Santa Cruz Trek in Peruvian Andes/ Lima

After a short sleep and an early start as we set off on the classic 4-day santa cruz trek in the Cordillera blanca mountain range of Peru. I may have been more sure but for my part Dennis was a little uncertain of his skills in tackling such a big task. We met at the tour office at 6 AM and were joined by 5 others who were all traveling alone. There were two Israeli´s, one german, one slovakian, and one other canadian. We set off in a small combi with our bags strapped to the roof and arrived at our start point (which was actually the traditional end point, so therefore we did it backwards). We hiked up (in the hot sun) alongside a beautiful river in a valley between sheer cliffs for about 9 kms to our first campsite. In an open valley and when the sun was behind the clouds the temperature dropped significantly and we quickly bundled up to stay warm (no fires allowed in the park). Once our donkey driver arrived with all of our baggage our guide cooked up a wonderful meal. On the second day we were awake early from a long sleepless night in the cold. We started out for 7 hours of hiking with amazing scenary of snow capped mountains peaking out from behind the vast mountain scape. We veered off the the main trail to a hike up to a view point of another mountain view and continued on up to a glacier lake. The view was breath taking and the wind even more so, we quickly headed down to keep warm. Our camp for the night was below a magnificent mountian view. The night was cold and we got very little sleep, when we awoke there was a thick layer of ice on our tents and the ground was white with frost. We got moving early to keep warm and to start our climb up the mountain pass. Our guide told us it would take 3-4 hours, but under 2 hours we were at the top enjoying the view on either side of the valley. The elevation on top was just under 16,000ft! We then descended down on a very different landscape to another valley with lots of trees (and random cows). We hiked on to our last camp spot and enjoyed the rest of the afternoon in the warm sun playing cards with our group. We had a great time getting to know all of the people in our group. Finally we hiked out of the mountains to wait for transportation which took many hours longer then expected. We drove down a winding nail biting road that left us grateful to be alive at the bottom. We returned to huaraz and went for some awesome food with our group from the trek and then we went our seperate ways.

We headed out on a night bus the day we returned from our hike to Lima where we arrived at 5 am. We found a hostel and quickly headed out for a full day out in Lima. We visited some ruins which were neat to see. Then we headed off to Larco Mar, which is an open air mall that is over looking the ocean. Then off we went to do some souviener shopping at hundreds of craft stalls. Weary we treated ourselves to a little McDonalds for supper! We then pressed on rejuvinated from our meal and a bit of ice cream for dessert to drop off our treasures at the hostel before heading out to the "festival of fountains" (or something) where there are over a dozen water fountains that are lit up with different coloured lights all around a huge park. The various fountains are all very unique where one you can walk under a tunnel of water, or one where you can dodge the water (there were lots of screaming teens-we just watched), one was in the guiness book of world records for the highest fountian, and one lazer/music show on water!! It was pretty neat to see and the park was full of people.

Another day on the big city today we killed the morning waiting to go paragliding, but unfortunately there was no breeze and we were not able to go. We walked along the walkway at tge top of the cliffs that over look the ocean. Lima has a beautiful water front. We relaxed most of the day wandering around Lima.

We are off again tomorrow morning for Haucachina and Nazca.

Did we mention that the ice cream here is great and everywhere!! I am a very happy girl.

Santa cruz trek

So here we are in Huaraz, Peru and we arrived at 700am on a bus from Trujillo. Our last days in Trujillo were great we had fun hanging out with friends and family. On Sunday Dennis had lots of people to see even though for just a short time. Dennis had the oppritunity to say a few words in church on Sunday. It is great to see how the church has grown from a thatch roof to a beautiful 3 storey building. And although I didn´t know the songs or what the sermon was about, it was neat to be with other people worshiping God here in Peru. The young people that Dennis know when he was there came over to Liana Penners to play a few rounds of Dutch Blitz that the Trek group had introduced. It was cool as there were a few people that hadn´t been going to church for awhile and with Dennis here they came together to hang out. Monday we headed out with our wonderful host (Maribel) and daughter Gianella to Huaca la Luna y sol. These are old ruins from about 400 to 800 ad from the Moche people. It was neat to see how they built the structure over the generations and they covered the old building to build on top (Like an inverted triangle) and they are still working at uncovering more of the ruins under the sand. Around Trujillo it is very dessert like with lots of barren mountains and sand. It is very unique and beautiful (although I am not sure when it is really hot out). Then our time came to an end very quickly and we had to say goodbye. We had a send off at the bus station and off we went on our night bus to Huaraz.

We started out looking for a tour group and signed up for a 4 day trek (Santa Cruz) which we were hoping to get to do. We are off tomorrow morning at 600am and looking forward to it and hope we are in good enough shape! We spent today walking lots with a short hike up a "hill" to help get acclimatized to the altitude. We also visited some ruins from the wari people. It was interesting with all the very small stone rooms, and very short doors (we had to basically crawl through). We also managed to find a couple of markets and did some souviner shopping (now hopefully it will fit into our packs).

The Trujillo Times

Well a few days have gone by since we arrived here in Trujillo and we thought it was about time for an update. We ended up taking a "luxury" bus from Piura to Trujillo with big poofy reclining seats on the second deck as it was a night bus (we felt like we were first class). We managed to get a little bit of sleep(due in part to the earplugs I borrowed from work) and we rolled in at about 5 AM. We were greeted by Liana Penner at the bus station ( a missionary here in Trujillo that works teaching english and at the church as well through mbms). It was nice to see a familiar face as I had worked with Liana when I was here in the past. So Liana let us crash at her house for a bit before we embarked on our surprise to the house of Edgardo and Maribell where we were to stay (My peruvian family where I had stayed for 3 months). We rang the doorbell and when Maribell answered the door she stood there in disbelief. After pulling herself together she let us in and called down her son Andres who was equally surprised. The daughter Gianella was there as well and although she was too young to remember me she has grown quite attached to having us in her home (she has been writing us a constant stream of cards which appear under our door in the mornings). Unfortuantely we did not get to see Edgardo untill the next morning as he was gone but his reaction was great as well. It is good to be here with Liana. The family always jokes that I had said I would return one day with my wife and here we are.
So we have been quite buisy both meeting people and going to see various places in and around Trujillo. Some of these activities include going to Huanchaco beach and laying in the sun with the sound of the waves crashing. Also we ventured out of Trujillo to the town of Chicamita where Edgardo´s mother lives. She is a very small and sweet and lives in a beautiful little house with a tree in the middle and a talking parrot. We also got to surprise my old spanish teacher Isabel. Her reaction was probably the best as she had absolutely no idea that we were coming and just couldnt believe it. We hung out at Isabel´s place for the evening, talking and playing table tennis which their whole family are professional at.
Today we went to buy our tickets for Huaraz only to find that the bus is full and so we will be staying here untill our bus leaves on monday night( another night bus). So we will try to see some more people and maybe go to ChanChan(the largest adobe ruins in the world) or hit the beach again.

sad note

we will not be able to post any pictures while we are here.....so inspite of my over preparedness, we don´t have the computer cable for our "back-up" camera which we now rely on. So you will just have to wait until we are home...sorry!

saying goodbye to ecuador

Well we have given our fond farewell to Ecuador. We have managed to cover quite a bit of ground in the last few days, although nothing too exciting. It is quite the experience watching the andes go by outside of the bus window. There is so much variety as you are driving along the side of mountain. But if you think that many hours on a bus would be boring you have never driven with the retired nascar drivers that man the many buses. There is debris flying from one side of the bus to the other as the driver rips around potholes, animals, people, and vehicles. One time there was this little old lady in the front seat and the driver couldnt make the pass on a blind corner so he slammed on the brakes. WEll the lady slid clear off her seat, across the floor and onto the steps, good thing the door was closed. This interesting driving also managed to do a number to our stomachs, swerving through all the switchbacks. The buses are interesting. There are people who sit and wait for the buses to come by and then jump on and try to sell you food, drinks, and other random things. Ecuador proved to be quite the beautiful place. Our time there allowed to meet many interesting people. There is such a diversity from the big city, to the laid back countryside where some people still dress very indigenously, with bright colors, cool hats, alpaca ponchos, traditional jewlery, and babies (or anything else) strapped to their back. Although I will add this, on one bus a very very indiginous looking grandma sat down beside us and proceeded to whip out a cell phone...are we the only ones in the world without a cell phone??? Things in Ecuador were also very cheap. We ate many typical meals at small local "hole in the walls" with meals consisting of rice, meat, some salad and usually starting with soup.

Today we crossed the border into Peru. In this process we had to go to 5 different stops, slightly confusing as we were ungulfed into a massive heat wave. We had to go into a makeshift health station to be screened for the swine flu. The nurses did a basic vitals (and even casually took our picture on her cell phone of us) and then we had to see the doctor who just asked some basic questions. We were given the ok to proceed on with a perscrition type note from the doctor. Interestingly enough no washing of hands, change of gloves, cleaning of equipment as they went from person to person (maybe now we have the swine flu)!!! So now after 9 hours on the bus we are in Piura Peru, which is basically situated in a dessert. IT is smoking hot here and we are dripping with sweat as we are crammed into this little booth at an internet cafe. We decided to move on quickly and got tickets for an overnight bus to Trujillo leaving at 11 pm. Hopefully we will be able to get some sleep. But untill then we have another 6 hours to kill so were going to find some food and check the place out a bit.

So we finished up in Baños with a very beautiful hike up the mountain to try and get a view of the volcano. We hiked up for several hours to have some lovely clouds covering the top of the volcano, but hey it is the journey. So we came to the top thinking we were pretty isolated (after 2 hours of vertical over grown switch backs) we came upon a house and some cows! And in fact there was a whole village up there and apparently they are in better shape then we are (or I think there is a road up there from the other side). Either way we hiked for about 5 hours following this map that almost lead us to our doom, not such an accurate map to say the least.

Sadly we had to move on to try and catch the train in Riobamba. We once again said by to the guys who were not feeling so hot and niether were we. We toughed out the bus ride to only arrive and find out that the Nariz del diablo train was full!!! A bit of a disappointment, but it turned out to be alright as Liana got really sick during the night. Although she had not been feeling well it came on like blitzkreig and about 6:30 AM we finally managed to get a few winks of sleep. The fear of being sick on the bus proved not to be a match for our dislike of Riobamba and we headed off for Alausi. It is a small town where we were to end up if we had been able to catch the train and we had the place cased in about 30 minutes. So now we are relaxing and enjoying the beautiful scenery and the laid back atmosphere. If everything goes well and we are feeling good tomorrow we will take off to Cuenca which is about another 4 hours. Buses are very cheap out here, its awesome!

the adventures of baños

So here we are, still in baños and enjoying it thoroughly. Baños is located about 3 hours south of Quito and is situated in the valley between beautiful green mountains. The city itself is actually quite small, like our hostel is 2 blocks from the main plaza and is considered "out of the way" (can I get a cheer from everyone who grew up in Guernsey). Baños is like an ecuadorian banff with lots of outdoor activities and lots of touristy things, like people that make toffee on every street corner. We have met up with Tim, Ryan, and Devin again which has been very nice. At first we expected to only see them a couple of evenings but it turns out that we have been together since they got here. So we have managed to have a few adventures here already, yesterday we bostered up the courage to go Bridge jumping. We headed out to the big bridge on the edge of town and put on harnesses. Then we stood on this little platform on the top of the guardrail and jumped out into the canyon. You freefall and then swing out under the bridge, wow what a rush. Liana was a little nervous so the guy ended up pushing Liana on her legs and with his head so she fell the right way. So I guess if that wasnt enough of an adrenaline rush we all went out white water rafting today. We got a smoking deal because there was five of us and headed out down the river. It was a class 4 rapid(sometimes higher) and turned out to be a white nuckle ride. So now we are just relaxing and planning on heading out for supper with the guys.

Change of plans

We are here in Baños and it is beautiful! We decided that we would come straight here and spend extra nights to relax and that is what we are doing. We had a $3 lunch (for both us) and then did a bit of a splurge for supper with a nice glass of vino! We are wondering the town and are excited about adventures to come.

set backs

Well we had our first travel hiccup today. We were having supper in beautiful central quito after a long day of seeing the sights when we heard a knock on the window beside us. Some lady was making all these crazy gestures at us, which took us off guard for a moment, and when we turned around our bag was gone. Oldest trick in the book to be sure, the tried and true distraction tactic. We are okay and thankfully we left our passports, some money, and some of our cards in the hostel. WE did however loose our video camera, one of our camera´s, some money, and a few gifts including some post cards(sorry to you who were the recipients). IT is not so much the money we are upset about as the pictures and video from our journey thus far (and the anaconda was really15 feet). So immediately after we realized it was stolen we found a policeman who took us to a place we could report the incident. Soon after the tourist police came to take us too the station for a claim report(keep in mind we are currently only blocks from our hostel before they took us). So they drove us to the station and got our report completed and that was it...only we didnt have any money or any idea where we were. So "graciously" the policeman gave us a tourist map to walk back to our hostel (by now it is dark). Well we managed to make it and when we told the lady at the hostel she said we were the third one today from that one hostel, buisy day in Quito I guess. Well we are thankful that we are safe and sound, just a little flustered. I guess we will most likely continue on to Guaranda and salinas tomorrow, let you know how it goes.

Amazonian adventure

So we are back safe and sound in Quito, relaxing a bit after a great adventure in the amazon. We kicked off our trip by flying into the city of Lago Agrio (where we almost missed our flight as it was bumped up earlier, but the flight ended up running late where we met up with Tim, Ryan and Devin. We met our tour company and quickly packed all of our belongings into dry packs and started out on a 3ish hour drive into the jungle. We passed small towns and enjoyed the scenery as everything was so green and so humid (our cameras didin´t work at first as they were all fogged up). We arrived at the river and started a few hours of canoeing down stream and then our guide, Diego, took us down a detour...... so as it was getting dark we canoed through, over and around fallen trees that our guide cut a path with his machette. Wow that was definetly a highlight and we´ll have to tell you more later. We arrived to a candlelight campsite that had been set up for us and food waiting. We continued on with more canoeing the next day and arrived at our jungle lodge. We saw all kinds of animals (anacondas-15ft, caiman, monkeys, fresh water dolphins, lots of birds, insects, sloth....and the list goes on)! We had the oppritunity to do some fishing for pirhanas...we weren´t too successful. Some of our other adventures included going to a village, going on a night walk, and a jungle walk where we learned the ways of the native ecudorian tribes. Dennis swung on some vines, ate some ants that tasted like lemons as well as some larvae. Lots more stories too tell...... We ventured back with a motor boat and are all set up at our hostel in old town quito. Looks beautiful here and we will spend the next day exploring before heading off down south to a small town called Salinas. We have been feeling fine (mom an dad) and yes we are taking lots of pictures. We have had a wonderful time seeing Tim and sharing part of our adventure with him. Thanks for all the prayers and support.

Quito

Well we are finally here...actually we have been here for a few days but have not found an internet cafe close to our house (sorry to our parents who probably thought we were dead). Its been three days and already we have had our fair share of adventures. Well to begin with thanks for all the prayers because we arrived safely with all our lugguage and even had Jose and his father pick us up at the airport. Jose and Cynthia have graciously let us stay in their house untill we head out to the amazon tomorrow. Quito is nice and we have enjoyed being here. Its kind of a funny climate, changing from rain to hot sun, and then back to rain within minutes, but it is a beautiful encircled by luscious green mountains. On friday Jose and his family invited us over for a traditional Ecuadorian meal and some good conversation...it was a lot of food!! Then yesterday Liana and I braved the Quito transit system via bus as we ventured to a place called Mitad del mundo (the center of the earth). It was a bit confusing trying to figure out what buses went where, and where our stops were according to the color of bus we were on and random names of parts of the city we did not know. But with the help of some nice ecuadorians we made it(and even returned home). What made this all worth it was standing in a bus crammed full of ecuadorians with a sign that said "occupancy - 37 sitting, 40 standing" and having a bus full of tourists half asleep drive by. They were seeing all the sights but missing a great adventure. Today we braved the transit once more and went to Cruz Loma, which took us up a gondola to a station overlooking the city, from which we continued hiking up the mountains for about 2 hours in the fog. The moments when the fog broke made the trek worthwhile as we were rewarded with breathtaking mountains and a great view of the city. Tomorrow we head off in the morning to the Amazon so it will most likely be a week or so untill our next entry.
Ciao
Dennis and Liana