6/3/15: Trekking the Colca Canyon, Day 1

Today has been a truly tough day. Yesterday I signed up to trek the Colca Canyon (even though my original plan was to do the day tour and use only buses) because the staff member who talked to me about the Canyon tour really recommended it, so I chose the 2-day-1-night tour. I don't really know how I feel about it right now, because I am sore all over and exhausted and my knees have taken a ton of stress today.

I woke up at 2:40 am, the earliest I think that I have ever woken up. I was ready to go by 3, but the bus didn't come to pick us up until 3:30. I did get to sleep on the bus a little, but it was extremely cold to the point that my neck pillow, which I had leaned against the window, was stuck to it with ice when I stirred a little along the ride.

We had breakfast at around 6 am, and I met this nice couple who were from Virginia but the guy grew up in San Antonio. Apparently the girl had traveled Peru alone about 4 years ago and was now leading the guy through it, which was cute!

Our first stop was the Mirador Cruz de Condor, where there were a lot of beautiful views of the Canyon and condors flying around - they have special significance in Peruvian history/culture because they are thought to represent the sky.

We then got back on the bus and took a little trip to the start of our trek. I was grouped together with 7 others and a guide, Abel (pronounced Ahh-BEL). We took about 3 hours to get almost all the way down the Canyon near to the river, which was a struggle for me because I didn't really see a point in it. I wasn't physically being challenged by the trek down and I didn't really want to do it at the time, but I pushed on and made sure that I was making progress to the bridge meeting point, taking some beautiful pictures along the way. What I don't like about trekking down a mountain is that the trail is very slippery and it's easy to lose footing, so I have to look at the ground the whole time. As a result, I miss the views around me, which defeats the purpose of trekking a little bit. Maybe next time I will bring poles for stabilization and those will help.

We had to then trek upwards a little to a small town along the way, San Juan de Chuccho. We were able to sit down and eat a nice meal of alpaca meat (!! it tasted a little like lamb without the characteristic gross aftertaste that lamb has and was decent) before continuing on.

Abel pointed out some cool things to us while walking - stones that could be used like chalk due to their bright colors, various plants and fruits (like avocado trees and mint bushes), and a little about the history of the Canyon. Apparently it is inhabited by two groups of people who descended from the Incas, the Collagua and the Cabana. The combination of their two names is where the term "Colca" comes from.

Along the way, there were some beautiful views again, but a lot of the time I was challenged by knees that were starting to hurt a lot and muscles that were starting to get sore. By this time, we had trekked about 6 hours when we got to the little Oasis where we would stay for the night. We had dinner, and some people started heading to bed because the next day would start at around 4:30 am and we would be trekking by about 4:50 am.

I chose to stay at the cafeteria area with two other girls (right around my age) and Abel, just talking about anything and everything. I was asked about knowing Chinese, which made me feel less incompetent because all the other people spoke multiple languages and English was a secondary language for them. One girl, Candy, was interested in things like drinking and partying and asked a lot of questions about that, which was funny. Another topic we talked about was music, and when I said I liked Ed Sheeran's style, I was surprised to see that everyone knew who he was even though I really shouldn't have been. They were from Peru, Isreal, and Switzerland, and he is obviously a world-renowned star. Abel even had "Thinking Out Loud" on his phone, which was cool!

We stayed talking for maybe 2 hours before going to sleep, but I was very tired by then. Sleep was very much welcome!