Advertisement
Published: October 29th 2008
Edit Blog Post
i arrived from trujillo to huaraz overnight, to a chilly, damp, grey and very english feeling morning. the altitude is quite high here and the thin air and the lack of sleep and dreary weather didnt inspire great things in me. i found a hostel for two nights until i could get in touch with my couch host and get acclimatised. i am ashamed to say i did this watching telly and eating but it did the trick! in the hostel i actually had a shower so hot i had to add some cold! which hasnt happened since leaving england!!
the rainy season has started here in peru and every afternoon between 2 and 4 ish it pours down. you get a ten minute warning with a loud clap of thunder then take cover for half an hour or so and its over. depending on where you take cover you can meet some quite interesting people! the mornings are nearly always garunteed dry though so its quite helpful.
cant believe i have been here for 3 months, how time has flown!!
i arranged to go on the santa cruz 4 day trek up in the cordillera blanca with a group. while
i was in the office of the tour company i asked if they could recommend a days walking for the next day (the day before the trek). he recommended lagoona churup, "a nice days walking " he said "just four hours or so". so i got up at half 5 to get on the bus to a village to start the walk. the little combi buses here are great. they are the size of a bedford van and are very cheap. the record so far that i have counted is 23 people in the back, most of whom are indigenous and dont travel light. all the women for a start wear these massive hats and carry bundles of goodies and kids. they just keep squishing in until no more will fit its very funny. i got to the little village, still not having had any breakfast, i wasnt worried at the time because i havent yet been anywhere remote in south america where there isnt a little lady selling bread or food by the side of the road.
i started up the hill away from the village and it got more and more remote, lots of amimals, donkeys and pigs
and the odd indigenous group moving their livestock, but no food.
oh well i thought its only 4 hours i will be ok......
famous last words. the altitude at the beginning was 3600m andi kept walking up hill for 4 hours until i eventually reached the lagoon at 4650m.
the final half was a killer, it gave the illusion of just being over the next ridge, every ridge, but it wasnt. i was starting to suffer by about 4000m and nearly gave up loads of times. if there had been any one else around i would have got them to go up with my camera and take a photo for me because i thought i was going to die! i couldnt breathe, vision was going, felt sick etc.
anyway i did get to the top after scaling a rock ridge that you really needed ropes and climbing stuff for and got to the crumby lake. it wasnt that nice, i have seen nicer lakes since amd i felt so ill i didnt really appreciate it. i practically ran down and got back to huaraz and ate! crazy! just a little walk indeed!!
the up side of all this is that
i could practically run up the 4800m ridge that we climbed on the santa cruz trek, while the others struggled!
the trek goes in a loop and involves walking up to the ridge and down the other side on days one and 2 then up to another lagoon on day 3 and down through the valley day 4.
this lagoon was a bit special, we walked up there and it is up on the snow line anyway so the back drop is snow and the water, which is 120m deep, is the most amazing colour blue and completely still. while we sat up here taking it all in we heard an avelanche on the otherside of the mountain but couldnt see amything. the tiny waterfalls from this lagoona trickeled down the mountainside and we effectively followed this to the river then the river down the valley until it became a raging torrent that the people who live at the end of the trek use as a power source with a system of leats and canals.
the scenery was breathtaking, literally! walking the flow of a river is quite special and the vegetation and climate changed dramatically over 4 days.
we
were very well looked after and had donkeys to carry the kit and food. we all fell in love with these lovely animals on the way. we were very well fed too, eating all the time, which was nice!! we saw some wicked skies and sunrises and moons and stars amd we all got on and kept each others spirits up. my tent stood up to the challenge too but i was freezing cold every night and have now got a cold!
it was worth it though and i feel much better about peru now. i am off to lima in couple of days then south from there.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.077s; Tpl: 0.014s; cc: 9; qc: 46; dbt: 0.0379s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb