W Trek, Torres del Paine National Park

Both days we were in Puerto Natales, it rained the entire time. Strong rain, all day. In Torres Del Paine park it was worse. 4-6 cm of rain, historic amounts, so bad that they closed the entire eastern part of the park (we were booked to start on the eastern side and hike west). This never happens. The only other times the park has ever closed were for wildfire (admittedly these fires were pretty severe, so bad that now if you're caught breaking the strict "no fires" policy, park rangers will kick you OUT OF CHILE).

We tried to find out the situation in the park before we left, but information was scarce. No one in town knew what was happening except that the park wasn't fully closed: all we could do was take our bus as planned and see what happened.

On our way to the park, our bus caravan finds the main road to the park completely flooded, so backtracked to a much longer secondary road. Arrive and the rangers confirm the whole eastern part of the park is closed, our only option is to reverse our trip, start in the west and hope that everything reopens.

Ok, no more build-up, the hike was great, everything worked out fine, and we had perfect weather!

We hiked 60+ kilometers in 4 days of hiking. We were traveling light because we were staying in the refugios which also provided all of our meals. Luckily it's the very very end of the season, and there are so few hikers that the refugios were nearly empty anyway.

Patagonian weather is notoriously changeable. We were briefed to expect rain at any time, and that we would be wet the whole time. No rain gear would survive the wind, so double-bag everything in your pack in trash bags and hope for the best. It rained lightly our first day on the trail, and then no rain (and mostly clear skies) for 3 days!

The terrain was magical. Desolate arctic barrens near Glacier Grey, transition to forests and scrublands as we worked our way east, all the foliage in brilliant fall colors. Shockingly tall mountains everywhere, some so steep that snow can't cling to the sides. It's so pristine here that you can drink the water from any moving stream completely unfiltered. Wildlife we saw included falcons, condors, woodpeckers, hares, horses, and mice- and from the bus we saw guanacos (llama relative), rheas, and flamingos.

I'm very happy coming at the end of the season- the trails almost to ourselves, bright fall leaves. The weather isn't even that cold (relatively). Only issue is the amount of daylight: sunrise at 9am, completely dark by 7:30pm, so headlamps were essential.

Trekking poles are also essential for navigating the steep slopes and watery/muddy trails. The trail is often literally a stream or goes through huge pool of standing water. Here are some typical trail shots:

All in all a great trek! No bears, water is drinkable, temperatures are milder than you'd think, and you don't even need to camp or cook if you don't want to. What luxury! I hope we're not spoiled for real backpacking now.

Peter

Stories from the refugios

We luckily got to stay in refugios during our trek which provided us with full room and board - usually these ski lodge type places are fully booked well in advance during the high season.  Description and stories below!

Grey - a few minutes walk to a great view of Glacier Grey.  

When we heard about showers, we were excited to get a hot shower to warm up!  The ones here were lukewarm at best and it was terribly cold in the lodge. I think I was colder and wetter after the shower than during our hike. 

One of our trip tips was to arrive early for dinner and not to linger - the menu can change as supplies run low and dining space is limited. We didn't run into this problem at all since we were trekking during the end of the season when everything is cold.  We were the only people having dinner besides the staff!  And it's probable they gave us all the mashed potatoes they had left. 

Paine Grande - aka Disneyland, according to our pre-trip guide.  A sizable refugio that has a mini market and a post office.

We roomed with an awesome Australian named Melanie.  It was just the 3 of us in our 6 bunk room.  Peter and I both slept on the bottom bunk near the window and Melanie slept on the other bottom bunk, also near the window. So, if you can imagine it, we were sleeping in a "L."  Underneath the window is a set of wooden storage boxes where we were airing out our dirty socks and left a small bag of trail mix.  

Peter and I are huddled around the fire stove when Melanie comes down to inform us that there is a mouse in our bag.  We go up and just stare at our trashbag waiting for something to move.  Nothing happened so we went to dinner. 

During dinner, Melanie proceeds to tell her own story of when her house was infested with mice and how her carpet snake was either too lazy to do anything about it or there was too many it was overwhelmed.  After dinner, we met a camper who said the mice had eaten through his tent to get at his food. With mice on our mind, we went to bed.

Around 1AM, we could hear the mouse scurrying across the wooden storage box and the crinkling of plastic. Peter got up and discovered that he had gotten into our trail mix. A little while later we heard more crinkling of plastic.  It had run up the curtain onto the top bunk and was going for the rest of our snacks.  Peter got up again and put all our stuff on the top bed of the empty set of bunks.  Peter pretty much stayed up all night mouse proofing our food. 

The next morning while we were getting ready to head out, Melanie informs us that the mouse is now in her bag!  It had somehow gotten into her closed backpack that was hanging off the bed and chewed up her snack bag.  There wasn't even any food in there.  We took her backpack outside and dumped the mouse out. It was so fat. So fat. 

Cuernos - nice and cozy.  

We shared a room with a couple and 3 study abroad students from the States.  Our room had triple bunks!

One of the students, Mike, felt the need to bring 3 bottles of Pisco on the trip instead of a sleeping bag. So we all sat around the dining area and had a lively Pisco fueled night.  This is of course in preparation for our 12hr hike the next day. 

Las Torres - right next to Hotel Las Torres making it extremely hard to find in the dark.  Moderate sized refugio and the warmest of them all. 

We had hiked 12hrs that day and all we wanted was a warm bed and some food in our bellies. It took has an extra 40min walking aimlessly around searching for this place. It didn't help that we only had headlamps for light and signs were scarce. We finally made it and graciously enough, the staff let us have dinner even though they had started to clean up. 

Puerto Natales, the W

Not much to report, arrived in Puerto Natales yesterday and have been taking it easy and getting ready for the W Trek starting tomorrow! We'll be in the Torres Del Paine park for 4 nights, likely without 3G access, so no posts until we get back.

It's been raining almost the whole time we've been here, so hoping the Patagonian weather will cooperate for trekking. Have all our gear double-bagged, so we'll be wet while hiking during the day but nice and dry in the refugios at night!

Chile: first impressions, attack of the completos

We bookended Chile in 3 days: from the northernmost city to the southernmost city (flying, thankfully).

But the really story was written by completos. Completos are extremely popular snacks here: hotdogs smothered with heaped piles of avocado and mayo. Our stomachs thus far have been as iron, and we laughed as we strolled Arica's beach front consuming all we saw. Popcorn? Of course! Pizza? Sure! Completos? CONSUME.

Not our best idea. The completos had their revenge, and we've spent the last two days recovering.

But back to facts and interesting history.

Arica, Chile's northernmost city, is known as the "city of eternal spring". It's a coastal desert city, so the temperature is sunny every single day but not too extreme. The last time it rained was May 2013.

We stayed at the Sunny Days hostel, custom built by a generous New Zealand host to cater to the backpacking crowd, a great place. We climbed El Morro, the bluff overlooking the city, saw the sights and hit the beaches. Plus the completo incident.

Arica used to be part of Peru until the War of the Pacific in the 1880s. For a number of reasons, Chile invaded Antofagasta (Bolivia's port on the Pacific) and Arica, and even occupied Lima. End result was nitrate-rich territory added to Chile and a landlocked Bolivia (although Arica guaranteed as a free port and Chile built a railroad to La Paz). A strange war and worth the Wikipedia read.

Punta Arenas, Chile's southernmost city, is almost the opposite of Arica. Cool and rainy, it feels very similar to Alaska. Penguins, whales, etc are all allegedly close by. Punta Arenas was founded on the shores of the Strait of Magellan to enforce Chilean sovereignty in southern Patagonia, and grew wealthy and famous for shipping (due to Cape Horn), then sheep farming, then petroleum, and now Antarctic research and tourism.

Chile has been hugely different from Peru. Noticeably wealthier and more expensive, lots of joggers, less honking, and the cars stop to let pedestrians cross, which we can't get used to. Out of the corner of your eye the flag looks just like the Texas flag.

Tomorrow it's on to Puerto Natales, to start our W Trek in Torres Del Paine on the 24th.

Life on the road: Peru

We've been posting about the interesting and exciting things we do and see, but what about the rest of it? How do we spend our days? We've been traveling almost three weeks, and we're starting to fall into our travel routines:

6am: wake up. Yes we like sleeping in, but it's easy to wake up at 6 when you go to sleep at 9! We got used to early times on the Inca Trail and never really shifted back. Chile is 2 hours ahead of Peru for some reason, so we've finally moved to later times!

Lay in bed, read up on guidebooks or use WiFi if we have it, get ready for the day. Purify more water with our steripen. Enjoy the hostal's breakfast. The hostals we stay in have been running ~$20 US per night total, staying in private rooms with our own bathroom.

We're pretty much alternating travel days and sightseeing days:

Travel days: make our way to the bus station and spend 5-7 hours on a bus to our next destination. Either a pretty nice double-decker "semi-cama" class with plush seats that recline far back, or a standard bus. No "chicken busses" yet but we did have a lady put her baby alpaca in the storage area of the bus to go 20 minutes down the road.

Time on the bus is spent napping (mostly Priscilla), reading guidebooks, planning and blogging (mostly Peter), staring out the window at the scenery, and maybe watching whatever bad movies are playing or tolerating too-loud music. I have a history lecture series on "the conquest of the Americas" we're also working through. Lunch is snacks, sometimes provided by the bus company.

Sightseeing days vary on where we are. Lots of walking to take in the character of a place, seeing the major sights but leaving something "for next time". Lunch is usually a local place with a 2-course set menu for around US $5 per person. Dinner usually similar. Start with a soup, then some variation on meat and rice, followed by tea (manzanilla, or chamomile, is our usual).

Back to the hostel for an early sleep and charge devices, then repeat!

What about what we see? What was typical in Peru?

• Llamas. There are llamas/alpacas/vicuñas everywhere, usually in large herds off in the distance, sometimes one or two at a tourist attraction.

• Dogs. Stray dogs everywhere, so many types. Lying on the street soaking up sun, sneaking in to cafes, sometimes following you for no obvious reason. Young dogs, old dogs, clean dogs, dirty dogs.

• In-progress/half-completed buildings. People build in installments as they can afford more building materials, and cover the exposed rebar with plastic bottles.
• Painted political or other ads. Political parties pay people to let them paint on their houses/walls.
• Walls topped with broken glass or cacti.
• Stone terraces.
• Taxis beeping gently at you to take them.
• Small shops, and vendors asking you to buy things/come to their restaurant/place of business.
• Ladies in traditional clothes selling knit souvenirs.
• Kids playing soccer.
• A surprising number of Chinese restaurants ("Chifa").

Peter

That time we had 18 empanadas

and it wasn't great. After an 8 hour journey to Arica, Chile and only crackers to fuel our bodies, we were quite hungry. What better dinner than empanadas?!  We ordered 12 cheese empanadas and 6 shrimp and cheese empanadas. Advice to anyone who is craving empanadas, 18 is too many.

Priscilla

Food for Thought (in Peru)

Some of the Peruvian food/drink items we've had while in Peru!

Inca Kola - drink that tastes like bubblegum.  Peter was a fan, Priscilla was not.

Chicha morada - purple drink made from purple corn. This has been by far our favorite food/drink item in Peru. 

Pisco - tha national drink of Peru, a potent grape brandy.  There are 4 kinds of pisco: aromatic, non-aromatic, blended, and half fermented; all made from a variety of 8 different grapes from the southwest coast of Peru. 

Antichucho - beef heart kabobs. Don't be turned off by the definition. Definitely worth a try because it was one of the best meals we had. 

Ceviche - raw fish in lime juice.  Another one of the best meals we've had. 

Alpaca - good for wool and good for eat. 

Pollo brasa - commonly known as Peruvian chicken in the US. Who would have thought this meal is considered street food?

Lomo saltado - stirfry with fries. Sometimes beef, sometimes alpaca.

Sopa de quinoa - quinoa soup. 

Sopa de criolla - my favorite soup here!  It's a cream based soup with noodles and beef. 

Potatoes - there are 300 varieties of potatoes grown in Peru. 

Cuy - guinea pig. Usually served during celebrations. Fatty and crispy skin like a duck, with a hint of fish?

Arequipa

We weren't in Arequipa very long, just two nights to give us time for errands and recovery from colds, but what a cool city! Peru's second largest, so it's very sprawling, but the downtown area is manageable. Hip, European, and relatively wealthy. The volcano El Misti towers over the city, while other volcanoes and mountains seem to watch from the distance in case El Misti needs backup.

We spent a day wandering past white stone façades of the historic buildings, visiting the market, and seeing a museum dedicated to Incan mummies found on the volcano summits. The Incas worshipped the volcanoes as gods, and made child sacrifices to appease them. The volcanoes are so tall that the mummies weren't found until the 90's, some of them perfectly preserved depending on how active the volcanoes were.

We're on a bus to Tacna now, for the land border crossing with Chile. Will be in Arica tonight!

"Change of Plans"

Last week when we finished the Inca Trail, we reached the end of our initial planning. At that point we were in Cusco and had no hotel, bus, or anything else booked until our departure flight in August! So what did we do? Booked a bus out for the next morning and walked down the street to check into a new hostel. Since then we've been thinking and moving on our feet: our entire trip we haven't spent even 48 consecutive hours in the same place. We have a general idea where we're going, but not booking much more than 24 hours in advance, which is easy to get away with since it's not the high season.

So next we're going to Patagonia!

Our plan was "Peru into Bolivia then South until we get too cold", but we've come up with a new, better plan! Our Inca Trail friends Kelly and Laura recommended the W Trek in Torres Del Paine, Chile, so on April 20th we'll be flying down the whole length of Chile to do that! This is almost as far south as you can get on land, not counting Antarctica. We're flying into Punta Arenas, which is on the Straight of Magellan!

We'll be spending 5 days hiking in the Torres del Paine park (http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torres_del_Paine_National_Park) staying overnight in serviced cabins called "Refugios." The mountains and glaciers are stunningly rugged, and even though it's so far south, it's only 53°S latitude, the northern equivalent of Newfoundland or the UK (but minus the warming gulf stream), so highs for are trip will average 50°F and lows 32°F. We won't mind because we'll be nice and warm in the refugios!

Peter

Colca Canyon / Cabanaconde

Future travelers to Peru: Colca Canyon is a must-see! Almost twice as large as the Grand Canyon and 4km deep in places, with a strong resemblance to the U.S. southwest.

We stayed in Cabanaconde, a tiny village perched on the edge of a ravine, and contender for my favorite place so far. Such a great place that I'm going to name-drop where to stay: Valle del Fuego, a quirky place with enormous breakfasts run by laid-back owner Yamil, and down in Sangalle Oasis, the Paradise Oasis (the one with the rectangular pool) run by his equally awesome brother Pablito.

We stayed up in the town, pretty much a main square and not much else. Dinners ran US $5-7 total for the two of us, and we finally had Peruvian chicken! Nick, similar to King Pollo but the green sauce is much, much spicier.

After getting turned around in some farmers' fields en route to the start of the trail, we spent a morning hiking maybe 2 kilometers vertically down to the bottom of the canyon. The Sangalle Oasis at the bottom is even more magical after a dusty, sun-scorched hike. A cluster of simple lodges with palm trees and river-fed pools perfect for a lazy afternoon. 

We didn't feel like hiking back up so we took mules instead, which took half the time going up that we needed going down! Priscilla's mule Esperanza was great, while my ride Francisco preferred stop-and-go.

Now we're off to Arequipa!

PS added photos to the previous post!

Peter

Puno and Lake Titicaca

Peter is writing- that means time for another boring factual post! Internet too slow for pictures but trying to add.

Lake Titicaca, at almost 4000m above sea level, is the highest navigable lake in the world and the largest lake in South America. We spent two nights in Puno on the shores of the lake, and did an overnight homestay on Amantani, one of the large islands in the lake. The lake is so smooth that none of our tour group had seasickness, even after 7 hours on boats (this is a big deal for me).

On our way to Amantani and Taquile, we stopped on one of the floating islands of the Uros people. 2500 people live on the dozens and dozens of these artificial islands made from reeds, making their livelihood from fishing, farming reeds, and tourism. The 40m square island we visited was the home of 5 families and one cat. Everything is made of Totora reeds: the islands, the small houses and cooking huts, and even the traditional boats.

On Amantani we stayed with Lydia and Julio, a couple the same age as us. Extremely nice and willing victims of my bad Spanish. 4000 Quechua people live on Amantani, farming and raising sheep. The entire island is covered with farming terraces. Not enough pasture for alpacas or llamas, this was the first place we saw not overrun with dogs! In the evening we got to borrow some of our hosts' traditional clothes and dance at a tourist "fiesta".

I'll admit, I would describe the tour we took as "kind of a racket". Very cheap, lots of opportunities to buy things, lackluster guide. I'm glad we went but anyone else going should try to find a higher-class outfit.

That said, I'm blown away by the friendliness we encounter. Our hotel clerk Dani helped us to arrange everything: our tours, busses, everything, Spanish only, and was so happy to talk and learn more about us. The same for our bus guide Monica. When we tried to take a local bus today that was too full to take us, we taxi carpooled with some awesome French backpackers, and our driver Valdo chatted the whole time and told us everything we needed to know.

Wayqechas on the Inca Trail to Machu Pikchu

Hello blog, we have some catching up to do! This week we saw Machu Picchu, an abandoned Incan estate that the Conquistadors never discovered, and one of the seven wonders of the world. There are two ways to see Machu Picchu. Most people go by train and bus to spend the day there, but we braved the Inca Trail! 

The Inca Trail is an Incan-made stone path that winds ~40km through the mountains past several Incan ruins, ending at Machu Picchu. Four days of early rising, long hikes, beautiful scenery and early bedtimes. 

Our group was 12 "passengers" from the US and Canada, head guide Pedro, assistant guide Miguel, our cooks Benny and Pablo, and 20 Quechua (the indigenous Andean people) porters- Priscilla is writing a post on them. A really great group and now that it's over I'm still in shock that they're not around all day.

Day 1: Bus from Cusco through the Sacred Valley to KM 82 to start our hike. Beautiful warm, sunny day and level hiking to get us warmed up and working together as a group.

Day 2: the hardest day! 1200m rise in elevation to Dead Woman's Pass at 4200m. Elevation and slope were serious enough that by the top the routine was "take a dozen steps, stop to catch your breath." Altitude sickness affected all of us throughout the hike: headaches, stomach trouble, shortness of breath. Woken up in the middle of the night by someone in another group screaming: they swore someone tried to come into their tent and grabbed their leg, but there was no one there. Guides say that site is haunted and this has happened before: spooky.

Day 3: the most beautiful day, even though we were completely surrounded by clouds. Hiked on stunning dramatic paths through cloud forest and past more ruins, and camp on top of a mountain. The clouds let up just as we arrive, treating us to jaw-dropping views of the mountains, and, once the sun set, the milky way. Take me back!

Day 4: the usual final campsite was out of commission due to land slides, so we got to wake up at 2:30am and hike 5 hours to finally reach Machu Picchu! Machu Picchu is one of those places you'd think is over hyped, but it's not. Standing at the Sun Gate watching the clouds sail past through the valley below is unbelievable, a great payoff after 4 days of hiking. Toured the ruins surrounded by clean, normal tourists, and spent the rest of the day feasting and celebrating our achievement and friendships in Aguas Calientes and Ollantaytambo. One thing our guide Pedro told us on the tour was that we've been pronouncing it wrong this whole time: in Quechua it's pronounced Machu "Pik-chu". Picchu in Quechua is a rude anatomical word!

Day 5: Toured Incan sites of Ollantaytambo and Pisac in the Sacred Valley, visited a weavers' collective (yes I went crazy shopping) and back to Cusco for a group farewell dinner.

Yesterday was recovery, errands, Inca Museum, Pisco museum, and final goodbyes, and now we're in Puno to see Lake Titicaca!

We've also had our first gear casualties:

-blue raincoat I've used for hiking since the 90s finally wore out and split its seams. Got a replacement and store clerks said my old one went out well and " joined the honorable dead"

-one hiking sock, lost by the hotel laundry

-the GoPro lasted through most of Machu Pikchu but is now permanently frozen, I'm still trying to troubleshoot.

Am working on adding a photo gallery!

Porter!

Our 4 day mountainous trek would not have been so enjoyable without our 20 porters, ranging from ages 22 to 65.  They each carry a 25kg bag full of camping equipment and food and basically run up the mountain in order to set up EVERYTHING before you arrive. We even got agua caliente the first night to wash ourselves after a hot day of hiking. 

The typical porter day starts before ours and ends after ours. We got a cheery buenos dias wake up call served with hot tea every morning. While we're busy eating a scrumptious breakfast made by our chef, Benie and our sous-chef, Pablo, the porters are busy taking the camp apart and packing our bags.  A good ways into our hike, we would hear quick footsteps behind us. "Porter!" someone would yell and we would all stand off mountainside and watch these tiny men with giant packs run past us. 

I need to talk more about Benie and Pablo. These two chefs were AMAZING. one night, Benie made 4 desserts in 2 hours and another night he made us a checkered cake!  He said the cake only took him 40 minutes. It takes me 40 min just to find and read the recipe online. Everything they made was exactly what we wanted after hours of hiking. 

Solpayki, porters!

Technical difficulties

The full potential of this blog is being held back by some tech challenges:
-We spend more time trying to connect to wifi than actually using it
-Every time I try to upload a photo to the blog, the blogger app crashes
-GoPro keeps glitching, hopefully the SD card reset fix will take
-Haven't been able to get our phones to work on the int'l networks here, so no texting yet, but haven't really spent much time on it

That said, we're in Cusco now! Arrived yesterday after a 20 hour bus ride. Last 5 hours or so were rough, you wouldn't expect something called the "Pan-American Highway" to be so tortuously winding. We've been adjusting to the altitude and exploring the city, we have some great pictures but see above re: sharing.

We're about to start our 4-day Inca Trail hike to Machu Picchu! We're still unsure if the hiking starts now or the day after, so this might be another gap in posting.

Donde esta el Metropolitano?

DC's winter lasted so long that we forgot about the power of the sun, so we're slightly sunburned. It's been a good day of Spanish immersion and seeing the major sites in central Lima:
-Plaza Mayor's historic buildings, plus the changing of the guard at the Governor's Palace
-Museum of the Inquisition and Congress: took the free Spanish tour because why not and the tour guide totally called us out on not understanding anything
-Circuito Magico Del Aqua: park filled with fountains, great place for a nap
-Mercado Central and Chinatown

Hostel we're staying in (the Point) is in Barranco, a hip district in the southern part of Lima. It's a self-declared party hostel, so full of young people somehow both up all hours and sleeping all hours.

Food has been awesome, notables include: antichuchos (heart kabobs), Inca Cola (tastes like bubblegum), local liquor Pisco, and surprise favorite chicha morado (purple corn juice)