Trekking Again: Peru's Stunning Cordillera Blanca (And Falling Into a Cactus)

We've spent the past few days in and around Huaraz, a pleasant city in the northern highlands. Huaraz is surrounded by some spectacular scenery in the Cordillera Blanca and Cordillera Huayhuash mountain ranges, and is fast becoming known as the trekking and adventure capital of Peru. You can see several beautiful snowcapped mountains just from the city centre, with the skyline dominated by the majestic Huascarán, the highest in Peru at 6768m. Ready for some more hiking after a break since our long Machu Picchu trek, we were excited to explore the region.

Trekking in the Cordillera Blanca - Santa Cruz Trek, Day 4

The city of Huaraz is up at 3100m, and having had a while down at sea level we needed a couple of days to re-acclimatise to the altitude. Our main objective here was to undertake the famous 4 day Santa Cruz hike in the Cordillera Blanca, voted as one of the world's best treks by National Geographic, and we spent our first day in Huaraz looking round all the local trekking agencies. In fact this hike can be done independently, but we didn't fancy carrying all our own gear (including tents and cooking equipment) around, especially at altitudes of well above 4000m. We decided to sign up for an organised trek with a small company called Eco Ice, departing in two days' time.

Following the river at the start of our Laguna 69 trek

Having got that sorted, we needed to do a day hike to acclimatise further prior to the longer trek. We chose the trek to Laguna 69 (inventive name!), which came highly recommended by several other travellers. The hike started at around 3800m and proceeded across mostly flat terrain, following the river and passing numerous gorgeous waterfalls. After some fairly easy switchbacks, we reached not Laguna 69 but its sister lake, Laguna 68, and from there it was a lot tougher going. Kev was okay with the altitude but I was gasping for breath and had to slow to a snail's pace for the last section! However as we crested the summit and got our first view of Laguna 69, it was all worth it. The most dazzlingly turquoise lake you can imagine, ringed by snowy mountains and glaciers (that from time to time would creak loudly!). The weather had been very changeable on the way up but as we arrived it cleared nicely and we had a wonderful view of the tops of the mountains emerging from the clouds.

Laguna 69

Laguna 69 is hard to do without taking organised transport, and while this was fine on the way it was a little frustrating on the way back. We were some of the fastest people in our busload of people; in fact having got to the top and spent an hour there eating lunch, on our way down we passed the majority of the group still going up! So it was quite a long wait for everyone to finish before our bus could depart for the long 3 hour trip back to Huaraz.

View down the valley at the end of our Laguna 69 trek

On our return from this hike, we found an email from Eco Ice advising us that our Santa Cruz trek had been postponed for two days due to the illness of someone else who'd signed up for it. We were actually not too sad about the delay - it was pretty good not have to get up before dawn again for the second day in a row, and I was grateful for some more acclimatisation time. Rather than hanging about any further in Huaraz, we decided to switch our plans around and visit the nearby historical site of Chavín de Huantar before the trek.

The main plaza at Chavín, with temple behind, surrounded by mountains

We took a very rural local bus out to Chavín, opting to stay a night in the town itself rather than do a day tour from Huaraz (which would have been another 6 hours round trip!). The road wound up into the mountains and then through a tunnel into the neighbouring district of Chavín, where the road surface changed dramatically for the worse: an hour of bumping along, often next to a sickening drop, with feathers blowing in the windows from the dozens of crates of chickens on the roof. Arriving in Chavín town itself in the late afternoon, we checked out what Lonely Planet describes as 'thermal baths'. Expecting some nice hot springs, we were a little disappointed to find they really were 'baths' - several private cubicles with bath size holes in the floor, which we had to fill with a hot tap to a maximum depth of about 8 inches. Not quite what we'd hoped for.

Snake carvings on the steps at Chavín

But our main reason for coming to Chavín was to see the ruins near the town, which make up yet another UNESCO World Heritage Site. This site was built by the Chavín culture between 1200 and 500 BC, and used as a ceremonial centre where local people would come together to worship. The main temple was a huge pyramid, with a sunken plaza in front and stone columns still with original carvings. The whole complex had a ventilation system, earthquake proofing and even a system of channels that would have acted as a sound system, amplifying sounds during ceremonies. Perhaps the most impressive feature was the elaborate series of underground passages, or galleries - some have unbelievably high ceilings and you can still walk though them today. One passage has at its centre a huge carved stone monolith of the Chavin supreme deity, the Lanzón: most of the gallery was dark but the lighting was cleverly designed by the temple's builders so that light from outside beams directly on the sculpture. It was pretty incredible.

Underground gallery at Chavín

The monolith representing the Lanzón deity

We returned that afternoon to Huaraz and the next day were up at 5am to start our Santa Cruz trek. Like Laguna 69, this trek goes through the Huascarán National Park in the Cordillera Blanca. The trek was amazing, with scenery reminiscent of Patagonia. The Cordillera Blanca has 33 peaks over 5500m and over 700 glaciers - there were magnificent snowy panoramas everywhere we looked.  We even saw Paramount Mountain; yes, the one in the Paramount Pictures logo! While easier than our ridiculous Machu Picchu trek, it was still challenging at times, particularly with the altitude. Day 2 took us up to a 4750m pass, the highest I have ever hiked to, and that day we camped at 4250m. Two sleeping bags still weren't enough to quite keep out the bitter cold; it's the highest we've slept at on the whole trip and the first time we've had ice inside the tent! We were lucky with the weather though, with clear skies most of the time allowing us stupendous views at both of the highest points.

Looking out on the Paramount Mountain

We were in a group of eight, all lovely people - an Aussie couple, two Israeli brothers, and an Aussie girl and Canadian girl travelling together - plus two guides, a donkey driver and several donkeys. And a dog, which ostensibly belonged to the donkey driver but was nameless and spent most of his time trekking with us. In fact he became rather overprotective, one night waking everyone up barking wildly and attempting to chase away nearby cows.

Kev with 'El Perro' ('The Dog') - we gave him a name!

On the last day of the trek we had a fairly easy walk downhill, next to a lovely river with so many waterfalls that we beat our record number in a day. Kev managed to fall over spectacularly on top of a cactus - the guide got to practise his first aid skills bandaging his hand and later extracting a cactus spine at least an inch long! We celebrated the end of the trek with beers at a shop in the tiny village at the end that was actually run by our guide's aunt and uncle.

One of numerous waterfalls along the river on day 4

That evening we were all also invited to the house of Orlando, the owner of the company, for delicious homecooked dinner and pisco sours, with a demonstration of the making of the latter. Orlando invited us on to the birthday party of one of his colleagues and we had a great evening drinking, chatting and watching the (somewhat odd) Peruvian style of dancing. We'd definitely recommend the Eco Ice company to anybody!

Our final campsite at Llamacorral 

There's plenty more to do here, and in fact we'd like to come back here on holiday in the future to do the challenging and perhaps even more impressive 10 - 12 day Huayhuash circuit in the other cordillera. But for now we're pushing on up north before we fly back down to Patagonia in 2 weeks' time to meet family and do yet more hiking!

Our trekking group at Punta Unión, the high pass on day 2 - new height record!

The Oldest Civilisation in the Americas

We've spent the last few days getting to know a bit more of Peru's history, from the oldest civilisation in the Americas to the turbulent recent past.

Ayacucho

From Ica, we set off for the less-visited city of Ayacucho, back up in the mountains. Ayacucho was the main base for the Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) communist organisation. Starting in the early 80s, it waged a guerilla war against the military government that, predictably, responded with violence. This left much of the populace caught between the two sides with thousands of casualties, the majority poor people from the countryside. Sendero Luminoso declined in activity from 1992 when its leader was captured, but there are still sporadic bursts of activity.

The remains of the powerful Wari empire

We used Ayacucho as a base to visit the ruins of the Wari civilisation's capital city. This was a city of an estimated 50,000 people and was the centre of a pre-Inca empire extending over much of Peru between the years 500 and 900. There isn't much left of it today; although there are some remaining buildings and walls still standing, it's hard to imagine a city that big in the abandoned cactus-covered desert.

The main square in Lima

After Ayacucho, we took another night bus back down to the coast for a brief stay in Lima. We're planning to return here in about a month, so we just visited the main sites - the park filled with stray cats in Miraflores (which Jo loved), and a walk around the historic colonial-era centre. It felt a bit depressing as Lima is famous for being covered in white mist for half of the year. We cheered ourselves up by finding one of the first places in which pisco sours were made.

5,000 year old pyramids at Caral

We left Lima to travel further north along the coast to Barranca, the closest town to the ancient ruins of Caral. This is an astounding site - it dates from 5,000 years ago so is one of the cradles of civilisation. It's the oldest such site in the Americas, and was founded at the same time as the Egyptian pyramids were being built. There are remains of pyramids and residential buildings centred around a large square that are in amazing condition considering their age.

Being gluttons for punishment, we've now returned to the mountains, where we're hoping to do some more trekking from Huaraz.

La Serena and Pisco Tasting in the Elqui Valley

La Serena is the main town of the Norte Chico region of Chile and the scenery during our seven hour journey here was a dramatic change from everywhere else we've been so far - arid, desert-like landscapes, with few plants other than cacti of all shapes and sizes. The temperature is noticeably higher during the day, getting up to the high 20s, but drops a lot at night.

The arid Elqui Valley, near to La Serena

We were lucky to hit gold with our choice of hostel here. La Sombre del Viento, a recently opened place, was more like a boutique hotel than a hostel! We had the best shower of the trip and homemade yoghurt, bread and cake for breakfast every day. Our French host, Marie-Laure, was incredibly welcoming and happy to chat to us about her travels across the world over a pisco sour. We told her she could easily charge a lot more - but she doesn't want to attract only the rich customers. Awesome.

The wonderful hostess Marie-Laure, and her world travel map

We spent our first couple of days here checking out the highlights of the city, namely the Japanese garden and the Archaeological Museum where exhibits included one of the original Moai statues from Easter Island. We also decided to visit the nearby Valle del Encanto (enchanted valley), which is famous for its rock art and archaeological importance. Tour agencies in La Serena offer this trip at exorbitant prices, but we opted to go instead under our own steam. After two hours on two different buses we set off walking the final 5km in the baking heat, but luckily were picked up halfway by a friendly Chilean guy who turned out to work there! The rock art was really amazing, with a mix of petroglyphs (carvings), pictographs (paintings), and also lots of hollowed out depressions in the rock, possibly used to mix paint in. There were also two enormous, 3m wide holes, which were labelled as 'Baños del Inca' - baths of the Inca - although we're not sure how accurate this name is. Most of the art came from the early centuries AD, but they have also found evidence of human habitation here up to 5000 years ago.

Jo and a Moai

Pictographs in the Valle del Encanto

After three days around La Serena, we took a bus into the Elqui Valley and stayed one night in the picturesque, if very backpackery, village of Pisco Elqui. Pisco, a spirit distilled from grapes, is Chile's speciality and we've had many a pisco sour here - a delicious cocktail made from pisco, lemon juice, sugar and egg white. Most production of the spirit happens in the Elqui Valley and we enjoyed the long bus ride there with spectacular views of the valley far below, enclosed by steep cliffs and patterned with vineyards. While in Pisco Elqui we obviously had to try some, so did a short tour of the Mistral distillery (one of the premium brands of pisco), including two tastings.

Pisco tasting in Pisco Elqui

We've just survived a gruelling 16 hour bus journey to arrive this morning in the desert town of San Pedro de Atacama, which is literally in the middle of the Atacama Desert! More on that next time.

Valparaíso

Houses showing off their bright colours

We have spent the last few days in Valparaíso,
Chile's second city and, also, its capital of culture. It's not a place with a long list of things to see and do; more somewhere for strolling around and enjoying getting lost. It's situated on the coast, adjacent to Viña del Mar, and its 42 hills are a maze of streets, stairways and passages.

Valparaíso rose to prominence in the mid-1800s, as a convenient stop for ships travelling to the Californian gold rush from Europe. Many of the immigrants built their houses on the slopes out of adobe, then lined the walls with the iron carried in the ships as ballast for their arduous journey around Cape Horn at the south of the continent. To stop the iron rusting, leftover paint from the fishing boats was used to coat the houses, giving the city its characteristic multicoloured patchwork appearance.

Nowadays, the city is a haven for street art. Everywhere you look, you will find walls covered in murals of all shapes, sizes and themes, from the (very) weird to the wonderful. Although street art is technically illegal, many people commission artists to paint their walls to avoid someone scrawling a tag on them.

Street art

To get around the city, several of the hills are served by small ascensors, or funicular railways. Many of these are relics from the 1800s but are maintained as part of the city's UNESCO status. We used one to get to another of Pablo Neruda's houses, La Sebastiana. The day we visited was the national Cultural Heritage day, so it was free to get in but was thronged with people. It had magnificent views over the city and the harbour, but we missed the depth of information that was given by the audioguide at La Chascona, Neruda's house in Santiago.

More (rather phallic) street art

We're continuing next to La Serena - further north and close to the Elqui Valley, where they make the ubiquitous pisco.