Choquequirao

Cusco Blog 9/30/10

This past weekend I was lucky enough to go on a lovely three day trek to Choquequirao with some friends from the hostel.  It was Maren’s last weekend and she wanted to do something fun with a few close friends.  So, Maren, Ellen, Diana, Juan Pablo (Juan P) and I all left Friday night to go to Cachora and spend the night before setting off of the trek.  Diana had done the trek before and she said it was gorgeous and a little tough, but she had done it in three days and was sure we all could do so again.  Plus, we were planning on hiring a mule, so that would keep things moving quickly (or so we thought!).

At the hostel in Cachora we asked the man in charge if we could hire a mule.  He kept trying to get us to hire a guide with the mule for 70 soles a day, but that was way more than we were planning on paying.  Plus, we had Diana who would show us the way.  So after some hassle over that the man told he would not let us rent a mule without a guide.  He also told us, for good measure, that the trek took five days to complete and we were crazy to think we could do it in three without a guide.  I suppose he was a little bit right about that last bit.  But hey, we were stingy and determined, so we asked his wife her opinion.  She was very nice, and a friend of Haydee’s, and she remembered Diana from the previous time she had stayed at the hostel.  She told us of a place we could stop right near the beginning of the trail where we could for sure hire a mule, no problem, and we should mention her to ensure a good deal.  The only problem was it was five kilometers away.  Okay, actually more like eight.

(Views from the hostel)

Well, no problem we, thought, we’ll just distribute the weight evenly and all carry our sleeping bags and pass the tent around and we’ll be fine.  We were fine, but it was a long way and already hot and I fell and scraped my knee.

When we made it to the mule rental farm we quickly relaxed in the shade while they prepared the mule, which turned out to be a bad idea.  In the shade were lurking hundreds of tiny mosquitoes just waiting for fresh human blood.  Everyone received about twenty bites within the first five minutes.  Except, miraculously, the Minnesotan, me!  I was shocked when Juan P said he was getting mosquito bites everywhere, and everyone else agreed.  I quickly inspected myself, jumped into the sunlight, and breathed a sigh of relief.  Not a single one!  I couldn’t understand why the mosquitoes at home just adore me and can’t wait to make my skin swell into huge welts while these tiny foreign buggers didn’t give a hoot that I was smack in the middle of them: fresh, cool, Minnesota-grown, pine-smelling, delicious blood, beating furiously in amazement.  Maybe getting attacked constantly at home all my life actually has its benefits, I thought.

Anyhow, I kept a weary eye on these strange bugs, slathered on repellent and took the advice of the old great-grandma at the farm and rubbed muña leaves all over myself as an extra precaution.  You can never tell if the moquitoes are leaving you alone for a reason or if they are just waiting in the shadows (literally), planning a strategic attack.  It doesn’t hurt to be overly protected against the stinkers.  Plus, the muña plant smelled pretty good, so I stuck a few twigs in my hat and behind my ears as well.

(Juan P with the muña plant)

After about 45 minutes our mule, Salvadora, was all loaded up and ready to go.  She’d eaten her food, been strapped to the bags, and was looking rather bored about standing there.  So, we started off on the trail.

The first few hours of hiking were rather unremarkable as far as the trail, but the views were spectacular.  We could see down into the valley, and ahead of us were huge mountains, green, green, green with white snow on top (my favorite!).  I had a hard time not stopping every three minutes to take pictures.  Luckily, I remembered my goal of taking more pictures of people, and I tried to include the others in my photos whenever possible.

After we stopped for a brief lunch of bananas, peanuts and chocolate, the trail became a bit more interesting with lots of ups and downs. 

(Ellen during lunch break) 

 

(Salvadora resting)

(Diana eating)

 

(It's a long way down!!)

 

(We're almost to the view point and Juan P looks very pleased!)

Finally, we arrived at a lookout point, and man was it beautiful!  We rested here a while, took some pictures and then began the very scary and long descent down down down into the valley.  Our destination was the river (and beyond), but it looked so far away still!   

(Juan P and the gorgeous view!)

 

(My feet, waaaay above the river!)

 

(There's the sign to Choquequirao)

On our way down, we discovered very quickly that, Salvadora was not too fond of going down.  She stopped and refused to move after about three steps.  She absolutely would NOT go any further.  We used branches and our walking sticks to hit the bags and we did a lot of waving and yelling behind her to try to scare her…. No avail.  Juan P and I were stuck with her since the other girls were walking faster.  They noticed we were stuck though and sat down to watch our tactics, which we were told later were quite hilarious.  Juan P tried sweet-talking her and pulling the rope really hard; I tried pushing and shoving and jumping and yelling at her… Nothing.  I finally called her a stubborn ass, and for some reason she moved!  Halleluiah!  The others cheered and we continued.  I knew we had to move quickly to keep her going and not look back.  Unfortunately a few minutes later Juan P handed me his camera and asked me to take a picture of him leading Salvadora.  I tried to do it walking backwards without stopping but I failed and Juan P stopped and so did Salvadora and then we were stuck again.  For at least twenty minutes. 

After quite a long journey down the mountain we figured out a better strategy for leading Salvadora.  I explained my theory to the others and, working together, we kept her going.  Much like a horse, you have to be very confident in where you are leading Salvadora.  If you stop, she stops.  If you look back at her while trying to move forward she gets confused and stays put.  If you go ahead confidently, she will go too.  It’s more likely that she will go right away if there are others moving as well.  If someone else is having a rest goshdarnit she wants a rest too.

(She's really quite docile and sweet)

 

(Finally we had a rest near the bottom of that crazy steep mountain)

The rest of the day was a lot of up and down, with the down parts being rather hard to navigate with Salvadora.  We were constantly worried about her, but it turned out that most of the time we were moving to slowly for her and that was why she was hesitant. 

Finally, after 21 kilometers, we reached the river.  We took a quick break, debated on whether or not we should go up to the next campsite and risk walking in the dark, or just stay put, and decided to continue on.  We had one flashlight and one cell phone.  But we moved quickly.  It was four very, very hard kilometers straight up the mountain.  After the first two kilometers it was pitch black with no moon.  The three girls were going quite quickly, but Juan P and I seemed to stop more often, and we ended up getting stuck with Salvadora, who also didn’t care to walk uphill in the dark.  My strongest memory of that night is me stumbling up the hill, tripping over every rock and tree root while trying to hold my feeble phone’s light a foot from the ground and yelling “VAMOS!!!” at the mule from behind every time Juan P yelled in exasperation, “Salvadora!!” because she wouldn’t move.  Apparently that is what everyone else kept hearing too.

Earlier in the day, Maren, from Germany, had counted the number of zigzags that we would have to go up before we reached the campsite.   She had counted forty turns, and when we caught up with them at number forty we continued on together past one more turn, and up to the campsite!  Hooray!!  We were so exhausted and relieved and burnt out…. I’m still amazed we made it alive.  We made it to the site, which was really just a patch of grass next to a man’s house, woke up the man, and borrowed a strong flashlight to start setting up the tent.  Little did we know the very nice man from the hostel in the town that reluctantly rented us a tent when we wouldn’t hire a mule with a guide gave us a crappy two person ten with broken poles.  Yup.  We ended up using medical tape that I had brought along to mend the pole, which took like 30 minutes, and then we to cram five people into the tiny thing.  With no air to breathe and a broken zipper on the mesh opening.

After thoroughly washing our filthy feet, legs, faces, and arms in the river, and filling up our water bottles from the same stream, (It was clean!  No toxins! Non-lived on mountain!) we collapsed (carefully) into the tent.  I’m pretty sure Diana had her knees resting on my stomach most of the night, and my head ended up on Maren’s feet… it was a close-knit group.

The next day we woke up at five, packed up everything but left Salvadora to rest for the day.  Our plan was to make it all the way to Choquequirao and back which was a total of 16 very hard kilometers in time to pack up Salvadora and camp down by the river.   Ambitious? Yes.  Easy? No.  Possible?  Of course.

And so it was that we set off while the sun was still tucked nicely behind the mountains and the air was cool.  We walked like mad people, breathing heavily, stopping every other turn, drinking liters of water and sweating profusely.  After about 2 kilometers we stopped near a waterfall with a bench and were visited by an adorable little kitten.  I named her Sally, after Salvadora, and she quickly settled down on my lap, purring away. 

 

(Juan P and his new best friend)

She was very insistent to be paid attention to, and once Juan P arrived he had no trouble giving her plenty of attention.  In fact, about two minutes after Diana and I continued up the trail Juan P yelled up to her, she yelled back and I asked what was going on.  She said he asked if he could bring the cat along.  She said, whatever makes you happy, and we continued.  That was the last we saw of Juan P for more than five hours.  We kept thinking he was close behind us, but we didn’t actually see him, and once we got up to the highest point we waited over twenty minutes and he still didn’t appear.  I figured he’d lost the cat and gone back after her, but then we realized he was probably going slower due to of the insane amount of mosquito bites he had.  Honestly, just on his legs I think he probably had over a hundred.  And they were very swollen and red… it looked awful, and he said they were very painful.  I think he must have had an allergic reaction because they affected him much more than they did anyone else (at this point I had about twelve on my calves and around my feet but they weren’t too bad).  He also had them all over his arms and hands… it was really terrible.

So, we continued on, trying to go slowly to give him a chance to catch up or to see if we could spot him behind us, but we never did.  Maren and Ellen had surged ahead, unaware of how far behind Juan P must be, so Diana and I continued at a rather normal pace, taking lots of breaks and hoping he would catch up.  We made it to the pay point for Choquequirao, about two kilometers below the actual ruins, and found in the log book that Maren and Ellen had been there about half and hour before us.  Those last two kilometers were rather tough, lots of up and down, but at least it was shaded.

(Me at a rather nice lookout point)

 

(The tiny "town" high up in the mountains about 3 kilometers before Choquequirao)

 

(Nice waterfall where we stopped to rest)

At last we made it to the top.  We were so relieved, so tired, and so amazed.  It was gorgeous, and aside from Maren and Ellen who cheered when we arrived, it was empty.  Imagine that, if you can: an ancient fortress, or city, on top of mountain, completely empty and serene and free of tourists.  It was as if we ourselves had discovered it and were the first people to set foot there for hundreds of years.  We were free to imagine how it looked so many centuries ago, we were free to take ridiculous pictures, we were even free to do Yoga, which I can happily say that we did quite successfully.  We took off our shoes and walked around barefoot.  We left our bags in a “building” and climbed up to the highest point to take pictures.  We ate lunch and laughed and relaxed and were amazed.

 

We stayed there over two hours, and were reluctant to leave.  However we realized that Juan P must not be coming and that we needed to make sure he was okay.  We slowly made our way down from the main plaza and hung out on the terraces for a few minutes before heading back.  After about thirty minutes of walking we discovered a note from poor Juan P saying that his bug bites were too painful for him to continue and he was turning around L.  We felt so bad for him.  Ten minutes later we met a group of people (the first people we’d seen all day other than at the check point!) who told us that a boy named Juan P wanted to let us know he’d had to turn back.  Five minutes later we found another note, then we encountered another person with the same story… all along we felt so bad for him, especially since he made it so close but not all the way: he was less then two kilometers from the ruins when he turned back, poor guy.

We finally found Juan P at the edge of the only town (about five houses) where he had been talking with a lady about Sally the cat.  Apparently that woman was the owner of the cat but Sally didn’t want to stay there and Juan P had tried to return her but she ran off again.  My theory wasn’t completely off!  We set off again down the mountain, back to the campsite to pack up, have a quick dinner of real food from the campsite owner’s sister, and quickly head down the hill to the river.

After a warm dinner of yummy lentils and rice (hooray for something other than bananas chocolate and peanuts!) we quickly packed up Salvadora (or rather, paid the lady to do it for us since it’s awfully complicated) and set off again.  We knew we would be walking in the dark again, but we needed to get down to the river so we wouldn’t have to walk 24 kilometers the next day again.  It was agreed that I would lead Salvadora since I was the best with her, and everyone else would follow behind to give her plenty of encouragement and keep her from stopping too often.

We made it about a kilometer and a half before the darkness really settled in.  I took out my phone again and carefully led Salvadora down the trail.  What seemed to be most helpful for me was talking aloud to her and giving a complete commentary of where we were stepping.  I sounded a lot like this for about 45 minutes: “Okay, going down, there’s a rock don’t trip… another rock, that’s a big one, oh wait not so big, ok here’s a line I think it’s a step, whoops big step don’t fall, okay here’s a tree and there’s a rock, ok I’ll go over here okay you take your own path, whoa slipping yep that’s slippery lots of dirt and here’s another rock, wait big rock, nope not so big whoops slippery—ouch! don’t trip.. yep there’s another rock, okay annnnd we’re turning, turning, annnd you already knew that okay you go that way yup I’ll wait okay here’s a rock, whoops that’s a step down, big step down ok good job….”

I quite amused myself and we kept up a good pace.  I didn’t fall, and neither did Salvadora!  The others did all right behind us, but Salvadora and I seemed to be cruising just fine.  Suddenly, however, there were about five mules rushing up behind us and Salvadora startled so we stopped abruptly to let them pass.  A man followed behind the mules, he was clearly taking them to pick up supplies, and he was well prepared with a large flashlight.  Salvadora seemed to think this was fantastic and she suddenly picked up her pace and desperately tried to keep up with the other mules and the man with the magic light.  I was not ready for this but I attempted to keep up for about three minutes until they got too far and I was tripping every step again.  I stopped Salvadora, which took some effort, and waited a couple of minutes to let me eyes readjust.  At this point my cell phone had been dead for about 20 minutes, but I knew we were getting close because I could hear the river and see a bit of light reflecting from it.  We continued on a little more slowly, Salvadora seeming very disgruntled, until about five minutes later when we saw a light crossing over the bridge and making its way up the two zigzags toward us.  We stopped and we were surprised to have the man come up to us and say he was informed that we were descending the mountain with no light and he had come to lead us the rest of the way.  We were very happy and informed him so.  He went up to fetch the other four, and we continued on down together to cross the bridge and make our way to the campsite.  Later, the man informed us that we had just arrived at a dangerous point in the path where mules had been lost over the edge and into the river before.  We were so grateful that he’d arrived at just the right time and told us to stay towards the inside of the path.

Setting up camp that night was easier, mostly because we decided to sleep on the tent instead of inside it.  The air was not cold and the night before we had been too cramped and stuffy and Maren was rather claustrophobic.  So we laid out the tent, put our sleeping bags on it, covered up with the rain tarp, and slept under the stars.  Everyone slept so much better.  It was gorgeous, the temperature was perfect, and had space. 

Unfortunately, we got up at four the next morning and left by five thirty, just as the sun began to rise. We had a lot of walking to do and wanted to get most of the uphill walking done before the sun got too hot.  Of course that didn’t happen really, but we avoided a good deal of excess sun by leaving so early.  Maren and Ellen were the fastest so we asked them to take Salvadora since she got frustrated by how slowly I went up hill and then she would stop and refuse to move again.  Maren kept up a nice pace for her so those three went together, and Diana and I walked together.  Juan P was moving slowly again because of the bites, but he wasn’t too far behind at first.

It got hot very quickly and I drank a liter of water in the first hour.  Luckily, I had my UV water cleaner along and was able to refill at the next campsite.  By the time Diana and I made it to the top of the mountain (300 meters up) I had drank over four liters of water, and had probably sweat about that much as well.  My chest hurt from the altitude change, and my legs were heavy, but we made it!  Getting up to that point was the hardest part of the whole trip, I think, because we were so devoid of proper sleep and real food (still eating bananas, chocolate, peanuts and a few cookies).  Also we’d walked 52 kilometers in the past two days and 9 kilometers that morning almost all straight uphill.

Whew. I’m tired again just thinking about it.  After resting up at the viewpoint for an hour, Ellen and Maren decided to continue on and would wait for us at Salvadora’s farm, where they would ask for a cooked meal for all of us.  Diana and I waited for Juan P.  We had seen him at the previous viewpoint and he said he was doing fine, just going slowly.  However, when he made it within yelling distance of where we were waiting for him at the highest point, he yelled to us that he was out of water!  I couldn’t believe it.  He’d apparently only started the day off with about a liter and a half of water, and he was completely out, going straight uphill at the hottest point of the day with no shirt or hat and getting an awful sunburn.  BOYS.  Diana and I were rather annoyed with him that he would risk his safety like that and didn’t tell us earlier that he was almost out of water.  We quickly filled up an extra bottle for him and when he reached the top we demanded he drink it and put on a shirt to keep from getting any more sunburnt.  We shook our heads at him, made sure he had food to eat, and told him we’d meet him at the farm where we would have real food for a late lunch.

The last kilometers went quickly and Diana and I were able to talk and chat and move at a much more rapid pace.  We were anxious to arrive, and also very anxious to get back to Cusco and take showers.  Imagine that.  We were so disgustingly filthy and smelly and my hair was a rat’s nest… all my clothes smelled and were still damp from sweat… ugh.  I was also craving a nice cold Coke.

The last bits of the journey were rather unremarkable.  We made it to the farm, we had delicious soup and pasta and tea while talking to the nicest brothers who own the farm.  We took a taxi from the farm (yeah, we were that tired) and stopped in the town to get Coke and Fanta.  Two more taxis and four hours later, we were back in Cusco!

It was an awesome weekend, quite a whirlwind, and very exciting.  I was tired and sore, but I am so happy that I went.  I ended up with about fifty bug bites by the end, but nowhere near the amount that anybody else had.  Mine may have lasted a little longer than everyone else’s, but I am so thankful that they were not that bad during the actual trek.

Well, I hope you enjoyed reading about our awesome adventure.  I would definitely recommend the Choquequirao trek to anyone who is planning to travel to Peru, however please give yourself at least four days, and maybe five, to complete the trek.  You could even hire a guide if you so desire; I suppose it wouldn’t hurt J.

Love, love, love,

Maia Jo