Huaraz and Santa Cruz Trek

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We arrived in Huaraz late last wednesday evening after a 24 hour jouney from Mancora. The journy should have been a lot shorter but unfortunately travel in SOuth America is not always as it should be!
The first day we managed to find a hostel in the rain and get some dinner before heading for an early sleep.
On Thursday we decided that we needed to organise what to do here and we wanted to visit the Cordillera Blanca. This mountain range has the most amount of peaks over 6000 meters in all of the Andes. After a visit to a few different agencies we decided to book the Santa Cruz trek. This trek last for 4 days and goes directly through the range. That evening we stocked up on tasty pizza, packed our bags and tent, had a couple of beers and then we were ready for our trek.
At 6am Friday morning we were picked up by our guide, Lukas and met our fellow trekker, Chris from New York. The journey to the national park took 4 hours. On arrival at the park we waited briefly for our Donkeys which carry most of the equipment and off we went.Friday was the easiest and shortest day of trekking with only around 5 hours to our first camp. Unfortunately around 2 hours inot the trek the heavens opened up and everything including our tent got absolutely soaked and our first night was spent sleeping in wet sleeping bags in a wet tent with the rain beating down all night. We figured we should not get too down and keep on going. At camp one there was a French couple who had to turn back after the first night as everything they had was to wet!
The second day we were up at 7am for breakfast and to pack away our wet tent. Luckily it looked like the weather might be with us as we finally got to view some of the spectacular scenery with many peaks over 5000 meters surrounding us. Saturday continued through the Valley constantly gaining altitude and we rose to over 4000 meters. Although the trek was tough I am beginning to find them a lot easier than previously, I was keep a ery fast pace and not easing up at all, Anne too was keeping up with the boys and we all arrived at camp two at around 4pm, Set up the tents and let it dry in the sun. Soon after the rain arrived but thankfully our fast pace had helped us and this night we had a comfortable sleep in a dry tent at 4200 meters!
Day three was earlier and we were up at 6am and again had a lovely breakfast cooked by Lukas and straight after we were on our way again. This was the longest day of all with around 8hours on trekking with a lot uphill to the Pass at 4760meters. Unfrtuantely we could not get great views from here as we were in the middle of a cloud but a cuple of hours later after the rain had diminished we got some fantastic views (photos to follow). When we could se we were near to our next camp we also noticed the large cloud that was coming the other direction towards our camp so myself and Chris ran to the sight and as the rain arrived so did we. I dont think Ive ever assembled the tent so quite and luckily there was no rain inside. That night we enjoyed some nice Spaghetti and a good nights sleep before arrising again at 6am this morning. Today was only a few hours trek but mostly up steep hill and prved to be quite difficult after the previous few days. Once we arrived at the finish line we were all very relieved and we could then relax in the jeep to be taken back to Huaraz for 5 hours with a ocuple of stops along the way for photos (again to follow).
Now we have finished our dinner in Huaraz and are waiting for our night bus to Lima which will be followed by a 23 hour bus to Cusco so you might not hear from me for a few days!!

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