Day 4 - Chivay

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We were picked up around 7:30 and another couple from where we are staying are doing the same tour, Richard and Caroline from the UK who are back packing it for a year and have a few interesting stories. On the bus there are another seven of us, one young fellow from Oz, two young American fellows, three Peruvian, and another girl from the chec republic and all seem like a good bunch. Our guide is Marcello who is Peruvian and also speaks english which is a bonus and explains all the sites along the way.

The trip heading out of town was good and an eye opener again, we did a number of stops to take in the scenery and to stock up on goodies from the shops, such as cocoa lollies, drinks and the likes. When we reached about 3600mts, we all stopped for some recommended cocoa Tea to reduce altitude sickness.

The andes are a spectacular sight with tips covered in snow, the barran landscapas, Alpacas, Viçunas grazing and the photos we have don´t do it justice. The sun is out and it is T-shirt weather again, it´s not even cold, the air is thin and it gives you a slight headache, but we havent reached the top yet.

At 4900mtrs the air is thinner so Jeff and I break into the Cocoa lollies which takes like a hardened tea bag, we all hop of the bus to take in the views again , (even some of the streams up here are frozen solid, like mini glazier)and your head feels light head and you´ve had one to many to drink, when you breath in the air is cold and crisp and you feel slighlty unsteady on your feet. You take a shoryt walk and it feels like you walked a mile sucking in air with short breathes...what a buzz!. All I can say is I am glad we went to Arequipa first and not via Cusco.

We arrive at Chivay which is now at 3700mtrs and we all went to a buffet type meal. We went for the Alpaca, stuffed chillie, chicken and rice, I ate all mine and went back for seconds while Jeff was looking a little pale and had the Altitude headache, so he took a couple of panadol and they kicked in shortly after. I had actually beaten him to finishing a meal before me. We arrived at our accommodation and it´s not a bad sort of Hostel, not what I expected for a 2 Star place, When shown the room Jeff decided to crash for a couple of hours, headache and tummy now...hehe just what I had in Lima.

The bed has 3 thick blankets and sheets with bed cover, when you get under it´s like a Lama has lied adross you, does this mean it´s going to get cold..someone said it can get to -15 celcius

Later on he felt better so we went into the plaza to find a place for Cocoa tea and coffee. After we found this little place and as Jeff was drinking his tea, this lady comes out with this cup and a couple of odd looking slices of something in there, she wets them, then slaps them on the side of jeffs temples..she did this without saying a word, I laughed, then she left. Apparenty some sort of fruit or potato to relieve altitude sickness, within a couple of minuted Jeff was feeling good and his headache was going.

We re going out for dinner tonight the group of us for a meal and entertainment so should be interesting. I left Jeff in the room as he´s having another lie down and I have wandered down the plaza to do an update. Tammy and Family, Jeff is fine just a little rumble in the stomach now caught a little travel bug I think. (oops just got txt, Jeff is now feeling a lot better)

I can´t load any photos at this stage as the internet caffe I am in I can hardly make out the keyboard, it has stickers and painted letters everywhere.

Chivay is truly a wonderfyl little town surrouned by mountains with a population of 5000 and very peruvian oriantated. We head to Colca Canyon tomorrow so we will be climatised for the next haul of our journey.

Will update again when I can

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Comments

[Hernandez]

Another couple
The "other couple" you write about are male and female. Notice anything different to "you " couple? Ha ha. It all sound fantastic so far. Keep up the writing only try the next one drunk.