Don’t be a (Expletive Redacted) Idiot: La Paz Part 2

(SPOILER ALERT: We survived)

‘Trust me’ said Omar, the rep at Gravity Mountain Biking who booked us on to the Death Road tour, ‘there’s nothing worse than trying to ride a mountain bike with a runny stomach’.

Good advice.

Heeding it, the evening before our tour we opted for the very safe bet of Tuna Pasta to cap off what had been a rather lazy day, save for heading across the street to pay through the nose to get our clothes laundered. Machine washing isn’t really be a thing here, many of the locals believing that it doesn’t get clothes as clean as hand washing, so the few laundrettes that exist can charge something a premium to travellers in need of the service. Some you lose, I guess.

We begrudgingly got up at the crack of dawn the day of the tour to head over to Higher Ground Café in Belen district, the meeting point for our tour and an opportunity for a spot of breakfast at western prices and some much-needed caffeine. 20 minutes or so after we arrived, a young American with a wide, warm smile, a blonde ponytail, Gravity branded hat and jacket and a clipboard (the universal symbol of competent authority) came in and introduced himself as Nate, our guide for the day. Once the final few bits of paperwork were sorted out, he rounded up our group and took us down to the waiting minibus with racks of mountain bikes on the roof. In we all climbed to head to the starting point for the tour, on the way getting to know the rest of the group; an Irish couple from North London, an American from Georgia, a couple from Belgium and a Frenchman.

Just over an hour later we arrived at La Cumbre Lake about 60km north-east of La Paz, the starting point for our ride. At 4,700m the altitude here is even higher than Salkantay Pass, but our short stay at this altitude meant the low oxygen levels had little impact. Pulling over in to a large dirt car park by the side of the lake the Gravity crew unloaded the bikes, gloves, helmets and overalls and handed them out. We were given 10 minutes or so to get comfortable with the gear and a feel for our bikes; high-spec and highly tuned mountain bikes with wide tyres, highly absorbent suspension and ultra-responsive disc brakes.

We soon got a feel for the bikes and Nate gathered us around to give the first of the many safety talks of the day; all of which essentially boiled down to the same message: ‘Don’t be a (expletive redacted) idiot’. Following this we gathered our group by the lake for a photo op and each of us made an offering to Pachamama for good luck by pouring a small amount of stupidly potent alcohol on to the ground, on to our bikes and then in to our mouths (Yes dear reader, the wisdom of the combination of high strength alcohol and ‘Death Road’ crossed our minds as well). Along with Nate we had a second guide called Luis who rode around the group taking pictures and ensuring that nobody fell too far behind unaccompanied. Over the course of the day Luis took the best part of 250 pictures, saving us having to worry about stopping to take photos ourselves. Apparently, Gravity offer this service so that their customers aren’t tempted to try to take photos whilst riding along and winding up on the wrong side of a cliff. According to Nate this is not unprecedented. Remember ‘Don’t be a (Expletive Redacted) Idiot’.

It was reassuring how safety focused Gravity were compared to the service offered by other tour operators also departing from La Cumbre lake, and you could clearly see where the extra money was going. Where we were riding as a group of 8 with 2 guides and a support vehicle, other groups had a single guide for groups of 20 or more and provided far less suitable looking bikes. Nate also told us that all Gravity staff are rope rescue trained up to 100 meters. Not hugely reassuring since the drops in many places are 400m, but he assured us that if we fall more than 100m it wouldn’t matter… Good to know…

Equipment readied, bikes tested, safety briefing complete and Pachamama appeased, we got under way. The first stretch, about 22 kilometres, a steady downward section along a wide, smooth tarmacked road. This was an opportunity to get comfortable with the bikes handling at speed, getting a sense of who are the faster and slower riders and, most importantly, to get used to how the brakes react. 99% of all accidents, according to Nate, occur when riders come up to a corner too fast, panic, hit the brakes way too hard and go flying.

After a short ride through La Combre Pass, the road turned a corner round the side of a mountain and the vista opened up overlooking a huge valley stretching off in to the distance. The view from here was stunning, the black and grey volcanic mountains flanked a wide, half-pipe shaped valley peppered with thin patches of vegetation. The meandering river in the valley basin caught the sun at just the right angle to make the whole thing glisten and the road ahead snaked down the northerly mountain side roughly parallel to the river. The morning cloud layer was breaking up under the heat of the sun and what was left of it was clinging to the tops of the mountains and casting patchy shadows on to the slopes below accentuating the slopes and the overall scale of the scene before us.

One of Nates points during the safety briefing was to not get distracted by the scenery. ‘The bike will follow your eyes’ he said, ‘so if you stare at the scenery for too long, you’ll end up joining it’. To not miss out on the view, Nate stopped us at the side of the road near the entrance to this valley for a photo opportunity and to give us a bit of history lesson.

Death Road is in fact known by 3 names; Death Road, North Yungas Road and The World’s most Dangerous Road. North Yungas Road is the roads formal name and until 2005 when the new road was built bypassing the most dangerous sections, it was one of only a few routes (and by far the shortest) connecting the Yungas, the name for the heavily forested region of the lower-Andes that border the Amazon Rainforest, with La Paz and the rest of Central Bolivia. The original road was about 55 kilometres long and ran from La Combre Pass to Coroica, descending about 3,600m in the process. Built in the 1930’s by Paraguayan prisoners of war, it was from the high death rate amongst the workforce that the road got the moniker ‘Death Road’. Through the 80’s and 90’s and in to the early 2000’s, the road started to see much more traffic and much larger vehicles than it was ever intended to deal with. For much of its length it was only single-track dirt road and had numerous sharp, blind corners. By the time the new road was completed in 2005 the original road was seeing 200-300 fatalities a year, earning itself the title of ‘world’s most dangerous road’.

Today, the new road follows the path of the original road for the first half, the section we were currently riding on, before heading north away from the original road, by-passing the most dangerous section; a narrow 15km descent winding along mountain sides complete with waterfalls, tight turns and sheer drops with no barriers. Nowadays this section specifically is the one generally referred to as Death Road, omitting the upgraded sections and the new bypass.

Before heading on our way, Nate invited us to peer over the edge of the cliff from which we were admiring the valley. About 100 meters below was the wreckage of a bus that had met its fate some 15 years earlier, apparently the driver had fallen asleep at the wheel. A poignant reminder, if one were needed, that we whilst we were here to have fun, this road was not to be (expletive redacted) with.

We continued down the new road for another 10km or so, enjoying the thrill of the speed that the descent allowed for as we wound our way down the valley to a drugs checkpoint. Not really aimed at traffic headed in our direction, the checkpoint was there to prevent (or more likely to take a cut of) cocaine being smuggled from the jungle up to La Paz. Here Nate stopped us for one of his frequent head counts and to check how everybody was getting along and to give us a warning that the section ahead was a little bumpier and to take it easy round corners. Along the way I caught a bump unseen which knocked my right foot off the pedal and made the back end step out. The tyres and suspension did their jobs though and what would have been a nasty accident on a road bike was taken in stride by the mountain bike. A bit of a hairy moment, but It was actually pretty reassuring to feel the stability and understand how the bike would react and correct itself from a momentary loss of control.

Stopping to regroup before a short tunnel we got our first opportunity to try the bikes out off-road. Following a rather nasty accident a few years ago inside the tunnel involving a group of cyclists and foggy weather, the local authority had built a small gravel track by-passing the tunnel for cyclists to use. According to Nate this would be one of the most technically challenging parts of the day; the gravel track is only about 200m long, but as it isn’t used by vehicles the gravel isn’t as packed down and present more of a challenge that dirt roads used by vehicles.

Shortly after re-joining the main road we arrived at a checkpoint where we each were required to pay 50 Bolivianos (£5.50), ostensibly as a tax to help maintain the road. Bolivia, like Peru, forbids tour companies from including taxes in the ticket prices, obliging them to be paid individually by the tourists, so this is something that we’d got used to now. We’d been cycling now for about an hour and a half and covered the best part of 20km. We took a short break to use the toilets and have a quick snack and Nate gave us the option of either cycling the next few kilometres, all uphill, or loading up the minibus and driving to the top. Nobody wanted to be the first to say that they wanted to take the van, but as soon as someone said they didn’t want to cycle, the rest of the group quickly fell in line.

So on to the bus we all hopped for the 10-minute ride up to the start of Death Road proper. After a few photos with the ‘Welcome to Death Road’ sign we gathered around Nate for another re-iteration of ‘don’t be an (expletive redacted) idiot’ and a briefing on what to expect, what to look out for and techniques for riding downhill on Gravel. Death Road is still a public road, although since the construction of the by-pass the volume is nothing close to what it used to be and is now only really used by locals to access the handful of villages along the route. Nate also said that, owing to a landslide about half way down, he didn’t expect us to see any traffic at all, but that we should be vigilant nonetheless. A rule on Death Road that dates back to before the by-pass was built is that traffic has to drive on the left, rather than on the right as in the rest of Bolivia. The reason for this being that it puts the downhill driver on the outside of their vehicle where they can more easily see where their wheels are in relation to the edge.

As ready as we’d ever be, we set off down Death Road. Proceeding steadily at first, we quickly built confidence in the bikes handling on the gravely and rocky terrain, controlling the speed by constantly riding the brakes. The first section had a few steep drops but was quite wide and it was easy to maintain a comfortable distance from the sheer drops to our left. At several points we stopped so that we could take photos, take on water and snacks and give Nate a chance to brief us on upcoming sections which may catch out the unprepared.

About a quarter of the way down we stopped by San Pedro waterfall. If you’ve ever seen pictures of Death Road, chances are this is the where it was taken. The waterfall is about 40-50 meters wide and cascades over the top of the road which is nestled in to the cliff along a crescent-shaped curve. The final few meters of the waterfall drop straight down on to the road in a way that cannot be avoided when cycling through. The stretch of the road after the waterfall is relatively flat, but also featured the narrowest and windiest section of the road, with sheer cliffs overhead on one side and unguarded drops of near 600m on the other. Doing this on a mountain bike was unnerving enough but to think that Trucks and Busses used to drive along here (and sometimes still do) is just mind-boggling. The numerous crosses lining the road-side testament to those less fortunate souls that have passed along this route.

As we descended further down the mountain the temperature quickly rose so the numerous encounters with waterfalls and streams posed little concern. The road also widened out a little and Katy and I continued to get more confident in the handling of the bikes. In a refreshing change from the Salkantay Trek, we found ourselves routinely at the front of the pack following Nate down and waiting for the others to catch up at our various stopping points. With the adrenaline pumping and the wind rushing past us, not to mention the perfect weather, we were now thoroughly enjoy ourselves. The confidence got the better of me at one point though; carrying too much speed off the exit of a left-hand hairpin I drifted out wide from the flattened dirt groves left by passing vehicles and onto a patch of larger stones and rocks. Before I could slow down enough to get the bike under control the front wheel bounced out from under me and tipped me on to my side. The fall left me with a nice gash square in the centre of my left shin and a broken pair of sunglasses, but otherwise I was OK and able to carry on after a quick dusting off.

Shortly thereafter we came across the landslide Nate had mentioned earlier, in the process of being cleared by a JCB. The mangled terrain could only be traversed on foot pushing our bikes over the rocks and through the thick mud that we quickly realised we stood no chance of avoiding getting covered it. On the far side of the landslide an ambulance waited for a rider from another group who had had an off much worse than mine and had to be carried down by one of the guides. Good thing we have our travel insurance documents with us.

From here on out the road was much flatter and smoother and the edges much more forgiving. This was to the great relief of our group all of who were, to some extent, really struggling with the constant vibrations and riding the brakes that came with the steeper, more rocky sections. We were still descending quite rapidly, and the terrain went from black and grey rock to brown and red dirt and dried mud. Following another short stop, we encountered a second landslide near a stream which ran across the road. We were left with no choice but to wade through the ankle high mud, before then wading in to the knee-high stream which proceeded to clean us off quite nicely. After crossing this Nate assured us that we’d cleared the last of the mud and water, and were now home free with only a couple of Kilometres to go until we reached the end of the tour; La Senda Verde animal sanctuary near Yolosa, deep in the valley at the bottom of Death Road. Just as we entered Yolosa we came across another thick, muddy landslide. So much for the last of the mud eh, Nate? To be fair, this landslide had apparently only happened a few hours earlier, so he can’t have reasonably been expected to know about it, but we had to cover ourselves in mud again regardless.

The late-afternoon’s sun was really belting down on us now and the 38 km bike ride we had just completed had really taken its toll. Thoroughly exhausted, we wearily made our way in to the animal sanctuary grounds, which entailed crossing a precarious wooden bridge and then walking through a ‘human cage’, a wire mesh tunnel through the middle of the sanctuary surrounded by monkeys, parakeets, deer, capybara and all manner of other native species. We soon reached the sanctuary’s restaurant, a large open-sided wooden structure built around a central kitchen with a buffet counter and an upper terrace looking eastwards (not that a huge amount could be seen through the dense jungle). Waiting for us in the restaurant was a pasta buffet and a glass of the tastiest and most refreshing beer any of us had ever had. A good meal, an ice-cold beer and a refreshing shower later a few of us opted to go for a tour around a part of the sanctuary to see the Spectacled Bears. One of the sanctuary volunteers led us off through the jungle, over a small stream and up to a pair of enclosures constructed on to a steep cliff side filled with trees, shrubs and a small rock pool. Each bear had about a square kilometre of space; an awful lot more appealing as a captive environment than the animal sanctuary we went to outside of Cusco. The volunteer guiding us had brought a tupperware box full of peanuts and the sound of him throwing a few in to the enclosure was enough to bring the bears out of the undergrowth and down to only a few feet away from us.

Bolivian law prevents the sanctuary from re-releasing the animals in their care back in to the wild, but as they are accustomed to humans now, for most of them re-release would be very dangerous as they would not have any compunction about wandering in to Human settlements where they would risk injury, capture or even death. It was great to see the bears in a more natural habitat and the sanctuary has about 800 animals in total, most of which have free-reign over the site (except where it would be dangerous to allow, such as the bears and the Jaguars). We had a long drive ahead of us to get back to La Paz though, so we and headed back over the dodgy bridge to the waiting minibus for our 3 hour drive back.

On the ride home it finally sunk in what the day had taken out of us, arms aching, legs numb and barely able to sit down owing to the effects of the thin, hard saddle. But also, we reflected on an absolutely phenomenal adventure which we both agree had been the most enjoyable thing we’d done since arriving in South America. To cap things off, a giant storm blew in over the valley behind us as we made our way back up the new road, past the entrance to Death Road and through La Combre Pass back to Lap Paz, finally crawling back in to our apartment with its super amazingly comfortable bed at about 10pm.

Thoroughly burned out and very saddle sore, the next day we did nothing but binge watch the Netflix F1 documentary. 1 more night left in La Paz and then we have the pleasure of the night bus to Sucre.

Don’t eat the chicken, it’ll make you gay! La Paz: Part 1.

After our rather uneventful week in Puno and Copacabana, we decided La Paz would be the place for us to pick up the pace a little rather that lounging around reading, drinking and eating trout cooked every which way you can imagine in the hotel restaurant. We departed Copacabana for our 4 hour journey to La Paz in the early evening of the 14th. Our Bolivia hop bus was oversubscribed, so we were bumped on to a local minibus chartered to carry the overflow, sharing our ride with couples from The Netherlands and the USA as well as having our own guide accompany us.

Copacabana is on a large peninsula jutting north-east in to the eastern end of Lake Titicaca. The land connection is on the Peruvian side of the border and so Copacabana and its surrounding villages are a de-facto exclave of Bolivia, accessible only by crossing a narrow stretch of water in a town called Tiquina about an hour’s drive from Copacabana. The lake here is a few hundred meters wide at most and the low, flat banks provide for a natural crossing point. Rather than a bridge or ferry, here a fleet of large wooden skiffs are used to transport vehicles across. The skiffs have a ramp at one end and a single outboard motor at the other and are large enough to take a single coach or about 3 or 4 cars at a time. Each has a crew of two sailors (I guess that’s what you’d call them, skiffers maybe? Hmm, no, that that sounds like prison slang for someone who provides an unpleasant service), one to operate the outboard which is the only source of power and steerage for the craft, and another to run up and down the skiff preventing collisions with other skiffs by yelling at them and warding them with a long pole.

We arrived in Tiquina after nightfall where the skiffs lack of any lighting only added to the chaotic scene, and also sadly preventing us from getting any good photos. Even by Bolivian standards, this crossing is considered somewhat hairy (and this is the country that has a road called ‘Death Road’), so passengers are off-loaded from their vehicles and ferried across the lake about 20 at a time in small passenger boats. Not the most comfortable things ever; it was the 26^th mode of public transport in South America that I banged my head on whilst entering, but certainly preferable to staying on the bus whilst it traversed the lake.

Re-united with our transport on the other side we continued our journey, arriving in El Alto, La Paz’s neighbour city at about 9pm. The larger, but also younger and considerably poorer of the two city’s which make up the La Paz metropolitan area, El Alto (Spanish for ‘The Heights’) sits on a plateau to the west of La Paz, almost 400m higher than the affluent down-town area which occupies the cluster of valleys that merge below. Looking at the cities from above or on a map, you’d be hard-pressed to say where one ends ant the other begins, but from the ground the boundary is very stark as the cliff drops suddenly and steeply from El Alto down to La Paz. Not only geographical, the boundary between El Alto and La Paz is starkly social and economic and until the cable-cars were built only a few years ago, travel between the two cities was limited to a handful of heavily congested roads.

No such trouble for us arriving so late at night though, and the brief descent from El Alto to La Paz gave us some fantastic views of the city. From the drop off point it was a 30-minute walk, or about a 10-minute taxi ride to our AirBnB. La Paz is a generally safe city for tourists (very safe by South American standards) but the home office website (see Dad, I am checking it!) advises not to wonder around unfamiliar areas of the city at night and not to flag down taxis on the street. Fortunately, our guide was able to phone ahead for a taxi and so we had one waiting for us when we were dropped off. Arriving at our AirBnB we followed the instructions provided to us by the owner and asked for the key from the doorman, only to be greeted by nonchalant shrugs and grunts from the most unhelpful man in all of Bolivia.

DSC00806 - Copy — La Paz viewed from El Alto

At this point, dear reader, I’d like to say that we aren’t the sort of anglophone tourists who expect the rest of the world to speak English, and indeed we have got to the point where even I can muddle through a simple conversation in Spanish and Katy can usually get several sentences in before she has to resort to google translate for assistance. When spoken slowly and clearly with plenty of gesticulation, we’re generally able to follow the gist of what is being said to us in Spanish. This doorman, however, had the most indecipherable accent ever and mumbled quickly as he tried to deal with us as hastily as possible so he could go back to watching Game of Thrones on the lobby TV. Again, we tried to explain who we were and why we were there and again he just mumbled and shrugged leaving us none the wiser. Tired and stressed and unable to get our phones to download data in order to contact the AirBnB host we were starting to get quite worked up, the doorman eventually pulled out a notebook with a telephone number for a woman called ‘Gabriella’ in it. The number however didn’t include the dialling code for Bolivia and when we tied to ask the doorman for it, he just looked at us bemused and said we didn’t need it. We explained that we did need it as our phones were UK registered but again, he just shrugged and went back to watching Game of Thrones.

After about 10 minutes of badgering him and frantically trying to think up an alternate plan the doorman finally got fed up enough to phone the number for Gabriella himself and pass us the phone. Turns out she was the woman who looks after the apartment for the owner and was up in the flat the whole time waiting for us. In retrospect, that’s probably what the doorman had said to us right at the start. Stupid Gringo’s. It was about 10:45 when we finally got in to the flat, a gorgeous 2-bedroom apartment on the 7^th floor with views in 3 directions across the city with one of the cable car lines running right outside our window. The apartment had a tasteful monochromatic decor and was fitted out with all the mod-cons. A smart TV in every room, a nicely fitted out kitchenette, a small bar with a few complimentary drinks, glittery black bathroom fittings (the internal designer was presumably getting a little carried away by this point) and the comfiest bed in all South America.

Exhausted, Katy took herself off to bed whilst I stayed up for a bit to indulge in some Netflix and poured myself a glass from the complimentary bottle of white wine in the drink’s cabinet. It turned out to be a corked desert wine, but I guess it’s the thought that counts. Half an hour in to an episode of The Expanse I noticed myself swaying gently on the sofa, which was strange as I really didn’t think the unpleasant glass of wine wasn’t that strong. A moment later the bedroom door started rattling and I noticed that the rail holding the blind in the kitchen was rocking back and forth and clattering in to the window. Earthquake! Within a second of me working out what was happening the swaying stopped and the building settled down. Like any millennial faced with an alarming situation they don’t fully understand, I quickly turned to Google for information and advice on what to do. Should I stay put? Should I get Katy up and leave the building? Where there likely to be more, stronger quakes coming? Fortunately the answer to all 3 of these questions turned out to be no, what I felt were merely the tremors from a quake near Cochabamba about 200 miles south east of La Paz. Relief could reflexively become excitement at the fact that this was the first time in my life that I’d experienced an earthquake.

The following morning, we ventured to down-town La Paz to have some breakfast and to visit the offices of the mountain biking company whom we had chosen to take us down Death Road. This meant making use of the cities cable car network ‘Mi Teleferico’ which had been constructed over the last 6 years or so and to which new lines were still being added, the most recent of which opened only a few days before our arrival. The network now consists of 10 different lines connecting over 30 stations across La Paz and El Alto and constitute the world’s largest cable car network. Cable Cars aren’t unusual in mountainous south-American cities -Rio De Janeiro being perhaps the most famous example- as they’re relatively cheap to construct and far more suited to the terrain that other mass-transit systems. La Paz is unique though in that it is the first city to use them as the primary public transport system, rather than to supplement other systems like subways or trams.

Taking the White Line from Plaza Triangular two blocks down from our AirBnB, we paid our 5 Bolivianos each (about 55p) to the friendly ticket booth operator and headed through the gates, guided all the way by the numerous helpful and cheerful members of staff up to the platform, and in to one of the cars which whisked us up out of the station. The line took us up along the main street past our apartment building and up to the large square at the top of the road where we transferred to the Orange line. This line took us west, scending over the steep northern suburbs of La Paz and down towards the central station in the next valley. The views from the cable car are fantastic and give a great view of the whole city. The journey time, which would have been half an hour on foot and about the same by taxi in the heavy traffic was cut down to about 15 minutes. Clean, smooth, intuitive and very cheap, we could have happily spent a day just bombing around La Paz on the cable cars. Unlike the Tube or even street level transit, they give you a great sense of the geography of the city and allow you to very easily familiarise yourself with the city’s layout. Furthermore, the fact that the cars on each line are different colours means that from the ground it’s very easy to orient yourself based on what coloured cars you can see.

Arriving at the central station we took a short walk down the hill to the Belen and San Pedro districts of La Paz, an area consisting of about 10 city blocks just off the main arterial highway and that contains the bulk of the tourist attractions, hotels and restaurants. Down Town La Paz is a bustling, vibrant and as fast-paced as any European capital The wider streets are lined with trees, street merchants and high-rise buildings with western style (but notably not western branded) shops and restaurants in their lobbies whilst the narrower side streets are filled with every manor of business you can conceive of, from cobblers and furniture makers to language schools and cement mixer merchants. With its cool climate, the city has a surprisingly familiar vibe; On the main streets surrounded by commuters and towering buildings you could easily be in central London or New York, albeit with even more chaotic traffic. We had breakfast at the highly recommended Carrot Tree restaurant where our waiter Johnny, who spoke near perfect English with a strong US accent, sold us on the Cholitas Wrestling experience they offer for the coming Sunday. A short walk through the backstreets with their myriad tourist shops brought us to the offices of Gravity, the most highly recommended tour company for cycling down Death Road. If we’re going to do something this stupid, do it with the best.

Our business for the day concluded, we meandered our way down to the Celeste Cable Car Line and headed south through the cities large Central Park which follows a deep canyon leading from the centre to the south-west of the city. The cable car follows a route under the many bridges which connect the two halves of the city dissected by the park, to a pair of stations flanking the road where we changed on to the southern end of the white line. One stop up and we were back where we started.

Saturday rolled in and we booked ourselves in for a walking tour around down-town La Paz starting from San Pedro Square, adjacent to which stands the infamous San Pedro Prison; a uniquely bizarre prison operated by the inmates where the families of long-term inmates will often voluntarily reside alongside them. The prison has a fully functional(ish) internal economy; prisoners are not assigned cells or provided food or other amenities, but rather must provide goods and services and trade for the things they need and rent their cells. The bulk of the cashflow in to the prison comes, not massively surprisingly, from cocaine production and the inmates are supposed by those in the know (read: not me) to produce the finest in the world. The guards provide a perimeter to keep inmates in, taking a sizeable cut of the cocaine and other illicit revenues, but beyond that the inside is a self-regulating free-for-all which is, by all accounts, a remarkably safe place to be, provided you know the right people to slip a few hundred Bolivianos to. The prison use to allow tourists inside for tours (this was one of the services provided by the inmates in order to earn their keep) but in recent years such tours would end with tourists being marched by the guards around the numerous ATM’s in the area being made to empty the contents of their bank accounts to pay to be ‘released’.

Whilst waiting in San Pedro Plaza for our walking tour to start we began eavesdropping on a small group of tourists circled around a short, skinny man in dishevelled clothing and heavily worn sandals. The man spoke with a thick US accent and barely stood still as he gave an erratic, flamboyant and somewhat unhinged regaling of stories about the prison. For a while, it was unclear whether this was an actual tour or whether these were just some unfortunate tourists cornered by a local lunatic, too polite (or too alarmed) to make their excuses and leave. It transpired later that the man in question was ‘Crazy Dave’ An American citizen and something of a local legend who spent over 17 years inside the prison for attempting to smuggle 2.5 kilos of cocaine out of Bolivia and now earns his keep telling tourists his story outside the prison grounds. As entertaining as this all was, there was something rather pitiable about the scene of a man ravaged by drug addiction and prison, who had lost contact with his wife and children and had ended up here, reliving it all as entertainment to make a living. There was an unsettling midnight-express undertone to his performance and whilst the thought did cross our minds that it might be interesting to spend half a day following him around and hearing his stories, there was probably better ways to find out about the inner workings of the prison.

The guide for our walking tour was the much more down to earth and level-headed Marisol of Red Cap Tours. Unlike in most of the cities we’ve visited where we make a point of seeking our free walking tours, operators in Bolivia are forbidden from offering services for free, so they charge the minimum of 20 Bolivianos (about £2.20) upfront and ask for tips at the end. After a somewhat more objective overview of the prison and some tips on navigating the hectic traffic in La Paz (‘just ignore the traffic lights, their just decorative’) Marisol lead us up to a Rodriguez Market, a large market used by locals that, on weekends, spills out in to the neighbouring roads for several blocks.

Somewhere in the warren of stalls and tarpaulin Marisol found a quieter spot talk to us about the history of Lap Paz and the Aymara people, the largest of the over 30 ethnic groups native to Bolivia and by far the most prevalent in La Paz and the surrounding area. The City, like many in this part of the world, has roots that go back to the Incans. Laja, as it was then, sat on the intersection of several major Incan trading routes before the Spanish arrived and established La Paz in 1548. La Paz was often a troublesome city for the Spanish to control, being the site of many revolutions and sieges during the Hispanic period. In 1809 the city declared its independence from Spain, being amongst the first places in South America to do so. The rest of Bolivia would follow suit in 1825 and since then La Paz has functioned as the seat of government and de facto capital, with Sucre recognised as the constitutional capital.

Our tour continued down to Plaza Murillo, the square around which sits the presidential palace and the congress and site of many of the most pivotal chapters in Bolivia’s history. Marisol told us of the numerous uprisings and revolts that have seen the Plaza be their epicentre over the years as well as giving us our first insights in to contemporary Bolivian politics. In 2009 President Evo Morales, the first president of ethnically Bolivian (Aymara) descent ushered in a new constitution for the country, changing its name officially to the ‘Plurinational State of Bolivia’ to recognise its diverse and multi-ethnic heritage. Morales has adopted notably anti-globalisation and anti-western policies (hence the presence of western style business but lack of western brands in the country, with the notable exception of Coca Cola, which is seemingly bloody everywhere) and has pushed an agenda of nationalisation and fighting corruption (juries out on his success here) as well as investing heavily in infrastructure (Such as the cable cars, so that’s a big point in his approval column). Whilst a divisive and polarising figure within the country, it can’t be overlooked that since his presidency began in 2005, the country has enjoyed a level of economic stability and prosperity unparalleled in its 200-year history. Tellingly of the slightly darker side of contemporary politics in Bolivia though, Marisol told us that she would be saving some of her more controversial thoughts on Evo Morales until we were in a private place and no longer in earshot of the police outside the presidential palace.

After a short stop in another market for some fresh fruit juice and a stop outside San Francisco church (Another Bloody Church) Marisol lead us to a bar a few blocks down from the start of our tour in San Pedro. Here we were each provided with a shot of Singani, the national liquor, mixed with Orange Juice. Singani is a hard flavour to describe, it’s not that much like anything I’ve tried before. There’s a hint of Ouzo to it, but beyond that it’s a rather unique flavour. In the privacy of this bar Marisol felt more at ease to discuss the more negative aspects of Evo Morales presidency, most notably how he had bent the rules of his own constitution to give himself a 3^rd term (where he should be limited to 2) and is now lining up a referendum to allow himself a 4^th. Morales has also concentrated a lot of power in the executive branch and become increasingly influential in setting media narratives and agendas throughout the country. Around La Paz his face is commonplace on adverts and billboards and his personal banner adorns the side of every cable car carriage. There are the trappings of a dictator and a cult of personality in the making here and although he shouldn’t be able to run for a fourth term later this year, lamentably Marisol suspects that he will, and that he’ll win, largely as a consequence of the alternatives being even worse. Marisol also told us of bad policies he has enacted and bizarre statements he has made such as claiming that eating chicken makes you gay as well as, more concerningly, being an outspoken supporter of Maduro in Venezuela.

Our tour concluded, we retired again to our apartment and looked forward to our leisurely Sunday morning and the evening’s entertainment, the Cholitas Wrestling we’d signed up for back at The Carrot Tree. We weren’t totally sure what we had got ourselves in for, but we would soon find out.

Late afternoon Sunday then and we headed off to the rendezvous point for the Cholitas Wresting a short walk from our apartment. Our bus (comically names ‘Jesus Team’) meandered around the streets for half and hour or so picking up Gringos before heading up to El Alto. On the way our guide laid down the ground-rules for our visit. No glass bottles in the arena, no alcohol, no videoing the wrestlers and no throwing things at the wrestlers as they will retaliate, and you won’t like it…Ok… (For the record, once we arrived, beer was being sold, the complimentary drink we were provided was Coke in a glass bottle and there was absolutely no enforcement of the ‘no videoing rule’).

Arriving at the arena we found ourselves in a semi-enclosed basketball court, a wrestling ring with an entrance ramp coming off the wall on the far side and a concrete stand opposite about half filled with locals and a few tourists. Around the ring, separated only by a metal crowd-control fence was about 3 or 4 rows of plastic ‘VIP’ seats which we were invited to sit in. All in all the audience was about 50/50 locals and tourists. It’s not totally clear if this event was set up for the tourists and the locals started tagging along, or vice-versa, but it seems to have genuine appeal to both audiences now.

Not long after we arrived, the lights came up, the music started and a Spanish announcer using a PA system that distorted his voice to the point where it was completely unintelligible began excitedly whipping the crowd’s energy up. Although we couldn’t understand a word being said, the use of tone and elongated vowels were unmistakeable as introductions and two male wrestlers came out from the behind the curtain at the top of the ramp and made their way down the entrance ramp to the ring. According to our guide the men go first because they aren’t important, the Cholitas are the real stars! After the wrestlers were introduced the referee came out, a portly middle aged man all in black, effeminately dancing around the ring and goading the crowd to waves of boos and hisses. Evidently this referee has prior form. The fight started with the Referee overtly siding with the antagonist, a man dressed like the gimp from Pulp Fiction, against the hero, a man in a red Mexican Wrestlers mask and wearing non-specific oriental style garb and shouting ‘HI-YA’ as he performed flying kicks and chops. The wrestling style was a mix of WWE and Mexican wrestling and, to their credit, the wrestlers were very good, selling the punches and falls and performing acrobatic jumps and slams off the ropes and turnbuckles. The fight ebbed and flowed and the referees prolonged counts on the protagonists pins suitably rousing the crowed before eventually, as form would dictate in any staged event, the hero won, and the referee and the villain slunk away.

Next up were the Cholitas! Bit of background; the Cholitas are the women of the Aymara and Quechua communities in Bolivia who wear the traditional garb of broad, multi-layered colourful skirts, knitted cardigans and small bowler hats*. Until Morales came to power, the Cholitas were a marginalised underclass in Bolivian society, but in recent years they have seen their social and economic status grow substantially, and now they are free to put on wrestling shows for the delight of locals and tourists alike… Perhaps it’s best not to try and make sense of all of this…

*The small bowler hats weren’t originally part of the traditional attire, apparently the hats were intended for the British railway workers who came over to Bolivia during the late 19^th century to construct the nations railway network. The hats ordered were way too small for the British engineers to wear however, so the distributor, stuck with thousands of useless hats, manged to convince the local women to start wearing them and the fashion stuck, now forming part of the Cholitas iconic appearance.

The first match was between two sets of young women in a sort of tag-team match. At least that was how it started. The match, again overseen by the faux-camp referee of dubious integrity, quickly spilled out and in to the space around the ring and then over the barriers and in to the crowd, much to the visible surprise of the front row of tourists who suddenly found themselves with Cholitas being hurled into their laps, and the shrieking delight of the locals who had seen this all before. From there the room descended in to total chaos. The wrestlers started grabbing the drinks cans of audience members and emptying their contents on to each-others heads, sometimes taking a mouth-full and spraying it in to the crowds as well. The locals started pelting the villains with popcorn and chastising them. In turn, the villains ventured further in to the crowd to target with drinks bottles the crowd members who challenged them. All the while the music blared, the lights flashed, the crowd booed and cheered, and the announcer excitedly shouted a running commentary that surely now nobody could make any sense of. The Referee then got involved, chasing the wrestlers around the ring, whipping them with some cord he’d acquired from somewhere until the fight eventually worked its way back in to the ring and the heroes finally turned the match around and won, to the ecstatic delight of the crowd.

Soon after that match the music pipped up again and an older cholita and a large male wrestler in a Mexican mask and tight-fitting spandex made their way out to the ring. They started by taking the microphone from the announcer and addressing the crowd before the introduction of their opponents. Before the opponents could enter the ring though, one of the younger cholitas from the previous fight began to woo the male wrestler, much to the chagrin of the older female cholita and the hissing disapproval of the crowd. She chased away the younger cholita away before proceeding to punish the male wrestler for his perceived infidelity, throwing him out of the ring and breaking a plastic chair over his head. This exchange carried on, interwoven with impassioned exchanges on the microphone between the warring parties. At one point, another male wrestler appeared, seemingly a love interest of the younger cholita. He shouted a few things then disappeared again before finally the older male wrestler turned on the young cholita to the delight of the older cholita and the crowd, pinning her in the ring and winning a match that, from what I could work out, had never even started.

The last fight of the evening was between 2 cholitas and 2 men dressed as flys. Yes. As flys. They even squatted and bounced around as if they were flys and used their hands to wash their fake compound eyes. By this point we had completely given up trying to work out what the hell was going on. The whole night had been very, very surreal and totally ridiculous, but thoroughly entertaining. Before leaving we took advantage of the opportunity to take a photo with the Chlitas, who had fortunately put their differences aside long enough to allow us to take some pictures.

Boy that was a long one. On to part 2 then!

P-p-p-pick up a Puno

Here we are in La Paz then! Bolivia! A good 2 weeks after our final day of the Salkantay Trek and we’ve just about recovered. Our descent from Aguas Calientes was fairly uneventful, once again more beautiful vistas of mountains, rivers, and Incan ruins all seen from the train back to Ollantaytambo. The following day team TWC met up for a final team to visit Cusco’s newly opened cat café. It’s a really sweet place where you can sit and enjoy a sandwich and a coffee surrounded by kittens and older pussy cats, you can even adopt them if you’re so inclined. It definitely helped to fill the foster kitty shaped holes in our lives and was an excellent way to soothe our ever-aching muscles. Having spent a good 4 hours playing with the moggies and with the place getting a little busy, we headed off as a group to find some dinner at the excellent Maikhana Indian buffet – all you can eat for 15 soles, woohoo! – before saying our final goodbyes and with promises to see each other again in another life.

Off we trotted to join the Bolivia Hop bus which would carry us the delightfully arduous 9-hour journey to Puno. The bus is about as comfortable as you could reasonably make it, reclining around 150° with a blanket provided and somewhat ample legroom, depending on whether you ask me or Dave. Unfortunately, being anything over around 5’7 puts you at a distinct disadvantage over here. Dave often finds himself to be too tall for beds, doorways, and public transport (female privilege strikes again!) and there have been choice words expressed on more than a few occasions when his head has met with various South American doorframes. After a bumpy overnight journey during which I managed to get some shut-eye and Dave, with what might just be the worst superpower ever, once again stayed up all night due to his inability to sleep on anything that moves. Arriving in Puno at around 5am we were dropped at a hostel where we could at least charge our phone and use their wifi to entertain ourselves while we waited to check in to our AirBnB at around 1pm. Puno is an odd little town that sits on the shore of Lake Titicaca, a short drive from the Bolivian border. Its main attractions include a large condor statue that sits a princely 700 steps above the city, the Uros floating reed islands, and a surprisingly well stocked supermarket. In our sleep deprived state, we had somewhat neglected to realise that our arrival into the city had coincided perfectly with Carnival, a festival celebrating the final week before lent. Celebrations in the larger cities range from throwing paint around to chucking water balloons at each other and in rural communities they’ll take it in turns to whack a tree until it gets chopped down – you know, normal celebratory type stuff. Puno however celebrates Carnival in a much more traditional sense, with marching bands at 5am and a little van that drives around playing an out of tune, out of time jingle, and selling juice to revellers. It was at this point that my body decided that the best thing to do would be to come down with a cold. Thanks body. As a result of this our time in Puno was decidedly uneventful, luckily our AirBnB had a big smart TV with Netflix so that was my time in Puno, being woken up every morning bright and early by marching bands, music in the streets, random air-raid sirens, oh and the random train which goes through the middle of town so has to beep to alert people to get off the tracks. Wonderful. Luckily Dr Dave was on hand to cater to my every whim and walk up and down the 6 flights of stairs to our apartment fetching various cold medicines as well as breakfast, lunch & dinner. Luckily (or not as the case may be), our journey back up to Lima will take us back through Puno so we can take the time to do all the touristy stuff we missed out on, on the way back. Phew!

bdr

After 3 days spent miserably bed bound, it was time to head to Copacabana and our first step into Bolivia! After reading horror stories about dodgy police offers, muggings, and general ineptitude, we were pleasantly surprised to find that the border crossing went smoothly. We hopped off the bus with our bag, received our exit stamp from the Peruvian side then climbed the short hill and went under the white arch marking the border between Peru and Bolivia. We were greeted by the Bolivia Hop bus guide and filled out a form before heading to Bolivian customs where the form was briefly glanced at and then added to a pile with all the others. We were then swiftly waived through and that was that! Not wanting to add myself to any sort of list, I’ll just say that if you were that way inclined, you could probably make your way through without encountering any sort of border official at all, thus avoiding any visa fees, should your country need to pay them. ANYWAY.

Our Bolivia Hop bus this side was a single storey affair, unlike our double decker beauty in Peru but as our final leg was only around 20 minutes this wasn’t terribly inconvenient. Copacabana accompanies Puno in the “odd little town” gang and seems to exist solely to provide overpriced mediocre food to tourists as well as tours to the Isla del Sol which is currently embroiled in somewhat of a local civil war between the North of the island and the South of the island. It doesn’t seem to be anything to be concerned about, it just means if you want to go to the opposite end to the one you’re currently on, it’s a bit of a pickle. Copacabana also sits on Lake Titicaca and the lake front looks like some sort of dystopian Blackpool with grubby swan pedalos and kayaks littered about the place, surrounded by more common litter such as Inca Kola bottles and random less buoyant plastic shapes. Its saving grace was our beautiful beautiful hotel. The view over the bay and the town with the lake is breath-taking and it is surrounded with alpaca filled gardens, deckchairs and hammocks. Our room left a little to be desired with a skylight that dripped sporadically during one of the region’s many thunderstorms but at only £20 a night we couldn’t really complain. There really isn’t enough in Copacabana to spend 4 nights there but gosh darn it we did! Still suffering the after effects of the cold and with the 3821m altitude not helping, most of our time was spent lounging around in the gardens, eating too much food, reading, and catching up on podcasts – almost as if we were on holiday! The baby alpaca frolicking around also provided ample entertainment. In an effort to feel mildly active and not let all that trekking go to waste, we trotted off on a little jaunt to the headland, about a 3 hour round trip away from the touristy town centre but sadly not the litter. While us Westerners sit in our little circle jerk feeling smug about buying metal straws and canvas bags, Bolivians are over here not giving a **** (insert word that Grandma definitely wouldn’t approve of here)! We’ve seen people chucking rubbish out their car windows and just dropping litter on the floor, it’s really quite sad and my Spanish isn’t good enough nor is my sense of superiority strong enough to interject. Poor planet. I imagine like most developing nations, they’ll get there eventually. In the supermarkets there are signs encouraging you to use re-usable bags so we live in hope and along the coast (Is it called a coast when it’s a lake?) there is some sort of eco-village with signs warning people not to litter, they’ve also collected a lot of litter and repurposed it into buildings which were quite cool as well. Most importantly however we ran into a little dog half way along the path who was swiftly named John Locke which definitely has nothing to do with the fact that I’ve been re-watching LOST. He followed us to the headland and I shared a cereal bar with him before he trotted off back to the eco-village on our return journey. The following morning we had a huge great hail storm which made everything turn white which was pretty cool. The storms in general in Copacabana were some of the biggest we had seen so far, our dinner every evening was accompanied by flashes from across the bay.

I started to feel a bit more human on our last day but not quite enough to climb the big old hill just up the road so we hung around in the gardens while we waited for our bus to La Paz, around 4 hours away. There was a beautiful ginger cat who kept us company so it wasn’t a particularly arduous wait. As with Puno, we’ll be heading back through Copacabana on our way back up to Lima so we can stay in the lovely hotel again (but in a nicer room this time) and do all the touristy things then! The bus ride to La Paz is worthy of its own post so I’ll sign off for now, we’re doing Death Road tomorrow! 😀

What’s your version of Drunken Baptism? Salkantay Trek Part 2:

4am. It’s dark. I hear chickens. Ok, where am I? Oh yeah, totally authentic steel frame and plywood Andean hut. Bloody hell, just remembered, we hiked over a mountain yesterday. Hmm. Better check the appendages. Arms? Check. Legs? Yep, check, legs are there. Knees bend. Good. They don’t hurt, that’s pleasantly surprising! Toes. OW. Ok, don’t bend those. All in all though, body parts are less achy than I was expecting. Don’t have to be up for a few hours yet, might try and get some more… SHUTTUP CHICKENS!!!! Ok, forget that plan.

5am. Light creeping in from under the sides of the hut. Are those slugs? Yep. Great. Slugs on the ceiling. There’s a flickering light coming from the other side of the hut. A mobile phone! That means Katy is awake. Amoroso will be round with Coca tea soon. Mmmmmmmmm Coca tea. Should probably get up and get dressed. As much as Amoroso is a seasoned professional, a naked hairy Brit at 5am might be a bit much. Ok. Getting up, need to wake up and switch out of first-person narrative mode anyway.

Day 3. Katy and I crawled out of our authentic Andean Hut to be greeted by clear blue sky and the Sun beaming down on the tips of the mountains behind us. Feeling orders of magnitude more human that we had felt the night before we joined the rest of Team White Chocolate, the team name having been near unanimously agreed upon the whilst at the top of Salkantay the day before. Oxygen deprivation is a funny thing. It was reassuring to hear the rest of TWC™ complaining of aches and pains from Day 2’s ordeal and we all looked forward to the ‘considerably less arduous’ day 3.

On paper, Day 3 was to entail a half-day steady downhill trek to our next camp site, the Jungle Domes (whilst this sounds like a zone on the Crystal Maze, it sadly isn’t that exciting), followed by an afternoon excursion to the Hot Springs in Cocalmayo de Santa Teresa. We also said goodbye to Darwin, our horseman at this point. From here on out, everywhere we were headed was accessible by road of train, so the mules (moolees) were no longer required. We set off about 7am, the clear skies and lower altitude making for an almost perfect morning. We left our campsite via a back path taking us down a short drop to the river running around the campsite, crossing the raging torrents on a reassuringly solid wooden bridge.

Up the other side we joined a dirt road which, by the standards of terrain we’d be used to over the last few days, was like joining a motorway. We followed this road for about 40 minutes as it meandered down the valley, all of us in good spirits and chatting away, soaking in the views of the mountains around us. Near the low point of the valley we broke off from the road and followed a path down across the river where it was joined by a tributary, the swirling waters making for a great scene. Over the bridge and up in to the jungle on the other side, we continued up for another 20 minutes then down steeply for another 30 minutes. This was now just starting to look like a Peruvian ‘considerably less arduous’. But still, we persevered, and about an hour after leaving the road we found ourselves at a small clearing down near the river.

After a quick pause for some water and to slap on some more sun cream, we continued following the jungle path that roughly followed the bank of the river, only to encounter an another Salkantay trek group (I don’t know there team name, but it certainly wasn’t as awesome as Team White Chocolate^TM). Turns out the path ahead had been blocked by a landslide in the night and so that left us with no choice but to double back on ourselves. Climbing back up the hill with the sun beating down, the previous days exertions began to catch up with us and by the time we got back to the road we’d fallen some way behind. Amoroso, noticeably more anxious about time-keeing than he had been the previous day (we were now 2 hours behind schedule after all) negotiated with a local in a pickup truck to give us and a straggler from another group a lift to the next rendezvous point, a roadside restaurant and shop with a covered structure on the cliff-side of the road.

From here, we had a clear view of a huge landslide blocking the road ahead. Apparently this one had happened several weeks ago and was the reason for our diversion to the jungle path on the other side of the river in the first place. Once the rest of TWC^tmhad caught up (Come on guys, we’re waiting here!) Amoroso stated in no uncertain terms that we were not crossing that landslide. The locals had created a small footpath across the landslide, but it was barely the width of a microwave and very unstable looking (you make think that a strange analogy, but the AirBnB I’m sitting in right now is fairly baron and devoid of familiar small objects approximately the width of the path in question for comparative use). The alternative route we’d be taking involved using a rope-drawn cable car to get across the valley, each crossing taking 2 people at a time. With 3 or 4 trek groups queuing to get across, this was going to take some time. Wanting us to get a head start on the rest of the group, Amoroso sent us over first, instructing us to continue along the path towards another small clearing with a couple of houses in it.

The heat of the day increasing and the blisters on our feet worsening, we trudged along the path. Stiff upper lip and all that. Fortunately, this section was relatively flat, although we had to take the odd detour through the undergrowth where the path had been washed away by the river. An hour later, after another trip through a waterfall for an involuntary foot bath we found ourselves at the clearing Amoroso described (We hoped) and waited for the rest of TWC to catch up, keeping ourselves entertained by playing with a puppy in the meantime. 15 minutes later TWC was reunited and we continued along the path, now a good 3 hours behind schedule.

The Path continued to wind its way through the jungle, up and down, zig-zagging side to side, crossing more streams until we arrived at an elevated section with a clear view downstream. About a quarter of a mile ahead we could see a wooden suspicion bridge. ‘That’s where we are crossing back’ Amoroso said. Before we could make it to the bridge however, we had to traverse another landslide that had taken out the footpath, smothering it in rocks and fallen trees. This was easily the most unnerving part of the trek so far, edging across the churned-up landscape trying to find the rocks that didn’t wobble when you stepped on them and holding on to hiking poles for dear life. Once we reached the bridge our bodies and minds were really starting to feel the strain of this considerably less arduous day and the sight of the steep climb on the other side of it was just too much. Marley, because she’s awesome (and seemingly some sort of superwoman), ran ahead to grab some blister treatment packs for us from Brandon’s bag before returning with the news that, with the impeccable timing usually reserved for the arrival of good guys in action films, at the top of the climb a minibus was waiting to take us on to the jungle domes. According to Amoroso we were still the best part of 3 hours trek away from the Jungle domes and we wouldn’t have reached there much before 5pm, without having stopped for lunch and having long exhausted our food and water supplies.

About 2:30 we finally made it to the Jungle domes and to our awaiting lunch. A quick turnaround in the domes, which look something like Dalek head sunk in to the ground, and we were back on the minibus headed to the hot springs about an hour up the road. After the ‘considerably less arduous day’ we had just had, the hot springs were absolute heaven and we spent well over an hour letting the warm waters soothe our aching joints and muscles. There are 4 springs in all, with the hottest at about 47/48C and each subsequent pool a few degrees cooler. Between the 3^rd and 4^th pools were a set of outlet pipes which poured water on to a stone bunch, wide enough to allow about 6 people to sit on them and shower (bathing suits on, of course, or rather ‘nuse clothe of bathes’ as per the rules). The site was exceptionally pleasant, set on to a gentle hill with a sheer cliff forming the back wall against which the pools were built. Around the pools were flagstone pathways and flower beds with 2 sets of loungers under painted steel awnings and just the right number of security guards to be reassuring rather than unsettling. The hot spring were frequented by a varied mix of locals and travellers of all ages, including a trio from Bournemouth who were doing Salkantay with a different tour company and who’s guide had made them cross the landslide we had taken the cable car to avoid. Seems we made the right call opting for one of the more expensive tours.

Muscles and joint soothed and spirits lifted, we all convened in the make-shift bar area to enjoy a very well-deserved beer whilst Amoroso regaled us with stories of life in Peru and the underhanded behaviour of tour companies he’s worked for in the past. Our drive back was upbeat, owing in no small part to the alcohol coursing through everyone’s systems. Now that we were all that bit more familiar and at ease with each other, we began sharing stories of drunken antics from our teenage years, leading Jo to ask the question ‘So [in England] what’s your equivalent of Drunken Baptism?’ To my mind, this is the finest question every asked by anyone, of anyone, in the history of the English Language. The high spiritedness would not last however; dinner that night was marred by a bitter division in TWC over whether or not Nicholas Cage was conventionally attractive. Before going to bed, Katy and I decided to take Amoroso up on an offer he made to us earlier in the day for a shortcut the following day that would cut the day in half and see us skip a 750m climb and descent to the ruins of Llactapata.

As Day 4 dawned, whilst we wiped ourselves clean of the condensation that had dripped on to us during the night, we quickly concluded that we had made the right decision. Despite the wonders of the hot springs and Marley’s blister packs, we were still very much worse for wear and so were relieved to be facing only a 10km steady incline rather than a 12k steep ascent and descent; and then a 10km steady incline. Waving goodbye to the rest of TWC for now we were left at the Jungle Domes for a few hours before being tagged on to the private tour of a strange Mexican couple and their guide Geordie. We boarded the minibus with Geordie, the strange Mexicans and the crew of porters transferring our belongings and set off down the winding, single trac dirt road for about 20 minutes before grinding to a halt. Up ahead a group of 30 or so locals were running ropes up and down into the undergrowth just of out view and a JCB was parked diagonally across the road. All of the Peruvians on our minibus promptly jumped out leaving just ourselves and the strange Mexicans completely clueless as to what was happening. Shortly thereafter the police showed up and amongst a sea of Peruvians gesticulating, shouting and pulling on ropes what was transpiring ahead just became even more unclear. 15 minutes or so after we’d stopped and the issue apparently being unresolved, everyone simply shrugged, dropped what they were doing and went back to their vehicles to carry on about their day. As we started moving again and passed the scene of the commotion, we looked down the bank to see a minibus about 40-50 foot below. From what we could understand from the conversations being had by the Peruvians, it had gone over the edge the night before. As to why they suddenly decided recovering it was a waste of time? No idea. Survivors? Not a clue. Katy and I looked at each other, gulped, then checked that our seats and seatbelts were firmly attached and stopped looking out of the valley-side window.

A couple of hours passed, and we arrived at Hydroelectrica, so named because it has a hydroelectric power station (see, Spanish is easy!) From here we walked along the railway line that follows the Urubamba river upstream around Machu Picchu Mountain, giving us our first tantalising views of the citadel. Our destination was a 3 hour walk away, the small town of Aguas Calientes. So named because there is hot water (I suppose any langue is easy when the place names are so unimaginative). For perhaps the first time in the whole of our time doing the Salkantay trek we weren’t the slowest ones as the strange Mexicans routinely dropped behind causing Geordie, Katy and I to stop and wait for them. Not that we were complaining.

As we approached Aquas Calientes we dropped down from the railway line to join the road by the entrance to Machu Picchu. Aguas Calientes is only accessible by train or on foot, the roads here are a closed system which basically entails the zig-zagging road up to the citadel and the short bridge connecting to the road in to Aguas Calientes. How did the buses get there in the first place you might wonder? Nobody knows! But given how expensive it is (£20 each for a round trip) to use them, I assume the were flown in on gold-plated Chinooks.

Aguas Calientes itself is a tourist town. Pure and simple. Its sole reason to exist is as a base for Tourists heading up to Machu Picchu. That said, it’s not too unpleasant of a town. Sure, it’s overpriced and excessively westernised, but it’s nicely laid out, it’s very clean and the central boulevard dissected by a small river crashing down to join the Urubamba at the bottom is flanked with statues, small parks and buildings with lavish facades, which get steadily less lavish the further up the hill you go. A train line also runs straight down the middle of the main restaurant street, making for a pretty novel place to have dinner and empty the content of your bank account. Katy says it’s quite like a typical alpine ski resort town.

Our short-cut had brought us to Agua Calientes a good 4/5 hours ahead of the rest of TWC. Our bags had also yet to arrive, due about the same time. In the meantime, then, we most full use of the shower and amenities at our surprisingly nice hostel, before having a good long afternoon nap. The rest of TWC caught up with us at about 5:30 looking very battered and tired, but with a small Labrador cross they had christened Lola in tow, who had followed them all the way from near Llactapata. Lola became the honorary 12^th member of TWC as she joined us for dinner that night, hiding under the table as we ate. Heartbreakingly she then followed us back to the hostel, but this was where we had to part ways and leave her to get acquainted with her new home town. I imagine there’s worse places to be a dog, although Amoroso informed us that any dogs that wander up to Machu Picchu get rounded up and put to sleep . He may have been pulling our legs, but his deadpan matter-of-fact delivery of this information made it very difficult to tell.

But I digress. I don’t want to talk about the local canines so much that I lose sight of what we had achieved over the the course of the trek, and what was still to come. After 4 days of hiking and sweating and bleeding and using language Grandma most certainly would not approve of, we were here! Machu Picchu was only 1 sleep away.

A very short sleep it would transpire. In order to make the entrance of Machu Picchu at 6am to allow us to see the sunrise from the Citidel, we would need to get to the bus stop in Aguas Calientes at about 4:30am to beat the queues. Assembling in the hostel lobby with our crew of cranky caffeine craving North Americans we set off for the bus stop and a place selling coffee at this ungodly hour. Luckily for us an enterprising local had recognised the demand for caffeine filed liquids at this time in the morning and we able to top up before jumping on the bus. Tyler, Julian Madeline and Machine Webb the unstoppable (who, the previous day, had walked so far ahead of the rest of the group that he’d overshot the lunch spot) decided to make the climb rather than take the bus, so we rendezvoused with them in the queue at the entrance.

With the dawn mist hanging in the valleys and the sun just beginning to break over the horizon, we awaited the opening of the gates. Dead on 6am we were in and Amoroso lead us quickly up a steep staircase to the west through a bank of trees, allowing us tantalising glimpses of the Citadel, up close for the first time. Doubling back along a set of agricultural terraces, we came to a large artificial plateau by the guard house – one of a handful of the buildings around the site that had been fully restored to aid in visualising Machu Picchu during its heyday. This vantage point gave us our first uninterrupted view across the whole site, a view which left everyone in silent awe. The dawn mist had now condensed in to thin, patchy clouds which hung over the ruins and clung to the steep slopes of Huayna Pichu mountain behind. The sun was now creeping over the mountains to the east and illuminating the top of Huayna Pichu, as well as the snow-caps of the mountains in distance to the west. Behind and to the sides of the ruins a ring of mountains covered in lush green vegetation formed a natural amphitheatre, but on an epic scale, and the patchy clouds drifted serenely between them all helping to provide a sense of the sheer scale of the vista.

It was one of the most perfect scenes Imaginable, accentuated by the weather which, with the clear air, sunshine and sporadic clouds drifting gracefully over the ruins, could not have been better. We could all have spent hours standing there watching the scene slowly change throughout the day, it was really that stunning. After a good 15 minutes of snapping photos and soaking up the views, Amoroso led us up to a slightly smaller level populated by a spittoon* of Llama’s to give us a short history of Machu Picchu. Machu Picchu is in fact the name of the large mountain to the south of the Citadel, with the ruins straddling the wide ridge of land connecting Machu Pichu Mountain to Huayna Picchu. The name Machu Picchu is used for the ruins as the original name, as well as the Citidels original purpose are, sadly, lost to History. During the Spanish conquest, it is believed that Machu Picchu served as one of the final hideouts for the remaining Inca’s. In an attempt to hide it from the Spanish whilst retreating they torched the city and allowed the jungle to overtake the ruins. Archaeologists point to the high concentration of ash found in the soil at the site to support this theory. Whatever the truth of what happened or why the Citadel was abandoned, the attempts to hide it worked as the ruins laid undiscovered to the outside world until the early 20^th Century, known only to a few local farming families. After their rediscovery, the quickly became a site of archaeological significance and then later a tourist attraction. In 2007, Machu Picchu was names one of the New 7 Wonders of the world, a source of great pride for Peru.

*Yes, that’s right, I googled ‘collective noun for Llama’s but sadly they don’t have a word more interesting than ‘Herd’. Lamenting this, some random internet user on a forum I stumbled across proposed the word ‘Spittoon’ for Llamas, Alpacas and Vicuñas and I rather like it so have chosen to adopt it here.

After our brief history lesson, it was time to bid Amoroso a very fond fair well as we had a mountain to climb (quite literally). As part of our entry ticket we also had access to Machu Picchu mountain, but the entry window was only open between 7am and 8am. Owing to the narrow, winding and at times precarious path upwards, there are a limited number of entrances spread throughout the day. On the wall of the control booth was a sign stating that a trip to the top should take about an hour and a half. Given our current physical state that was optimistic. The climb, with several stops for water, sun cream, a quick snack and to catch our breath took the best part of two and a half hours. The path mostly consisted of original Inca steps and stonework, many of which were worn, uneven and at times very steep. Furthermore, the climb was on the East side of the mountain, putting us squarely in the sights of the now fully risen sun and the heated air currents rising out of the valley below. About three quarters of the way up we bumped in to Julian and Madeline on their way back down, who uttered those fateful words ‘you’re nearly their’. As they had an early train to catch this was our final goodbye to them, which is probably a good thing, as we were still about 50 minutes from the top and we would have needed to have words later! Nicholas Cage level words!!!

We finally finished the 650m ascent at about 11am, thoroughly exhausted from what was, In my opinion, the toughest climb that we had done during the whole trek. Although that probably would have been true of whatever the last thing we did happened to be. The climb was worth it however, the view from the top was absolutely incredible. The mountain top allowed for a 360-degree view of the surrounding landscape with Salkantay visible to the south, the great sprawling extent of the Andes to the east and west and Machu Picchu and Huayna Picchu to the north, which we were now steeply looking down upon. Katy was particularly inspired by the view from the top, so much so that she asked me to marry her. I’m sure it would have made for a somewhat different blog if I had said no, not to mention a very awkward descent back down the mountain, so it’s a good thing I suppose that I agreed. In all seriousness though, it was a wonderful, if slightly surreal, moment and I don’t think there could have been any combination of moment, person and location that would have been more perfect.

The descent was, as has been established on previous occasions, worse that the ascent and not helped by the grinning giddiness of our recent change of relationship status (If only we still had Facebook). By the time we finished hammering our knees and ankles down 2600 or so steps we’d exhausted our water, our snacks and most of all our legs and we set at the edge of Machu Picchu bathing in the sunshine just happy to have the weight off our feet and watching a storm roll over the mountains in the background. We’d hoped to explore some more of the ruins, but we were just too wiped by this point and, annoyingly, there are no shops, cafes or toilets within the Machu Picchu complex, meaning you have to leave to use the facilities just outside the gate. For a while, we simply sat and enjoyed the moment though. We were weary, battered, bruised and burned out, but we’d done it, we’d trekked Salkantay and climbed Machu Picchu. There was something eerily poetic about the sight before us, Machu Picchu is glowing sunshine, the golden rocks glistening and the vibrant green vegetation neatly segmenting the site, with the dark clouds, flashes of lightning and sounds of thunder rolling around the mountains. Our thirst and exhaustion got the better of us and we begrudgingly left, boarding the bus back down to Aguas Calientes mere seconds before the storm rolled in our direction and the heavens opened.

I take it as a sign that the Gods approved of our decision. Thanks Gods. Thods.

P.S. Tyler and Webb aren’t a couple, they are friends travelling together. See guys, told you I’d get to that 😊

White Chocolate presents: Nicholas Cage. Part 1.

It’s just ticked past 9am on our first morning at our latest stop; an AirBnB in central Puno located just off a street filled with nothing but party shops… oh, and an army training centre. Katy sadly has picked up a cold and is bed-ridden and I’ve just got back from the shops to acquire paracetamol and other goodies for her. We’ve both been up since 5am. We were awoken by the usual cacophony of fireworks and car horns. However, Puno added a small group of men dancing to very loud music in the street, a marching band, and a van that sells mystery juice that plays an out-of-time, out-of-key 15 second audio loop that sounds like it’s been lifted from an early 90’s children’s toy, to the mix. Still, it wasn’t all bad, the early start allowed us the opportunity to see the gorgeous sunrise over Lake Titicaca from our 6^th floor apartment. But anyway, once again I’m getting ahead of myself. Enough about Puno for now.

It’s been an uneventful week, with the exception of climbing a mountain, trekking through the jungle for 5 days and visiting Machu Picchu, it’s been somewhat unremarkable. So don’t expect this to be a long post. I jest, of course, it’s been an incredible week. We’ve been pushed hard, seen amazing things, shared incredible moments, and met wonderful people and it’s an experience that will be with us for the rest of our lives. To be honest I’m not sure where to begin, other than to say that after everything we’ve been through this last week our 6^th floor apartment feels more like a 60^th floor one.

The evening before our trek started we went to the offices of the tour operator ‘Salkantay Trekking’ for a briefing, an opportunity to meet our fellow trekkers and our guide for the next 5 days, a warm, cheerful and informative man named Amoroso (whose name, as helpfully pointed out by one of our fellow trekkers, literally translates as ‘Love Bear’, a name to which Amoroso was somewhat ambivalent). After an in depth discussion of the trek and what to bring (not that we had time to buy anything we didn’t have by now anyway) and signing away our ability to hold them accountable for anything stupid we might do to ourselves, we were loaded up with duffle bags to pack for the trek and sent on our way, being instructed to be ready for collection from outside our flat at 4am the following day. Goody!

The following morning, bleary eyed, disorientated and ignoring the endless stream of Taxis waving, flashing and beeping at us, we boarded the bus at what turned out to be a Peruvian 4am to be whisked away to our trek. Heading west out of Cusco the drive was a refreshingly pleasant one, Amoroso provided us each with a blanket and we were treated to a great view of the sunrise flooding over the mountains and into the valleys, with Salkantay Mountain looming in the distance as we meandered towards it. About 2 and half hours after departing Cusco we stopped at a small bare-bones concrete and brickwork restaurant in the middle of a corn field overlooking the valley we had just ascended for a much-anticipated breakfast.

This was the first real opportunity we had to get to know our fellow trekkers. As these were the people who were going to be waiting for us to catch up for most of the rest of the trek, it was very important to get off on the right foot! According to Amoroso, Salkantay Trekking always try and put similar people together into groups with a maximum number of 10 for each trek. The principle divider between groups is language, but after that they organise by factors they think will best allow people to have a positive experience; so there will sometimes be 10 single men, 10 single women, younger groups, older groups, student groups and family groups. According to Amoroso family groups are the worst as you can never make the all happy at the same time. In our case, we’d been grouped with 4 other English-speaking couples* in the mid-20’s to early 30’s, all of whom were noticeable fitter than we were, being much more seasoned travellers than us. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a tick-box for ‘slow and plodding travel noobs’ on the sign-up sheet. Our group consisted of two pairs of Americans; Joe and Ashley from Arkansas and Webb and Tyler from Colorado, and two pairs of Canadians; Madeline and Julian from near Toronto and Marley and Brandon from British Colombia.

*Don’t worry Webb & Tyler, I’ll get to that.

Stomachs filled and acquaintances made, we jumped back on the bus reaching our drop off point for the start of the trek around forty minutes later. Once the bus was unloaded, the mules were saddled up and the hiking poles were assigned, we set off on our way. There had been no going back for some time now I suppose, but now there really was no going back!

Our first hike, a sort of ‘baby’s first hike’ was three hours in all, taking us up-hill for about an hour and then following a water course (in to which I dropped my hiking pole, first fail to me!) for a couple of hours, arriving at our base camp for the first night shortly after midday. Our homes for the night were ‘sky-domes’ each shaped like a large igloo with clear glass allowing for a glorious view of the night sky (weather depending) and an unnecessarily small doorway. After offloading our belongings into our sky domes, we went to the on-site cafeteria for a lunch which was way better than any of us were expecting. Each group of 10 trekkers has, along with its own guide, its own cook, porter and horseman, all of whom make the trek with us ensuring our belongings arrive safely at our next destination and that we get a good hearty meal when we arrive, and boy are they hearty!

Stomachs refilled and all of us very pleasantly satisfied with the quality and quantity of our meal, we gathered our poles and ponchos (a flurry of showers meant this loathsome but annoyingly functional piece of cheap plastic was called for) for our afternoon’s activity, a trek up to Humantay Lake about 2km to the north and 300m further up the mountainside. Unlike Baby’s First Hike where we stuck together as a group, the steep and relentless ascent to Humantay very much sorted the wheat from the chaff as Webb and Tyler sailed up off the hill and Katy and I began to drop back with everybody else strung out between us. There was no rush though, and more than anything we didn’t want to overdo it today with the 22km hike over Salkantay the following day. For a little while Marley hung back with us for moral support, and to inquire as to our thoughts on Brexit, before chasing up to Brandon again as he had their water.

A small side story here dear readers: When we went to Greece a few years ago, a matter of weeks before the EU referendum, the locals and other holiday makers we would get chatting to would, upon finding out that we were English, invariably want to know our opinion on Brexit. With this experience in mind and with Brexit imminent (possibly) I was expecting similar during our time in South America. Maybe not from locals, but certainly from other travellers. Anticipating this I had prepared answers to the question, serious answers for when I felt like discussing it and asinine answers for when I didn’t (I intend to claim that the UK voted Brexit to annoy the French (Unless I happened to be talking to French people, in which case I would say it was to really annoy the French)) But no, 5 weeks in to our time in South America and not once had we been asked about Brexit. Not, that was, until we were hauling ourselves up a mountainside sweating profusely and barely able to catch our breath.

An hour and a half after setting off up Humantay we bumped in to Tyler on her way back down. ‘You guys are so close, it’s just around the corner’ she said encouragingly, although our time in South America had quickly ingrained in us a scepticism of unqualified adjectives such as ‘close’. Fortunately however, ‘close’ turned out to be true, which is good because otherwise Tyler and I would have been having words that evening. We rounded the corner and followed the stream flowing out from the Lake and saw the rest of our group standing on a bank overlooking the water.

The view was absolutely worth the climb, Humantay lake is a vibrant, almost glowing turquoise glacial lake formed in a long thin valley just below the snow-line. The sides of the valley are steep, with lush green vegetation lower down towards the lake and thinning off higher-up giving way to grey and black rock then the brilliant white of the snow-cap. The day we were there was overcast and so the snow-caps disappear into the cloud layer, adding an almost ethereal sense that the mountain could go on for ever. The valley edges are tallest towards the mountain end of the lake and so a near perfect V is formed with the streams running off the glaciers above trickling down the middle to join the lake. A young couple took the opportunity to get engaged shortly before our arrival, and who can blame them? Not many places trump this in the ‘oh yes darling well we got engaged at X’ game. After about 30 minutes of taking in the sights we decided to head back down, ending up in a conversation with a guy from Sao Paulo called Lucas who runs a balloon factory! We’ve decided if Brexit really goes south, we’ll go and work for him.

That evening, over another splendid meal we did that cliché thing that Brits, Canadians, Americans and all other Anglosphere residents always do when they first go to know each other and compared notes on linguistic differences, before moving on to the light-hearted subjects of gun culture and political polarisation (spelled with an ‘s’ guys, not a ZEEEEEEE). Amoroso joined us for dinner to inform us that we would be heading off at about 6:00 the following morning, so we’d need to be up at 4:30 to get breakfast and get our stuff together. He would, at least, be bringing us Coca tea first thing, so it wasn’t all bad. With a long day ahead of us we decided to get an early night and headed to bed about 7:15 to enjoy some of Julian’s 90s disco music from the neighbouring sky-dome. As night set in the temperature dropped quickly, and so Amoroso also supplied each of us with liners to go inside our sleeping bags. Tucked up cosy and warm in our glass igloo we waited for the power to be turned out around the site so we could see the stars only to realise that the condensation building up would prevent that anyway. At one-point Katy was forced outside by nature’s call and got a view of the stars uninterrupted by steamed up sky dome and said it was absolutely breath-taking. I very nearly got up to take a look, but by then I was sleepy and very snug and warm in my multiple layers. Besides, the stars have been there for millions of years, they’re not going anywhere.

Day 2 then. According to nearly every blog, article and tour operator the hardest day of the whole Trek. 22km in total, peaking at 4630m. Using the previously established BMI (British Mountain index) metric from earlier in this blog; that’s 1 Ben Nevis and 3 Snowdons (plus a handful of London buses to make up the final few meters). The initial climb up to Salkantay pass entails a 7.5k hike with a 700m gain in elevation, before descending nearly 1800m over the remaining 14.5km down to the next base camp. After breakfast and loading up on snacks for the day ahead, we left base camp just after 6am for our estimated 4-hour hike to Salkantay Pass. The initial 3^rd of the climb was a steady ascent following well-travelled farm tracks and for a good while Katy and I kept pace with the pack. The sun hadn’t yet got above the mountainsides and the cloud hung low drizzling on us with just about enough intensity to necessitate the loathsome ponchos.

About a 3^rd of the way up the angle of ascent began to increase and the terrain become more gruelling, intersected by mountain streams with makeshift bridges traversing them. Webb and Tyler flipped on some sort of afterburners and went off into the sunrise whilst Katy and I resumed our usual role, forming a rear-guard action. I thought we might claim we were watching for Pumas sneaking up from behind and therefor we were serving a useful purpose, but I doubt that would have flown.

Still, we slowly and steadily made our way up, beginning now to get overtaken by the mules and porters carrying our belongings, as well as those who had opted to pay 130 soles to ride a mule (in this context, referred to as ‘taking an Uber’) up the to the pass. That felt good! Sure, we were slow, but by Jove we were doing it undo our own steam! We could claim a moral victory if nothing else! Amoroso, with the nimbleness and elegance of a mountain goat flicked back and forth between checking up on us and ensuring the rest of the group didn’t get so far ahead as to take a wrong turn. As we got to about 2/3rds distance the rain stopped and the cloud began to lift allowing us to take off the blasted Ponchos. Even with cloud cover still present, at these altitudes the thinner atmosphere makes it deceptively easy to burn, so we stopped to slap on some cream and remove a couple of layers of clothing. As cold as it was at night, now that the Sun was up and burning off the cloud layer it was warming quickly.

3 hours in and with about a kilometre to go, the clouds started to break enough that we could see the peak of Salkantay mountain (summit height of 6271m, or BMI: 3BN+2S+14LB) mistaking it at first for a strange cloud formation. We caught up with Amoroso at a small plateau with the sun now fully out and giving us a great view of the trail behind us. ‘About 40 minutes to go he said’ as we passed a sign indicating that we were only 200 meters shy of the pass’s altitude. It was from this point onwards though that the altitude really started to kick in. As much as we were now comfortable with Cusco’s altitude of 3,400m (BMI: 1BN+2S), this extra 1,400m (BMI…oh whatever) was really taking its toll. Barely making 10 steps at a time before having to stop to catch our breath, the final few hundred meters were very hard going.

But, with minutes to spare, we made it in under 4 hours, arriving at the pass shortly after 10am. Excitement overtook exhaustion and we got a round of high-fives from our speedier fellow trekkers, none of whom seemed to be bothered by having to wait for us in this kind of location and best of all Alberto, one of the porters, had a cup of Coca tea waiting for us on arrival. Perfect.

Salkantay pass is between the peaks of Salkantay and Humantay, and whilst the cloud had broken for a while a new bank was rolling in and it started to mist up pretty quickly, so sadly we didn’t get the best of views from the pass. Before it clouded over too much though, we were able to see enough of the peak to see the frequent avalanches and rockslides tumbling from the mountainside, the roars of the great movements of earth and ice echoing between the adjacent peaks. Several group pictures, coca tea and arguably the most well-deserved Twix of all time later we were ready to make our descent west off the pass and down towards our rendezvous with the chef for some Lunch.

The descent was uneventful, with the thickening cloud and the returning rain (BOOOO Poncho) there wasn’t a great deal to see. It was just a long, tedious and honestly rather painful descent. When engaging in a trek like this one always looks at the ascents knowing they’ll be a challenging undertaking, but the descents are often overlooked. I genuinely found the descent tougher than the ascent; the constant impacting on the knees, the rocks moving under foot causing the feet to land at awkward angles and the consistent need to look down and focus on each and every step.

After a few hours we made it to a small rest stop for a very much needed lunch break. Following lunch the descent continued for a further 4 hours, although the changing terrain made things a little easier. Where higher-up the descent was over narrow rocky paths through thin grassland and boulders, the lower altitude brought warmer temperatures and the lush, rich vegetation of the cloud forests. The flora slowly grew around us, the calls of the local fauna become more frequent and varied and the mountain streams ensured we had numerous compulsory foot baths along the way.

Weary and battered from the trek, and with night beginning to draw in we staggered in to our camp for the evening escorted by Amoroso in his helpfully fluorescent Green Poncho. It had been a hell of a trek, but we had made it! Day 2, the hardest day, was done, and we’d managed it without the use of an Uber! Our accommodation for the night was ‘Andean Huts’ which consisted of a thatched roof over a metal frame with plywood sides and, again, an unnecessarily small door (I’m thinking shares in Peruvian Chiropractic services would be a sound investment). Still, they had beds in them, and right now that was the only thing occupying my mind. After a short dinner exhaustion took over me and I headed for bed whilst Katy took the opportunity to have a shower. Before going to sleep Amoroso had some good news for us! As the following day was considerably less arduous, we could afford to have a bit of a lie in, only need to get up at 5:30 the next day.

Considerably less arduous

Yes, those were the words I needed to hear, and I felt asleep with those words still echoing around my mind.

Considerably less arduous…

Considerably less… Well yes, I’m sure you can see where this is going… but that will have to wait for part 2.