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Once again we have to apologise about how long it has been since we put anything up on the blog!
After our amazing trip to the Amazon and finally meeting Beastie (only a couple of days late!) we all arrived in the seaside town of Huanchaco. Although we could see that the town had potential to be a holiday destination unfortunately, and we have no idea why, it was freezing while we were there! We had a few lazy days here, which included a few days in bed sick for me and Matt, I never realised before that it was possible to cook pizza that badly?! The highlights of our times here included tasting the local fishy cuisine, Cerviche, which is raw seafood which is cooked by the acidity of lemon juice; and watching Beastie have his first surfing lesson, which proved to be enjoyable for all!!!
We cut short our planned time in Huanchaco due to the weather and headed inland and up to the mountain town of Huaraz. We were greeted off the night bus by beautiful snow capped mountain views surrounding the town. We had planned previously to become explorers here and trek for several days across the Andes. We were therefore quite disappointed to learn that recent law changes meant that we were unable to trek by ourselves without using a tour company and guide, which would result in us losing control about where we went and for how long. Luckily we met one of the national park officials who promptly pointed out places on the maps where there were no check points and we were least likely to be asked about being alone! A great example of rules being stuck to in South America.
And so... after a couple of days planning and preparation; including buying some warm coats, hats, scarves and gloves, renting camping equipment after decided that perhaps hammocks would't be warm enough by the glaciers and buying food supplies; we set off on our initial overnight test run! We had decided to visit Laguna 69, a beautiful high altitude lake (used by one of the computer programmes as its background picture!), usually this can be done as a one day trip but we decided that we would camp overnight at the lake before walking down the following morning! The scenery was stunning and initially the walk was easy, despite our really heavy bags! We stopped for lunch in the bottom of a valley not looking forward to the next part of the walk as the path zig-zagged straight up the side of the mountain. The initially great idea to have a rum and coke with lunch turned out to not be so good when we all realised we'd eaten way to much and had heart burn whilst climbing!! Two mountains and another valley later, and feeling like we were about to collapse we finally reached the top and it was well worth it! The lake was beautiful with glaciers all around ending just a couple of hundred metres above out heads! We set up camp quickly as it was starting to get dark and started making dinner! A great night was followed by not such a great morning, apparently alcohol and high altitude really don't mix the next morning! Somehow I escaped from the pain that the boys suffered and had to cook them all a big breakfast to ready them for the downwards climb! I'm not sure I've ever known Beastie to be so quiet all day!! At the bottom after a much easier walk we sat in the sunshine in a beautiful valley for a congratulations beer and the leftover packet of soup before returning exhausted to Huaraz.
We had a few days in Huaraz before the big trip in order to celebrate Matt's birthday! The celebration started with an envelope send by Adriana (Matt's girlfriend) from Columbia with an invite to a posh restaurant in town. It turned out that she had already paid for a meal and cocktails for Matt and a bottle of wine for all of us to toast his birthday! And, having never been to Peru had managed to choose the best restaurant I think we've ever been to!! Matt's birthday started with one of his favourite hobbies of eating tinned fish- first he made a garlic and oily concoction and then marinaded the tinned anchovies for hours! We then all headed to the natural hot baths nearby had a swim and went to the pub garden next door for his fishy treats- as you can imagine they tasted terrible!! The highlight of the day though (and Peter you would be proud!!) was that we actually managed to convince Will to put on his Borat style mankini that Peter bought for him and do a running jump into the swimming pool! Probably the funniest sight ever!! But almost even funnier was that after he changed into his normal swim shorts and left the mankini on the side of the pool someone actually stole it!!! I think Will was more relieved than upset about his loss!
In the evening we managed somehow to convince Matt that it would be a good idea to decorate him like a Christmas tree, with balloons ties to his dreads and a Happy Birthday banner tied around his waist, and this is how we arrived at the posh restaurant (Kristoffs)!! The owner, a Belgium man and amazing chef, was lovely and really welcoming and the food was fantastic, all the different dishes were yummy and I've never tasted mashed potato that good! A lovely dinner was followed by a very amusing (and drunken for Matt!) night our that ended with Matt requiring a little help back to the hostel and to bed!
After recovery days we prepared for our big trek. We had identified a four day, three night trek through a valley and then over a mountain pass at about 4700m altitude. We had slight fear the first day after being told it was all flat and struggling up hill all day, and this was made worse when we set up camp and could see a huge mountain towering in the background with a path zig zagging as high as we could see! The evening was lovely we managed to set up and make a fire before dark and had soup followed by meat tortilla wraps for dinner! Again the scenery was beautiful, the sound of avalanches up in the glaciers and trying to spot them in the snow covered peaks took up most the following morning as we pumped water from a river and cooked eggs for breakfast! Then we headed upwards!! The path was hard work but we made surprisingly quick progress until we reached as high as we had been able to see only to realise that the path continued further upwards! We had to rush as the clouds started to come in and we still couldn't work out where the path led! The rain started to turn to hail and then snow and climbing up off the path to look over into the next valley we realised that we had to hurry more as the clouds seemed endless! Finally we reached the top only to see the narrowest "death pass" clinging to the edge of a mountain with a drop of hundreds of metres down below! And so we had to make a decision- carry on or retrace our steps for the next two days! Beastie at this point decided to reveal to us his bad fear of heights which made the following part of the trek even harder! Matt and Will decided that they would leave their bags and check the path to decide whether it was passable or not! Beastie and I waited and tried to distract ourselves by eating cookies! Having decided it was passable, and needed to be passed quickly due to the snow, we decided that Will would lead, holding onto me, then Beastie and Matt at the end. I was terrified, but under strict instructions from Will that I wasn't to look down and had to hold his hand at all times, and also no one was allowed their bags strapped on incase we slipped then we could throw our bags easier to get rid of the weight! We all succeeded the "death pass" and had to make a speedy descent down the other side in order to reach a beautiful valley to camp overnight. The following morning we were greeted by some very brave cows who really wanted to be close to us and so spent the morning chasing cows away while we cooked breakfast and pumped more water. After the previous day we decided to have a really lazy short walk and then set up camp really early and have time to nap and chill! Our final camp was by the bank of a river in a valley not far from the road that was under construction and our final route out! The next morning we felt more than ready to return to reality! After failing to blag a lift with some of the road workers we started to walk down only to see a taxi pass in the opposite direction. He promised to return shortly after he had dropped of his passengers to take us back to Huaraz! Feeling proper pleased with ourselves we continued to walk until we he returned, although sadly still with his passengers. Again he promised to return as they'd changed their mind of where to go but he would be another half an hour! We decided at this point that it was unlikely and so managed to hitch hike for a bit with some of the construction workers! Until, very surprisingly we spotted our taxi coming in the other direction. We had originally planned to walk out to the nearest town, but in hindsight were so lucky with the taxi as it would have taken hours and hours!! On return to Huaraz we treated ourselves to another (two!!) meals at Kristoffs before Will and I left the boys and headed on to Lima.
We had a couple of days exploring in Lima but most of our time was spent tracking down and visiting a really expensive dentist!! Over the past few days Will´s face had swollen badly and after a very brief visit to the local hospital we had decided dentists were in fact better here!! The hospital was really scary; the consultation, if it could be called that, took place in the middle of the men´s ward with all the people in their beds with no privacy. The doctor proceeded to ask Will what he thought was the diagnosis and try to get us to buy some painkiller to inject into his face, despite the fact that she had barely touched or examined it and he told her there was no pain. It was a reality hit about how bad medical care can be and how most people have no choice of where to go. The dentist was very posh, in fact Will had the same dentist as the former Peruvian President! Two root canals and a lot of money later we were heading to Bolivia, via a brief overnight stop in Arequipa.
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Jane (Mum) Another fantastic blog Kathryn, you really should go into travel writing - come to think of it what a fantastic career move for you. That degree was not wasted.