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5am wake up call for us chicas and guys, Charlie Brown our assistant guide opened the outside of our tent and gave us cocoa tea to wake up. We were given a hot water bowl each again to wash and freshen up and then pack our things up ready for breakfast at 5.30am.
The porters literally do everything! They would let us pack our sleeping bags up or deflate our mattresses they did it all! I feel so guilty for then doing everything for us.
Breakfast was massive again! We had porridge, the runny stuff we had back at the homestay in Ccaccaccollo. It wasn't great but much better after I put honey in it! For seconds we had a pancake each with 'well done Bethan' mine read and everyone else had their names on theirs too in toffee drizzle. It was so cool :) I'm constantly surprised at what these guys are cooking from a gas oven in a tent at at 3000 metres above sea level!
We started our trek at 6.30am on the dot, we were warned today was the worst of all four days...
The scenery was lovely, I still feel like in Jurassic park or giant land though because these mountains are absolutely huge with Donna by rocky edges and streams, some have snow on top because they're at least 5800 metres above sea level. This morning it was lovely to see all the clouds racing through the mountains, we were as high as them!
It was a nice day again, a few more clouds today but we were sort of thankful for that!
I'll skip to the first check point at 8am... we had been constantly walking up hill for almost two hours! With around two little breaks of course but my god was it steep, plus the constant incline of altitude we were racking up! These poles are a god send!!
After we rested our legs at the first check point we carried on again, we were beginning to split up a bit as a group. Some were feeling the altitude and not coping very well with steepness of it all. We all sort of broke off into little groups, I was with Jaydin, we were doing pretty good, well we thought! Until the porters came walking past us at a faster speed with 22kg on their backs! Carves of steel.
Me and Jayden were zig zagging out what was a bit of a forest with a lovely river flowing through, we were doing well and hadn't stopped, we were building up a momentum. Also covered by the trees from the sun rays which made it a bit easier! So thankful it wasn't raining because this part of the trek would have been very hard if it had been! The thought of having to walk 7/8 hours in rain in high humidity is horrible.
We reached the check point at 9.30am, so a good hours walk uphill with no stops, not forgetting the altitude is reaching 3600 metres now so little oxygen about the place.
I stocked up on a savoury snack - a much needed one too! Things were a little more expensive up here because the people have to carry it up!
The scenery again was breath taking, the massive mountains with the clouds drifting between them, we felt so high we could touch them! We could see just about were we had come from this morning and my god we were high! What a sense of accomplishment! We were doing well and it was only 9.30am! The rest of the group were way back and we didn't want our momentum to slow down. Although we waited because we wanted to try and get a group photo together at the summit which was 4200 metres and we couldn't stay there long (only 20 minutes) because there wasn't much oxygen and you begin to feel ill on the way back down otherwise.
We began again at 10.10am only five of us started at this time as a lot of them were coming in dribs and drabs. Scott made it at about 9.50am, he's doing good! He's taking his time because of the scenery. But I dunno about that so much, Hehe.
This last part was (excuse my French) f***ing hard! Oh my god. A constant battle with up hill steps (not just normal size steps may I add, Giant made steps) we were also battling the altitude now, we were at 3800 metres and it got very steep very quickly! The five of us kept stopping to have a breather m, take some photos and try to see if the others were catching up but no sign at all.
We got about 50 steps from the top and a porter looked really sick so he stopped and his friend the other porter went down to get him and his bag so I felt bad and mentioned to Jaydin that maybe we should help, before I knew though Jaydin's bag was on my front and the porters bag was on Jaydin's. I was egging her on to keep going. The porters were super thankful!
We were only allowed to stop at the top for around 20 minutes because of the lack of oxygen and they didn't want us getting sick on the way back down which is when we feel the altitude sickness.
The views were incredible, so of course a boomerang video and some awesome photo opportunities!
Me and Jaydin made our way down, Jonathon our guide was here by this point and told us that the incline down to camp number 9 would be around 45 minutes.
Wow!! The porters were running down these massive steps, I feel as though the descent was worse than going up! It was so hard on my knee and your whole body when you were pushing against the poles to help you get down.
We had a good ole chin wag on the way down and met some others from different groups along the way. Half way down it started to drizzle but because it was windy it made it worse. Ponchos on! No rain coat though because the humidity was still so high.
It stopped after about 20 minutes and you sort of dried off almost instantly.
The last 20 minutes or so was hell, you kept seeing the campsite in the distance and it didn't seem as though it was getting any close to us, plus now the rain was making the stones slippery so it was harder to get down and it was also slowing us up.
We got greeted by a porter with a flag of 'g adventures and number 9' on it. That was me get me to the campsite!! Little did we know... the campsite was downhill a little further. I was literally on my last legs by now and to top it off I walked quite far down from the bloody communal toilets - never a good sign!
Three of the guys were already there, the tents were pitched with a beautiful landscape scenery of the cloud forest. By now the sun was shining again and I got washed (as best as I could with my muc-off dry foam shower gel)
And now I had to go to the toilet back up the hill, my legs were shaking so badly from walking I couldn't control them! Haha.
The toilets were minging! They smelt so bad, and they were only an Asian hole in the floor with a flush that over flowed the toilet area - great! So I had to run out of the toilet block because I had bloody flip flops on!
We arrived at 1.05pm. The rest of the gang arrived in dribs and drabs between 1.25pm and 1.40pm, it was good to see them! Jess one of the Australian girls was really poorly and felt the altitude sickness massively, she passed out for a few seconds on the way to the summit and was having oxygen almost the entire morning. There was one point were she nearly had to go back down I think. That would have been so upsetting for her and her friend. But she made it! Slowly but surely!
Scott kept going on that I was running off and walking too fast, that I should have stayed with the group because they had such an amazing time. I don't know what he was trying to get at, whether he was trying to make me jealous? But I didn't really car because we had an awesome time at the front aswell singing and taking photos of the view, chatting and laughing with the porters. I just couldn't walk any slower than I already was (one step with two feet at a time) if I had slowed down I would have stopped for good!
Lunch was served at 2.15pm I wasn't at all that hungry, in fact I felt full for some reason? Walking doesn't make me that hungry.
Lunch was massive much to my dismay, we had a quinoa soup for starters and fried chicken breast, beef saltado, rice and a mini spinach and broccoli omelette. Then they passed around a huge tub of cheese and zucchini pasta for us to all have a bit of. Jesus, how much do they think we eat! Plus we had a desert of a sponge with flamed sugar on top. It was quite funny that Scott had told them he doesn't like butter or cheese so he didn't have the cake because it was cooked with butter (just like any normal cake) so he had the gluten free apple pie jelly. Yum.
We all had a nap after lunch, I was zonked! Scott seemed to think I was tired before lunch because I walked so 'quickly', turns out he was tired too after his body had stopped... oh look at that! Perhaps because he was walking so 'slowly'?
We napped until 5pm and then we had some sort of presentation with the porters and us, basically introducing everyone. They are incredible men, the oldest is 59 whilst the youngest is 21, they run and walk so fast with the back pack with basically no breaks at all. Then they put tents up cook and clean... it's crazy!
After a presentation the clouds started to creep up through the camp (we are in the middle of a cloud forest valley after all). We headed inside the communal tent and played cards.
Dinner was served at 7pm and we had another soup for starter with a rice and chicken/tofu veggie sauce with it. Still so surprised at how they are producing all this amazing food at 3600 metres above sea level!
The briefing for tomorrow was that today was our hardest day but tomorrow is our longest. With 9/10 hours hiking. We start with a morning wake up at 5am again and a 6.30am start for the hike. Praying for some nice weather! We have one incline in the morning to 3900 metres and then we are pretty much downhill there with our evening camp site being at 2600 metres! (FYI we only declined 500 metres from the summit to this campsite today) that decline is going to bloody hurt!! I think I would rather go up hill!
We are trekking through the oldest Andean jungle tomorrow, how very cool! Plus it's in the cloud forest so it's going to be pretty we hope! Praying to our protectors tonight - the mountains. (For good weather tomorrow)
Couldn't wait to clean my teeth out some numbing gel on because my tooth is still playing up (not as bad as it was though). I was hoping to be asleep by 9.30pm ready for the awesome wake up call!
I wasn't sure how many layers to put on tonight because we were a lot higher but last night I was sweating streams! I had to de-layer.
Campsite - pacaymayu
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