a rendevous with jesus

ok a little behind on the updates so i will try to remember the hilarities without the rambling. After a large stockup at los perros with the additional company of Rosie and Sam, a rendevous with Jesus to sort out the details for the trek and a dash around the aptly named proceduras, procuring trekking poles, boots, socks and the odd fake north face appendage in between palm sunday mass and dances in the plaza d´armas we were ready.

Fortunately the entire room bar 2 were rising early for their various treks too so i ran a breakfast racket for the bargain price of 2 soles each for scrambled eggs, tomato salad and garlic spinach. yum.

We piled in the bus joined by the unfortunate Ryan, who had presumably not envisaged trekking with 5 teenage girls and set off for the heights of Lares. Once there we had an undeserved bathe in the hot springs and were treated to the first of quite a few meals, not to slack we never once deviated from our 3 courses despite the kitchen consisting of a gas stove and a hole in the ground.

trekking started and i think we all trudged in silence for the first few hours to hide our breathlesness! Filipe our guide however was pleased with our progress and we made it to camp (eventually as it had been set up on the wrong side of a river) early enough for a full high tea before supper an abortive walk in the direction of the waterfalls but leading througha rock field and a bog and an impromptu market from some of the local village girls.

day 2 was a little harder. We had to pass over the huanytucko juan  pass which at nearly 5000m was a struggle. However, we felt very spritely afterwards hurtling down the valley to lunch by a lake when it promptly decided to bucket it down. We were in fact very early to lunch so we huddled from the wind and rain, periodically pulling out the stools from the mud in our very flimsy canvas cover for a few hours during which time I experienced the early onset of hypothermia and only emerged from the perching foetal position (advanced yoga i´m told) to imbibe green bean energy and hot soup. After lunch however I couldn´t really put one foot infront of the other with much confidence and as a result I set off teeth chattering in the direction of the horse caravans ahead. This was not the right way and only about 20mins later when i regained a little feeling in my body and some of my mental processes did i realise my solitary status, ahhh. Having stopped to take stock of the situation I caught a glimpse of a lurid pink wafting up towards the top of the mountainside, brilliant this marshmallowesque figure was Sam in the, by this stage, obligatory rain poncho. Unfortunately, I was at the bottom of the valley so started a vertical ascent upwards, the cliffs weren´t so much the obstacle, my main enemy was the soddon ground which combined with the incline sent me sliding back down the mountain several times. On the last of these muddy occasions I slid straight into salvation, our guide.

By contrast after a much better nights sleep and dry clothing in the morning day three´s downhill route was pips and after a good lunch in Ollantytambo and (another) coffee from incabucks we said goodbye to Felipe and the rest of the guides and caught our train to Agas Calientes eagerly anticipating those hot showers and a guide at the other end. Unfortunately neither appeared. Worse our escort never transpired at the station in a town that was pedestrianised so we had no way of knowing where our hotel was. Armed however, with the knowledge that the town was small and a couple of people pointing us in the direction of the Sol Plaza we set out in the rain on a hostalhunt. We failed. Having walked to the extremity of the town we never found said hostal, on finding some friendly shopkeepers still about they called the main tourist offices and confirmed that there was no such abode. ah, especially since Sab and Rosie had disappeared in search of an internet cafe to look it up. Fortunately (or perhaps testiment to our having scoured the town and asked everyone where the elusive sol plaza was) we managed to bump into our guide who showed us to the hotel on the other side of town and eventually provided a booking for our included supper at a pizzeria, with no cheese. Solace was not to be found in our bathrooms either as hot water failed to arrive despite a dripping wet, semi-naked eleanor making a reappearence at reception until the plumber arrived.

4am, we awoke to the combined roar of the river and the rain. Despite making it to the bus station we soon arrived back outside the hotel as the road wasn´t pasable so the buses were leaving approximately 50m from our door. I managed to chance upon breakfast though which was very satisfactory. Machu Picchu in the rain and fog was not terribly exciting, I felt rather sorry for the poor guide who´d suffered our wrath the night before and now had to drag us through a sea of coloured ponchos. It was depressing enough that when we went in search of coffee pre-Wayna Picchu climb at 10am the route to the canteen was blocked by the number of people attempting an early exodus. Wayna Picchu it transpired was closed since after only 44 people had ascended, one had already fallen and deaths dont tend to look very good on reopening days. Mine at least was almost certainly avoided by its premature closure. The weather however, decided to change and Sam, Sab and I (occasionally accompianed by a rather sunnier Ryan in his new role as photographer) were treated to the full beauty of the inca ruins. Complete with ceremonial llamas, quite literally being pushed off terracettes (sadly llamas were hurt in the process) by the paps surrounding the mayor, susan sarandon (¿quite?, but she did wave up at me and sab after sabrina accidentally punching me in the mouth sent us into hysterics) and traditionally dressed children, we listened in on the BBC world services coverage been recorded below us before setting off to the inca bridge, where Sam attempted a stunt somersault over the edge of the path, fortuantely metres past the cliff and before the forested cliff where she would almost certainly have come to rather more harm. Eventually we returned to a near deserted Machu Picchu and retrieved Rosie and Eleanor from the redecorators at the cafe before making our way back to the train station where a fortunate walk along the platform from ryan resulted in our not missing our (very expensive) trainride back, where we even managed to scab a brownie of the poor american woman that sabrinas coke launched itself at!