We disembarked early in the morning. We went for a stroll by the water before saying a sad farewell to Jordan. Later in the day, we went for a hike up the slopes of a local mountain. Lovely to stretch our legs.
Climbing a local mountain
Showing posts with label South American hiking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label South American hiking. Show all posts
30 March 2023
Day 20: Disembark in Urshaia
11 May 2006
Hiking into the deepest canyon in the world
The Colca Canyon is the deepest in the world (over 1500 metres deep in places) and is thought to be twice as deep as the Grand Canyon in the USA.
Unlike most of the Grand Canyon, portions of the Colca canyon are habitable, with pre-Colombian terraced fields still supporting agriculture and human life.
We did a three day hike into the canyon. We stayed overnight with local families farming in the canyon (always special to have close contact with real locals) and we visited a beautiful oasis in the canyon at the end of the second day.
A perfect way to refresh and recharge before the exhausting hike back out of the canyon!
Here are some views of the canyon as we walked down, down, down...
We arrived at the bottom at twighlight (with aching knees) and were welcomed by the last rays of the sun glittering off the river.
The rock formations were really beautiful.
One of the highlights of the hike for me were the cacti. They are awfully photogenic. Who would have thought it.
Love can be prickly...
The canyon is home to a couple of little villages and there is even a prep school. Here are some little kids running to class.
We hiked along the canyon for a day and ended up at this beautiful little oasis with refreshing pools to swim in. Bliss. Here we are lazing and having fun with our great hiking group - Glen from the UK, Mariann and Jesman from Portugal and Spain and Jan and Niels from Holland.
I couldn't resist doing my customary bomb drop.
Our cool guide
Amazing how the locals put every bit of land to use through terraces.
The locals in the region are an extraordinarily healthy bunch, most living to well over 100 years, some as much as 115. Apparently it is due to the local diet - almost entirely organic vegetables and fruits. No ice cream or chocolate! The walks up and down the canyon probably also help.
The hike back up the canyon was pretty brutal but Ally and I powered up with gusto and applauded ourselves for being the fittest and healthiest we have been in our lives. That night on the bus, Ally got horribly sick (tummy bug we think) and I came down with a horrible throat infection. Funny how pride comes before a fall...
Some of the birds I got to see
We met this cute little Peruvian child on the bus back from the canyon. Made my heart melt and I felt the stirring of paternal instincts. That night on the bus up North, we had a sick baby directly behind us who threw up and screamed hysterically for 7 hours non stop. All broodiness vanished immediately!
And finally, a signature farewell leap. What a great experience. No wonder the canyon is known as the "canyon of wonders".
Unlike most of the Grand Canyon, portions of the Colca canyon are habitable, with pre-Colombian terraced fields still supporting agriculture and human life.
We did a three day hike into the canyon. We stayed overnight with local families farming in the canyon (always special to have close contact with real locals) and we visited a beautiful oasis in the canyon at the end of the second day.
A perfect way to refresh and recharge before the exhausting hike back out of the canyon!
Here are some views of the canyon as we walked down, down, down...
We arrived at the bottom at twighlight (with aching knees) and were welcomed by the last rays of the sun glittering off the river.
One of the highlights of the hike for me were the cacti. They are awfully photogenic. Who would have thought it.
Love can be prickly...
The canyon is home to a couple of little villages and there is even a prep school. Here are some little kids running to class.
We hiked along the canyon for a day and ended up at this beautiful little oasis with refreshing pools to swim in. Bliss. Here we are lazing and having fun with our great hiking group - Glen from the UK, Mariann and Jesman from Portugal and Spain and Jan and Niels from Holland.
I couldn't resist doing my customary bomb drop.
Our cool guide
Amazing how the locals put every bit of land to use through terraces.
The locals in the region are an extraordinarily healthy bunch, most living to well over 100 years, some as much as 115. Apparently it is due to the local diet - almost entirely organic vegetables and fruits. No ice cream or chocolate! The walks up and down the canyon probably also help.
The hike back up the canyon was pretty brutal but Ally and I powered up with gusto and applauded ourselves for being the fittest and healthiest we have been in our lives. That night on the bus, Ally got horribly sick (tummy bug we think) and I came down with a horrible throat infection. Funny how pride comes before a fall...
Some of the birds I got to see
We met this cute little Peruvian child on the bus back from the canyon. Made my heart melt and I felt the stirring of paternal instincts. That night on the bus up North, we had a sick baby directly behind us who threw up and screamed hysterically for 7 hours non stop. All broodiness vanished immediately!
And finally, a signature farewell leap. What a great experience. No wonder the canyon is known as the "canyon of wonders".
2 May 2006
The Inca Trail
The Inca Trail (one of my life goals) is a mountainous jungle hike that leads to the sacred Inca city of Machu Picchu. The route leads through the mountains above the Urubamba river, following the course of an old Inca roadway built in the 15th century. It combines a stunning mix of Inca ruins, mountain scenery, lush cloud-forest and rich subtropical jungle.
We covered the 45km trek in 4 days, arriving at Machu Picchu at daybreak on the final day. It was an amazing (and pretty exhausting!) experience and one we will certainly never forget.
Having a good group always enhances one´s hiking experience and we were lucky to have a great one. From left: Claudio, Christy, Toni, Paul, Louis, Holly, me, Ally, Mami, Erik and Mark.
I got to share my photography passion with Mami, a petite bundle of sunshine energy from Japan who was even more passionate about photography than me. Her name was pronouced "mummy" and it felt pretty strange when we lost her on one occasion and all shouted "Mummy, mummy, where are you!" We sure got some strange looks from other groups!
I also got to share some very inspiring chats with Eric, a wonderful Canadian who is a member of the Anthony Robins foundation - a motivational guru who I really respect.
The mountainous scenery on the hike was spectacular, especially when the clouds lifted to reveal snow capped mountains and the sun reflected off the red granite. April is the end of the rainy season in the area, so the slopes were still lush with trees and grass.
We passed through mountain rain forests where tree trunks were covered in hanging moss and higher up we could see the most magnificent valleys with soaring cliff edged mountains.
The high mountains (we ascended to 4200 metres) tended to be misty and cloudy, and although this somewhat obstructed the views, it did provide a mysterious beauty of its own.
All the chaskis were laden under enormous weights (apparently their loads are not allowed to exceed 25kg but I am sure that they must have weighed more) and were expected to charge on ahead of us up the mountain so that by the time we reached our lunch and evening sports, all our tents were already pitched and our food was ready to be served!
Not that this deterred the chaskis at all. In fact they took a lot of pride in what ever they did whether it was running up steep mountain steps, laying the table or setting up our tents.
All in all, this meant that we were totally spoiled! We ate our dinners with metal crockery on tables and chairs that were set up in a special dining tent. And the food was absolutely amazing consisting of multiple courses and laid out with tremendous care. What an enormous contrast from our Wit Els hike in Cape Town in December where we had to do it all ourselves and survived on burnt noodles and tuna for 5 days!
What made the Inca trail particularly special for me was that it followed the original ancient Inca road. The road was paved with enormous rocks - how the Incas found the energy to manually lay it all I will never know.
There were also countless steps along the way. At one stage we walked down 2300 steps in about an hour to get to lunch. We all collapsed at the bottom with legs too shaky to stand on.
At one point, the Inca road passed through a 20 metre tunnel that the Incas dug through solid rock without modern tools and equipment. Amazing!
Along the hike, we also saw many Inca ruins. The reason they are so well preserved is that the Spanish did not know about the existence of the Inca trail (or Maccu Picchu) so did not have a chance to loot and pillage it. Having said that, the the American who “discovered” it for westerners (in 1911) managed to pillage all the mummies along the way which now reside in Yale university. Thankfully it wasn´t the Brits who discovered it or much of Machu Picchu would probably now lie in the British museum (like the Greek Parthanon!).
As usual I had my eyes peeled for feathered rarities and got to see some crackers. I was most excited about seeing the torrent duck (bottom photo) which somehow manages to swim and feed in even the strongest rapids. It was an extraordinary site to behold, though I only managed to photograph it from quite a distance. The trojan sighting (bottom right) also caused much excitement. Thanks to Mami for spotting it!
We saw some beautiful flowers along the way. Over 250 species of orchid have been counted along the Inca trail.
Due to a landslide, we could not finish the Inca trail through the Inca sun gate as is tradition. At the end of the 3rd day, we had to hike along the rail way track to the town of Aguas Clientes ("Hot Water"– named due to the hot springs).
We spent the night on the floor of a restaurant which is an experience we hope not to repeat in a while. Our restaurant was on the main road and we were in bed by 10pm as we had a 3:30am get up. But sleeping was out of the question as there was an extremely enthusiastic Bingo game on the go and we could hear all the numbers being screamed out (one way to improve your Spanish "numbers" vocab!)
To add insult to injury, we had bored teenage boys looking into our restaurant window calling gringo, gringo!! We were all rather grumpy the next morning added to which we ran late so we had to run up the steep hill to get to the entrance of Machu Picchu before the buses arrived with the hordes of people.
Some more people shots along the way
Next stop: Machu Picchu
We covered the 45km trek in 4 days, arriving at Machu Picchu at daybreak on the final day. It was an amazing (and pretty exhausting!) experience and one we will certainly never forget.
Having a good group always enhances one´s hiking experience and we were lucky to have a great one. From left: Claudio, Christy, Toni, Paul, Louis, Holly, me, Ally, Mami, Erik and Mark.
I got to share my photography passion with Mami, a petite bundle of sunshine energy from Japan who was even more passionate about photography than me. Her name was pronouced "mummy" and it felt pretty strange when we lost her on one occasion and all shouted "Mummy, mummy, where are you!" We sure got some strange looks from other groups!
I also got to share some very inspiring chats with Eric, a wonderful Canadian who is a member of the Anthony Robins foundation - a motivational guru who I really respect.
The mountainous scenery on the hike was spectacular, especially when the clouds lifted to reveal snow capped mountains and the sun reflected off the red granite. April is the end of the rainy season in the area, so the slopes were still lush with trees and grass.
We passed through mountain rain forests where tree trunks were covered in hanging moss and higher up we could see the most magnificent valleys with soaring cliff edged mountains.
The second day of the hike was the toughest by far when we climbed 1300 metres (a non stop uphill hike of 4 hours) to ascend a 4200 metre pass - the "challenge" section in the graph below! We were pretty ecstatic to reach the top. Ally was an absolute Trojan and was the 4th person in our group to reach the summit. We then had to descend 400 metres before climbing yet another pass. Needless to say, we slept very well that night.
Given the big climbs, we felt very lucky to have light packs only. All the food and tents were carried by our personal "chaskis" or porters. There were more chaskis than there were people in our group!
All the chaskis were laden under enormous weights (apparently their loads are not allowed to exceed 25kg but I am sure that they must have weighed more) and were expected to charge on ahead of us up the mountain so that by the time we reached our lunch and evening sports, all our tents were already pitched and our food was ready to be served!
Not that this deterred the chaskis at all. In fact they took a lot of pride in what ever they did whether it was running up steep mountain steps, laying the table or setting up our tents.
All in all, this meant that we were totally spoiled! We ate our dinners with metal crockery on tables and chairs that were set up in a special dining tent. And the food was absolutely amazing consisting of multiple courses and laid out with tremendous care. What an enormous contrast from our Wit Els hike in Cape Town in December where we had to do it all ourselves and survived on burnt noodles and tuna for 5 days!
What made the Inca trail particularly special for me was that it followed the original ancient Inca road. The road was paved with enormous rocks - how the Incas found the energy to manually lay it all I will never know.
There were also countless steps along the way. At one stage we walked down 2300 steps in about an hour to get to lunch. We all collapsed at the bottom with legs too shaky to stand on.
At one point, the Inca road passed through a 20 metre tunnel that the Incas dug through solid rock without modern tools and equipment. Amazing!
Along the hike, we also saw many Inca ruins. The reason they are so well preserved is that the Spanish did not know about the existence of the Inca trail (or Maccu Picchu) so did not have a chance to loot and pillage it. Having said that, the the American who “discovered” it for westerners (in 1911) managed to pillage all the mummies along the way which now reside in Yale university. Thankfully it wasn´t the Brits who discovered it or much of Machu Picchu would probably now lie in the British museum (like the Greek Parthanon!).
As usual I had my eyes peeled for feathered rarities and got to see some crackers. I was most excited about seeing the torrent duck (bottom photo) which somehow manages to swim and feed in even the strongest rapids. It was an extraordinary site to behold, though I only managed to photograph it from quite a distance. The trojan sighting (bottom right) also caused much excitement. Thanks to Mami for spotting it!
We saw some beautiful flowers along the way. Over 250 species of orchid have been counted along the Inca trail.
Due to a landslide, we could not finish the Inca trail through the Inca sun gate as is tradition. At the end of the 3rd day, we had to hike along the rail way track to the town of Aguas Clientes ("Hot Water"– named due to the hot springs).
We spent the night on the floor of a restaurant which is an experience we hope not to repeat in a while. Our restaurant was on the main road and we were in bed by 10pm as we had a 3:30am get up. But sleeping was out of the question as there was an extremely enthusiastic Bingo game on the go and we could hear all the numbers being screamed out (one way to improve your Spanish "numbers" vocab!)
To add insult to injury, we had bored teenage boys looking into our restaurant window calling gringo, gringo!! We were all rather grumpy the next morning added to which we ran late so we had to run up the steep hill to get to the entrance of Machu Picchu before the buses arrived with the hordes of people.
Some more people shots along the way
Next stop: Machu Picchu
