Thanks to Mike and Leif for taking on the daunting task of blogging about our trek. Good men. And thorough.
And if you haven't quite had enough, here are a few of my highlighs from the trip:
- I was quite proud of my asthmatic lungs for chugging along and getting me up the mountains. I certainly wasn't running up the switchbacks, but I managed to make pretty good time. Altitude? Pshaw!
- In fact, the only time that I did feel the lethargic pull of altitude sickness was on day 4, when we weren't even up that high. I felt tired and nausious and had a 2000 meter climb ahead of me. I spent 4 hours hiking very slowly and stopping every few minutes to dry heave. Not the most fun, but at least the weather wasn´t too hot. The situation was remedied by lots of coca tea and sleep, and the next day I felt great.
- It was really awesome to pass through lots of different microclimates, and every day was diverse. All of the changes in vegetation gave us a great sampling of Peru, even though we only trekked through a relatively small area.
- You gotta love hiking and camping with the local farm animals! Pigs, chickens, dogs, cows, mules, etc. are always roaming around, and cows and bulls meander across the trails. On the 6th day I had a showdown with a very large bull with very pointy horns that was in no hurry to move off the narrow trail. The muleteers always throw stones at them, so I tossed a couple in his direction, but that only prompted him to turn to face me directly. The bull gave me a long stare, and I kind of just milled around trying not to provoke it, hoping it would just move on. When it started shaking its head around at me I got a little nervous. Fortunately the muleteers weren´t far behind, so when they came along the bull got hearded off into a field, where he mooed loudly at us as we passed.
- Aside from the evident awesomeness of Machu Piccu, one of my favorite parts about our visit there was the people watching. Seeing hoards of tourists of all ages and nationalities get hearded around by tour guides was highly entertaining.
After our whirlwind two weeks in Peru, it was time to head back to Ecuador. The wee village of Vilcabamba provided the perfect respite from the stresses of travel and the drone of big cities. The sleepy little village is quiet, relaxing, and surrounded by gorgeous mountains. Our 5 day stay in the Valley of Longevity (so called because of the high number of centenarians there) was not particularly eventful, which made it wonderful. German-owned Hosteria Izcayluma, 2k out of town, had comfy beds, plenty of hammocks, a variety of leisure activities, and a restaurant that had a panoramic view of the valley and served huge plates of excellent, cheap food. Ohhh, the food! We went straight for the German specialties (just a tad bit tired of rice, veggies, and white bread) and never looked back. Goulash. Stroganoff. Homemade spatzle. Mushroom sauce.
Oh, and we went hiking, too. Between our daily rounds of feasting we did manage to take in the natural splendor of the surrounding mountains. First up was a 4-hour hike along the ridge of Mandango, and oddly-shaped little mountain that rises above the village. After a hearty breakfast we set out into the hot, sunny morning and made our way up some steep switchbacks to the top of the ridge. 360 views of the surrounding valleys and villages, blue sky, blazing sun, soft green hills. We hike right along the ridge on a narrow trail (less than two feet wide in some spots, with fairly steep drops on either side). The little tufts of grass that cover the hills form interesting patterns in the surrounding landscape, which is dotted with cacti and agave. After a couple hours the trail leaves the ridge, passes through a farm with lots of cows, then intermittently dissapears as we follow a little stream. It had been raining alot in the days before we arrived, and parts of the trail are washed-out. An hour of scrambling through rocks and mud, and zig-zagging back and forth across the river. We make it back to the main road sweaty and hungry, and head back to the hosteria to make sandwiches for lunch, lounge in hammocks, play cards, relax, watch an afternoon thunderstorm.
Izcaylums seems to have monopolized on the trail system around Vilcabamba, having marked paths that loop around different parts of the surrounding area. There was a 6-hour hike to a waterfall that sounded appealing, but one of the girls who worked at the hostal told us it wasn´t all that great, but that there was a really cool spot where two rivers convege that we could hike to in about an hour. We could follow one of the marked trails to the spot where it meets up with the waterfall trail, check out the river, then continue on if we wanted. So we set out with map in hand, of through quaint little parts of the village, past houses and farms, over a few landslides (and one spot where the road had completely collapsed), down to one river, across a little footbridge, and into...someone´s yard. We slogged around through the tall, pointy grass that concealed the mud underneath, searching for the trail. No one was inside the house, so we poked around the back only to find a labrynth of banana trees and a fence. A mule brayed at us. We turned back. After some bushwhacking and a little scrambling we find what seems to be the trail, which we follow along until it too dissapears. We check the map again. We see where the trail should lead to, but there´s no way to get there. A steep drop-off and tall grass. After two hours of going nowhere we decide to turn back, feeling a little defeated. No river frolicking for us. Oh well...We head back to town for a burritos and ice cream, then back up the road to the hostal for more relaxation.
For Mike and me, Vilcabamba was our next-to last stop on our three month journey. We knew we wanted to head up to Cuenca for a few days before leaving from Quito, but it was hard to leave such a chill place. We debate about staying for another day, but ultimately decide we should move on. Because there had been so much rain, the roads to Loja and Cuenca had been riddled with landslides. There had been a break in the weather, though, so we waned to take advantage of passable roads while we could. During the 8-hour journey we definitely witnessed some sketchy areas (landslides, huge cracks in the road, chunks of road that were undercut and missing). The trip took and hour longer than it should´ve, but I´m glad we made it.
Now we´re kickin´it Cuenca, which is considered to be Ecuador´s finest city. Lovely colonial buildings, tiled roofs, cool markets and cafes. Sunday night we´ll take an overnight bus to Quito, spend a day in the city, and on Tuesday we´re off! Crazy...
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