random pictures from Huaraz

Thanking Rudolfo for the ride he gave us, in his awesome little blue bug, to the right bus station after we wandered all over the country side looking the Wilcahuin ruins.

At the Wilcahuin ruins. We got a very detailed tour by a little 10 year old boy wandering around after school, for "solomente un propina."

Inside one of the delapidated "combis" buses that rattle around town packed full of people.

Playing ultimate frisbee in a field of cows and their poop.

Our ultimate frisbee "team" taking a water break. We consisted of 4 locals of Peru, 1 Italian girl, an Austrian guy, a climber girl from London and me. The Americana.

Huanchaco, Peru

We finally convinced ourselves that it was time to leave Huaraz. After about two weeks there, it was difficult to leave. I knew the staff at Hostal Churrup and enjoyed talking with them in the mornings. I knew the backpackers staying there. And I had finally figured out the back ways and routes around town. Almost a local and I knew it was time to leave.

So I popped two dramamine and got on the nine hour night bus to Huanchaco, a little beach town about 12 km outside of Trujillo.

The first day here we stayed in a hostel called Casa Suiza, aka, Casa Boring. Everyone stayed in their rooms, there were no dorm rooms, the food was disgusting and there was no communal kitchen. We went to explore the town and found another hostel called Naylamp which seemed much more backpacker friendly with a large area in the back for camping. So the next day we switched hostels.

View of the hostel common area.

My first impression, which I´m quickly learning means absolutely nothing, of Huanchaco was bad. I didn´t like it here in comparison to Huaraz at all. Where were all the women in their bowler hats and cute colorful skirts? Huanchaco seemed touristy and lacked appeal. Men and boys from all directions approached us wherever we walked, pushing flyers and pamphlets for their restaurant or surfboard rentals in our faces. We got more than the usual amount of cat calls and kissy noises, which by the way the men here must start practicing when they are in embryo because by the time they are 12, they can make that kissy noise sound from so far away and still be so loud.

Anyways, I didn´t like Huanchaco. I was starting to plan when we should leave when these three California girls came into the camping area all smiles. Their naivete and eagerness for everything, put things in perspective for me and I cheered up.

Sunset at the beach.

Yesterday, we went surfing. We rented boards and wetsuits for the day for 20 soles (about $6) and went out sin instructor. It was super fun. I kept saying to myself "I´m surfing in Peru," another thing that I didn´t think I would be doing before I came here. The other was hiking in the Andes. Stupidly, I didn´t even realize the Andes were in Peru.

"The strip."




Inside the tent and excited about it!

The Cali girls popping Lullia´s blood blister she got
from playing soccer barefoot on concrete.

The caballitos. Little fishing boats made from reeds that
look like a cross between elve shoes and kayaks.

Huaraz, Peru

On the bus from Lima to Huaraz, while looking out the window I decided that Lima was not Peru. It is a city of about 8 million people. Huge, and more or less indistinguishable from any other huge city.

Now, I am in Peru.

We arrived late at night to Huaraz and the town was bustling with activity. People crowded the streets, fireworks erupted in the sky. It was like 4th of July. Our taxi driver said it is like this every weekend. Why, I asked. "Because it's Saturday," he said with an obvious tone.

* * *

Huaraz is an amazing town. I've always thought that you can gauge a town by how easy it's people on the street smile back at you. Here, in Huaraz, they smile back.

The streets are full of senoras sitting and snoozing by their blankets full of their knitted alpaca hats or a cart full of fruit and candy. They always squeeze my arm and call me 'preciousa'. I can't help but smile.




This is in the Plaza de Armas. I think there might be a Plaza de Armas in every Peruvian town. The sign says, more or less: "If you don't love nature, you love nothing."

This is on the hike to Laguna 69. We took the hike as an acclimatizing hike. It was about five hours of hiking through a valley and then up ... and up. Coming from Asheville, I thought it would be a breeze. A easy day hike. No. It turned out to be the most difficult hike I've ever been on. It wasn't that the terrain was that difficult, it was the altitude. I felt like someone was squeezing my brains and pushing my chest back. This is Shay, gearing up for the rain. It rained, then hailed, then snowed.

We made it to the summit at Laguna 69.
There was a waterfall coming down right off the glacier above us. It was incredible. We made Ramen Noodles for lunch up there.

This is the perspective on the way down.

It was much easier going down.

This is back in Huaraz: a little girl with her alpaca. He was wearing sunglasses. It was Sunday and the town was a huge festival.

Sunday market.

Street after street was blocked off and filled with local vendors selling everything from clothes to fried chicken feet. I wanted to take so many pictures but felt it was a little inappropriate.

Also on Sunday.

Marching bands were marching throughout the town. At the front of each band, a group of locals were dancing to the music, drinking beer and setting off fireworks. The guy setting off the bottle rockets would light them right in front of the group and they would shoot off and hit the buildings and get hung up on awnings. It was crazy. They all seemed to be un-fazed. I, on the other hand, almost peed when one bottle rocket got stuck in a street vendors' umbrella and exploded like five feet from my face. The drunk guy in front of me who was trying to get me to dance with him, didn't even blink.

The trash trucks here even play music out of loud speakers on the roofs of their trucks. It's a very festive town.

A farm outside of Huaraz on the way up to the trail head of Laguna 69.

We were driving on back roads for about two hours, all dirt, gravel and huge rocks. The station wagon taxi rattled and bumped it's way up. Every now and then, the taxi driver would open his door and peer back at the car. I suspected something was wrong. After about five peeks, he finally pulled over and pulled out his car jack from underneath his seat. "You can take pictures now if you like," he said. Two local men wandered up the road to watch him while he changed the flat tire in record time.

My first view of Laguna 69. I wish my camera had captured this place. It was fantastic.

Estoy en Peru!!

A little Peruvian girl sitting behind me on the plane squeaked "Peru!" in a tiny voice when the orange lights of Lima finally came into view from our windows. It was exactly what i was screaming in my head. Everyone clapped when all the plane´s wheels thudded to the ground.

After the long lines through customs we exchanged some money and headed outside. A taxi driver from our reserved hostel was to meet us at the airport, so we dutifully followed the guy with a sign saying Shay "Slifho". That drive was one of the scariest drives ever. As we floored down narrow, pot-hole-ridden, broken-down-car-lined streets, I looked out the window at the sprawling Lima ghetto and wondered "What in the hell am I doing here?"

For months, I have been telling strangers and friends alike that I've got a one-way ticket to Lima. Now, as we fly through Lima in a rattling taxi, I feel like a fraud. I'm not brave. I'm scared. I'm in LIma, clutching my mace, double checking the locks of the taxi doors and fearing that every vacant street we are tossed onto is the last street I will see before I am robbed blind.

But it all turned out fine.

We got to the hostel. It smells like cat pee and arm pit but it has a bar. It's all good.

* * * *

I'm trying to decide which is better, planning out everything and knowing our plan and destination or spending three days in dirty Lima deciding where to go next. Some people have everything planned and they seem really happy with that. "Two days in Lima. Four days in Cusco. One day for Machu Pichu." It is nice to have them around though. I've found myself using their regimented schedules as starting blocks for mine. It's kind of like they are planning my trip for me. Almost like a tour guide, except I don't have to follow them. I don't have to take their advice.