing is apparently fantastic around the local streams and they have a farm close by which is pretty sweet, although they seem to be a broader fish, not as long...? A traditional band piped up after dinner and there was much drinking and dancing to be had, we failed to get photos but they we´re kitted out in traditional uniforms doing thier dances and the band was going off, whilst we enjoyed a few litre jugs of calientito - a warm drink consisting of rum, pisco, lime, honey and water.
The following morning we bid Charlie and the hostel crew farewell, Nico and Stephanie came with us in a taxi to Huancavelica, about 3 hrs away...
Hasta luego,
Sam & Jess
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