Condors and Colca Canyon

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After our extended time in Cusco and the Sacred Valley, we contemplated for awhile where our next move would take us. Arequipa was originally not in our travel plans, but members from PSF have hiked the nearby Colca Canyon and had strongly recommended it to us. Colca Canyon is the second deepest canyon in the world at 3191 m (next to Cotahuasi, which is a few meters deeper and also nearby). Colca Canyon is apparently twice as deep as the Grand Canyon, but the depth is measured from the lowest point of the canyon to the highest peak of the mountain range.

So on Sunday, December 13th, we traveled by bus from Cusco to Arequipa, the second largest city in Peru. A couple we met in Nicaragua had recommended the hostel La Posada de Calcique, which we found shortly after arriving. It was nice and quaint, but the selling point was the friendliness of the owner. It is owned by a family and José, the son, was very nice to us when we arrived and made us feel right at home.

Colca Canyon is located approximately four hours from Arequipa, and out of convenience (so we didn't have to deal with waiting for buses that may or may not pass us by) we decided to do a 3-day/2-night trek with a tour group. Hundreds of travel agencies in Arequipa offered treks to Colca Canyon, but we decided to go with one that offered a homestay, and was recommended by José at our hostel. On Tuesday, December 15th, the tour bus rolled in early at 3 am in front of our hostel. José was tired from running a 5-day shift (he had been sleeping on the couch behind the reception desk), but he wished us well as we left.

The tour bus contained many people on many different tours, most with different, yet similar trekking routes. The first part was identical though - driving 4 hours to Chivay, the gateway to the Colca Canyon area, and then 45 min onto the Cruz de Condor, a mirador over the deepest part of the canyon to see condors soaring on the rising morning thermals. We were there for over a half hour not spotting any condors, but enjoying the beautiful canyon landscape. Just when we were about to give up and head to back to the bus, we spotted the shadow of what turned out to be a male condor gliding through the canyon with his enormous wingspan. I managed to get a few pictures as he few almost directly over us. Incidentally, that's how I found out it was a male condor - he had the archetypical comb on his forehead, visible only when I was able to zoom in on my pictures. Unfortunately, with the bus horn beckoning us back, we couldn't stay too long to continue watching the condor in flight.

The bus drove onwards towards the town of Carbanaconde, where it stopped a few meters from the main gate as the dirt road was currently being fixed. There we assembled and walked through the main gate and through to the town square. We passed by many lines of stone walls with small cacti grown all along the top to act as a deterrent for trespassers. There were only 6 people in our group, a Danish couple, a German guy, George and I, and our guide Luis. Other groups were also heading the same way - and into the same small restaurant by the town square. By the time our group had reached the restaurant, it was already full and we had to wait until groups had finished before we could have our set lunch. Lunch was good and the typical set meal - vegetable soup, main plate with meat, rice, and potatoes, followed by tea (coca or otherwise). Meanwhile, our guide disappeared into the back room (probably where he ate lunch with the other guides) and not to be seen again until we had finished our lunch.

After lunch, we headed out of town again and started our trek. The entire area was desert, with many varieties of cacti and mountains in the distance. We hiked to the edge of the desert, where we got a good look at the beautiful canyon below. Where we started we were still too far up to see the bottom, but as we decended further, we could see green oases down below at the canyon bottom. The first part of the trek was quite long and tough - a descent for about 4 hours or so winding down the canyon. Early on during our trek, we could easily see the village we were going to stay in for the night. However, the only problem was that it was on the other side of the canyon, and we were still far from being able to see the river down below or where the bridge was that we had to cross. The canyon trail was rocky and we were passed by several mules, singly or in caravans, and going in either direction. By the time we had reached the bridge to cross the river at the canyon bottom, I had developed a bad blister on my right heel. Unfortunately the bridge was not our ultimate destination for the night and we still had to go uphill from there. As others stayed overnight in San Juan, the closest town to the bridge and only a half hour walk away, according to our group itinerary, we had another hour or so further to go to the next town, Cosnirhua, with the last half hour going straight uphill. Needless to say, I was is pain and not in the best mood when I learned of this. By the time everyone made it to the homestay, it was already nightfall.

The homestay that we were promised wasn´t so much a homestay as it was a small hostel with plans for expansion. The five tourists were put in a small room with 5 twin beds behind the dining room. There was however a nice hot shower, which was very welcomed after the horrendous descent. Luis cooked dinner for us, which was quite yummy - carrots, green beans, egg, and cheese stir-fried together somehow with potato and rice on the side. We didn´t meet the family that night. We were so tired we pretty much fell asleep immediately after our dinner and showers.

(Continued by George)

We met some of the family the next day, although I agree with Eva that it was hardly a homestay. In a pattern that we saw repeated many times in Peru and Bolivia, this family had constructed a hostel around their home. Interestingly, even though the hostel buildings were made of concrete, the family´s home was adobe (i.e. mud), and looked less comfortable than the rooms that the guests used. Overall the family was nice, the friendliest of them being the four-year-old grandson of the owner. For reasons I can only guess, the parents jumped two cultures out of the canyon when they named him. Neither Quechuan or Spanish, his name was Kevin. The least friendly was the owner´s father. Our German companion thoughtlessly took a picture of the man while he was eating, and he got up to chase the German with a stick. My sympathies were with the old man (I would have chased that German too), but his family just laughed at him. By their reckoning, he was over 100 years old, the oldest man in the village, and he used to be chief until they decided he had gone crazy. The second oldest man in the village was now chief.

After breakfast we packed and headed down the trail. We had hardly started when we passed the former chief sitting by the trail, shouting at us. Our guide Luis explained he was actually begging, not for money, but for coca leaves. It just so happened I was carrying some, and fished some out of my bag. I must confess I was motivated not so much by charity or pity, but by curiosity. There was something very odd about a Peruvian begging coca leaves from a foreigner, especially when his daughter owns a hostel. Maybe they were cutting him back? I displeased the man by only giving him half. A chewer myself, I was counting on some leaves to help me on the long climb out of the canyon later that afternoon.

We left the old man and passed into the neighboring town of Malata. Luis, our guide, was born here. He showed us the home he used to live in before he and his family moved to Arequipa. The family still kept the house for a summer home, but he prefered visiting their new cottage on the coast. As Luis explained, many other young families were moving out, raising their kids in bigger towns where provisions are not carried in by mule. Many of the houses around us were clearly abandoned. Their roofs, once either straw or sheet metal, were gone, and plants now grew in the adobe walls. I thought of the progressively named four-year-old Kevin, and the hostel his family is expanding to catch all those tourist dollars. Kevin, obviously, is not meant for farming in the Colco canyon.

Tourists, are we some kind of cultural zopilotes? Are we a sign, if not an actual cause, of cultural death? Maybe the old man wasn´t so crazy shaking his stick at us. Leaving the town of Malata, we passed along a bank of terraces, constructed into the hillside for farming. These terraces and the supporting water channels may have been 800 years old. However, unlike the terraces we passed earlier in our hike, these were no longer farmed, as no water was channeled here through the irrigation systems. Generations would have farmed here in the past, and the terraces would have been green with plants and fruit trees. But the day we passed these terraces were yellow and dry. An occasional tree remained to hint at the life that once flourished on this hillside.

We continued down to Sangralle, the village in the green oasis of the river valley where several swimming pools had recently been constructed for the comfort of the passing tourists. We rested for a few hours, taking a swim and some lunch. In the afternoon, we started for that last unavoidable climb out of Colco Canyon and back to the town of Carbanaconde. It was pretty tough, and Eva´s foot was still hurting after the swim. After about four hours, with the sun setting, we made it out of the canyon, and enjoyed a quick supper and early bed in a small hotel in town.

We spent the next morning in Carbanaconde, but it was easy breezy compared to our first two days. First we went to a mirador near town overlooking the canyon, hoping to see more condors in flight. We had just turned around to leave, disappointed, when yours truly looked back and saw a large bird flying about 200m away. We stayed a few more minutes as the condor did a couple of turns giving us a show. When we arrived back in the town square the other tour groups were already there - all dusty and sweaty. They were the ones who had stayed in the Sangralle oasis the last night and climbed up steep canyon early in the morning, while we were on our relaxing mini-hike. All of us were then loaded onto a bus again and taken to a hot spring near Chivay for swimming. Eva and I declined, and saved on the entrance fee. Instead, we explored the surrounding hillside, which actually featured a small ruin, although we were not sure how old it was or who built it. The tour ended with a stop in a decent buffet restuarant (Peruvian style, with plenty of potatos and soup) before departing for the 3 hour bus ride back to Arequipa.

I enjoyed the hike through the canyon, but I was sad to think that the culture in that canyon was ending. I suppose in another generation the canyon won´t be worth looking at - every second building a hotel or pizza joint. I couldn´t help but think of all the dying communities back in Newfoundland. Will Colca canyon be something like Trinity, where tourists flock every Sunday to chase university students, mocked up as fisherman, all through the town? You can´t blame people for wanting to move out of the canyon, or for staying and going after the tourist dollars. The tourists, well maybe you can blame us, but we mean no harm. This isn´t what we want. We leave home and travel thousands of miles hoping to find people and cultures unchanged and unspoilt by outside contact. Alas, we bring a little change, and even a little spoilage with us in our backpacks.

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Comments

[Eric]

I enjoyed your Peru post. It made me want to go back there. Our blog is giving away a free night at The Point hostel in Peru or Bolivia. If you are interested, check out dirty-hippies.blogspot.com Continued fun on your travels, Eric