For the next two weeks I was offline: I did 2 5-days treks: around Ausangate mountain and Salkantay to Machu Picchu! I did it the way round: first Ausangate, then Machu Picchu. Do not ask me if there was a logic here, I just found a group (and the trek that does not end up in MP is hard to find in Cusco), so I went for it first.
As I am reeeeeaaaaaaallllyyyyyyyy late with this blog few next posts are going to be in English to save time.
Trek one, week 25. Ausangate
Ausangate is 6000+ mountain 3 hours away from Cusco. I tried to find agency to summit, but it was too expensive and no groups were doing it. The other option was to walk around it with two passes over 5000m. This is what I did.
Our group was 4 girls and 2 horsemen: two teacher-friends working in Singapore (1 australian and 1 kiwi), female guide, myself, Hernan and Mario. Our horsemen were from the area, on the first night we stayed in Hernan's house and played football with his kids. Horsemen were also cooks and pretty much guides as the girl had no idea where she was going.
Those two are tough: they were running all the time way ahead of us, although we tried to be as fast as we could. Hernan got flu on the way, but still kept going giving up a horse to Kerry who could not make it to the pass.
I loved the trek: it was remote, beautiful, only for us: we did not meet many other trekkers on the way, but could see life of campensinos in Andean Peruvian area.
All horsemen have radio that they listen to while walking, all of them speak Quechua between themselves, their wives wear traditional dresses, their kids call us 'gringos'.
Hernan brought his wife's outfit so we could make pretty photos
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One of the lagoons around Ausangate mountain
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Alpacas in action
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Weekend in Cusco: Chocolate workshop
After the trek I relaxed a couple of days in Cusco. Luckily, Ines (Isla de Pascua, Puerto Madryn) was there with her injured knee, so we spent a day together
Next day I went to Chocolate museum for workshop to make crazy flavoured chocolate (CHOCOLATE!!!!!)
My face is already crazy enough after inhaling pure chocolate paste and drinking chocolate tea
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Crazy flavours
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Result
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Salkantay trek
And I am finally off to Machu Picchu through Salkantay!
This is one of the most popular late-bookings treks to the Inca town, so we were hundreds on the trek.
The bus collected everyone from the hostel at 3am in the morning, there was 17 people in my group and 2 guides. We called ourselves 'Night riders'. There were 4 Irish, 2 English, Brazilian, French and Canadian couples, 2 Dutch girls, 2 brothers from Canada studying in Bolivia. Quite diverse, but mostly English-speaking. So different experience from Ausangate!
Landscape was also very diverse: from high mountains to rainforest in 4 days walking!
If in Ausangate we stayed in shelters, here it was tents (although I think this is only due to amount of people doing the trek). Facilities in Peru mountains are way more basic (and disgusting) comparing with Bolivia (and they call Bolivians lazy!).
Last night before heading to Aguas Calientes (town close to MP), we had bonfire party, where the guides got high/drunk and refused to walk next day making everyone to take a bus. However, a small Irish-Russian group refused and decided to walk. We walked waaaay ahead of our suffering guide checking road with locals, poor guy hated us by the end of the walk.
End of this day we have reached Aguas Calientes, 4 days trek was over, just Machu Picchu was ahead of us tomorrow!
Although I do not like crowded walks, I enjoyed this trek: we had amazing group full of very intelligent young people (yes, most of them were around 23 yo): Irish boy knows Russian literature better than I (he was reading Demons by Dostoyevsky during the hike!).
Night Riders at the Salkantay pass
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Avalanche
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Landscape change
1.
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2.
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3.
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As I am reeeeeaaaaaaallllyyyyyyyy late with this blog few next posts are going to be in English to save time.
Trek one, week 25. Ausangate
Ausangate is 6000+ mountain 3 hours away from Cusco. I tried to find agency to summit, but it was too expensive and no groups were doing it. The other option was to walk around it with two passes over 5000m. This is what I did.
Our group was 4 girls and 2 horsemen: two teacher-friends working in Singapore (1 australian and 1 kiwi), female guide, myself, Hernan and Mario. Our horsemen were from the area, on the first night we stayed in Hernan's house and played football with his kids. Horsemen were also cooks and pretty much guides as the girl had no idea where she was going.
Those two are tough: they were running all the time way ahead of us, although we tried to be as fast as we could. Hernan got flu on the way, but still kept going giving up a horse to Kerry who could not make it to the pass.
I loved the trek: it was remote, beautiful, only for us: we did not meet many other trekkers on the way, but could see life of campensinos in Andean Peruvian area.
All horsemen have radio that they listen to while walking, all of them speak Quechua between themselves, their wives wear traditional dresses, their kids call us 'gringos'.
Hernan brought his wife's outfit so we could make pretty photos
One of the lagoons around Ausangate mountain
Alpacas in action
Weekend in Cusco: Chocolate workshop
After the trek I relaxed a couple of days in Cusco. Luckily, Ines (Isla de Pascua, Puerto Madryn) was there with her injured knee, so we spent a day together
Next day I went to Chocolate museum for workshop to make crazy flavoured chocolate (CHOCOLATE!!!!!)
My face is already crazy enough after inhaling pure chocolate paste and drinking chocolate tea
Crazy flavours
Result
Salkantay trek
And I am finally off to Machu Picchu through Salkantay!
This is one of the most popular late-bookings treks to the Inca town, so we were hundreds on the trek.
The bus collected everyone from the hostel at 3am in the morning, there was 17 people in my group and 2 guides. We called ourselves 'Night riders'. There were 4 Irish, 2 English, Brazilian, French and Canadian couples, 2 Dutch girls, 2 brothers from Canada studying in Bolivia. Quite diverse, but mostly English-speaking. So different experience from Ausangate!
Landscape was also very diverse: from high mountains to rainforest in 4 days walking!
If in Ausangate we stayed in shelters, here it was tents (although I think this is only due to amount of people doing the trek). Facilities in Peru mountains are way more basic (and disgusting) comparing with Bolivia (and they call Bolivians lazy!).
Last night before heading to Aguas Calientes (town close to MP), we had bonfire party, where the guides got high/drunk and refused to walk next day making everyone to take a bus. However, a small Irish-Russian group refused and decided to walk. We walked waaaay ahead of our suffering guide checking road with locals, poor guy hated us by the end of the walk.
End of this day we have reached Aguas Calientes, 4 days trek was over, just Machu Picchu was ahead of us tomorrow!
Although I do not like crowded walks, I enjoyed this trek: we had amazing group full of very intelligent young people (yes, most of them were around 23 yo): Irish boy knows Russian literature better than I (he was reading Demons by Dostoyevsky during the hike!).
Night Riders at the Salkantay pass
Avalanche
Landscape change
1.
2.
3.
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