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Published: April 17th 2008
Cow and the Cordillera Blanca!
This cow seemed to want to pose for us as we started the trek.Hello Again!
We had our friend James visit us from Seattle and he was interested in doing some hiking. After checking out different options we decided to head back to the Cordillera Blanca near Huaraz where we took my parents in December of 2007. After hanging out in Miraflores for a day, we took a bus to Huaraz and stayed at a relaxing bed & breakfast, The Lazy Dog Inn.
After hanging out there for a day and a half and eating Diamox to help with the altitude, we headed out for a 3 day/2 night trek through the Quebrada Quilcayhuanca and Quebrada Cayesh. This trek was all set up for us by Diana who is the the owner of the The Lazy Dog Inn. As part of our trekking team, we had James, Melanie, myself, Donato (guide), Miguel (cook), and Asolina (donkey). Asolina was a very kind, 21 year-old burro, who was in charge of carrying our food and tents.
On the first day, we hiked about six miles through the Quebrada Quilcayhuanca to our base camp (about 13,000 ft), set up our tents and ate gourmet camping food such as fresh trout. It was raining and
Lima Traffic
Heading out of Lima towards Huaraz. sleeting a bit so we decided to relax and wait until the morning to do more hiking.
After a hot breakfast, we headed out at 6am for a 10-hour day hike through the Quebrada Cayesh. I really had no idea on what to expect that morning, but I would soon learn. After hiking for 3 hours, we were at about 14,000 ft and had to make the decision to keep going or to just call it a day. We decided to continue. We started to see trace areas of snow and soon we were knee deep in it. It is weird to see snow when you are this close to the equator (9 degrees south latitude) but one needs to remember that we were at 15,000 feet. At about 11:30am, we reached a point where we decided that we had enough. We had been walking through deep snow for awhile without gaters or snowshoes and our feet were starting to become very cold. Originally, we thought we had reached 15,000 feet, but upon closer inspection of the topographic map, we were indeed well above 16,000 feet or between 5,000 and 5,100 meters. It was definitely the highest we had
ever been on foot. We arrived back at our base camp around 4pm and I was exhausted. We all slept very well in our tents that night.
The next day, we took a small 3 hour day hike to a glacial lake where we were able to see small avalanches from the glaciers above. It was interesting to hear the crack and thunder of the glacier and then see ice and snow slowly rain down below like a waterfall into a turquoise lake. I had previously only seen that sort of thing on the Discovery Channel.
The Lazy Dog Inn is a great place to stay before and after a trek. The cabins are warm, comfortable and relaxing. Diana even stoked up the wood-burning dry sauna for us upon our return.
We have a few guests here for our final six weeks in Peru. Amy and Bernie are in Cusco right now and they will be staying with us in Lima before they head back to Santa Clara. We will be doing an alternative Inca trail in Cusco with Jenya and Matt as well as finally checking out Machu Picchu. In early May, we will have a
Lazy Dogs
These are a few of the "lazy dogs" at the Lazy Dog Inn. chance to meet up with Nicki and John in Cusco and Lima during their adventure in Peru.
For those who are curious, yes, Melanie is still working. She's burning through some final papers and hoping to set up future opportunities here in Peru and elsewhere before heading back to school in June. We're both excited and anxious to take on whatever comes next.
See you soon!
Bill and Melanie
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danny b
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Wodka
I love Wadka!