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Published: January 26th 2007
Lady Spining
DAY1: This lady is typical of the area. This costume isn't for the tourists but is their everyday wear.We signed ourselves up for a treck in Colca Canyon, 3 days / 2 nights in a dirty great crack in the earth. Sounds like an aventure? just read on...................
Day 1 - The intrepid trekers meet the canyon
So day 1 of our trek to Colca Canyon, the first of a 3 day adventure. The trek started with a ridiculously early start of 5:15am. Now we were under the impression we were on holiday here, but time and time again, it is proven not to be true by an early alarm call. Still, this was self inflicted so it feels that bit less painfull somehow. A half asleep Andy and Josie packed their final items (toothbrushes, etc...), deposited their rucksacks in the reception of the hostel and headed off at 5:45am, with their guide Pepe (or PeePee as he would become known to us later). To be fair, it wasn´t an amazing start as said guide Pepe turned up in a small taxi, with 2 french ladies. Not bad in itself, but if you think that a taxi seats 5, and 4 were already inside, you begin to realise a typical cramped South American taxi ride was about
Josie - Before the Treck
DAY1: Note the happy face....soon to change to happen. Now, to be fair, this isn´t the first illegally filled taxi we have been in, as NY in Buenos Aires holds the record for 5 on the backseat, but that time we were alcohol effected, AND we hadn´t paid $45 each for a tour. Anyhow, thankfully, it was only a short ride to the bus station so it wasn´t so bad.
Once we left our taxi at the bus station, we realised the bus we arrived on had docked at the "Gringo Station" , and this time we had arrived at the real "locals" station. Needless to say it was mayhem inside, with people selling things everywhere, people carrying all manner of things which you could never imagine would fit on a bus, such as live animals, dining tables, beds etc...... Josie went off an procured brekkie for us which consised of the worlds largest croissant, and a massive bap with cheese in it. Oh and a coffee for Andy. Pepe got our tickets all sorted and our group of 9 (us 2 , the 2 french, and 5 chillian lads) plodded off to the bus. This bus was everything you would ever imagine of a bus
Clouds in the Canyon
DAY1: Note, an impending soaking in South America. Looked a bit like it had been to war, with a ladder on the side for access to the roof. Luckily Pepe had secured us seats, which as it turned out, were the height of luxury, not because of their comfort value, but becuase it meant you didn´t have to stand. As we sat there and waited for departure the bus gradually began to fill up. The customary bed and matress was hauled up onto the roof, along with a ton of other bags and things. Once all the seats were filled, people kept on pileing onto the bus, filling up the aisle of the bus. Once the aisle was rammed with about 30 people, a bloke popped his head in the window and shouted something in Spanish, roughly translate to "You still have room to breath, shift up more as we can get another 20 on the bus". Finally, with the bus filled to dangerous levels, we departed on what was billed as a 5 hour bus transfer to our entrance point into the canyon.
Now, Andy seems to have this skill of picking the most uncomfortable seat on the bus, and his skills once
Bottom of the canyon
DAY1: Andy is glad to be down again proved excellent, as he had the only seat on the bus behind someone who liked their seat reclined all the way back. Now with his massive legs, this poses a problem, as a fully reclined seat leaves about as much room as there is in a Brazilians Speedos (which frankly isn´t even enough for a 5p coin). Anyone with long legs will sympathise with this I think. OK, so about an hour into the bus trip, the road ran out. We went from tarmac roads of moderate safety to dirt road, we were travelling full on local style now. The adventure starts here! To be fair this wasn´t too bad but meant that our promised 5 hour journey was clearly a lie. Not till later did it transpire that 6 hours was probably more realistic. We reached the town of Chivai, which is pretty much the biggest place in the whole Colca Valley I think, and half the bus got off, leaving the rare sight of empty seats! A man got on and claimed 35 Soles "Gringo Tax" for a Tourist Permit for our presence in the Valley. This was then followed by another ton of people and our
bus was packed to the top again and ready to move on out!
The next part of our journey took us through some spectacular scenery, to altitudes high enough that there was snow all around us, and close to some very very long drops off unguarded cliff. It was very uncomfortable but well worth it somehow, as the secenery was totally spectacular. On some occasions, a river presented itself in the road, which the bus managed to take on, which was most scary. You can see why it is common here for roads to become blocked due to landslides as the rain simply washes the road over the valley edge. Luckily for us, we managed not to fall to our deaths in the bus, probably mainly due to the sheer weight of people inside the bus, perhaps there is method to their madness afterall!
So.... after a long bus journey which resulted in 2 dead legs for Andy, we arrived at our little village, for lunch before finally heading off on the trek. Lunch was in a simple little hostel (by simple, think simple then go below your imagination by about 10 steps, this is Peru remember), and
A little mud hut
DAY1: This was on our walk back up the valley to night 1 consisted of soup, followed by a rice dish with meat and potato puree. Now, I know what you are thinking, 2 carbs on 1 plate???? This combination is extremely common in South America, especially here in Peru. It is common to be given both rice and potatos, but then food here serves a different purpose than in the West, a more pure purpose. Food is to fill the stomach and allow you to get on with your life, not to sample different flavours, and titilate the tastebuds. Food here isn´t to make the obese even fatter like at home, it is to allow you to live. Now we think this is a good thing (if not a little dull sometimes), you very rarely see a chubbo Peruvian, who has eaten themself to an early grave due to pure greed. I think the west has fogotten an important lesson due to the ease we can obtain food, and is paying heavy price as a result (moral rant over....) So lunch was capped off with the customary after dinner Mate de Coca, and we were ready to leave. Pee Pee had different ideas and dissapeared somewhere , not to return for a
Cuy
DAY1: This was next to a cage full of rabbits. Rabit clearly doesn't cut it in these parts, rodent all the way frustraiting hour and a half. As we waited for PeePee, black clouds started to appear in the blue sky, and thunder could be heard in the distance. Ourselves and our new French chums (sisters Sophie and Celine), had come prepared for the treck and had waterproofs and treking boots. Our chillian chums on the other hand had all come dressed in shorts, t-shirts and trainers. We had assumed this was just for the bus, but as it turned out, not so, this was their gear for the next 3 days. It was going to be a wet wet day for the boys.
So Pee Pee returned and we headed off to the valley. As we walked we could see that we were now in the "real" rural Peru, as it is like a completly different world. It is common to see people in what you would consider to be traditional costume, with brightly coloured dresses and hats, large loads casually slung over their backs in blankets, expertly tied to form a kind of rucksacks. Men riding by on horses or on donkey karts , wearing cowboy hats. It all sounds like a cliche, but it is the way these
The bridge to home for the night
DAY1: NEVER have we seen such a sketchy bridge. YES it was made of twigs and YES it was about 5cm off the raging river. people live, and why not, if it works why change it! It was a great site to see, and a real reminder of how people from the west have such an easy, comfortable life but with it, we have lost a lot of our tradtional knowledge and skills. As we trecked up the dirt lane we had traveled down on the bus a couple of hours earlier, the black clouds rolled in obscuring the sun, and booms over thunder overhead signalled an impending soaking. We reached the edge of the valley, and stopped for a picture session over the edge of what looked to be a beatufull and deep valley. As it turns out Colca is the 2nd deepest canyon in the world, twice as deep as the Grand Canyon (not so grand now are ya! 😊 ). It is beaten only by its neighbour
which is only a couple of hundred meters deeper. We were going all the way to the bottom on foot, and more frightening, all the way back up again! An amazing yet physically challenging trek was ahead of us. As we took pictures the rain began to fall, so we put on our Our bed for the night
DAY1: It may have been made of sticks but it was remarkably comfortable.
NOTE: genuine mudfloor waterproofs. The chillians, doned their plastic ponchos and one comically put on a binbag, which blatently would be ineffectual against a thunderstorm. It was amusing none the less.
As we started to desend into the valley, we realised what a steep climb it was down. The path was both narrow and full of loose mud and rocks. One step in the wrong place could have led to a long drop down, perhaps the quickest way to the bottom, but probably a little life threatening. This was the kind of adventure we had signed up for, and we headed off excitedly! A little way down the path, the rain really began to fall heavily, and we trudged along, with spirits dampened slightly. Pepe pointed across the valley to a village, which was to be our destination for the night, it seemed an impossible distance away to us, but that was our destination. Due to the distance, it turned out to be a bit of a race to the bottom of the valley, with not much time to stop and look at the wonders around us. The rain stopped after an hour or so, but this did little to lift spirits All the mod cons
DAY2: Clearly built to keep us gringos happy. A flushing toilet and solar shower. I would have like to see a hole in the ground, just to be in-keeping wih our mud hut or slow the pace. We rushed on, and unfortunatly Josie started to feel an old injury reappear. During our trip to Paris a few years ago, and after a heavy dose of walking, her knees basically became extremely painfull. This started to happen again, which both frustraited her, and gave her pain. Like a true explorer, she trudge on all the same, and dispite us falling behind (understandably) we eventually made it to the bottom in one piece. Dispite her pain she made a real amazing effort to do this, helped along by hurling expletives and abuse at PeePee our guide, who had explained little on the way down, and at most times was so far in front he couldn´t be seen. The way down took about 3 hours, and was largely uneventfull except for the rain, and the occasional mule passing us, which would become a common sight over the comming days.
We stopped briefly at the bottom to take some water, tostado (toasted corn) from our snack rations, and some pictures. At the bottom was a raging river, which had some real big rapids on it, probably explaning the depth of the valley. The geology here was Happy chickens
DAY2: What an idillic scene, sums up this little village really really intersting with a whole array of rock types, colours and formations. Just to the left of the bridge we could see and hear a waterfall which cascaded from high up the canyon, quite a spectacular sight.
Following the stop we headed over the suspension bridge to the other side of the valley and began our ascent to our resting place for the night. The far side of the valley felt very different with plants and greenery, which was in contrast to the mostly bare rock of the side we had decended. We could see fig trees, pear trees, corn and other crops. The start of the walk was a hard climb up rocks for abour 15 mins, enough to work up quite a sweat. The following sections took us through terraced fields still worked by the inhabitants. It took us through a small village, with cages of rabbits and the famous cuy (rabbit cage was full, cuy housed only 2..... clearly the rodent of choice). The way up to the village was hard walking and it started to get dark towards the end. There were some unbelivable parts which were about a foots width, one side with hillside, the Morning in the Canyon
DAY2: This is what we woke up to other with sheer cliff. As we neared the end, and in almost darkness, we met what was the sketchiest bridge we have ever seen. Basically some tree branches over a raging torrent of water, the bridge nearly touching the river. If it wasn´t for tiredness, or what we had seen before, we would have been worried, but not for a pair of intrepid travelers like ourselves! 😊 We crossed the bridge, and hit the last section, a punishing zig-zag climb up a vertical path to the village. PeePee took the easy way out, and went up mule class. We trudged up in single file, sweating heavily until we reached the peak in total darkness. It had been a long, hard day, but to reach the top of the path felt really good, probably because it was all over for the day.
The village we stayed at was again basic, but had real charm. It did, of course, not have electricity, and so was lit only by candlelight, which added to the charm. All the buildings were built of mud bricks, with mud floors. Especially for the gringo tourists, they had installed a flushing toilet and solar shower, sounds grand, Travel in style on 4x4
DAY2: I believe this has a mighty 1 mule power engine, fur lined seats, is good for a few miles on 1 tank of grass and as we discovered farts when climbing uphill, almost constantly. but see the pictures to see it was quite basic. That said, you couldn´t have asked for much more considering the remote location. We were shown to our cosy mudbuilt room with a double bed in, how lucky were we! The bed was made from bamboo and branches but we didn´t care, as it was warm, dry and ours to sleep in! Dinner that night was again, a soup, rice and potatos affair (pollo saltado, a stirfry with chips in it and rice on the side!), topped off with the mate de coca, expertly made by Pepe and his local helpers over a wood fire. We hit the sack pretty early that night, and slept really well after the days excersion.
Day 2 - Shorter than expected
The second day of our trek started with brekkie in the village we had slept in the night before. We both had slept really well, which is not surprising considering the trek of the day before. After seeing the showers and knowing how hot we would get from walking, we both resigned ourselves to being filthy and didn´t shower that morning, but I don´t think anyone else did either so Patchwork fields
DAY2: As you can see it is quite a contrast between the sheer bare rock and the lush farmed terraces. we were in good company. Brekfast was surprisingly without rice nor potato, but was a very tasty 2 pancake affair. They were the thick american kind with Anese seeds in for a bit of flavour, and some jam for topping. We hadn´t eaten pancakes for a long time, and it awakened Andy´s hunger for them as he had forgotten just how good they are. Breakfast ,of course, ended with a cup of Mate and we were off for the next trek which was planned to be across to the Oasis, and up the canyon in the afternoon, ending at a hostel at the top. Now, the chillians kept up waiting for an hour or so pissing about, or whatever they were doing, but eventually we got our stuff together. The walk started really beutifully as we walked through some small villages in the warm sunshine. The rain of the previous day had been long forgotten and the land looked green and lush, with clear skies. It was a real pleasure to walk in such land, and as we walked through villages we were greeted by the locals with a customary "Hola!" or "Buenos Dias". Once again the Peruanos proved a Little mud built church
DAY2: This place has managed to withstand a couple of earthquakes, yet is made of the local mudbricks, pretty impressive. warm hearted people. After a short trek we stopped at a little church built of mudbricks. PeePee, our guide, explained how it was still standing dispite a major earthquake some years before, apparently the only thing that fell was the bell. A few doors down from this was a museum , basically the spare room of some ladies house. Despite its tiny size, it was actually really interesting as it explained the way the native Ketchua# lived. She explained how they ground corn and grains for food, the way they cooked, the animals they hunted and their uses, the fabrics they wove and the traditional clothes they wore. She seemed both a knowledgable and genuinely nice lady, she finished with dressing up a porky chillian as a lady and then dancing with him, which was pretty funny.
The trek continued from here through lush farmland, still farmed by the local people. It must be incredibly hard work as it is all steeply terraced land and , of course, there is no mechanical assistance. The tractor of these parts is the the mule and the donkey. The mule is used for riding and the donkey for all the carrying (hence A-Mazing
DAY2: Sorry for the appauling pun, it was too good to miss. This is just a sample of the amazing array of maize they grow in Peru the donkey work). The land eventually gave way to more rocky terrain, and once again we started to decend into the canyon to cross the river again. Once again Josie´s knees started to play up, and once again PeePee ran off into the distance. After a long and painfull decent (once again full of hurling abuse at the out of earshot guide) we hit the bottom, yet another suspension bridge. A quick rest was taken here then we continued across and up to the Oasis. Following a short walk, we hit the Oasis at around 11:30am, so the sun was hot. Now an Oasis was promised, and that kind of implied a grandure that the place didn´t totally live up to. The Oasis was made up of 2 manmade swimming pools basically, filled with naturally warm water from somewhere in the valley. This served as a rest point for travelers as it was surrounded by huts and camping grounds. The basic amenities of toliets and showers were also here, but they were pretty grotty, but once again, still better than shitting in the woods! It was planned to stop here for 3 hours or so, to rest, have lunch, and Traditional kitchen in these parts
DAY2: Basic but very functional. Our dinner the night before was cooked on a bigger version of this. They probably have more modern kitchens now, but interesting to see and very functional prepare for the climb in the afternoon. Andy stipped off and took a dip in the pools which were very pleasent but also probably extremely dirty pools due to the unwashed stinking scouser that just dived into them. It was a really refreshing experience for Andy, but probably not for the others in there, but having said that they stank too, so fairs fair! As Andy dried out in the sun and Josie chilled in the sun, some whisps of light cloud began to appear. These were followed by some larger ones, then some larger again. We all knew what was comming, and some cracks of thunder confirmed it. SHIT we were in for another soaking. That said, it is summer and therefore the rainy season, so what can you expect. As we waited for the rains to come, we could see some trekers leaving via. Mule class for the top of the valley. Now, what is the point in walking all the way to the bottom, only to chicken out and take the mule up! We would have felt we had cheated ourselves doing that, so we scoffed at them as they muled their way off. Lunch that day A loom
DAY2: This is the way they used to make the elaboratly coloured cloth you see everywhere. Now, of course, it is all done on machine was....... soup and pasta (surprisingly) with a tinned tuna sauce. Not our favourite, but due to our remote location and hunger, it mattered not, it all went down easly. As we ate, the rain began to fall which meant we could not tackle the valley just yet. We sat and waited , with a game of Uno with the chillians, expecting the rain to stop in the hour. We sat and sat, but the rain didn´t stop. PeePee surveyed the group as what to do, Josie and Andy wanted to go to the top as promised, to get a show and finish the treck. The 5 Chillians and 2 French wanted to stay at the bottom, so outnumbered we begrudingly admitted defeat and prepared of another night in the canyon, bugger! PeePee showed us to our room, which was made of mud (shock horror) and bamboo. It was mud up to about waist height and bamboo vertically placed all the way to the roof, meaning you could literally see through the walls. Typically, our roof had a bit of a leak, and was dripping onto the bed. A quick biscuit wrapper repair fixed this, and we settled in for the Chillian Dancing
DAY2: This porky chap is dressed in traditional costume. The hat is to hide the face and make them look like a woman so they could get a dance with a lady. Too complicated to explain..... night, awating our 3am departure for the top, yes 3AM!!!!!
The evening was spent with our french chums, placing cards and chatting. One thing PeePee didn´t tell us was that he didn´t plan on our little stop and hence didn´t have any food for us. Luckily he had begged some soup off someone and we gifted him our last pack of Tostado for the group, we would be hungry tonight! Tired of our enclosure, we and the french decided to break out and go in search of Pisco Sour and Alpaca steak which a sign promised us. I can only think that this was their way of being funny, as once we had followed the sign, we found only a deserted camp and a barking dog. We had been cheated again, bollocks 😞
It got dark about 7pm with the rain still comming down, and we sat there pondering the walk up the next day and just passing time. Now then it gets dark here it gets truely dark. Far from electricity and mans presence, there are not the normal amibent lights and sounds you would normally here everwhere. There could be a 100m drop right in front Zig Zag Path
DAY2: Hopefully you can make out the zig-zag up the canyon side. That was our way up and out of the canyon. Piece of Piss! :) of you and you wouldn´t see it. It is also so quiet that you can hear nothing except the sounds of animals and insects. As we walked around camp in the absolute pitch black, we began to notice the most amazing thing. There were little lights flashing everwhere, and the valleyside as completely alive with flashing lights. It seems that the valley is home to not only donkeys but also fireflies as well. They blinked away like the lights on a christams tree, but in a far less brash way. It was like christmas on the hillside, a truely amazing sight which wowed us all, and which made our unscheduled stop here totally worth it. I really is amazing sometimes how nature can provide such a spectaular show, and something we will remember forever due to its sheer beauty.
Dinner was served at about 9pm and was soup with tostado, potato puree with tomato sauce and rice. Seems PeePee had begged stolen and borrowed us quick a satisfying dinner after all. We finished with the mate (what else) and went to bed for a couple of hours before our 3am alarm call. Oh joy, yet another torturous wakeup, which meant we would tackle the hilside in the pitch black, woop!
Day 3 - All the way to the top!
Day 3 started with the painfull beep of the alarm clock. Had we really slept for 5 hours, becuase it felt like we just went to sleep. To further annoy, Andy's nose decided to explode at the exact moment of the alarm and he had a nosebleed. We can only assume that it did so in protest, and who could blame it, it was 3AM and pitch black outside. The nosebleed soon stopped without much hastle and we got up preparing for a climb out of the valley. Josie put on her headtorch and finally realsied what a fantastic gift it was. This was made more evident when the once again, super prepared Chillians showed up with 1 torch between 5 of them, if they didn't fall to their deaths on the way up, they would be doing well. Having said that, the whole group was quite short on light as Sophie (one of the French) had broken her headtorch the previous night falling into a hot stream, ooooppppss.
The group finally all gathered for the push The "Oasis"
DAY2: As you can see, not so natural. Just to prove the fact, of a night, the water was turned off somehow, and the pools emptied. Natural my ass! to the top and we were off into the dark night. It is a really strange feeling only being able to see a small patch of ground in front whilst walking. You can sense that there is a steep drop on one side of you and over 1000m of rock on the other, but you just can't see it. The group trudged on up the mountain, slowly but purposefully in one long train. After about 15mins, we could all feel the burn, and it began to become clear that it would be a looooonnnnng way up. Even at this early stage, people began to fall back, the Chillian smokers of the group. It was seriously hard work but you knew that you had to continue, step by step and not consider getting to the top or you would give up. As we walked we could hear this hissing noise behind us, concentrating on the path we didn't turn, but soon we could hear panting. A look over the shoulder, and what was there, a couple of mules. Now apparently, these 4x4's of the canyon are totally blind in the dark they just "know" where the path is. I personally am Sun begins to rise
DAY3: This is an hour or so into our assent. Pictures don´t do it justice skeptical and think the folks riding em up were very brave if not a bit stupid. That said, they look like they do this every day so perhaps I am understimating them. It is amazing the age of some of the locals we saw going up the valley too. Here are us, panting and struggling to climb, young and reasonably fit. There they are, in their 60's wearing leather flipflops overtaking us on the way up, amazing.
So we climbed and climbed , as time passed the sun began to think about rising. As it got lighter it seemed like we were near the top as Andy could see a peak. We asked PeePee and he laughted saying we were less than half way, this was like torture and a real kick in the balls, as we were knackered. As we reached the peak we had assumed to be the top, another of similar size appeared before us. It is astonishing when climbing up hill how the end can seem so close but it merely hides more punnishing path to climb. It has to be said that the majority of the climb was quite soletary and uneventfull barning the The offering
DAY3: Not sure what I was offering here, perhpas some chocolate in return for a PiggyBack up the hill. Obviously, no takers. On the bottom left is Pepe our intrepid guide occasional mule or donkey. The group really spread out far, and we were all facing our own personal battle with the valley, struggling, step by step, sweating and punishing with each step. This really saps the energy and brings the spirts low. The spirits of everywhere where lifted instaniously by an inadvertent event. Andy was walking with a Chillean lad close behind, as he reached up for a big step, he inadvertently let out an enormeous fart in the poor lads face. It was a true genuis moment which had everyone laughing, including the Chillean who did not bear a grudge. Andy tittered all the way to the top, like a 10 year old girl (understandibly so I think).
The sun rose over the mountains and once again, PeePee proved his worth. We had been promised that you could see the sunrise, which may have been true, had it not been for the enormeous 1000m high piece of rock in the way. The scene was still amazing though, and the pictures don't really do the whole thing justice, I would suggest comming here if you are in this part of the world, but if you are too lazy look Sun a rise in the morning!
DAY3: Come on all you Rolf Harris fans, you know the words. at our piccies. As we got closer and closer to the top, eupohoria began to appear. As we actually hit the top section, it was like a rush of adrenalin and relief at the same moment. It was not only a totally amazing sight but a totally amazing feeling. It had turned out to be the most physically demaning endurance event we had ever undertaken, and the had beaten it!!! We stopped for some time at the top, taking in the scenery and basking in our glory. You would have thought we were the first humans to climb it, it felt that good to us. Obviously hundred of Gringos a year made it up, probably much quicker than our 4 hours or so, but that didn't matter, WE had made it.
Once everyone had reached the top, the heat was on again as we had to make it to our 8bus. If we were late, we would not get seats and standing was not an option at this point. We basically ran through beautifull terraced cornfields, back to the village where it had all started 2 days prior. As we hit the village, we saw a woman selling bread Josie with her new best friend "stick"
DAY3: This little stick made it all the way through the trip, from top to bottom. which was too good to resist. We gave her 1 sole expecting a couple of buns, but she filled out bag with 7 or 8. Now for us people who love food, this was like christmas. We ran on, and finally made it to the bus with time to spare. Spirits in the group were so high after us all climbing the valley and we all chatted, smiled and laughted.
Our bus took us to the end of our tour and frankly the least interesting parts. We first stopped at Cruz del Condor, an almost surefire Condor viewing stop. The place was full of hawkers selling Peruano handycrafts, and typically, no sodding condors. The view over the valley was nice, but the large turkey-esque birds of prey where nowhere to be seen. The closest we got was a glimpse from about 2km away of some blackspots in the sky, grand. The bus came after about an hour here, and took us to Chivai, about the biggest town around. The plan was we would be taken to a Peruvian buffet restartant, but we could see it was just a scam to flease gringos out of 15 soles. We decided to The path up
DAY3: Two things to note about this:
1) It is bloody steep
2) It is full of rocks break free and instead took a walk around the town and market, we didn't actually get much food, but also we didn't get robbed for 15soles, so we won. Next stop after Chivai, where the hot spring. Once again, a bit of marketing spin made them sound more romantic than they were. It was essentially an open air swimming pool, but the water was awsome. It must have been about 38c and after all the hard walking it was amazingly relaxing. A little too hot in fact as it nearly sent Andy to sleep, which would have meant a gradual boiling. After leaving the hotsprings, refreshed, we got on the bus and went home. It was a long and bumpy ride home which must have taken about 5 hours, but it was amazing to hit home and rest.
The whole experience in the canyon was a great one and something we would totally recommend to everyone. Yes, the bits at the end where a tourist ripoff, but then the trek made it all insignificant. We both feel it was well worth the money, and the things we saw and did will stay with us forever. Yet another score for Andy looking a touch sweaty and tired
DAY3: Note: I am wearing my 100% Merino t-shirt. Thanks to the folks at Lilly for this. You will be pleased to know it was warm and didn´t smell after 3 days of abuse, top notch Peru!!!!
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Claire Capoeira
non-member comment
WOW
The whole trek looks amazing - such hard work but what an amazing sense of achievement! Haven't written before due to my general allergy to computers and technology but have been having a sneaky look at your travels every now and then. Your adventures look fantastic and you must be having the time of your lives. Bims and i the hardworking proles that we are, are off to Venice for a few days in March which is fab. Much love and good wishes Claire xxx