Helen
Where Colombia was like an easy beach holiday, and Ecuador a series of life long lessons, Peru is so beautiful it completely feeds my soul. It feels incredibly remote and wild, and it’s difficult to capture an image of the seemingly never ending mountains and valleys. It’s even more difficult to describe it, but it feels good to be here, a tiny dot amongst this vast landscape.
It’s a beautiful clear sunny morning as we set off once again with our fully loaded bicycles. The city is bustling as we cycle through, and before long we’re out in the quieter countryside and after 12 miles we turn off the road and start winding our way along one of the many mining tracks we’ll come across in Peru. It winds steeply at first before easing off and changing to lots of switchbacks, which I don’t mind so much as the view changes every time you turn a corner. The landscape is wild, arid and the roads are dusty. Occasional trucks full of locals pass by us, waving and smiling. We cycle through tiny hamlets with old mud houses, children playing outside, donkeys, pigs and dogs a common sight. Eucalyptus trees line some of the tracks and the smell is divine. Older women dressed in traditional colourful clothes and sombreros work in the fields, and everyone is friendly. Age old farming methods still exist here, and we watch in amazement as whole generations of families work horses around in circles, breaking down the wheat and then families ‘winnowing’. Of course I didn’t know what any of this was until Chris explained it all to me! It was fascinating all the same. There are no cars in these villages, maybe the odd motorcycle, and it really feels that time has stood still.
The climb of course, is difficult and relentless but the scenery is beautiful, the sun asentuating the depth of the valleys and the vast Andes mountains that surround us. At one point we stop and watch an eagle no more than ten metres in front of us, perched on a shrub, before it sets off in flight. After four hours of climbing we finally reach our destination for the night, Lago Chico, a small lake nestled between the forest. I set up the tent while Chris cooks dinner. It’s a beautiful evening as we sit and watch the sun setting slowly over the mountains, the colours gradually changing, until it sets and the sky seems to fold under layers of reds to orange to yellow to blue. We’re at 3700m here so we don’t hang around too long as it gets cold very quickly. It’s amazing how quickly you can go from being too hot in shorts and a t-shirt to quickly having all your layers on in the tent! It’s incredibly peaceful, only the occasional sound of birds in the trees.
The next morning we awake to frost on the tent, pure blue sky with the moon still above us. The sun soon melts away the frost as I boil a pan of water for tea. We set off again uphill for four miles, our high point reaching 3980m high, I was hoping we’d hit the 4000m mark but we don’t and I don’t have the energy or inclination to climb another 20m up a stoney path! We look down the other side of the valley, I say valley, but the views are so expansive there are so many valleys it’s incredible!
We follow a long winding descent along a stony dusty track, there are more tiny farming villages on this side, the valley bottom seems to drop steeply for miles. It’s hot in the afternoon sun, and we stop at a small village to refill our water bottles from one of the community taps. It seems the villagers share their water supply. It’s a sleepy village with few people around, and no obvious tiendas. I ask a carpenter working away with his door open if there’s a tienda, he points to a dilapidated house across the road and says we have to knock on the door. Three knocks later and we’re in! It’s a tiny dark dusty place selling dry goods and biscuits and crackers, and of course Inca cola! We buy some biscuits to keep us going. I wonder how these villagers subsist, I’m guessing they grow their own crops, have a few animals and exist on what they can, maybe exchanging with other villagers or nearby villages. We carry on undulating down the valley until we eventually roll into a bigger village, Cachachi. Here we find an open tienda, the owner busy outside tending to her donkeys! We buy some fruit and veg and find a small grassy spot on the outskirts of the village with incredible views down the valley to camp for the night. It’s a peaceful nights sleep apart from the neighing donkeys, the occasional honk of a pig and the singing dogs during the night. I quite liked the sound of the donkeys but chris wasn’t too keen, and I’m awoken at one point by the sound of him outside the tent shouting ‘f**k off donkeys’!
The following day we cycle back through what last night was a sleepy village, but the Sunday market is in full flow this morning, and we sit in the sun for a while and watch as people buy and sell their goods. As I wander around the market, I smile and say Buenos Dias to people, some smile back but most stare open mouthed at two white dusty strangers wandering around. Back home I wouldn’t class myself as particularly tall, but here I’m positively gigantic amongst the petite Peruvian dark haired community.
We carry on out of the village and climb again for only a few miles before descending another dusty track full of switchbacks for 17 miles! The views are incredible, deep canyons on both sides, layers upon layers of mountains. We descend all the way down to 2000m and as we drop the heat intensifies and it reminds us of being back in the caribe. All of a sudden we’re surrounded by banana plantations once again! We re-join the main road for the last 15 miles and head for Cajabamba, a hillside town back up at 2700m. We find a hospedaje with a beautiful courtyard and views of the setting sun.
The following day we set off later than normal, knowing we only had 26 miles to get to our next camping spot, and being back on the main road it should be fairly easy. However, the ‘main road’ was more like a small road in the outer Hebrides, narrow with lots of potholes and every corner covered in sand! It was actually quite nice, far nicer than the busy main road I was expecting, but it was also a tougher day than I was expecting and we arrived at Laguna Sausagocha, another lake, just after 5pm. We got caught in a rain storm on our descent, which was a bit of a shock as it had been so dry and sunny since arriving in Peru I thought it may just last!
We camp at the lake under a canopy right next to the lakeside. The restaurant close by kindly makes us chips eggs and rice which was divine, and camomile tea which they made from the dried flowers they had in the corner of the room. I say restaurant but picture a dusty old room with plastic tables and chairs and unpainted walls. In the morning we’re awoken to pigs running wild in the field, and dogs barking and chasing them. We cycled the seven miles uphill to Huamachuco and decided to have a rest day as it was a nice town. We found a hotel and relaxed in the sun in the plaza. The next morning we were up early and wandered out for coffee, and ended up in a great little tienda with a couple of tables and chairs, we had a hot quinoa drink which tasted great and vegetable omelettes in bread rolls. The older couple running it were friendly and the man couldn’t believe we hadn’t visited Marcahuamachuco, apparently the Machu Picchu of the north. We decided to stay an extra day to visit them, as I was in no rush to leave and also thought sometimes we missed out on seeing historical sights as we felt we had to keep moving.
Greg, our friend we’d done parts of the TEMBR with early on in Ecuador, was also just behind us, and we hoped to catch up for coffee with him this morning. Fortunately we did, and it was great to see him and catch up. He was cycling the same route as us through to Huaraz, and he decided to stay overnight, the same as us, and join us for a visit to the historic ruins. We got a Moto taxi to the ruins, only four miles away, but up a steep rocky track with steep descents down into the valley. We walked around the Pre-Incan ruins high up on the hill. It was interesting to see and understand a bit more about Peru’s history. It was also great to wander these incredible ruins with no one else around, when we’d visited Machu Pichu years ago we were one of thousands.
The next day we went to the same place for breakfast and had the very nice quinoa drink. Then we all set off on the twenty mile off-road route up onto the mountains to camp a Laguna Larga. It was a beautiful route, winding through eucalyptus trees and small villages until we left the tree line and wound up and up to 4100m to the top of the pass. It was so quiet, with only the occasional mining lorry passing by us with a wave. Greg was ahead of us and from the top of the pass, we could see him 100m below at the lake setting up camp. It was a stunning camping spot, the mountains towering above us as the sun was setting, it went cold fairly quickly once the sun set so we quickly got into the tent with all our layers on. As night turned into morning and I lay in the tent waiting for the sun to rise, I noticed a distinct silence, there was no morning birdsong to listen to, it was almost eery. It was really windy as I finally dragged myself out of the tent to make tea, once I realised the sun wasn’t coming out behind the cloud for a while, and Chris wasn’t shifting! It stayed cold and windy while we packed away the tents and eventually set off. It was an equally stunning day as we climbed and undulated along the winding dirt road, our layers soon coming off as we climbed, crossing three 4000m passes until we eventually reached our high point at 4300m. This was the highest we’d ever cycled so far and we high fived whilst trying to catch our breath. We caught up to Greg at a junction where we were going right and he was going left, to stay high and follow a route with more beautiful lakes, whilst we were dropping down some 1600m to Mollepata, a tiny village where we could get supplies and carry on our route the following day. We said our goodbyes and hoped to meet again further south. That night we camped on a patch of grass beside the village church, the locals said it would be ‘tranquillo’ and they were right. We had a blissful nights sleep lower down at 2600m and woke up to beautiful blue skies. We sat in the plaza drinking tea in the morning sun, there was no one around, but it was nice to hear the bird song again and the occasional donkey. As much as I love being up high in the mountains, it’s physically hard work and I feel my body fighting to adjust to the changes. It’s good to be a little lower down to be able to breathe easier.
We left Mollepata feeling good and weaved our way down the six miles of switchbacks to the river at the bottom of the valley. The next section was a twelve mile steep climb back up the other side to a hilltop town called Pallasca. I really didn’t feel like climbing it, it would take at least four hours and my legs were tired, so we stopped a passing truck and asked him for a lift. He willingly helped, but first we had to take some full bottles of beer out of the back of the truck and deliver them to a tiny tienda on the side of the road. In went our bikes and bags, and we got in the front. We chatted away on the way up in our best Spanish, and I was really grateful for the lift up, it took Layza 50 minutes to reach Pallasca and that was in a truck! The road was asphalt in places but then really bad dirt track on many places with some steep diversions where land slips had occurred. Reaching Pallasca we tried to give Layza some money but he wouldn’t accept any.
Pallasca was a pretty hilltop village with 360 degree views of the surrounding mountains. There was a lady on the main plaza selling ceviche with noodles so we sat in the sun and ate lunch, before setting off downhill on an old dirt track that would take us down through the valley into a canyon, eventually dropping us back down to 500m high. It’s amazing that we can be in the mountains at 4300m one day and then back down in the lower valley the next. The descent is actually not that easy as the road is in poor condition, but we’re also slow as we keep stopping to take numerous pictures of the ever changing views. We eventually reach the riverside and then follow the valley bottom downstream through a desert like canyon, the land dry with many landslides. It’s getting late and the wind is getting strong so we find an old shelter on the side of the track and pitch our tent. There’s a steep path running down to the river below, so we go down and find a pool to wash in. It’s so refreshing after three days of cycling on dusty tracks! It’s a beautiful clear night once the sun sets, it’s so dark in the canyon the Milky Way is the clearest I’ve ever seen it. We have a peaceful nights sleep listening to the river flowing below us.
Spending days away from ‘civilisation’ is amazing, without a phone signal I switch off and enjoy the scenery and tranquility. Little treats like pure cacao we’ve managed to get hold of keep us going at night, but I start to get strange cravings. The latest is a Wetherspoons breakfast of all things! I mean, I’m a vegetarian! But the thought of sitting at a table eating a full vegetarian breakfast won’t escape my mind! I try to push the thought out of my mind whilst I nibble on oats and bananas with filtered water the next morning. My beloved aeropress and coffee grinder have gone in a box and are currently on their way via courier, along with a few other things, to Huaraz, the mountain city we should arrive in within the next week. This is the latest attempt at decreasing the load on my bike, making the climbs easier on my legs, but it doesn’t seem to be working!
We head off, downhill the next morning, for a change, and weave our way through the canyon. It’s vast, the river flows deep below us, there’s no colour apart from the odd green cactus on the mountainside. There’s no obvious signs of any animals, but we do see eagles soaring and swifts flying about. It’s baron, and whilst it’s interesting to see, I look forward to getting up higher into green alpine like mountains again where life flourishes. We hardly pass anyone all day, we pass through a couple of tiny dusty hamlets that feel like ghost towns, and I can’t believe anyone actually lives out here, how do they survive? We climb out of the valley a bit and find a sandy patch alongside the river to camp for the night. Across the river are three donkeys, in the morning I see a woodpecker and some other birds, butterflies and dragon flies, a sign of life existing out here. We sit and eat breakfast and I discuss my cravings with Chris. He confesses he also has a craving for fried potatoes in an omelette with sprouts – that make me feel more normal at least!
We cycle gradually up the valley, winding through tunnels blasted out of the rock. At one point we can see on the opposite side of the river, a rockfall in action, one of the many I can imagine. There’s nothing much around until we reach a small town Yaracmarca on a hill and there’s an artisanal ice cream sign. Four ice creams later and we’re off again. I see a tiny beautiful hummingbird and then three bright green parrots in the tree, chatting away.
We eventually arrived in Huallanca, and all six hotels were full apparently! But the town was dead do we couldn’t quite understand why. It was going dark and we were still in the canyon so not much chance of finding a safe camping space. In the end we asked the lady whose restaurant we were eating in if we could camp in her upstairs yard, she kindly said yes and we gave her 20 soles. She told me her three children were in Lima studying and her husband had died in a work accident, so she was alone running the restaurant. I felt sad for her and I think she enjoyed her night of company.
We say our goodbyes the next morning as the sun is rising above the canyon, and we start to climb out, heading for the town of Caraz, in the Cordillera Blanca, where I’m excited to finally see some huge glaciated mountains. We cycle through the Canon del Pato, the final part of the canyon that’s famous for its 36 tunnels. It’s a beautiful cycle and although once again it’s uphill, I don’t notice so much as I’m too busy looking around and taking photos. It’s a short 22 mile day and we arrive in Caraz for a late lunch. It’s cloudy when we arrive so I don’t get to see any white mountains, but the ne t day we’re up at 6am and I glance out of the hotel and can see blue sky and stunning white mountains! We walk around the central market and already it’s bustling with campesinos come down from the mountains to sell their fresh produce. After 10 days of cycling through some of the most stunning landscape I’ve ever seen, it’s good to have a few days rest and enjoy the friendly Peruvian culture.
