We drove yesterday from Pisac to Ocotongo and took 4 hours to drive 70 miles. Pathetic, proper?
That’s why it was an all day affair crawling as much as 13,750 toes and again all the way down to 11,900 on the opposite facet the place we camped. Alongside the way in which we stopped just a few instances for photographs, to stroll and water Rusty, and to chill the van down. Downhill in some methods was worse as I needed to maintain again 9400 kilos of GANNET2 in first and second gears to attempt to forestall overheating brakes. It was a gradual grind regardless of the completely good street floor and little or no site visitors.
Most of those photographs are from Layne as you may think my focus was targeted on the van and the street. You understand how the Bible speaks of separating the wheat from the chaff? That is the Andean model of that historical artwork:
Hollywood is in all places:
Stark magnificence underneath cloudy skies. 13,000 toes of altitude breaks no information for us however the street was extremely technical getting up there. It simply went on and on and on winding backwards and forwards and we hardly ever noticed 30 mph.
There was a Mirador ( scenic overlook) on the way in which down which turned out to be a Llama Park. All too usually South People construct one thing and do a pleasant job after which neglect to keep up it ( or pocket the cash put aside for maintenance).
When Rusty first set eyes in llamas (yam-ahs) in Southern Colombia he went nuts growling and lunging at these bizarre apparitions. Layne put him in a leash as a precaution and I held him to forestall him lunging.
They hung round for some time looking at one another then they wandered off and Warmth there and stared. Rusty has grown a lot extra self assured on this journey. He meets avenue canines and he owns them. In Mexico in 2023 they routinely terrified him.
In Tierra Del Fuego in Chile he noticed a guanaco close to our wild camp and he took off blinding like a pet throughout the grass. The guanaco bounded forward and performed with him main him far out of sight throughout the low rolling hills. He got here again ten minutes later panting madly nonetheless none the wiser about these weird otherworldly creatures.
In Argentina a Patagonian Rhea (or ñandu, a sort of ostrich, walked previous the van. The one ostrich he had seen was at Robert Is Right here in Florida Metropolis the place we stopped for smoothies and that freaked him out. In Patagonia he was simply curious. Florida Metropolis:
Patagonia, Argentina:
My little boy is grow to be an explorer.
I can’t think about automotive a great deal of English audio system present up right here however there’s your narrative. All of them additionally famous a German researcher has studied llamas and thinks they make wonderful remedy animals for people with emotional points as they’re clever and empathetic ( the llamas not the people).
I’d like to see one in every of these delicately stepping down the corridors of a hospital…not in my lifetime I doubt.
Onwards to our chosen iOverlander listed campsite at a hostal situated in a valley between the 2 mountain peaks now we have to cross to get to Brazil; one is completed the upper one is to come back.
Faculty was out.
This Quechua girl is cooking in a conventional oven, beneath, made by piling up rocks and dust into an extended low pizza oven kind of factor. They fill it with the yellow straw like grass you see in all places and pile twigs on high to make forcing this arid area. Gradual meals par excellence.
We handed one girl providing some meals from one in every of these however she was on a straight part of street (there was one!) however I couldn’t flip round because the street is lined with deep cement ditches. If we see one at the moment, what we hope is our final day within the mountains I’ll cease wherever to get a style. Very annoying as they hardly ever promote forward on the street that they’ve meals on the market roadside.
Life within the mountains. Huayucos is what they name them on this area. I first got here throughout the time period in Mario Vargas Llosa’s novel Demise In The Andes really useful by a reader and a strong story it’s too, not for the faint of coronary heart.
And right here it’s in actual life:
There may be so little site visitors we bought waved on via instantly.
We simply discovered the Phallcha Hostal (which implies gentian, a purple flowering plant in Quechua) with a simple entrance off the freeway and a big parking space, annd anrrived ant round two within the afternoon and I used to be fairly able to cease. All of us mainly handed out for a few hours and after I awoke I completed Demise within the Andes, the story of a small village with a ghastly secret tucked away in a mining space of the Andes in Peru. The motion takes place through the Shining Path years of political homicide and Vargas Llosa’s story is violent and superbly carried out. I knew a reporter from Florida who was murdered by Sendero Luminoso so I discovered the narrative fairly intimate and informative on a number of ranges.
Happier ideas: prepare dinner’s evening off and he or she deserved it after a day of dry hacking coughing at altitude and images and chilly grey skies.
Alcohol shouldn’t be for me at this altitude. We loved scorching water and coca tea with dinner. I slept like a log, Layne much less so.
There have been half a dozen Spaniards led by a big man with a beard ( my brother he mentioned – however he’s extra good-looking his loyal spouse mentioned) they usually had simply are available an expedition truck and a van like ours from Manaus in Brazil so they’d numerous ideas.
I’d like to journey with them as they’re hilarious and vigorous.
They instructed us the roads in northern Brazil are horrible, stuffed with potholes and BR319 via the jungle is boring because it’s lined solely with bushes and it’s dusty and full of vehicles and bikes. Sounds divine and solely 500 miles lengthy…Then a younger girl took off her shoe:
It’s constructed from rubber tapped from bushes and processed at a rubber plantation. Simply throughout the border in Brazil. It’s natural and fashionable they usually export throughout Europe and we’re going to cease by to see rubber tapping within the method I’ve solely ever examine. I hope they’ve footwear in my measurement as these are higher than Crocs: blasphemy.
We left them to dinner and went to mattress on an evening that promised freezing temperatures. Tomorrow it’s possible you’ll examine us within the tropics I hope.
