Various Adventures - Part II

Group Email- 03/08

My Dear Friends,

Part II, as promised. If you have not read Part I (and sent me an encouraging "hello" in response-- this is all but one of you! please), go back and do so now!

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All day I worry I am too slow, I am falling behind, etc. T. is 5'11 and walks with a look of utter determination on her face, but Noyme is no more than 4'10 and I am running just to keep up with her. Amazingly we arrive at our first campsite over an hour early, and Noyme says we are "Incredible hikers." T. and I look at each other and raise our eyebrows.
Though still by no means in favour of those who go travelling and spend time only with people from their own countries (herds of such tourists can be found at any hostel anywhere), but there is something about hiking up a mountain, between two endless fenceless fields of Alpaca, in a t-shirt, in the midst of a snowfall, talking about summer fruit in Ontario.
We have dinner in our snazzy little dining tent, with the wind shrieking up and down the walls and making the candles flicker- just to be sure we remember where we are. Noyme and Paul, the guide-in-training, get very drunk on chicha (corn beer), and talk a lot about plants, particularly one Paul (repeatedly) describes as "Peruvian Viagra".

I take out the itinerary (remember "see a beautiful lake, see two beautiful lakes...") and observe that day two sounds exactly like day one, only higher. This leads to some debate about whether tomorrow's hike will be more or less difficult than the one we had just done. Noyme says¨"longer, but easier" and I do not believe her. Somehow, wading unsteadily through the darkness our flashlights seem powerless to penetrate, we find our way to the tent, and put all our remaining clothes on, on top of what we are already wearing. The zipper on my rental sleeping bag is stuck, and I spend most of the night holding it closed with two gloved fingers. T. is tossing and turning and there is no sound anywhere except the wind. I have to go the "bathroom", which I have been putting off because it is just too cold for squatting behind a rock; this is not as much fun as it sounds, and I can't imagine it sounds like much fun.
About 5 AM T. wakes up and tries to get out of the tent, but we have been wrapped up tighter than a Christmas present, and are obviously not going anywhere until someone outside decides to let us out. Luckily this is only a few minutes away, when Noyme "knocks" on the tent and tells us there is "Aguas Calientes" (hot water) outside, for us to get washed with. Unfortunately they put the two orange bowls at least two meters from the tent, and we were so numb from the cold all we could do was sit and stare at them until being summoned to the dining tent for breakfast. We try to repack (strange how much you spread out in one night), but neither of us can get our sleeping bags back into their cases, and it is still too cold to take off most of our layers.

The scenery was much yellower than the day before, less craggy rocks and more boulders. It was obvious the steep path we were following was nothing but the footsteps of the alpaca farmers, who we occasionally saw sitting serenely in the middle of nowhere, doing nothing at all. Sometimes they had children with them, or older women knitting and looking right through us. I wondered (and still wonder) what it would be like to live in such a place, and what they think about. It was a strange walk, being so committed to following Noyme, to not falling behind, to finding my footing that everything else could be forgotten. So much of the time we were walking I was desperate to stop, desperate to sit down, but the minute we do I am wandering off, climbing things and eager to set out again.
Three children appear from a farmhouse up ahead, running beside us and giggling. The oldest one has a baby tied to her back, all three have runny noses, and the thick red cheeks characteristic of the region. I wade across a stream to take pictures of the valley, and when I come back the youngest girl is asking T. for a tip for having her picture taken. We had been given strange green oranges as a snack, and the children seemed much happier to have them than we were.

We climb to the top of one peak, my head beginning to spin from the altitude. Once again we have that glorious "You thought I couldn't do it but I did" feeling, followed by an angry wind and the maddening dilemma of how to capture a scene like this on camera- it is, after all, everywhere, all around you, vast and empty. At least this is how it feels.
By far the most striking thing about this trek is that we never saw another tourist the entire time, unlike the 150 or so a day joining the Inca Trail. We are in our own private world. Just us and the llamas. Down below there is a village with power lines up around it. "Maybe this year," Noyme says, "the rich people here will get power."
We scramble off the path, as the horses pass by, running shakily along the narrow path, the bags clattering along with their footfall. The cook and porter run after them, absent-mindedly; they all know the way. "We will have lunch," Noyme says, "Then we will climb up there!" She points off into the very very distant distance across the valley. From where we stand I cannot even make out the top of the hill, or the path; just snow and dense, slush-coloured clouds. I am all set to say something witty, like, "You're kidding, right?" but by the time I turn around Noyme is already scampering daintily down the hill, and T. and I follow.
It turns out climbing down is nearly as difficult as climbing up, because the ground is so sandy if you put your foot the wrong way you can go sliding down- and this is a long way down. The sun is beating down on us, and we stop for lunch in a flat area (or what is known as "Inca flat"- up and down, up and down), by a river.
Fruitlessly we try and convince Noyme not to waste the porter's time setting up the tent, on such a beautiful afternoon, but this suggested deviance from protocol proves too much for her, and she tells us to go "get washed". It is only midday, and our faces are so choked with dust they turn our hands black in the water. This upsets T., who has hardly stopped complaining about her appearance since we set out.
After lunch we started up for the highest pass (4500 feet) and our legs start to feel like lead. Noyme seems to have forgotten about taking breaks (and asthmatic hikers) and by the time she pauses to see we are still with her I have started to wobble on my feet, or so T. tells me. Without missing a beat Noyme takes out a bottle of rubbing alcohol, pulls off one of my gloves and pours some into my hand.
We start up again, only now my hand is full of rubbing alcohol and I can't hold my walking stick (5 soles- literally and figuratively a crutch). On the next ridge I get more alcohol rubbed across my face. I have no idea if this is actually helping, or if she is just trying to make me feel better. The thought strikes me that even if I had wanted to turn back (which I certainly did not), there would be no way to do so. I look at T., who is wobbling on her feet. I admit this cheers me up slightly.
We reach the top, a flat area filled with stone cairns, offerings to the Pachamama (mother earth), and clouds so thick all around us we can barely see each other. Paul, who has been noticeably silent up until this point, suddenly announces he is a shaman and takes out yet another variety of potent-smelling liquor which he offers us before starting into a mono-syllabic chant, the meaning of which was never explained to us. We are told to exhale three times and make a wish. We do.
Below us is a deep green lake, surrounded by Andean geese. Noyme says just three more hours down, and then we camp for the night. A large herd of sheep pass by us in a perfect line. About 10 minutes later we round the corner and are greeted by a pitifully bleating and four tiny white legs. We spent almost an hour with the lamb, fretting about what to do with it, while Paul (who thought we were all ridiculous but recognized we were paying his salary) looked on. How strange it was to look out across from the mountain we were circling, across the valley all the way up to the peaks on the other side, and see no one. The campsite that night was right out of a postcard. By the time we arrived it was getting dark, and three ladies appeared (where do they just appear from?) untied the colourful shawls they (men and women) use to carry everything from pineapple to children, and tried to sell us Inca Kola by the lake. The best news was that we had been warned this night would be colder than the first, but as I could not imagine anything colder I didn't really notice a difference. We slept very early that night. This time I got at least an hour of sleep, and dreamed about hurricanes.
Our final morning was meant to be only 3 and a half hours, all down hill. I think T. and I were both a bit sad to be finishing up, just as we had started getting used to it --it being the dust, the wind, the throbbing in our legs and the struggle to breathe-- but when we suddenly found ourselves in a hamlet, complete with school and satellite dish, we were ready for the bus to take us back to "civilization".
Unfortunately, the roads from Ollanytaytambo (where the bus was coming from) had been closed for-- I don't know why they were closed. Noyme said we would follow the road to the next town, and maybe they would have a bus. Of course they didn't, and we spent the next four hours filling the road (as well as our shoes) with clouds of dust, as we raced towards town in time for our afternoon train. In all we added 11km to our hike (making our trek about as long as the Inca Trail, though they took an extra day), and they were the hardest of all, despite being downhill. We had one ten minute break, sitting on a wooden bench on the side of the road, with an elderly woman ladling out cicha from a black cauldron that came up to her shoulder.
We made it back to town, somehow, picked up our bags and took a cab to the train station, for a three hour ride to Auguas Calients (also Hot Water, after the springs nearby), the nearest town to Machu Picchu. T. and I were not sitting together, and I watched with fascination as the many fresh-smelling, well-rested looking tourists leaned awkwardly against the windows taking pictures of the same scenery I had just been walking through.
Auguas Calients is really just a glorified tourist market, with a few hotels and vastly over-priced net cafes thrown in. R. was not at the station as planned, so T. and I, utterly bewildered and coated in dust, found our way to the hotel, and parted company. On the way up the hill (if I never see another hill it will be too soon) I ran into the British barbies, who had taken the train from Cusco that morning, and were on their way for a massage. In my room I separated my clothes into Dirty and Danger, took pictures of my shoes (don't ask), and spent half an hour in the shower trying to clean the dirt out from between my fingers, and then gave up. In fact, some of it may still be there, but I hope not.
The next morning we got a wake up call (which we did not ask for) at quarter to 5, ate passion fruit in a dimly lit breakfast room, and then got lost on the way for to the Machu Picchu bus. It wasn't even light yet, but already the buses were pulling in and out, in a fairly un-South American routine. The bus ride took only about 20 minutes, but we seemed a world away from the day before, as here everything is lush and green and misty.

At the main gate to M.P. there is a lot of shuffling of paper and suspicious looking guards, but we get through, and R. says we must rush to meet the Inca Trekkers. I didn't know about the others, but I had had enough rushing up hills in the dark, and the light was just starting to creep over the stones when I reached the top. The top area is already filled with tourists, who are taking pictures of everything even though the best view is yet to come.

The trekkers arrive, all giddy and bursting with inside jokes, and suddenly the sun splits the sky above the mountain (Machu Picchu actually means Old Mountain) and there is this giant... something, right there in front of us. It is mysterious and indescribable, everything it should be, and for those few seconds not even the flicker and click of hundreds of competing cameras could make it any less magical.

We meet Freddy ("Hello Family!") who leads us through the endless sun baked passages, like stone honeycomb, trying to stay a few steps ahead of the other tour groups. As most of what is known about M.P is really speculation most of Freddy's dialogue consisted of "One researcher says this building is this; another researcher says it must be this..." Somehow that seemed appropriate. It was almost better not to know, just to look, to feel, to wonder.

We linger some time by a sacrificial altar, ("for the sacrificing the youngest and purest girl") and as it is discovered that I am the youngest (two months younger than a Barbie, how disheartening) the killing is demonstrated on me, and I am "Baby", for the remainder of the trip. But to me, by far the most striking thing about M.P was the iconic sundial, which was seriously damaged a few years back-- by a malfunctioning crane, during the filming of a beer commercial.
After this there are more llamas, the search for an "Inca bridge", several hundred photographs, a train ride, a bus ride, and we make it back to Cusco around 9:30 at night. Rarely have I been so grateful for a full night's sleep.

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The next chapter is my adventure in the rainforest (and then I'm caught up!). Expect this in the next few days. Some rainforest pictures are already up on my blog, with more to come.

Hope you are well (and keeping cool).

Much Love,

N.

-- "To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive." Robert Louis Stevenson