Parque Lachay and Huacachina
After dragging ourselves away from paradise in Huaraz we made our way back down to sea level to the last possible stop before Lima to sleep. We ended up at a nature reserve known for its miniature animals and plant life. We heard lots of little animals, saw some giant birds, lots of fog and had a great night’s sleep. The next morning we woke up before the sun and started our drive to Lima. Unfortunately our random overheating problem decided to start again. After three stops to cool her down we finally pulled into a gas station and tried to bleed the coolant lines. No air bubbles came out so we decided to try our luck and start off again. We cautiously entered the Lima traffic and our luck held out, phewf. We managed to blow through Lima without any of the traffic issues we’d been warned about and made it all the way to Huacachina, a little desert oasis town surrounded by fine sand dunes and centred around a tiny fresh water lake(pond). It was a mini little paradise. We found a hostel that would let us camp on their lot and immediately went to the hammocks to chill out after a long hot day of driving. The second day we slept in, lounged poolside and then decided to do a sunset buggy tour of the dunes and go sandboarding. We’d heard lot’s of stories about how reckless the drivers are and how dodgy the sandboarding was and were a little nervous about the whole thing, but decided to go for it anyway. We all piled into the buggy and the driver took off at a great speed up a dune and then straight down the other side, gaining speed and hitting a banked turned at the bottom, WOOHOO!!! What a rush. Then we parked with all the other groups, waxed our boards and went for our first run. Luckily this stop only had two short runs to warm us up as sandboarding is tricky business. Then we hopped back in the buggy for another adrenaline rush with even steeper down hills. At times it felt as though there wasn’t anything beneath us as we crested the dune. Then we hit up a few more runs on the sandboard before we were taken to the grand finale. Here we were dropped at the top of a nearly vertical run. It was a little intimidating, but as we were the first ones there we rushed to put on our boards to get fresh lines. It was awesome!! We “carved” our way down with the sand avalanching down with us and then discovered we were at the top of the final run....WOAH!!! This one was massive, but again we had the chance fresh tracks so we went for it. Great fun! Only wish we’d had skis, hehehe. Then we waited at the bottom as all the other boarders came down. Luckily no one was hurt and there was only one major collision. Finally as the sun was setting we all piled back into the buggy and were taken for another rip. For the first time on the trip we both felt our stomachs drop and let out a bit of a scream. Then it was all over and we were taken back to the van. Now the next task began because for the first time in the entire trip we’d locked the keys in the van just before we left. Everyone gathered around and luckily we’d left a window open so with 6 people giving it a go were able to MacGyver our way into the van. After this adventure we bought a round of beers and then went into town for some food with the threesome from Argentina, Spain and Italy that were also staying at the hostel. What a mix of Spanish accents!!
The next morning we woke up early and went to meet Pedro, a local artisan we’d met in town who offered to take us to a remote village for an opportunity to meet some local people, tour the desert and go through an ancient San Pedro Cactus ritual. The day started with a trip into Ica to purchase the cactus and the offerings for Pacha Mama (Mother Earth) including sandalwood, coca leaves, pure alcohol, water, and two perfect apples. Ica isn’t the nicest town and we were taken to a witch market in the dodgiest section, but it was fascinating. Then we jumped into a taxi and headed into the desert. We pulled off the highway in what looked like the middle of nowhere and drove through the desert. Karen was feeling a little sceptical about this whole situation, but immediately felt better as soon as we arrived in Ocucaje. It was a dusty desert town where the people lived in shacks, but had huge smiles on their faces. We jumped out of the taxi and started walking even farther into nowhere. We were heading towards the house of an old man that Pedro had met on another visit. The cactus requires at least 7 hours of cooking and the old man had let Pedro use his stove on a previous occasion. The old man lived at the very end of the line and by the time we got there we were cooked by the sun and dehydrated. Welcome to the desert! Unfortunately he wasn’t home, but his son said that he would be home soon so we left our stuff there and went for another walk to the salt water oasis that these villages were based around. Along the way we were given permission to pick fruit off the trees. This included ciruela (in the plum family), pomegranates, and mango. The mango was so fresh and good you could eat the peel. Definitely the best mangoes we will ever encounter!! Covered in sticky fruit juice and mosquito bites we continued on our walk to the palm tree lined oasis. A lot of the lake had dried up so the ground was covered in a salt crust layer. It felt like we were on another planet. Then we headed back to the old man’s house only to discover he still hadn’t returned. Onto to plan B...we gave him our thanks and started the long, hot one hour slog back to the first village. We had to take a break from the sun so we stopped at someone’s house/store and grabbed some cokes and crackers. Slightly recharged we went back to the road where we were able to flag down a local fruit truck, phewf!! The pickers thought we were hilarious. They probably don’t see many gringos out here. They dropped us off back in town and we went to the house of another person that Pedro knew. Unfortunately the “man” of the house wasn’t home, but the wife set us up a little cooking fire outside and we started preparing the cactus. The entire family including all the cousins gathered around to chat with us and inquire as to what we were doing. They were so welcoming!! The kids all wanted to know our names and asked us tons of questions. We did the best we could to understand everything they were asking us as we removed the hard outer shell of the cactus and cut out the inner fruit. It was sticky business and took forever, but we eventually finished and the 7 hour cooking process began. Luckily Pedro manned the fire while we went and played with the kids. First off the entire gang grabbed hold of “Karina’s” (Karen’s name since we entered Mexico has been Karina as it is much easier for everyone to pronounce) hand and took her fruit picking which involved a lot of “Karina get this one, Karina this one” and so on. Then they returned and Karen took the girls off to teach them a game while Pete played soccer with the only young boy of the family. It was a blast and the kids loved hanging off of us and showing us around their community. Then we were fed a local mashed bean meal and took over watching the pot while Pedro snored away. Finally at 10:30pm all the kids had gone to bed and the brew was finally finished cooking. Another local woman came over with a blender to finish off the process and we said our thanks, promising to return for breakfast and headed into the mountains behind the village for the night. We were absolutely knackered at this point, but we made our offerings to Pacha Mama, drank the thick slime and went to bed envisioning the spiritual world. The mountain where we camped was an ancient burial ground for the preInca Pacaras and there were tons of dug up tombs as they were raided for their riches. It was also a site abundant with ancient fossils including crocodiles with fins and giant prehistoric sharks and whales. Most of these treasures have been stolen and sold on the black market, but they are still searching for more. It was a magical place! The next morning we got up, lazed around in the sun and then headed back into the village. We were both grabbed again to pick more fruit and then went back for some breakfast, unfortunately too tired to run and play more games. Then we jumped in a taxi and said our farewells. There was a lot of “Karina, Peter when are you coming back?? Karina, Peter stay!”, but it was time to leave. We felt truly blessed to have been able to meet these people and be taken into their home and community for a night. It was definitely an experience we will never forget. We arrived back in Huacachina and spent another day lazing around enjoying the day.
Nazca and Arequipa
The next morning we decided it was time to leave so we packed up, visited a grocery store and decided on a short day of driving to Nazca. The Nazca lines are world renowned figures drawn in the sand by preInca people between 900BC and 600AD. They were made by removing sun-darkened stones to reveal the lighter soil below. The lines are only visible from the air and therefore you have to take a flight to see them, although we did try from a nearby hill. Unfortunately we had been told about all the accidents that have happened here and how sick everyone gets in the rust bucket planes so we weren’t sure if we wanted to go. Then we found out that the price had just jumped from $50 to $75 for the half hour flight because of the deaths that had occurred only a month ago. Ummm thanks, but no thanks. Instead we got settled into the campsite, cooked up a good meal, played a game and went to bed to rest up for the long day ahead of us. We’d been debating which route to take to Cusco, but finally decided to drive the coastal road to Arequipa and then head up to Cusco. It was the safest route and the best road. The drive was stunning!! It snaked along the shore line, passing dunes which were at times swept across the road and dropped sharply into the Pacific. It was an 11 hour drive and we were exhausted by the time the road finally climbed up towards Arequipa. Then the construction began and we crawled along for about an hour and a half before finally arriving in Arequipa where we had to start looking for a place to stay. We lucked into a parkade (Playa in Peru) that would let us sleep in the car, right in the middle of town. We wandered into town for a bite to eat and then went back to the van for our imposed 9:30 curfew when the gates would lock us in. The next morning we went in search of spare parts for the van. Lucky for us South America organizes their streets so that every street has a theme. At first we thought this was crazy, but it is actually really smart and all you have to do is tell the taxi driver what you want and he’ll take you to that zone. So off we went to the spare parts zone where our search began. It’s been extremely difficult to find parts for a German van when all the vans down here are made in Brazil so in the long run all we got were rear shocks, but this is something we’ve needed since the start of the trip. Then we went back to town and Karen went to check out an Inca museum while Pete went looking for a voltage converter. It was a museum dedicated to the child sacrifices that had been made to appease the mountain gods in Inca times. It was really interesting and ended with a showing of one of the sacrifices that had been found frozen and perfectly preserved. What else do you do when faced with a smoking volcano, but think that the gods are angry with you and need a sacrifice. Then we cruised around town, went for another meal and then back to our parking lot for the night. Arequipa was our first colonial city in a long time and it was nice to be back.
Cusco
Peru is huge and there are long distances between everywhere we wanted to go so we decided to go for another 11 hour day to reach the Colonial town of Cusco, the previous capital of the Inca territory. Luckily we knew of a campground above town that accepted overlanders so we didn’t have to search for accommodation. We arrived just before dark, wound our way through the cobble stone streets and up into the hills above Cusco to Quinta Lala. It was a big grassy field with two other groups; one family from France in an old VW and another family from Switzerland. Good to know how easy it is to travel with kids!! We spent a few days hanging out here and going into town to check out the beautiful town and sort out how to get to Machu Picchu.
Machu Picchu
We finally decided on the easy route via the train and got a move on the next day. Due to all the wash outs and mud slides back in January the train no longer leaves from Cusco or Ollantaytambo. Now you have to catch a bus to Ollantaytambo and then another bus out to another town where there is a temporary train station to take you to Aguas Calientes. Unfortunately it was raining the day we left so when we arrived in Ollantaytambo even though it was a gorgeous little town we went and hid in a cafe where we whiled away the hours playing scrabble and drinking tea. Then we finally caught the Peru rail bus to head out to the station. In typical South America fashion the whole transport thing had not been thoroughly thought out and the 45 min bus ride turned into a 2.5 hour bus ride because there was a section on a single lane road that had been washed out and there were about 7 busses trying to go up and huge trucks trying to come down. The whole ordeal involved the constantly building traffic backing up on the narrow ledge to allow the other traffic to come down and then everyone fighting to get back onto the one lane road. No one can wait and so everyone gets jammed up again, windows get smashed out and all in all it took over 1.5 hours to get the whole thing sorted and get us back on the road. Luckily the train was also late so it all worked out well and we finally made it to Aguas Calientes around 10:00, found a cheap, but nice place to spend a few nights, had our first Pisco sour and crashed. It rained all night and was still raining in the morning so we decided on a late start and didn’t leave for Machu Picchu until around 9:00. The bus up cost $7 and so we decided to hike up. It was steep grind up high stepping, uneven stairs for about 1.5 hours but was well worth the climb when we got to the top. Machu Picchu is a truly magical place even in the rain and fog (maybe even more so). We decided to do the 1.5 hour climb up to the Intipunku (Sun Gate) for a magnificent view of the ruins to start the day. Unfortunately by the time we got there a cloud had descended and we could barely see each other let alone the ruins. We waited around for about 15 minutes and then decided to head back down. By the time we got back the cloud had lifted and we could see the ruins again, woohoo!! We spent the next 5 hours exploring the ruins first hand and doing another little walk out to the Inca bridge which is actually just a stone path built along a vertical cliff which allowed them to reach other towns along dodgy mountain trails. Holy surefooted people! It was a long day of climbing up and down giant Inca steps, but we were fascinated. Finally around 4:30 it started to rain again so we started the hike down. By the time we reached Aguas Calientes we were SOAKED!! We quickly found our hotel, took a shower and climbed into bed. Good thing we’d heard the food was super expensive and had brought lots of food because we didn’t have any dry clothes to leave the room in. The next morning was bright and sunny so we were able to dry out and enjoy a beautiful train ride back. Along the way we saw more ruins and more farming terraces with their ingenious steps built into the rock wall. When we got back to Ollantaytambo we spent a few hours exploring the narrow cobble walking streets and checking out the ruins before catching a cab back to Cusco. Lucky for us it was Sunday and on the way back our taxi driver agreed to stop at the colourful Sunday market in Chinchero to let us look around. Of course we got sucked in and bought a few souvenirs, but they were well worth it and the people were lovely. We were even fortunate enough to see a parade twirl its way through the crowd. It was well worth the stop even in our tired state, but by the time we reached Cusco we were done. We quickly went grocery shopping and hailed a cab back to the van to relax.
Lago Titicaca
We then spent a few more days relaxing, working on the blog and replacing the rear shocks (why didn’t we do this ages ago??). Every day we sat in the sun, surrounded by a morning stampede of llamas and could hear live music from town, what a place to spend a few days. Then it was time to move onto Bolivia. Our last night in Peru was spent on a beautiful point down a 1.5 hour dirt road right on Lago Titicaca. We were given quite a few strange looks as we drove through these tiny little farming villages, but when we rolled up to the spot where we could camp we were at peace. It was a great way to say goodbye to Peru. When we entered this country we couldn’t wait to get out, but once we got used to the landscape and poverty levels and met the friendly people of Peru we were sucked into their culture and didn’t want to leave.
“When you travel, remember that a foreign country is not designed to make you comfortable. It is designed to make its own people comfortable.” – Clifton Fadiman
“We live in a wonderful world that is full of beauty, charm and adventure. There is no end to the adventures we can have if only we seek them with our eyes open.” - Jawaharlal Nehru
To see a larger version of the pictures and read the captions just click on a photo to take you to the online version.
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Peru Part I
Piura
We were up before the sun had risen and were off to Peru. We only had gotten 10kms or so when we noticed that the temperature gage was above its normal position, we pushed on for another five minutes and then had to pull over for fear of overheating the engine. We checked the coolant level, and looked for leaks but everything appeared to be normal. Stumped and not sure what to do we sat on the side of the road for twenty minutes and then tried again, we headed in the direction of Loja where we could find mechanics and some help. We drove slowly and stared at the temperature gauge all the way to the border, but thankfully the gauge remained where it should be. The road from Loja to the border was a nightmare, full of pot holes, rocks, farm animals and lots of windy passes, not to mention a thick milky fog that limited our vision to a few metres. We finally reached the super mellow border crossing at Macara and after an hour or so we were in Peru. Just before leaving the customs office on the Peruvian side our customs officer came out to ask us a favour, he needed a ride back to Piura and the bus didn’t come for another few hours, so he hopped in the back and we gave him a ride. We were a bit overwhelmed and shocked at the drastic change from Ecuador to Peru, the landscape changed immediately from lush tropical forests to dry barren desert. The extreme poverty level also made us feel a bit uneasy, these people have literally nothing, living in small shacks made of wicker and bamboo in the middle of the most inhospitable dessert. We still have no idea how they eat or get water. Once again we were reminded how lucky we are in life. Once we arrived in Piura we found ourselves a cheap hostel with air conditioning where we relaxed and cooled off while watching some Latin T.V. Besides the proximity to a casino and the prostitutes near the entrance it wasn’t a bad place. At this point Pete was way over due for a hair cut so we made use of a pair of clippers that a fellow backpacker had given us and gave Pete his first buzz cut....WOAH!! Then we went into town to enjoy a meal and watch a parade in the streets.
Huanchaco and Barranca
Since Piura was kind of a hole we were happy to leave and head to the beach town of Huanchaco. It was a long and hot drive through more desert which kept getting drier and more desolate the further south we went. In Huanchaco we found a hotel which offered poolside camping so we didn’t hesitate to stay there. Since it was Samana Santa (Easter weekend) the beach was packed with Peruvian tourists and it was a blast people watching. While cruising the beach we were called over to join some Peruvians who were drinking and dancing to some live music on the beach, “bienvenidos a Peru.” They grabbed our hands and started swinging us around. They really got a kick out of Karen shaking her gringo hips, hehehe. Huanchaco isn’t the most attractive beach resort but it was a nice place to relax for a couple of days after two hard, hot days of driving. From Huanchaco we made our way to Huaraz with a stopover in Barranca, another beach town with far less appeal.
Huaraz
So far on this trip we’ve driven numerous mountain passes and been up to high elevations but none compared to the drive up to Huaraz. From sea level we drove up to over 4000 metres in about 100kms. Up and up we went, snaking our way through hundreds of switchbacks until we finally reached the summit and caught our first views of the Cordillera Huayhuash .These beautiful snow capped mountains reach heights of over 6000 metres and were worth a stop to take in the view and snap a few photos. When we got out of van we realized that we lost a hubcap on the rough pot holed road. After backtracking for a few minutes we found it balancing on top of a rock waiting for us to retrieve it. The rest of the road down to Huaraz was in very poor shape with so many potholes that it was impossible to dodge them all and as it turned out we lost another hubcap on the way. Huaraz is an ugly city in an amazing setting with the Cordillera Blanca to the east and the Cordillera Negra to the west. Pre 1970’s Huaraz had some colonial charm but there was an earthquake which caused a huge piece of a glacier to fall into an alpine lake which spilled over its banks causing an enormous land slide that wiped out the city. We spent a couple of nights in the city preparing to head out on the famous Santa Cruz trek. The night before we went trekking there was a heavy hail storm which flooded the streets and left piles of hail all over the city. We were a little worried about what we were getting ourselves into because it was still the rainy season and it is known to rain heavily every afternoon.
Laguna 69 and the Santa Cruz Trek
Instead of just doing the Santa Cruz trek we decided to combine it with the Laguna 69 hike. We caught a colectivo to Yungay and then a beat up taxi up into the park and to the trail head of Laguna 69. Here we stashed all of our overnight gear in the bushes and then hiked up to the lake. We’ve both seen many glacial lakes but this one was gorgeous, surrounded by 6000m peaks with a large waterfall plummeting into it, breathtaking! When we got back to the campsite we found our stuff in the bushes, set up camp and cooked up some dinner before going to bed. The next morning we packed up and waited on the side of the road for a colectivo or bus to pass. Fortunately a 4x4 drove by and picked us up, agreeing to drive us to Vaqueria for the same price as the bus. The rough, dirt road steadily climbed up to a 4700m pass through switchbacks, switchbacks and more switchbacks, looking down from the top the road looked like plate of spaghetti. Just as we crested the summit of the pass the truck ran out of gas... oh well we though, it’s all downhill from here. We coasted for a while before running into an empty petrol truck which had just dumped its load and was returning to Huaraz. Our driver stopped the tanker and managed to get the drags of the diesel from its empty tanks. Luckily it was just enough to get the pickup running again and get us to Vaqueria. Here we talked to some other hikers who had just finished the trek from the other direction, and they pointed us in the right direction. We hiked for a couple of hours until we arrived at a campsite where we set up camp by the river. We weren’t exactly sure where we were on the homemade map we had, but we were hoping that we were at the right campsite. After a relaxing lunch and time to dry everything out in the sun a group hiked by and Pete found out that we were actually an hour and a half shy of the campsite we intended to be at. With only a couple of hours of daylight left we decided to tear down camp and make our way further up the trail. At the next camp we spent the night with a couple of other tour groups, and ran into our friend Sara who we had befriended in Vilcabamba. Day three, our biggest day. We left camp and made our way up to the top of the pass. The trail was very rocky and muddy, which made travel slow and difficult. Even though we had heavy packs we were still quicker than most of the other tourists who had mules carrying all of their gear. The hike was gorgeous and it just kept getting better the higher we got. Fortunately the weather was nothing but blue sky with no rain clouds to be seen. When we finally reached the top of the pass at 4750 metres we took a long break and enjoyed the breathtaking views. You could count at least 15 peaks most of them over 6000 metres. It was like nothing we’d ever seen before, absolutely amazing. After relaxing and soaking up the sun we made our way down to camp number four. From here we had views of Alpamayo, a classic mountain here in the Cordillera Blanco, amongst other jagged snow capped peaks. Day four: the hike continued downhill past a couple of lakes until we reached a marsh. From here you had two options, either the longer dryer route around the marsh or straight through. We opted for taking our boots off and cutting straight through the marsh. After a total of six hours on the trail we arrived at the final campsite, which sat at the base of a huge waterfall and next to raging river. The end of the trail was less than two hours away but we were tired and decided to spend the night. It didn’t take long to realize that the black flies here were unbearable. Karen discovered this while relieving herself in the bushes, at first she thought she had sat on a cactus but then realized that her bare ass was covered in blood thirsty black flies. We spent the rest of the day hiding in the tent until they died off at dusk. Day Five: The final day. Only an hour and a half of hiking and we were done. We grabbed a colectivo and made our way back to Huaraz where we satisfied our hunger with a $ 1.50 lunch menu. What an awesome 5 days in the mountains!!!
The Way Inn
After another night in Huaraz we headed up the hill to check out The Way Inn lodge. This beautiful stone lodge sits at 3700 metres with the Cordillera Blanca right in its backyard. An absolutely gorgeous setting! To top it off this place has hot water, a wood stove, trout pond and a wood heated sauna. We knew right away we’d be staying for a while in this mountain paradise. We spent our days relaxing, hitting up the sauna, hiking, and bouldering. We also treated ourselves to an awesome trout dinner, fresh from the pond. One day we checked out Laguna Churup, and also ventured up to Montana Churupita, a peak that sits at 5035 metres. It was a long day but we were entertained by Albert and Princess two cute dogs from The Way Inn who joined us and made the hike look easy. After a week in heaven we busted a move and once again were south bound. We stopped at our favourite cafe in Huaraz, Cafe Andino, for some wifi to say happy birthday to Karen’s dad and a snack, then made our way to the coast. On the way we looked for our lost hubcap but soon gave up after stopping three times only to find other hubcaps which didn’t fit our rims.
Click on a photo to enlarge and see the captions
We were up before the sun had risen and were off to Peru. We only had gotten 10kms or so when we noticed that the temperature gage was above its normal position, we pushed on for another five minutes and then had to pull over for fear of overheating the engine. We checked the coolant level, and looked for leaks but everything appeared to be normal. Stumped and not sure what to do we sat on the side of the road for twenty minutes and then tried again, we headed in the direction of Loja where we could find mechanics and some help. We drove slowly and stared at the temperature gauge all the way to the border, but thankfully the gauge remained where it should be. The road from Loja to the border was a nightmare, full of pot holes, rocks, farm animals and lots of windy passes, not to mention a thick milky fog that limited our vision to a few metres. We finally reached the super mellow border crossing at Macara and after an hour or so we were in Peru. Just before leaving the customs office on the Peruvian side our customs officer came out to ask us a favour, he needed a ride back to Piura and the bus didn’t come for another few hours, so he hopped in the back and we gave him a ride. We were a bit overwhelmed and shocked at the drastic change from Ecuador to Peru, the landscape changed immediately from lush tropical forests to dry barren desert. The extreme poverty level also made us feel a bit uneasy, these people have literally nothing, living in small shacks made of wicker and bamboo in the middle of the most inhospitable dessert. We still have no idea how they eat or get water. Once again we were reminded how lucky we are in life. Once we arrived in Piura we found ourselves a cheap hostel with air conditioning where we relaxed and cooled off while watching some Latin T.V. Besides the proximity to a casino and the prostitutes near the entrance it wasn’t a bad place. At this point Pete was way over due for a hair cut so we made use of a pair of clippers that a fellow backpacker had given us and gave Pete his first buzz cut....WOAH!! Then we went into town to enjoy a meal and watch a parade in the streets.
Huanchaco and Barranca
Since Piura was kind of a hole we were happy to leave and head to the beach town of Huanchaco. It was a long and hot drive through more desert which kept getting drier and more desolate the further south we went. In Huanchaco we found a hotel which offered poolside camping so we didn’t hesitate to stay there. Since it was Samana Santa (Easter weekend) the beach was packed with Peruvian tourists and it was a blast people watching. While cruising the beach we were called over to join some Peruvians who were drinking and dancing to some live music on the beach, “bienvenidos a Peru.” They grabbed our hands and started swinging us around. They really got a kick out of Karen shaking her gringo hips, hehehe. Huanchaco isn’t the most attractive beach resort but it was a nice place to relax for a couple of days after two hard, hot days of driving. From Huanchaco we made our way to Huaraz with a stopover in Barranca, another beach town with far less appeal.
Huaraz
So far on this trip we’ve driven numerous mountain passes and been up to high elevations but none compared to the drive up to Huaraz. From sea level we drove up to over 4000 metres in about 100kms. Up and up we went, snaking our way through hundreds of switchbacks until we finally reached the summit and caught our first views of the Cordillera Huayhuash .These beautiful snow capped mountains reach heights of over 6000 metres and were worth a stop to take in the view and snap a few photos. When we got out of van we realized that we lost a hubcap on the rough pot holed road. After backtracking for a few minutes we found it balancing on top of a rock waiting for us to retrieve it. The rest of the road down to Huaraz was in very poor shape with so many potholes that it was impossible to dodge them all and as it turned out we lost another hubcap on the way. Huaraz is an ugly city in an amazing setting with the Cordillera Blanca to the east and the Cordillera Negra to the west. Pre 1970’s Huaraz had some colonial charm but there was an earthquake which caused a huge piece of a glacier to fall into an alpine lake which spilled over its banks causing an enormous land slide that wiped out the city. We spent a couple of nights in the city preparing to head out on the famous Santa Cruz trek. The night before we went trekking there was a heavy hail storm which flooded the streets and left piles of hail all over the city. We were a little worried about what we were getting ourselves into because it was still the rainy season and it is known to rain heavily every afternoon.
Laguna 69 and the Santa Cruz Trek
Instead of just doing the Santa Cruz trek we decided to combine it with the Laguna 69 hike. We caught a colectivo to Yungay and then a beat up taxi up into the park and to the trail head of Laguna 69. Here we stashed all of our overnight gear in the bushes and then hiked up to the lake. We’ve both seen many glacial lakes but this one was gorgeous, surrounded by 6000m peaks with a large waterfall plummeting into it, breathtaking! When we got back to the campsite we found our stuff in the bushes, set up camp and cooked up some dinner before going to bed. The next morning we packed up and waited on the side of the road for a colectivo or bus to pass. Fortunately a 4x4 drove by and picked us up, agreeing to drive us to Vaqueria for the same price as the bus. The rough, dirt road steadily climbed up to a 4700m pass through switchbacks, switchbacks and more switchbacks, looking down from the top the road looked like plate of spaghetti. Just as we crested the summit of the pass the truck ran out of gas... oh well we though, it’s all downhill from here. We coasted for a while before running into an empty petrol truck which had just dumped its load and was returning to Huaraz. Our driver stopped the tanker and managed to get the drags of the diesel from its empty tanks. Luckily it was just enough to get the pickup running again and get us to Vaqueria. Here we talked to some other hikers who had just finished the trek from the other direction, and they pointed us in the right direction. We hiked for a couple of hours until we arrived at a campsite where we set up camp by the river. We weren’t exactly sure where we were on the homemade map we had, but we were hoping that we were at the right campsite. After a relaxing lunch and time to dry everything out in the sun a group hiked by and Pete found out that we were actually an hour and a half shy of the campsite we intended to be at. With only a couple of hours of daylight left we decided to tear down camp and make our way further up the trail. At the next camp we spent the night with a couple of other tour groups, and ran into our friend Sara who we had befriended in Vilcabamba. Day three, our biggest day. We left camp and made our way up to the top of the pass. The trail was very rocky and muddy, which made travel slow and difficult. Even though we had heavy packs we were still quicker than most of the other tourists who had mules carrying all of their gear. The hike was gorgeous and it just kept getting better the higher we got. Fortunately the weather was nothing but blue sky with no rain clouds to be seen. When we finally reached the top of the pass at 4750 metres we took a long break and enjoyed the breathtaking views. You could count at least 15 peaks most of them over 6000 metres. It was like nothing we’d ever seen before, absolutely amazing. After relaxing and soaking up the sun we made our way down to camp number four. From here we had views of Alpamayo, a classic mountain here in the Cordillera Blanco, amongst other jagged snow capped peaks. Day four: the hike continued downhill past a couple of lakes until we reached a marsh. From here you had two options, either the longer dryer route around the marsh or straight through. We opted for taking our boots off and cutting straight through the marsh. After a total of six hours on the trail we arrived at the final campsite, which sat at the base of a huge waterfall and next to raging river. The end of the trail was less than two hours away but we were tired and decided to spend the night. It didn’t take long to realize that the black flies here were unbearable. Karen discovered this while relieving herself in the bushes, at first she thought she had sat on a cactus but then realized that her bare ass was covered in blood thirsty black flies. We spent the rest of the day hiding in the tent until they died off at dusk. Day Five: The final day. Only an hour and a half of hiking and we were done. We grabbed a colectivo and made our way back to Huaraz where we satisfied our hunger with a $ 1.50 lunch menu. What an awesome 5 days in the mountains!!!
The Way Inn
After another night in Huaraz we headed up the hill to check out The Way Inn lodge. This beautiful stone lodge sits at 3700 metres with the Cordillera Blanca right in its backyard. An absolutely gorgeous setting! To top it off this place has hot water, a wood stove, trout pond and a wood heated sauna. We knew right away we’d be staying for a while in this mountain paradise. We spent our days relaxing, hitting up the sauna, hiking, and bouldering. We also treated ourselves to an awesome trout dinner, fresh from the pond. One day we checked out Laguna Churup, and also ventured up to Montana Churupita, a peak that sits at 5035 metres. It was a long day but we were entertained by Albert and Princess two cute dogs from The Way Inn who joined us and made the hike look easy. After a week in heaven we busted a move and once again were south bound. We stopped at our favourite cafe in Huaraz, Cafe Andino, for some wifi to say happy birthday to Karen’s dad and a snack, then made our way to the coast. On the way we looked for our lost hubcap but soon gave up after stopping three times only to find other hubcaps which didn’t fit our rims.
Click on a photo to enlarge and see the captions
Thursday, April 1, 2010
Ecuador Part II
Still in Ibarra...Lago Cuicocha and Volcan Cotacachi
After 2 days of testing, our mechanic #2, Bolivar, was still convinced that our problem was due to the ECU so we finally succumbed to tow #3 and took her out to see mechanic #3 Juan Carlos. Unfortunately it was Friday so we had another weekend to wait before we could get any info so we decided to go for another hike. One of the many volcanoes that had enticed us from Ibarra was Volcan Cotacachi so away we went. We took the bus back to Cotacachi and then a taxi ride to Lago Cuicocha and started hiking. After about 2 hours we reached a beautiful shelter on the crater rim and decided this would be a perfect spot for the night. We admired the lake with its two volcanic peaks in the centre while watching the fog roll in and then set up camp. This time we remembered cards to pass the time so we could stay up to a reasonable hour as it gets dark here around 6:30. Then in the middle of the night we were woken up by the sound of thunder nearby. We were a bit concerned as we were camping under a metal roof, but decided to wait it out. It was intense for awhile, but then started to fade away when all of a sudden the storm was on top of us. We scrambled out of the tent and stood there in indecision. Freeze our butts off in the rain or risk electrocution. Luckily the weather made our minds up for us and the storm moved off again, phewf! We had planned on waking up early to hit up the summit, but after our restless sleep we decided to sleep a little longer. We finally got up around 7 noticed that our metal roof was actually clay, packed up and headed off. We weren’t sure where the trail started, but there was a road that went up so up we went. 3 hours later we finally got to the trail head, but so did the fog. After a short prayer to the Virgin Mary for clear skies (see photos) we decided to see how far we could get. It was an awesome trail, but it just kept getting windier, wetter and more socked in the farther we went. After another 2 hours of hiking and scrambling we reached a camp where it was so windy we had to erect the group’s blown over tents. The weather was fowl and we still had to hike back down so reluctantly we turned around. It was a long hike out and about half way down the road, just as we were starting to think about how we could fly out the rest of the way a saviour in a jeep drove down and picked us up!! Even better he was heading all the way back to Ibarra!! It was two local hikers who had also been turned back due to snow a little higher then we’d gotten. Exhausted they dropped us off at our favourite grocery store where we stocked up and took a cab back to Graham’s. Monday morning we wanted to give the mechanic a chance to look at her so we decided to walk up to our favourite restaurant overlooking Ibarra with Oliver and Carina. We relaxed and enjoyed some awesome crepes and the beautiful views. Then Graham showed up and we went for a drive up and over the mountain. What an incredible experience. The people in these countries are so tough that they farm on nearly vertical slopes where I have no idea how the stand up let alone plant crops!! It was a beautiful journey and something that we wouldn’t have done on our own. Another benefit of being “stuck” in Ibarra. The trip ended up taking longer than we thought and by the time we were down the mechanic’s shop was closing, but he said to come tomorrow for a “test drive”. That sounded promising, but we didn’t want to get too excited. The next morning we woke up and headed out to pick up the van or at least figure out what was going on. When we got there we were handed the keys and told to take her for a spin....WHAT?!?!?! Could it really be that easy? We looked at each other and then jumped in the driver’s seat and sure enough she ran! We took her for a drive with one of the young apprentices and eventually the strange knocking stopped and we were set! He did something with the ECU and replaced all of our cracking fuel lines. Still not 100% sure what the problem was, but pretty sure something shorted out the ECU. We drove her back to Ibarra totally in shock that we were back on the road, arrived at Graham’s and started the long process of packing her back up.
Mitad del Mundo and Quito
As if in a dream 3 weeks, 3 tows and 3 mechanics later and we were finally saying our farewells. We were so lucky to have met Graham and had the opportunity to stay at his place. He is incredibly welcoming and has such a big heart. We learned a lot about the community and met a lot of the single mothers that he helps out. What a guy!! Karen’s brother Dan only had one request from this trip and it was that we take a picture of the equator for him so off we went on a detour. After asking a million people for directions we finally ended up on the right road to the Mitad del Mundo (Middle of the world). The first place we came to was the giant monument set up by gringos in 1979, but they were off by about 240m. Then we went to the Intiñan Solar Museum built on the GPS calculated equator and enjoyed an amazing tour of not only cheap equator tricks like balancing an egg, walking a straight line, water going down the drain (straight down, counter and clock-wise), and strength tests but also a great tour of the different cultures in Ecuador. Our tour guide was an archeologist and loved his country so was super informative. We were also introduced to the art of head shrinking. An ancient practice no longer allowed on human heads, but still done on sloths and other animals. It was fascinating!! Although we were 2 days early for the big equinox celebration, bummer.
After a few hours we finally left the Equator and entered the SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE!! We got on an amazing highway passing through Quito and thought all was going to go smoothly until we hit a detour and were taken right into the heart of old Quito with it’s windy streets and one way streets that run into each other. We finally made our way out of the old part and were trying to find our way out of the city when the van started running rough and then died!! Luckily we were right beside a parking spot under an overpass and were able to coast in. CRAP!! Not only did it seem to be the same problem, but we were in the worst part of Quito a city we had no desire to visit and the sun was setting. Pete went to phone our helpful mechanic and Karen went to talk to a police officer about getting a tow. The police officer told Karen that because we were in a bad part of town no tow truck would come, what?? Luckily we then went to talk to a transit cop and he called for a police tow to come to our rescue. 15 minutes later our 4th tow arrived and we were driven around searching for an open mechanic shop. We drove around forever and then finally found an open door and were delivered into what would be our oily home for the next 2 nights. The owner kindly said that we could sleep in the lot, but told us not to go outside the gates at night because it was too dangerous. Our mechanic from Ibarra had told Pete that he was going to come and help us out on Saturday so we fended off the local mechanics and went to sleep. The next day our mechanic decided that he wouldn’t come until Sunday so we went to explore Quito. We wandered around for awhile and then ended up in a pub in mall land. Here we met Drew from Calgary who ordered us a pitcher and was great to chat with for the next couple of hours. So nice to take our minds off things. Back to our slum for another surprisingly good night sleep despite it also being a truck and bus parking lot for an early wake up to wait for our mechanic. After a bit of a communication problem he finally arrived at 9:30 with his entire family and got to work. After a short investigation he discovered it was our ignition coil that we’d just replaced before the trip with a cheap Chinese imitation part. He sent his family off to find us a real German part and we waited. They returned, he popped in the part and we were off and running again. We couldn’t believe it wasn’t the same problem, but were relieved it wasn’t. It was still early so we decided to get out of our grease pit and hit the road.
Quilotoa
Our original destination when we left Ibarra was Quilotoa so we got back on track. The route from Latacunga to Quilotoa was one of the most breathtaking drives we’ve done so far. Full of beautiful farmland, people and rolling green hills. We even picked up a local and he told us all about the different crops planted in the area. Then we arrived in the tiny town of Quilotoa and were greeted by all the friendly indigenous people there (who wanted us to buy their stuff) and went to look at the Crater Lake. You can’t see anything until you are right at the crater rim, but when you get there the view is breathtaking. We’ve seen a lot of crater lakes, but this one is stunning!! We wandered around taking pictures of the setting sun and fog and then met two other couples staying at one of the hostels. They invited us over for a drink and we all cozied up by the fire and chatted about travelling before heading back to the van for a peaceful night’s sleep. The next morning we met pack up with the rest of the group and took off for a 5 hour hike around the crater. It was a beautiful hike up and down ridges, through sand and farmer’s fields. By the time we got back it was starting to rain and we were all starving so we popped in for a bite to eat and then scammed the hostel’s shower before playing a rousing game of dice and enjoying an awesome meal. The next morning 8 of us piled in the van and headed back to the Panamerican. It was our first time with this many passengers, but Patience did awesome.
Banos
Next stop, the small town of Banos for a healing soak in the thermal waters. They were hot, awesome and very much needed. The next day we decided to rent bikes and go for a 30km waterfall tour. We passed tons of waterfalls, rode through and by 1km long tunnels and enjoyed some scenic detours. It was a beautiful ride, but way too long for Karen’s poor butt, hehehe. That night we treated ourselves to one too many amazing margaritas and had some mouth watering fajitas at the cutest Mexican restaurant.
Banos #2 and Cuenca
Just when we were raving about the roads in Ecuador we hit the road to Cuenca, yikes! Detours, construction and potholes. It took us 10 hours before we finally found a place to stay in Banos #2. It was a little more expensive then we were used to at $10 a person, but we got to use their hot pools, steam bath and hot showers so in the long run we got our money’s worth and more!! We’d originally been searching for a place we’d heard about near Cuenca so the next morning we resumed the search. Thank goodness we’d given up looking the night before because it took us forever to find! We eventually pulled into the unmarked driveway and headed in to explore Cuenca. It was a beautiful city, but everything seemed to be closed. We’d heard about some amazing climbing in the area so as always we went in search of the nearest climbing store where we always seem to encounter the friendliest people. This time was no different and at Monodedo we met Xavier, a fellow climber who offered us a ride home, a cheap canyoning tour the next day, a place to park and a chance to go climbing on Sunday...WOW!!! The next morning we got up early and went to meet the crew. It turned out we were going with the producer and star of an Ecuadorian adventure show who’d done the tour while filming and were coming back to take their American friend Chris on the trip. Since we were all experienced Xavier and his brother decided we should do the entire canyon instead of the normal route. Perfect! We drove and hiked up and to the start of the canyon and jumped in, literally. We were both starting to wonder what we’d gotten ourselves into especially since this was the coldest water we’d ever been in, but went with it. It was amazing!! We rappelled down 140ft waterfalls, jumped off rocks, slid down rock slides and shivered our way through 1km of beautiful Ecuadorian canyon. It was brutally cold and by the time we crawled out we were all shaking and turning blue, but were happy. We were all starving so Xavier took us to a steak house for the cheapest and best steak of the trip! Then we followed him back to his house where we met his family, bouldered around on his homemade wall and played board games with his son Amaru. Such a wonderful family and a dream home! The next morning we had a slow start and then met up with the gang to do some climbing. As always we were a bit sandbagged, but we struggled our way up a few amazing climbs and then went back to Xavier’s house for another night. The people that we have met on this trip have truly blown us away with their kindness and this was no exception. We have a lot of pay back to give when we finally get a house!
Vilcabamba
It was a hard decision to leave Cuenca, but fortunately the weather made it easy for us and we woke up to grey skies to push us on our way. Though not before we enjoyed a leisurely morning and big breakfast made in a real kitchen. The next destination was Vilcabamba and luckily the road was much easier to get there although we were now experiencing squeaky brakes. We hope that this isn’t due to the dodgy tow. Only time will tell. We arrived at the beautiful hostel Ishcayluma where they welcome overlanders into their parking lot with power, hot showers, a pool, beautiful views and awesome restaurant. We cooked up an amazing meal, had a glass of wine and unwound. The next day we scammed the awesome free breakfast and took off for a hike up to Mandango (the protective sleeping Inca) mountain for a little exercise and some amazing views of the valley. We managed to dodge the bulls on the trail and route find our way back to the hostel for a swim and a steaming hot shower. After an involuntary nap we went to the hostel bar and met up with three fellow travellers for a Caiprinia and a chat. The next day Pete went for a run and Karen enjoyed a super cheap 75 minute massage. That night we had an awesome German meal and then hung around soaking in the atmosphere. So nice!! We were going to leave the next day, but the facilities were so nice and it was time to get caught up on the blog so here we are hanging out one more day in paradise before another border crossing and our 11th country...Peru!!
Click on a photo to enlarge and see the captions.
After 2 days of testing, our mechanic #2, Bolivar, was still convinced that our problem was due to the ECU so we finally succumbed to tow #3 and took her out to see mechanic #3 Juan Carlos. Unfortunately it was Friday so we had another weekend to wait before we could get any info so we decided to go for another hike. One of the many volcanoes that had enticed us from Ibarra was Volcan Cotacachi so away we went. We took the bus back to Cotacachi and then a taxi ride to Lago Cuicocha and started hiking. After about 2 hours we reached a beautiful shelter on the crater rim and decided this would be a perfect spot for the night. We admired the lake with its two volcanic peaks in the centre while watching the fog roll in and then set up camp. This time we remembered cards to pass the time so we could stay up to a reasonable hour as it gets dark here around 6:30. Then in the middle of the night we were woken up by the sound of thunder nearby. We were a bit concerned as we were camping under a metal roof, but decided to wait it out. It was intense for awhile, but then started to fade away when all of a sudden the storm was on top of us. We scrambled out of the tent and stood there in indecision. Freeze our butts off in the rain or risk electrocution. Luckily the weather made our minds up for us and the storm moved off again, phewf! We had planned on waking up early to hit up the summit, but after our restless sleep we decided to sleep a little longer. We finally got up around 7 noticed that our metal roof was actually clay, packed up and headed off. We weren’t sure where the trail started, but there was a road that went up so up we went. 3 hours later we finally got to the trail head, but so did the fog. After a short prayer to the Virgin Mary for clear skies (see photos) we decided to see how far we could get. It was an awesome trail, but it just kept getting windier, wetter and more socked in the farther we went. After another 2 hours of hiking and scrambling we reached a camp where it was so windy we had to erect the group’s blown over tents. The weather was fowl and we still had to hike back down so reluctantly we turned around. It was a long hike out and about half way down the road, just as we were starting to think about how we could fly out the rest of the way a saviour in a jeep drove down and picked us up!! Even better he was heading all the way back to Ibarra!! It was two local hikers who had also been turned back due to snow a little higher then we’d gotten. Exhausted they dropped us off at our favourite grocery store where we stocked up and took a cab back to Graham’s. Monday morning we wanted to give the mechanic a chance to look at her so we decided to walk up to our favourite restaurant overlooking Ibarra with Oliver and Carina. We relaxed and enjoyed some awesome crepes and the beautiful views. Then Graham showed up and we went for a drive up and over the mountain. What an incredible experience. The people in these countries are so tough that they farm on nearly vertical slopes where I have no idea how the stand up let alone plant crops!! It was a beautiful journey and something that we wouldn’t have done on our own. Another benefit of being “stuck” in Ibarra. The trip ended up taking longer than we thought and by the time we were down the mechanic’s shop was closing, but he said to come tomorrow for a “test drive”. That sounded promising, but we didn’t want to get too excited. The next morning we woke up and headed out to pick up the van or at least figure out what was going on. When we got there we were handed the keys and told to take her for a spin....WHAT?!?!?! Could it really be that easy? We looked at each other and then jumped in the driver’s seat and sure enough she ran! We took her for a drive with one of the young apprentices and eventually the strange knocking stopped and we were set! He did something with the ECU and replaced all of our cracking fuel lines. Still not 100% sure what the problem was, but pretty sure something shorted out the ECU. We drove her back to Ibarra totally in shock that we were back on the road, arrived at Graham’s and started the long process of packing her back up.
Mitad del Mundo and Quito
As if in a dream 3 weeks, 3 tows and 3 mechanics later and we were finally saying our farewells. We were so lucky to have met Graham and had the opportunity to stay at his place. He is incredibly welcoming and has such a big heart. We learned a lot about the community and met a lot of the single mothers that he helps out. What a guy!! Karen’s brother Dan only had one request from this trip and it was that we take a picture of the equator for him so off we went on a detour. After asking a million people for directions we finally ended up on the right road to the Mitad del Mundo (Middle of the world). The first place we came to was the giant monument set up by gringos in 1979, but they were off by about 240m. Then we went to the Intiñan Solar Museum built on the GPS calculated equator and enjoyed an amazing tour of not only cheap equator tricks like balancing an egg, walking a straight line, water going down the drain (straight down, counter and clock-wise), and strength tests but also a great tour of the different cultures in Ecuador. Our tour guide was an archeologist and loved his country so was super informative. We were also introduced to the art of head shrinking. An ancient practice no longer allowed on human heads, but still done on sloths and other animals. It was fascinating!! Although we were 2 days early for the big equinox celebration, bummer.
After a few hours we finally left the Equator and entered the SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE!! We got on an amazing highway passing through Quito and thought all was going to go smoothly until we hit a detour and were taken right into the heart of old Quito with it’s windy streets and one way streets that run into each other. We finally made our way out of the old part and were trying to find our way out of the city when the van started running rough and then died!! Luckily we were right beside a parking spot under an overpass and were able to coast in. CRAP!! Not only did it seem to be the same problem, but we were in the worst part of Quito a city we had no desire to visit and the sun was setting. Pete went to phone our helpful mechanic and Karen went to talk to a police officer about getting a tow. The police officer told Karen that because we were in a bad part of town no tow truck would come, what?? Luckily we then went to talk to a transit cop and he called for a police tow to come to our rescue. 15 minutes later our 4th tow arrived and we were driven around searching for an open mechanic shop. We drove around forever and then finally found an open door and were delivered into what would be our oily home for the next 2 nights. The owner kindly said that we could sleep in the lot, but told us not to go outside the gates at night because it was too dangerous. Our mechanic from Ibarra had told Pete that he was going to come and help us out on Saturday so we fended off the local mechanics and went to sleep. The next day our mechanic decided that he wouldn’t come until Sunday so we went to explore Quito. We wandered around for awhile and then ended up in a pub in mall land. Here we met Drew from Calgary who ordered us a pitcher and was great to chat with for the next couple of hours. So nice to take our minds off things. Back to our slum for another surprisingly good night sleep despite it also being a truck and bus parking lot for an early wake up to wait for our mechanic. After a bit of a communication problem he finally arrived at 9:30 with his entire family and got to work. After a short investigation he discovered it was our ignition coil that we’d just replaced before the trip with a cheap Chinese imitation part. He sent his family off to find us a real German part and we waited. They returned, he popped in the part and we were off and running again. We couldn’t believe it wasn’t the same problem, but were relieved it wasn’t. It was still early so we decided to get out of our grease pit and hit the road.
Quilotoa
Our original destination when we left Ibarra was Quilotoa so we got back on track. The route from Latacunga to Quilotoa was one of the most breathtaking drives we’ve done so far. Full of beautiful farmland, people and rolling green hills. We even picked up a local and he told us all about the different crops planted in the area. Then we arrived in the tiny town of Quilotoa and were greeted by all the friendly indigenous people there (who wanted us to buy their stuff) and went to look at the Crater Lake. You can’t see anything until you are right at the crater rim, but when you get there the view is breathtaking. We’ve seen a lot of crater lakes, but this one is stunning!! We wandered around taking pictures of the setting sun and fog and then met two other couples staying at one of the hostels. They invited us over for a drink and we all cozied up by the fire and chatted about travelling before heading back to the van for a peaceful night’s sleep. The next morning we met pack up with the rest of the group and took off for a 5 hour hike around the crater. It was a beautiful hike up and down ridges, through sand and farmer’s fields. By the time we got back it was starting to rain and we were all starving so we popped in for a bite to eat and then scammed the hostel’s shower before playing a rousing game of dice and enjoying an awesome meal. The next morning 8 of us piled in the van and headed back to the Panamerican. It was our first time with this many passengers, but Patience did awesome.
Banos
Next stop, the small town of Banos for a healing soak in the thermal waters. They were hot, awesome and very much needed. The next day we decided to rent bikes and go for a 30km waterfall tour. We passed tons of waterfalls, rode through and by 1km long tunnels and enjoyed some scenic detours. It was a beautiful ride, but way too long for Karen’s poor butt, hehehe. That night we treated ourselves to one too many amazing margaritas and had some mouth watering fajitas at the cutest Mexican restaurant.
Banos #2 and Cuenca
Just when we were raving about the roads in Ecuador we hit the road to Cuenca, yikes! Detours, construction and potholes. It took us 10 hours before we finally found a place to stay in Banos #2. It was a little more expensive then we were used to at $10 a person, but we got to use their hot pools, steam bath and hot showers so in the long run we got our money’s worth and more!! We’d originally been searching for a place we’d heard about near Cuenca so the next morning we resumed the search. Thank goodness we’d given up looking the night before because it took us forever to find! We eventually pulled into the unmarked driveway and headed in to explore Cuenca. It was a beautiful city, but everything seemed to be closed. We’d heard about some amazing climbing in the area so as always we went in search of the nearest climbing store where we always seem to encounter the friendliest people. This time was no different and at Monodedo we met Xavier, a fellow climber who offered us a ride home, a cheap canyoning tour the next day, a place to park and a chance to go climbing on Sunday...WOW!!! The next morning we got up early and went to meet the crew. It turned out we were going with the producer and star of an Ecuadorian adventure show who’d done the tour while filming and were coming back to take their American friend Chris on the trip. Since we were all experienced Xavier and his brother decided we should do the entire canyon instead of the normal route. Perfect! We drove and hiked up and to the start of the canyon and jumped in, literally. We were both starting to wonder what we’d gotten ourselves into especially since this was the coldest water we’d ever been in, but went with it. It was amazing!! We rappelled down 140ft waterfalls, jumped off rocks, slid down rock slides and shivered our way through 1km of beautiful Ecuadorian canyon. It was brutally cold and by the time we crawled out we were all shaking and turning blue, but were happy. We were all starving so Xavier took us to a steak house for the cheapest and best steak of the trip! Then we followed him back to his house where we met his family, bouldered around on his homemade wall and played board games with his son Amaru. Such a wonderful family and a dream home! The next morning we had a slow start and then met up with the gang to do some climbing. As always we were a bit sandbagged, but we struggled our way up a few amazing climbs and then went back to Xavier’s house for another night. The people that we have met on this trip have truly blown us away with their kindness and this was no exception. We have a lot of pay back to give when we finally get a house!
Vilcabamba
It was a hard decision to leave Cuenca, but fortunately the weather made it easy for us and we woke up to grey skies to push us on our way. Though not before we enjoyed a leisurely morning and big breakfast made in a real kitchen. The next destination was Vilcabamba and luckily the road was much easier to get there although we were now experiencing squeaky brakes. We hope that this isn’t due to the dodgy tow. Only time will tell. We arrived at the beautiful hostel Ishcayluma where they welcome overlanders into their parking lot with power, hot showers, a pool, beautiful views and awesome restaurant. We cooked up an amazing meal, had a glass of wine and unwound. The next day we scammed the awesome free breakfast and took off for a hike up to Mandango (the protective sleeping Inca) mountain for a little exercise and some amazing views of the valley. We managed to dodge the bulls on the trail and route find our way back to the hostel for a swim and a steaming hot shower. After an involuntary nap we went to the hostel bar and met up with three fellow travellers for a Caiprinia and a chat. The next day Pete went for a run and Karen enjoyed a super cheap 75 minute massage. That night we had an awesome German meal and then hung around soaking in the atmosphere. So nice!! We were going to leave the next day, but the facilities were so nice and it was time to get caught up on the blog so here we are hanging out one more day in paradise before another border crossing and our 11th country...Peru!!
Click on a photo to enlarge and see the captions.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Ecuador Part I
Ibarra, Ecuador
When we pulled into the line up at the border we immediately recognized Oliver and Carina’s Camper only a few cars ahead of us, so Karen jumped out and surprised them. The Border crossing was Quick and easy, a nice change from Central America. The Germans knew of a place to camp for free in Ibarra so we followed them up a long rough road that eventually led to a nice property at the base of Volcan Imbabura . When we arrived the incredibly friendly Australian owner Graham had no problems with us camping on his property. He has a beautiful lot overlooking the city, and it is also home to a small tree nursery. Here, we also met Peter, another German who is riding a motorcycle solo around S.A. and yet another German couple travelling by luxurious motor home. Oliver and Carina had to buy bus tickets in the city so Graham offered to give us a lift to town in the back of his pickup. After they bought their tickets he drove us up to a beautiful restaurant overlooking the city, here we watched the dramatic sun set and then had a nice meal while watching the sky change colours and the buildings in the city light up. What a magical welcome into Ecuador. For the next couple of days we relaxed at Graham’s and got caught up on a few things. Then we decided to get a bit of exercise and go for a hike up to Imbabura, a 4630m. volcano behind the house. We packed all of our overnight gear and were off. Graham drove us up the road until he ran out of gas and then we continued on from there. It was a hot day and we were not accustomed to the altitude so we moved very slowly. By the time we reached camp at 4260m. we were both exhausted, dehydrated and starting to cramp up. We set up camp took in the views, had some dinner and were in the tent before dark just to keep warm. The night dragged on for what seemed like days, we both lied there restlessly tossing and turning waiting for the sun to rise, at one point we thought it was around 6 am only to be disappointed when the clock read 1:30. When we finally got up we skipped breakfast and were off for the summit. On our way up we had a huge condor circle overhead and check us out, our first condor sighting! We arrived at the false summit and realized that we would have to traverse a long way around the whole crater to get to the real summit. At this point the clouds were moving in quickly and we lost all of our visibility especially Karen who’s glasses were completely fogged up. We decided to keep going, but then only a hundred or two hundred meters from the top we had to head back before we got completely soaked. We took a quick break in the tent to warm up then packed out and headed down. The down is always more punishing than the way up so we were looking forward to catching the bus down near where Graham had dropped us off. Unfortunately though the bus went by when we were cutting off a switch back and since there are only two busses a day we had to walk the entire road back to Grahams place, it was 2200m top to bottom and an extra 10k or so, which took us forever.
The next day we were walking like we were ninety, barely able to step out of the van without grimacing in pain, so we decided to visit the hot springs. Thirty something kilometres later and we were soaking in the hot waters of Arco Iris. After two relaxing hours at the hot springs we started to make our way back to Ibarra. But only one kilometre from the springs the van stalled and we lost all power. Luckily we coasted off the road into a safe pullout, where we began to investigate the problem. Within minutes we had a couple of locals helping us and calling their mechanic friend who showed up minutes later to see if he could help. Josef was studying at a mechanic institute in Ibarra and seemed trustworthy. He thought that the problem was coming from the distributor (hall sender), so he took it with him to see if he could find a part, while we were stranded on the side of the road for the night. Luckily it was a very safe and tranquil town where the locals were chatty and no one bothered us. The only down side was that there was a decaying dog carcass beside us that smelled awful. A few beers and some cribbage passed the time before we fell asleep. Then at eight am the following morning Josef returned with our distributor, no new parts but he did clean it up so we tried it again. And again we had no luck; it would turn over but wouldn’t start. We decided to tow it back to Ibarra, but found out that a proper tow truck would cost $120.00 so we opted for plan B which was to tow it behind a pickup with an old decrepit rope. We let Josef take the wheel since we had never done a tow like this before. For the next couple of twisting up and down highway hours Josef wore out our brakes, but we survived. Then when we arrived in Ibarra we were surprised that the van was running, Josef had tried jumping it on the way a few times and it finally caught. We still wanted to go to the mechanic’s, but Josef said “it’s running isn’t it?” so we drove it back to Grahams with spongy brakes. Once at Grahams we turned off the engine and fired it up twice, with no issues, problem solved. The next morning we woke up and decided to be safe and take her to the mechanics, but she had another idea....she wouldn’t start. The Germans and Graham all had a look at it and did some tests and once again it seemed to be the distributor, it wasn’t delivering a spark. So we took the part down town to see if we could get another one or get it repaired, we found a VW store where we could order parts but first we took it to an electrical mechanic to get it tested. After a quick unconvincing test he said that it was fine. We then had him make a house call and look at the van, where he said the problem was in the computer. He got us to take the computer to a friend of his outside of town to see if he could take a look at it, but when we arrived he said that he couldn’t do anything without the car, and he also didn’t believe that it was the computer that was broken. We could bring the car back to him on Monday if we wanted (a $70.00 tow at least). We decided to order in a hall sender and wait for it’s arrival after the weekend.
Cotacachi and Otavalo
We were starting to get itchy feet so we took a bus to Cotacachi for one night, it’s a small town known for it’s Sunday leather market. We spent the afternoon wandering the main street looking at all of the different leather products, our intensions were to buy some small things but when we saw all of the beautiful jackets we knew we had to get one for each of us. Hours and hours of shopping and we finally found some that fit our tall and lanky long armed bodies. Unfortunately we liked the most expensive jackets that we had seen, isn’t that always the way. They ended up dropping the price of the two jackets by $170.00 so we decided to buy them, at a great price. We didn’t bring enough cash with us because we weren’t intending on buying anything expensive, so we had to visit the bank machine, we tried all three in town and none of them worked. So we had to wait till the morning to try them again which also gave us time to think about our potential purchases. The next morning we still were interested in those jackets so we tried the ATMs again and were once again denied. We decided to take a bus to the nearby town of Otavalo to try the ATMs there. Otavalo is known for it’s huge Saturday artisan market, and is quite touristy. The first machine we tried spat out $20 bills with no problems. After an hour of exploring Otavalo (and buying some nice art) we went back to Cotacatchi where we paid for our jackets. We still had our eye on a few other leather pieces so we threw caution to the wind and bought 2 stools, a wallet, a purse, and a cowboy hat for Pete. We just couldn’t turn down the awesome prices for beautiful leather! It was our first splurge of the trip and well worth it.
Back to Ibarra
We returned back to Ibarra refreshed and had high hopes for the new part the following day. The next morning we headed into town and were reminded that we were in Ecuador...they ordered the wrong part!! Hmmm, what to do. We decided to go back to the VW dealership to see if they could get the part, but of course everything closes for 1.5 hours for lunch so we went grocery shopping instead. We decided were done wandering around aimlessly so we went back to Graham’s to rejuvenate. Karen then went with Graham to help a friend make puppets and Pete worked on the blog. With a bit of time off from thinking about our problem we came up with a plan...tow to the mechanic and let him give it a go in the morning. Graham said he’d do the towing so the next morning Patience got hooked back up and off we went. We unhooked for the downhills and made it through town pretty smoothly and Patience is now in the competent hands of Bolivar. Only time will tell....
Click on a picture to enlarge.
When we pulled into the line up at the border we immediately recognized Oliver and Carina’s Camper only a few cars ahead of us, so Karen jumped out and surprised them. The Border crossing was Quick and easy, a nice change from Central America. The Germans knew of a place to camp for free in Ibarra so we followed them up a long rough road that eventually led to a nice property at the base of Volcan Imbabura . When we arrived the incredibly friendly Australian owner Graham had no problems with us camping on his property. He has a beautiful lot overlooking the city, and it is also home to a small tree nursery. Here, we also met Peter, another German who is riding a motorcycle solo around S.A. and yet another German couple travelling by luxurious motor home. Oliver and Carina had to buy bus tickets in the city so Graham offered to give us a lift to town in the back of his pickup. After they bought their tickets he drove us up to a beautiful restaurant overlooking the city, here we watched the dramatic sun set and then had a nice meal while watching the sky change colours and the buildings in the city light up. What a magical welcome into Ecuador. For the next couple of days we relaxed at Graham’s and got caught up on a few things. Then we decided to get a bit of exercise and go for a hike up to Imbabura, a 4630m. volcano behind the house. We packed all of our overnight gear and were off. Graham drove us up the road until he ran out of gas and then we continued on from there. It was a hot day and we were not accustomed to the altitude so we moved very slowly. By the time we reached camp at 4260m. we were both exhausted, dehydrated and starting to cramp up. We set up camp took in the views, had some dinner and were in the tent before dark just to keep warm. The night dragged on for what seemed like days, we both lied there restlessly tossing and turning waiting for the sun to rise, at one point we thought it was around 6 am only to be disappointed when the clock read 1:30. When we finally got up we skipped breakfast and were off for the summit. On our way up we had a huge condor circle overhead and check us out, our first condor sighting! We arrived at the false summit and realized that we would have to traverse a long way around the whole crater to get to the real summit. At this point the clouds were moving in quickly and we lost all of our visibility especially Karen who’s glasses were completely fogged up. We decided to keep going, but then only a hundred or two hundred meters from the top we had to head back before we got completely soaked. We took a quick break in the tent to warm up then packed out and headed down. The down is always more punishing than the way up so we were looking forward to catching the bus down near where Graham had dropped us off. Unfortunately though the bus went by when we were cutting off a switch back and since there are only two busses a day we had to walk the entire road back to Grahams place, it was 2200m top to bottom and an extra 10k or so, which took us forever.
The next day we were walking like we were ninety, barely able to step out of the van without grimacing in pain, so we decided to visit the hot springs. Thirty something kilometres later and we were soaking in the hot waters of Arco Iris. After two relaxing hours at the hot springs we started to make our way back to Ibarra. But only one kilometre from the springs the van stalled and we lost all power. Luckily we coasted off the road into a safe pullout, where we began to investigate the problem. Within minutes we had a couple of locals helping us and calling their mechanic friend who showed up minutes later to see if he could help. Josef was studying at a mechanic institute in Ibarra and seemed trustworthy. He thought that the problem was coming from the distributor (hall sender), so he took it with him to see if he could find a part, while we were stranded on the side of the road for the night. Luckily it was a very safe and tranquil town where the locals were chatty and no one bothered us. The only down side was that there was a decaying dog carcass beside us that smelled awful. A few beers and some cribbage passed the time before we fell asleep. Then at eight am the following morning Josef returned with our distributor, no new parts but he did clean it up so we tried it again. And again we had no luck; it would turn over but wouldn’t start. We decided to tow it back to Ibarra, but found out that a proper tow truck would cost $120.00 so we opted for plan B which was to tow it behind a pickup with an old decrepit rope. We let Josef take the wheel since we had never done a tow like this before. For the next couple of twisting up and down highway hours Josef wore out our brakes, but we survived. Then when we arrived in Ibarra we were surprised that the van was running, Josef had tried jumping it on the way a few times and it finally caught. We still wanted to go to the mechanic’s, but Josef said “it’s running isn’t it?” so we drove it back to Grahams with spongy brakes. Once at Grahams we turned off the engine and fired it up twice, with no issues, problem solved. The next morning we woke up and decided to be safe and take her to the mechanics, but she had another idea....she wouldn’t start. The Germans and Graham all had a look at it and did some tests and once again it seemed to be the distributor, it wasn’t delivering a spark. So we took the part down town to see if we could get another one or get it repaired, we found a VW store where we could order parts but first we took it to an electrical mechanic to get it tested. After a quick unconvincing test he said that it was fine. We then had him make a house call and look at the van, where he said the problem was in the computer. He got us to take the computer to a friend of his outside of town to see if he could take a look at it, but when we arrived he said that he couldn’t do anything without the car, and he also didn’t believe that it was the computer that was broken. We could bring the car back to him on Monday if we wanted (a $70.00 tow at least). We decided to order in a hall sender and wait for it’s arrival after the weekend.
Cotacachi and Otavalo
We were starting to get itchy feet so we took a bus to Cotacachi for one night, it’s a small town known for it’s Sunday leather market. We spent the afternoon wandering the main street looking at all of the different leather products, our intensions were to buy some small things but when we saw all of the beautiful jackets we knew we had to get one for each of us. Hours and hours of shopping and we finally found some that fit our tall and lanky long armed bodies. Unfortunately we liked the most expensive jackets that we had seen, isn’t that always the way. They ended up dropping the price of the two jackets by $170.00 so we decided to buy them, at a great price. We didn’t bring enough cash with us because we weren’t intending on buying anything expensive, so we had to visit the bank machine, we tried all three in town and none of them worked. So we had to wait till the morning to try them again which also gave us time to think about our potential purchases. The next morning we still were interested in those jackets so we tried the ATMs again and were once again denied. We decided to take a bus to the nearby town of Otavalo to try the ATMs there. Otavalo is known for it’s huge Saturday artisan market, and is quite touristy. The first machine we tried spat out $20 bills with no problems. After an hour of exploring Otavalo (and buying some nice art) we went back to Cotacatchi where we paid for our jackets. We still had our eye on a few other leather pieces so we threw caution to the wind and bought 2 stools, a wallet, a purse, and a cowboy hat for Pete. We just couldn’t turn down the awesome prices for beautiful leather! It was our first splurge of the trip and well worth it.
Back to Ibarra
We returned back to Ibarra refreshed and had high hopes for the new part the following day. The next morning we headed into town and were reminded that we were in Ecuador...they ordered the wrong part!! Hmmm, what to do. We decided to go back to the VW dealership to see if they could get the part, but of course everything closes for 1.5 hours for lunch so we went grocery shopping instead. We decided were done wandering around aimlessly so we went back to Graham’s to rejuvenate. Karen then went with Graham to help a friend make puppets and Pete worked on the blog. With a bit of time off from thinking about our problem we came up with a plan...tow to the mechanic and let him give it a go in the morning. Graham said he’d do the towing so the next morning Patience got hooked back up and off we went. We unhooked for the downhills and made it through town pretty smoothly and Patience is now in the competent hands of Bolivar. Only time will tell....
Click on a picture to enlarge.
Friday, February 26, 2010
Colombia Part III
Medellin
Luckily Yon has an apartment in Medellin as well so he invited us to the city for the weekend. It was about time to get moving, but yet another hard place to leave. El Penol will always be a special place for us! The morning we decided to leave we had a big breakfast, swam and did some minor repairs on the old girl before setting off. Then after a few fruit stops we arrived in the sprawling city of Medellin. One of the cleanest and most modern cities we’ve visited thus far. It’s in a deep valley so they’ve solved the transportation problem by building an above ground metro that leads to a metrocable which is essentially a Gondola that they use as public transportation. Great idea!! When we got to the apartment we had some take out Chinese food and then went to meet a friend that Pete had met in Colombia 13 years ago. Her family welcomed us in and fed us a wonderful traditional Colombian meal finished off with some Mazamorra, a milk drink filled with corn and served with a panela square for dessert. After dinner we bid our adieus and went to meet Yon downtown for some salsa dancing. He took us to this amazing little underground club where they were pumping great salsa tunes and there were some amazing dancers. The ceiling wasn’t built for tall people, but it was a great night out!! The next day Yon took us on the tour of the city. We started off with a hike up behind his apartment building for a great view of the city and then we jumped on the Metro. For $0.75 you can ride the rails all day so we took advantage of this for a skyline tour of the city. The metrocable that we rode went up to the athlete’s village, but went over top of the poorest sections of town. It was odd having a bird’s eye view of places you wouldn’t necessarily want to walk through. Then we returned to town to see the statues outside of the Botero museum, a police procession to signify the end of needless deaths in Colombia and have a quick bite before heading to our first giant supermarket in a long time. We were awed by the selection of foods and even managed to find some couscous. Luckily we were picked up by a friend of Yon’s and went back to his apartment for a big fish fry up. Yon’s mom taught us how to eat every part of the fish including the eyeball! We ended up spending over a week with Yon and his mom and by the end we felt more like family then travellers. Thank you so much for taking us in!!!
Salento
After Medellin we made our way down to Salento, in the Zona Cafetera. On our way we got lost in Pereira and couldn’t find our way out of the city. We finally found our way out on a back road and were now racing the sun as it was setting quickly. We agreed to take the first accommodation that we would find to avoid driving around in the dark. We pulled up to the first campground and were surprised by how nice it was. It was next to a river and had many private sites, hot water and outdoor kitchens. After Jorge, the eccentric owner and his co worker properly welcomed us they gave us the full tour of the campground. We were blown away by all of the theme tents and cabanas, the museum, spa and snake pit. The next morning we were invited by a Colombian family to join them for a hike up to a secret waterfall. After 45 minutes of beautiful hiking through farm fields and old rail tunnels we arrived at the falls. The water was Canada cold, a nice way to recharge from the heat and humidity. One night at Monteroca (the campground) turned into four. One day we made a day trip into Salento to check out the artisan shops and go for dinner but for the rest of the time we relaxed at Monteroca all by ourselves.
Popoyan, Impiales
In the heaviest downpour that we’ve experienced so far we headed to Popoyan, a colonial city on the way to the Ecuadorian border. When we got there we found a parkade close to downtown that would let us sleep there for the night, it was perfect only $3.25 and it had a toilet. That evening we got caught in another rainstorm but luckily we had just purchased umbrellas only minutes before. They kept our hair dry but our feet were soaked from the roads that now resembled rivers. The next morning we got up early and took off for Pasto. When we got there neither of us had any desire to stay so we kept driving and chanced upon an old timers restaurant where he told us we should park in his alleyway for the night. Lucky!
We had high expectations for Colombia and it managed to exceed every single one. We’ll be back!!
Click on a picture to enlarge
Luckily Yon has an apartment in Medellin as well so he invited us to the city for the weekend. It was about time to get moving, but yet another hard place to leave. El Penol will always be a special place for us! The morning we decided to leave we had a big breakfast, swam and did some minor repairs on the old girl before setting off. Then after a few fruit stops we arrived in the sprawling city of Medellin. One of the cleanest and most modern cities we’ve visited thus far. It’s in a deep valley so they’ve solved the transportation problem by building an above ground metro that leads to a metrocable which is essentially a Gondola that they use as public transportation. Great idea!! When we got to the apartment we had some take out Chinese food and then went to meet a friend that Pete had met in Colombia 13 years ago. Her family welcomed us in and fed us a wonderful traditional Colombian meal finished off with some Mazamorra, a milk drink filled with corn and served with a panela square for dessert. After dinner we bid our adieus and went to meet Yon downtown for some salsa dancing. He took us to this amazing little underground club where they were pumping great salsa tunes and there were some amazing dancers. The ceiling wasn’t built for tall people, but it was a great night out!! The next day Yon took us on the tour of the city. We started off with a hike up behind his apartment building for a great view of the city and then we jumped on the Metro. For $0.75 you can ride the rails all day so we took advantage of this for a skyline tour of the city. The metrocable that we rode went up to the athlete’s village, but went over top of the poorest sections of town. It was odd having a bird’s eye view of places you wouldn’t necessarily want to walk through. Then we returned to town to see the statues outside of the Botero museum, a police procession to signify the end of needless deaths in Colombia and have a quick bite before heading to our first giant supermarket in a long time. We were awed by the selection of foods and even managed to find some couscous. Luckily we were picked up by a friend of Yon’s and went back to his apartment for a big fish fry up. Yon’s mom taught us how to eat every part of the fish including the eyeball! We ended up spending over a week with Yon and his mom and by the end we felt more like family then travellers. Thank you so much for taking us in!!!
Salento
After Medellin we made our way down to Salento, in the Zona Cafetera. On our way we got lost in Pereira and couldn’t find our way out of the city. We finally found our way out on a back road and were now racing the sun as it was setting quickly. We agreed to take the first accommodation that we would find to avoid driving around in the dark. We pulled up to the first campground and were surprised by how nice it was. It was next to a river and had many private sites, hot water and outdoor kitchens. After Jorge, the eccentric owner and his co worker properly welcomed us they gave us the full tour of the campground. We were blown away by all of the theme tents and cabanas, the museum, spa and snake pit. The next morning we were invited by a Colombian family to join them for a hike up to a secret waterfall. After 45 minutes of beautiful hiking through farm fields and old rail tunnels we arrived at the falls. The water was Canada cold, a nice way to recharge from the heat and humidity. One night at Monteroca (the campground) turned into four. One day we made a day trip into Salento to check out the artisan shops and go for dinner but for the rest of the time we relaxed at Monteroca all by ourselves.
Popoyan, Impiales
In the heaviest downpour that we’ve experienced so far we headed to Popoyan, a colonial city on the way to the Ecuadorian border. When we got there we found a parkade close to downtown that would let us sleep there for the night, it was perfect only $3.25 and it had a toilet. That evening we got caught in another rainstorm but luckily we had just purchased umbrellas only minutes before. They kept our hair dry but our feet were soaked from the roads that now resembled rivers. The next morning we got up early and took off for Pasto. When we got there neither of us had any desire to stay so we kept driving and chanced upon an old timers restaurant where he told us we should park in his alleyway for the night. Lucky!
We had high expectations for Colombia and it managed to exceed every single one. We’ll be back!!
Click on a picture to enlarge
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Colombia Part II
Suesca
Off we went on another caravan journey with Max with the destination of Suesca, a climbing spot that we had heard was the best in Colombia. The owner of the hostel where we were staying gave us backroad directions to get there and it felt as though we were in rural Colombia seeing life in the mountains. It was gorgeous! When we finally got to Suesca we stopped for some amazing pizza and then looked around for somewhere to stay. We finally found the only hostel, El Vivac, in town and they said we could camp in their yard. Typical with a climbing community the owners were really hospitable and had lots of information for us so we parked and packed up to go for a climb. After following the train tracks for awhile we arrived at the wall. The most notable feature was a giant statue of the Virgin Mary watching from one of the overhanging roofs. We chose a climb to the right and played around for the next few hours. So good to be back on the rock again. The next morning we met Katty (the first Colombian woman to scale Everest) and Francesco who offered to show us around the rock. We spent another awesome day climbing and then met Carolina, an Argentinean at the end of the day who offered to take us around to find a free place to camp. Perfect! The next day we gave our surf board that we’d been lugging around since Mexico to the family who owned the hostel and moved over to Juan Carlos’s place....paradise!! We camped on his lot with a full frontal view of the rock, had access to running water and a bathroom. What more could we ask for!! Then we went for a climb up to a zone with more sport climbing and thoroughly pumped ourselves out. Good day!
Bogota
It was now the weekend so Max, Carolina and the two of us decided to hit up Bogota, the country’s capital. We’d heard that the drivers there were the worst in the world so we opted for a bus ride into town and wandered around the craziness for awhile. Then we stumbled upon the Candeleria district and were enchanted. We’d planned to meet up with a friend of Max’s, Wilman, a local from Bogota that Max had met in Mexico so he came and picked us up in his little sports car and proceeded to give us a whirlwind tour of all the highlights in Bogota. We’d spend about 5 minutes in each location and then be whisked off to another hot spot. It was madness, but a great way to see Bogota. The city is huge and has absolutely everything you could ever want including a super cool student scene with back alleys and street performers. Then we started drinking beers in front of a few different supermercados, meeting other locals and chatting the night away. The next day we started with an incredible typical breakfast of Tamales and hot chocolate and then went to a juice stand to sample some more of the fruits that Colombia has to offer. Everyday we discover a new fruit!! Then we went to the famous gold museum to see some ancient artefacts. We were especially interested in the finds from La Ciudad Perdida. Then we went for an awesome lunch of the usual...an absolutely amazing soup, meat, chorizo, plantains, rice, avocado, and this time a surprise blood sausage intestine thing that wasn’t too bad. Then stuffed to the brim we wandered around the huge park before heading back to the apartment to lame out and watch a movie. It’s a treat to chill out on a couch what can I say, hehehe. The next morning we needed some time to ourselves to we took the bus into the Candeleria district to do some wandering around and loved every minute of it. Carolina was having troubles getting an extension on her visa so we opted to take the bus back to Suesca early to avoid rush hour. Big thanks to Wilman and his daughter for showing us Bogota. It was so nice having local guides for such a big city and to feel so welcome into someone’s house.
Back to Suesca
We ended up spending another three nights in Suesca and had a hard time leaving when we did. Juan Carlos was so hospitable and his property was amazing!! Probably the best view in all of Suesca and super close to the sport climbing. He’s also a well known climbing shoe repairer so Karen took advantage of this to finally get an edge on her shoes, woohoo!! Three more days of climbing and we were spent. It reminded us a lot of climbing in Wyoming as we were the only ones there and it was so peaceful. We spent one more day lounging and exploring the town and then finally pushed on to El Penol.
Rio Claro and El Penol
It’s a two day drive to El Penol so we started off early, but decided we should check out the salt cathedral in Zipaquira on the way. The first church collapsed due to rain so another giant salt mine was used to construct an underground cathedral. It was huge, with cool lighting and music. It wasn’t quite what we were expecting, but it was definitely an interesting tour testing our knowledge of Spanish. An hour and a half later we were back on the road to El Penol. The roads here are insanely mountainous and curvy so it took us over 5 hours to go just over 100km before we stopped at a hillside refugio to camp for the night. The next day we made it to our original destination of Rio Claro and decided to stop for a few hours to cool off and enjoy the “agua dulce” (sweet water ie fresh water). It ended up being an amazing park with a jungle trail and cool caves. We even saw a huge fluorescent green snake. We finally pulled ourselves away from the refreshing water and drove the rest of the way to El Penol. We had made friends in Suesca with Yon the only climber in the region and he’d said that it would be okay to camp in his yard. He lives on the site of old El Penol which was flooded to make a reservoir. You can still see the Steeple of the original church sticking out of the water. We arrived just after lunch so we went into Guatape to use the internet and do some shopping and then returned and let ourselves in. It turned out that Yon was in the city, but his mom and dogs were there and they welcomed us in with open arms. LOVE COLOMBIANS!!! We spent the night getting to know the dogs and Socorro and then went to sleep with the view of El Penol in the van window. Ever since we entered Colombia Pete has had the idea of climbing El Penol and it was about to become a reality, hehe. We woke up early and took off with grey skies to the base. Welcome to the Squamish chief of Colombia. A huge granite slab with a few routes put up by Yon. We selected a few that looked doable and started climbing. On the second route the rain started, but Pete continued on while Karen got soaked at the bottom. Then it was Karen’s turn. Written by Karen: When I got near the top of this awesome climb Pete told me there was a surprise in one of the cracks. Since the climbs are really only done by Yon and a few weekend warriors there are a lot of spider’s and insects in all of the holds so I thought he’d found some massive spider or something gross so I refused to go any higher. Pete finally convinced me to take a look and there deep in the crack was a shiny object. I still didn’t know what to think of it and thought that it must have been something Pete had found on the climb, but then I pulled it out and it was a ring. Still not realizing what was happening I heard Pete say “will you marry me” I thought he was joking, but then I looked down and there he was on one knee, thankfully still belaying me. I asked if he was serious and he said of course he was serious and that it was our “five year anniversary, five months into the trip and it was Valentine’s Day. What a better time to do it” and so I started laughing and shouted “Of course I will, I’d love to be your wife, now get me down!!” It’s finally done...we’re getting married and we’re both really excited!!! Now we just have to figure out where and when...maybe a welcome home/wedding party this summer. Any ideas? It started to pour so we decided to pack it in and go back to the van. Then we went to town to call the folks, get haircuts and check out the military song and dance show. Afterwards we returned to the house and spent the night chatting with Socorro about Colombia.
The next day we went back up to the rock and spent the whole day slab climbing. When we returned to the van we ate some dinner and Yon arrived. He wanted to kayak out to “his island” for the sunset and a bonfire so we cleaned up and hit the water. Since he was taking the dogs we had to do two trips,I waited while Karen, Yon and the dogs paddled off. When Yon returned for the second trip the dogs swam all theway back to the mainland and followed him home. Then on the way back to the island Mujercita, one of his dogs, followed us back and swam all the way back to the Island, crazy dog. We had a fire and sat around, talked and enjoyed the silence of nature. The following morning Yon took us climbing, we started on an easy climb then moved on to a three pitch traverse that ended at a hammock that was hanging 70 feet off the ground under a giant roof. Even though we were safely backed up we were a little nervous not knowing if this hammock could hold the weight of three people, good thing we are all skinny. We enjoyed the scenery and took some photos before rappelling down. Back at Yon’s place we all went for a refreshing swim in the reservoir and relaxed for the rest of the day. The next day everyone including the dogs piled into the van and drove down to San Rafeal, where we went swimming at a secret swimming hole, ate fresh fruit off the trees and then went for some lunch at a local restaurant. It was a great day with Yon and his mom. They are so warm and welcoming that we felt like we were old friends.
Loving Colombia! Not sure if we are ever going to be able to leave...
Click on a picture to enlarge
Off we went on another caravan journey with Max with the destination of Suesca, a climbing spot that we had heard was the best in Colombia. The owner of the hostel where we were staying gave us backroad directions to get there and it felt as though we were in rural Colombia seeing life in the mountains. It was gorgeous! When we finally got to Suesca we stopped for some amazing pizza and then looked around for somewhere to stay. We finally found the only hostel, El Vivac, in town and they said we could camp in their yard. Typical with a climbing community the owners were really hospitable and had lots of information for us so we parked and packed up to go for a climb. After following the train tracks for awhile we arrived at the wall. The most notable feature was a giant statue of the Virgin Mary watching from one of the overhanging roofs. We chose a climb to the right and played around for the next few hours. So good to be back on the rock again. The next morning we met Katty (the first Colombian woman to scale Everest) and Francesco who offered to show us around the rock. We spent another awesome day climbing and then met Carolina, an Argentinean at the end of the day who offered to take us around to find a free place to camp. Perfect! The next day we gave our surf board that we’d been lugging around since Mexico to the family who owned the hostel and moved over to Juan Carlos’s place....paradise!! We camped on his lot with a full frontal view of the rock, had access to running water and a bathroom. What more could we ask for!! Then we went for a climb up to a zone with more sport climbing and thoroughly pumped ourselves out. Good day!
Bogota
It was now the weekend so Max, Carolina and the two of us decided to hit up Bogota, the country’s capital. We’d heard that the drivers there were the worst in the world so we opted for a bus ride into town and wandered around the craziness for awhile. Then we stumbled upon the Candeleria district and were enchanted. We’d planned to meet up with a friend of Max’s, Wilman, a local from Bogota that Max had met in Mexico so he came and picked us up in his little sports car and proceeded to give us a whirlwind tour of all the highlights in Bogota. We’d spend about 5 minutes in each location and then be whisked off to another hot spot. It was madness, but a great way to see Bogota. The city is huge and has absolutely everything you could ever want including a super cool student scene with back alleys and street performers. Then we started drinking beers in front of a few different supermercados, meeting other locals and chatting the night away. The next day we started with an incredible typical breakfast of Tamales and hot chocolate and then went to a juice stand to sample some more of the fruits that Colombia has to offer. Everyday we discover a new fruit!! Then we went to the famous gold museum to see some ancient artefacts. We were especially interested in the finds from La Ciudad Perdida. Then we went for an awesome lunch of the usual...an absolutely amazing soup, meat, chorizo, plantains, rice, avocado, and this time a surprise blood sausage intestine thing that wasn’t too bad. Then stuffed to the brim we wandered around the huge park before heading back to the apartment to lame out and watch a movie. It’s a treat to chill out on a couch what can I say, hehehe. The next morning we needed some time to ourselves to we took the bus into the Candeleria district to do some wandering around and loved every minute of it. Carolina was having troubles getting an extension on her visa so we opted to take the bus back to Suesca early to avoid rush hour. Big thanks to Wilman and his daughter for showing us Bogota. It was so nice having local guides for such a big city and to feel so welcome into someone’s house.
Back to Suesca
We ended up spending another three nights in Suesca and had a hard time leaving when we did. Juan Carlos was so hospitable and his property was amazing!! Probably the best view in all of Suesca and super close to the sport climbing. He’s also a well known climbing shoe repairer so Karen took advantage of this to finally get an edge on her shoes, woohoo!! Three more days of climbing and we were spent. It reminded us a lot of climbing in Wyoming as we were the only ones there and it was so peaceful. We spent one more day lounging and exploring the town and then finally pushed on to El Penol.
Rio Claro and El Penol
It’s a two day drive to El Penol so we started off early, but decided we should check out the salt cathedral in Zipaquira on the way. The first church collapsed due to rain so another giant salt mine was used to construct an underground cathedral. It was huge, with cool lighting and music. It wasn’t quite what we were expecting, but it was definitely an interesting tour testing our knowledge of Spanish. An hour and a half later we were back on the road to El Penol. The roads here are insanely mountainous and curvy so it took us over 5 hours to go just over 100km before we stopped at a hillside refugio to camp for the night. The next day we made it to our original destination of Rio Claro and decided to stop for a few hours to cool off and enjoy the “agua dulce” (sweet water ie fresh water). It ended up being an amazing park with a jungle trail and cool caves. We even saw a huge fluorescent green snake. We finally pulled ourselves away from the refreshing water and drove the rest of the way to El Penol. We had made friends in Suesca with Yon the only climber in the region and he’d said that it would be okay to camp in his yard. He lives on the site of old El Penol which was flooded to make a reservoir. You can still see the Steeple of the original church sticking out of the water. We arrived just after lunch so we went into Guatape to use the internet and do some shopping and then returned and let ourselves in. It turned out that Yon was in the city, but his mom and dogs were there and they welcomed us in with open arms. LOVE COLOMBIANS!!! We spent the night getting to know the dogs and Socorro and then went to sleep with the view of El Penol in the van window. Ever since we entered Colombia Pete has had the idea of climbing El Penol and it was about to become a reality, hehe. We woke up early and took off with grey skies to the base. Welcome to the Squamish chief of Colombia. A huge granite slab with a few routes put up by Yon. We selected a few that looked doable and started climbing. On the second route the rain started, but Pete continued on while Karen got soaked at the bottom. Then it was Karen’s turn. Written by Karen: When I got near the top of this awesome climb Pete told me there was a surprise in one of the cracks. Since the climbs are really only done by Yon and a few weekend warriors there are a lot of spider’s and insects in all of the holds so I thought he’d found some massive spider or something gross so I refused to go any higher. Pete finally convinced me to take a look and there deep in the crack was a shiny object. I still didn’t know what to think of it and thought that it must have been something Pete had found on the climb, but then I pulled it out and it was a ring. Still not realizing what was happening I heard Pete say “will you marry me” I thought he was joking, but then I looked down and there he was on one knee, thankfully still belaying me. I asked if he was serious and he said of course he was serious and that it was our “five year anniversary, five months into the trip and it was Valentine’s Day. What a better time to do it” and so I started laughing and shouted “Of course I will, I’d love to be your wife, now get me down!!” It’s finally done...we’re getting married and we’re both really excited!!! Now we just have to figure out where and when...maybe a welcome home/wedding party this summer. Any ideas? It started to pour so we decided to pack it in and go back to the van. Then we went to town to call the folks, get haircuts and check out the military song and dance show. Afterwards we returned to the house and spent the night chatting with Socorro about Colombia.
The next day we went back up to the rock and spent the whole day slab climbing. When we returned to the van we ate some dinner and Yon arrived. He wanted to kayak out to “his island” for the sunset and a bonfire so we cleaned up and hit the water. Since he was taking the dogs we had to do two trips,I waited while Karen, Yon and the dogs paddled off. When Yon returned for the second trip the dogs swam all theway back to the mainland and followed him home. Then on the way back to the island Mujercita, one of his dogs, followed us back and swam all the way back to the Island, crazy dog. We had a fire and sat around, talked and enjoyed the silence of nature. The following morning Yon took us climbing, we started on an easy climb then moved on to a three pitch traverse that ended at a hammock that was hanging 70 feet off the ground under a giant roof. Even though we were safely backed up we were a little nervous not knowing if this hammock could hold the weight of three people, good thing we are all skinny. We enjoyed the scenery and took some photos before rappelling down. Back at Yon’s place we all went for a refreshing swim in the reservoir and relaxed for the rest of the day. The next day everyone including the dogs piled into the van and drove down to San Rafeal, where we went swimming at a secret swimming hole, ate fresh fruit off the trees and then went for some lunch at a local restaurant. It was a great day with Yon and his mom. They are so warm and welcoming that we felt like we were old friends.
Loving Colombia! Not sure if we are ever going to be able to leave...
Click on a picture to enlarge
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Colombia Part I
Cartagena
After an hour and a half in the air we caught our first sight of Cartagena. It was a mix of everything, high-rise apartments, hotels, yacht clubs, ports, suburbia and the magical old city surrounded by its fortress walls. We grabbed a taxi to Calle Media Luna, where many of the hostels and cheap hotels are located. Here we strolled around with our backpacks on checking out our different options, a strange feeling becaus it was the first time we were travelling without our van since the start of our trip. We settled for a room with two beds for the three of us, at Hotel Familiar. We soon learned that Federico, the Aussies and the Germans, Axel and Katrina were all staying there as well. We walked the streets of Cartagena stopping for celebratory beers at a great little pub then adventuring through the gates of the old city taking in the beautiful colonial buildings, plazas and courtyards. In the evening we met up with the whole gang who were awaiting the arrival of their vehicles, and enjoyed the night by hanging out in a small plaza drinking Aguilas and eating street food. The routine for the next few days didn’t vary much, Cartagena was really hot and zapping our energy until the night time when everyone seemed to come to life. On Tuesday we went to the port to get our baby back, and after a very long and tiring day we drove Patience out of the Port, into downtown Cartagena and then parked her in a lot across the street from our hotel. The whole experience was so exhausting that we spent another two nights in Cartagena before we finally escaped.
Taganga
Our first driving experience here was a little intense, it was hot and loud, busses and trucks were flying by with only inches to spare, and there were motorcycles everywhere, zigzagging in and out of traffic with no fear what so ever. We figured out quickly that the gas pedal and the horn were our best weapons to escape the rush hour traffic. If you drove like that in Canada you wouldn’t have a licence for long .After a long hot day on the road we were finally entering Santa Marta, but on our way into the center we spotted the Germans big rig, hard to miss in these parts. They were parked at supermarket so we stopped in to say hi. They told us that they were camping for free in Taganga so we followed them back. They led us down some dirt side streets, through some slums and to a parking lot down by the beach just as the sun was setting. It wasn’t somewhere we would have felt safe by ourselves, but they’d already stayed there a night and said it was fine so we unwound with a couple of well deserved cold beers and then went to bed. The next day we booked a trip to the “Lost City”, a six day adventure into the jungle and said goodbye to Karina and Oliver.
La Ciudad Perdida (The Lost City)
Day One
We spent another hot night in the parking lot and then got up early for our 8:30am start to the trip. Of course South American time is the same as Central American time so we didn’t actually leave town until about 9:30, but we all piled into an awesome converted land cruiser with bench seats and no doors and were off. We drove for an hour on pavement and an hour off road until we reached the town of Machete where we ate lunch while the guides sorted out gear and food. The first day may have been the hardest due to the heat and the long and steady ascent up to the first camp, but thanks to the refreshing swimming hole and the many fruit breaks along the way we didn’t dehydrate. We arrived at a beautiful camp where we enjoyed the views and showers, followed by a huge dinner after which everyone passed out in their own swinging hammock.
Day Two
Day two of the trek started with breakfast followed by a visit to a beautiful waterfall and swimming hole. We were waiting for three other Aussies to join our group but after lunch we gave up waiting and headed for the second camp. The hike to camp two was full of great views and passed by a couple of indigenous villages. When we arrived we had just enough light left to jump off the 15ft rock into the refreshing river. What a way to end a day of trekking! The wait for dinner was almost too long but when we saw the huge plates of food being served we forgot about the delay and stuffed ourselves with beans, rice, meat and Plantains.
Day Three
Day three started with a ton of river crossings, a brief swim and lunch break and then a steep ascent and 1600 stair climb to La Ciudad Perdida. These stairs and the city itself were built between the 11th and 14th centuries by the Tayrona Indians before they were chased to higher ground by the Spaniards. The stairs originally went all the way from the beach dwellings up to the Lost City and around the thousands of terraces up in the hills. Finally the moment we’d all been waiting for, the arrival at the Ciudad Perdida....amazing!! Here, nestled in the jungle, were hundreds of circular terraced platforms with stone trails and stairs leading all around the city and surrounding villages. We only saw a few of the terraces on our way in, but our accommodations were only five minutes away from the main terrace and we were going to do more exploring the next day. Once again it was a bit of a wait for dinner so we took advantage of the time to sneak off and do a bit of exploring on our own. It was magical to be alone in the ancient city! We were also really lucky as we were one of the last tour groups that are going to be able to sleep at the city as they are moving the accommodations down to the river. Good timing!
Day Four
The next morning we were stuffed with empanadas and then taken back into the city for a tour. Unfortunately or fortunately depending on how you look at it, just as we were starting the tour a big giant military helicopter flew in and landed right on the main terrace. Apparently once a month the high up government officials are allowed to bring a bunch of guests up to La Ciudad Perdida. A bit strange, but I guess that’s what power does for you. After that spectacle we were led away from the main terraces and around to see a few other terraces and some recreated dwellings before going to the pool of youth for a quick dip to take off a few years. The city was so much bigger than either of us could have ever imagined and we only saw a corner of what is actually out there. It makes it even more amazing that it wasn’t “discovered” until 1975! It was a wonderful morning in La Ciudad Perdida and our guides and thankfully translator gave us an awesome insight into the city. A few hours later and we were back at accommodation two for another swim, a jump off of a 20ft rock and an awesome dinner.
Day Five
Since we’d decided to do the trek in 6 days we had a great sleep in while the rest of the group got up early and headed off. Then we got up, had some breakfast and went back to the river for a swim. It was an easy hike made even easier by a mule carrying our packs back to the final camp. We got there nice and early so we were able to hang out in the hammocks reading our books and napping until a giant group arrived on their first day of the trek all excited and full of energy. Quite a difference. We got up, chatted a bit had some dinner and celebratory fruit wine and then settled in for our last sleep in the jungle.
Day Six
Another fairly leisurely morning and then the long dusty descent back to the jeep. We got super lucky and had 5 and a half beautiful sunny days in the place that always rains until the last 5 minutes of the trek when it started pouring. We ran for cover in our lunch shelter and watched the rain bucket down for the next hour while enjoying lunch and a nice cold bottle of beer. We felt sorry for all those trekkers that were starting at that time. Stuff never dries up there and the trail would be pure mud, yikes! When the rain finally stopped we jumped in the jeep and headed back to Taganga. What an awesome experience!! We were exhausted and dirty when we got back to town so luckily the owners of the hostel where our friends from the trek ,Vanessa and Will, were staying let us use the shower to clean up. Then we went to dinner at an awesome sandwich place and used the internet to let everyone know we weren’t kidnapped before retiring to the van in a new parking place right by the soccer field.
The road to Villa de Leyva
The next morning we got up early and headed South. Still in the lowlands we sweated our way through the day until we finally decided to stop for the night and lucked upon this awesome place to camp for the night right by a river and all to ourselves. Another day of driving and we finally made it to San Gil where we were directed to another campspot 7 km away, again right on a river and almost to ourselves. We’re loving that Colombians know what camping is!! The next day we drove into Villa de Leyva expected to find a nice place to camp by the lake only to find out that there was no lake, but instead there was an incredible little colonial town with the original cobble stone streets and huge central plaza. We were directed to the Colombian Highlands Hostel where we could camp with our car and were shocked to run into the Germans Karina and Oliver and Max all at the same hostel! Small world! We set up camp for the next three nights, explored the city streets, caught up with everyone, did some laundry finally, went for a hike, chatted with the amazing owner of the hostel and chilled out.
After an hour and a half in the air we caught our first sight of Cartagena. It was a mix of everything, high-rise apartments, hotels, yacht clubs, ports, suburbia and the magical old city surrounded by its fortress walls. We grabbed a taxi to Calle Media Luna, where many of the hostels and cheap hotels are located. Here we strolled around with our backpacks on checking out our different options, a strange feeling becaus it was the first time we were travelling without our van since the start of our trip. We settled for a room with two beds for the three of us, at Hotel Familiar. We soon learned that Federico, the Aussies and the Germans, Axel and Katrina were all staying there as well. We walked the streets of Cartagena stopping for celebratory beers at a great little pub then adventuring through the gates of the old city taking in the beautiful colonial buildings, plazas and courtyards. In the evening we met up with the whole gang who were awaiting the arrival of their vehicles, and enjoyed the night by hanging out in a small plaza drinking Aguilas and eating street food. The routine for the next few days didn’t vary much, Cartagena was really hot and zapping our energy until the night time when everyone seemed to come to life. On Tuesday we went to the port to get our baby back, and after a very long and tiring day we drove Patience out of the Port, into downtown Cartagena and then parked her in a lot across the street from our hotel. The whole experience was so exhausting that we spent another two nights in Cartagena before we finally escaped.
Taganga
Our first driving experience here was a little intense, it was hot and loud, busses and trucks were flying by with only inches to spare, and there were motorcycles everywhere, zigzagging in and out of traffic with no fear what so ever. We figured out quickly that the gas pedal and the horn were our best weapons to escape the rush hour traffic. If you drove like that in Canada you wouldn’t have a licence for long .After a long hot day on the road we were finally entering Santa Marta, but on our way into the center we spotted the Germans big rig, hard to miss in these parts. They were parked at supermarket so we stopped in to say hi. They told us that they were camping for free in Taganga so we followed them back. They led us down some dirt side streets, through some slums and to a parking lot down by the beach just as the sun was setting. It wasn’t somewhere we would have felt safe by ourselves, but they’d already stayed there a night and said it was fine so we unwound with a couple of well deserved cold beers and then went to bed. The next day we booked a trip to the “Lost City”, a six day adventure into the jungle and said goodbye to Karina and Oliver.
La Ciudad Perdida (The Lost City)
Day One
We spent another hot night in the parking lot and then got up early for our 8:30am start to the trip. Of course South American time is the same as Central American time so we didn’t actually leave town until about 9:30, but we all piled into an awesome converted land cruiser with bench seats and no doors and were off. We drove for an hour on pavement and an hour off road until we reached the town of Machete where we ate lunch while the guides sorted out gear and food. The first day may have been the hardest due to the heat and the long and steady ascent up to the first camp, but thanks to the refreshing swimming hole and the many fruit breaks along the way we didn’t dehydrate. We arrived at a beautiful camp where we enjoyed the views and showers, followed by a huge dinner after which everyone passed out in their own swinging hammock.
Day Two
Day two of the trek started with breakfast followed by a visit to a beautiful waterfall and swimming hole. We were waiting for three other Aussies to join our group but after lunch we gave up waiting and headed for the second camp. The hike to camp two was full of great views and passed by a couple of indigenous villages. When we arrived we had just enough light left to jump off the 15ft rock into the refreshing river. What a way to end a day of trekking! The wait for dinner was almost too long but when we saw the huge plates of food being served we forgot about the delay and stuffed ourselves with beans, rice, meat and Plantains.
Day Three
Day three started with a ton of river crossings, a brief swim and lunch break and then a steep ascent and 1600 stair climb to La Ciudad Perdida. These stairs and the city itself were built between the 11th and 14th centuries by the Tayrona Indians before they were chased to higher ground by the Spaniards. The stairs originally went all the way from the beach dwellings up to the Lost City and around the thousands of terraces up in the hills. Finally the moment we’d all been waiting for, the arrival at the Ciudad Perdida....amazing!! Here, nestled in the jungle, were hundreds of circular terraced platforms with stone trails and stairs leading all around the city and surrounding villages. We only saw a few of the terraces on our way in, but our accommodations were only five minutes away from the main terrace and we were going to do more exploring the next day. Once again it was a bit of a wait for dinner so we took advantage of the time to sneak off and do a bit of exploring on our own. It was magical to be alone in the ancient city! We were also really lucky as we were one of the last tour groups that are going to be able to sleep at the city as they are moving the accommodations down to the river. Good timing!
Day Four
The next morning we were stuffed with empanadas and then taken back into the city for a tour. Unfortunately or fortunately depending on how you look at it, just as we were starting the tour a big giant military helicopter flew in and landed right on the main terrace. Apparently once a month the high up government officials are allowed to bring a bunch of guests up to La Ciudad Perdida. A bit strange, but I guess that’s what power does for you. After that spectacle we were led away from the main terraces and around to see a few other terraces and some recreated dwellings before going to the pool of youth for a quick dip to take off a few years. The city was so much bigger than either of us could have ever imagined and we only saw a corner of what is actually out there. It makes it even more amazing that it wasn’t “discovered” until 1975! It was a wonderful morning in La Ciudad Perdida and our guides and thankfully translator gave us an awesome insight into the city. A few hours later and we were back at accommodation two for another swim, a jump off of a 20ft rock and an awesome dinner.
Day Five
Since we’d decided to do the trek in 6 days we had a great sleep in while the rest of the group got up early and headed off. Then we got up, had some breakfast and went back to the river for a swim. It was an easy hike made even easier by a mule carrying our packs back to the final camp. We got there nice and early so we were able to hang out in the hammocks reading our books and napping until a giant group arrived on their first day of the trek all excited and full of energy. Quite a difference. We got up, chatted a bit had some dinner and celebratory fruit wine and then settled in for our last sleep in the jungle.
Day Six
Another fairly leisurely morning and then the long dusty descent back to the jeep. We got super lucky and had 5 and a half beautiful sunny days in the place that always rains until the last 5 minutes of the trek when it started pouring. We ran for cover in our lunch shelter and watched the rain bucket down for the next hour while enjoying lunch and a nice cold bottle of beer. We felt sorry for all those trekkers that were starting at that time. Stuff never dries up there and the trail would be pure mud, yikes! When the rain finally stopped we jumped in the jeep and headed back to Taganga. What an awesome experience!! We were exhausted and dirty when we got back to town so luckily the owners of the hostel where our friends from the trek ,Vanessa and Will, were staying let us use the shower to clean up. Then we went to dinner at an awesome sandwich place and used the internet to let everyone know we weren’t kidnapped before retiring to the van in a new parking place right by the soccer field.
The road to Villa de Leyva
The next morning we got up early and headed South. Still in the lowlands we sweated our way through the day until we finally decided to stop for the night and lucked upon this awesome place to camp for the night right by a river and all to ourselves. Another day of driving and we finally made it to San Gil where we were directed to another campspot 7 km away, again right on a river and almost to ourselves. We’re loving that Colombians know what camping is!! The next day we drove into Villa de Leyva expected to find a nice place to camp by the lake only to find out that there was no lake, but instead there was an incredible little colonial town with the original cobble stone streets and huge central plaza. We were directed to the Colombian Highlands Hostel where we could camp with our car and were shocked to run into the Germans Karina and Oliver and Max all at the same hostel! Small world! We set up camp for the next three nights, explored the city streets, caught up with everyone, did some laundry finally, went for a hike, chatted with the amazing owner of the hostel and chilled out.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
