Arriving in Cusco, after a horrific bus ride that involved a small crash with an oncoming vehicle, we were in need of another rest day. It is definitely easier to ride the bike rather than take these stupid busses but time restraints often dictate the need. Maybe we should just get faster?! Cusco came as somewhat of a culture shock, for the whole two and a half months we have been in Peru we have rarely strayed into a major tourist hub other then Huaraz, Cusco was a different ball game though, there were so many white people it was unnerving. I was constantly shocked to hear English been spoken, and often forgot that the locals had a pretty good grasp of the language as well. With our fill of good food, and a day to get over the bus ride, it was time to get down to the main event, being in Cusco meant that we were close to Machu Picchu, something you can’t come to Peru and not see. Not wanting to just take the normal route, or the hugely overpriced Inca Trail, we opted for what I thought was going to be a quieter option and attempted the Salkantay trek. I had heard amazing things about this trek before we even arrived in South America and it is something I have been looking forward to doing. We opted to go self guided and trawled the internet to find information on how to get to the start of the trek, the tourist information companies here were adamant that we couldn’t get there without going on one of their tours. A little more research showed that we could get a collectivo easily enough; the only problem was that we would have to be getting up at 4am to catch it; this didn’t bode well as Jess doesn’t do well with early mornings!! We managed to get to the start of the trek with little fuss except for the fact that as soon as we locked the door behind us I realised I had forgotten my wallet. Jess was less than impressed! With Jess paying my way we began the trek, not before paying an extortionate amount for 4 egg sandwiches from one of what I presume is a camp for the guided groups, looks like they don’t like self guided trekkers either! Luckily for me my wallet was tucked up in the hostel, or so I hoped anyway… Our plan due to time restraints was to go big, 20km a day for 3 days would take us to Machu Picchu for the 4th day, perfect. Perfect until we started. It quickly became apparent that our bodies are not hiking fit, especially for carrying a heavy pack. By the time we hit the 10km marker we were struggling, already I could feel the bruises developing on my hips and shoulders. What didn’t help were the hundreds of people on a guided trek ambling by with their tiny daypacks. Our second problem became camping. On the bike we rarely have a problem finding a secluded area to pitch our tent and get a good nights sleep but here any flat spot had been designated an official campsite and with it came fees that we weren’t willing to pay! In the end we walked all the way into Challay, a small hovel that only exists for guided groups, thinking we were going to have to bite the bullet and pay to camp we asked around for the owner so that we could set up and get some much needed food into us. Seeing our bedraggled state, and Jess’ look of pure pain he took pity on us, waving to a spot of grass he said we could camp for free, he must have been making a killing from the 8 tents that were pitched on his veranda to worry about a little more from us! We awoke the next morning to hear the trail was not passable due to the heavy rain and that everyone must walk down the road, some trek this is!!! With sore shoulders and hips and the prospect of walking down a road we were far from motivated to get going, again I think the owner of the camp must have picked up on our vibes and came over to offer us a lift with a few of the guided group to the bottom of the road. Done! We felt no regrets as we passed the light weight hikers tramping down a dirt road, hell, we had ridden roads worse than this, walking it would have mentally killed me. We were dropped of at Santa Teresa, a small town at the end of the trail and discovered that we now had another road stretch to get us to Hydroelectrica, the only way into Machu Picchu. I was struggling to see how this trek had been rated so highly when all you seem to do is walk on roads?! Again having no desire to dodge taxis and collectivos we took a lift to the end of the road, all that was left now was a 10km hike up a railway track and Machu Picchu would be in touching distance. With our bodies aching from the previous day’s effort we managed to stumble the 10km and found ourselves a campsite at the base of the path to the Incan village. With plans for a rest day to allow my body to recover before making the trek to Machu Picchu we explored the local town, and quickly retreated due to the crazy prices they were charging for anything and everything. Our day was spent relaxing in the tent and doing not much at all but hoping the weather would be clear for the following day. I awoke at 4am to the sound of rain. Brilliant! I have been in Peru for two and a half months and have woken up to gray skies a total of three times, this being the third. Not to be deterred I was up and dressed and with head torch trained on the road and water on my back I was off ready to beat the crowds to the top. I made it roughly 100m before I was in a queue. Turns out they lock the gates at the bottom of the hill until 5, I think this is to encourage more people to pay for the crazily priced busses rather than attempt the trek up the hill side. The first buss leaves town at 5.30 giving the walkers very little chance of being the first to the top. This still didn’t deter a huge number of tourists, even with my early start I was probably over 100 people from the front, still this gave me a good number to beat even if the bus was a long shot. The gate opened and the crowd surged through to tackle the climb ahead. Our advantage over the buses was that we went straight up for 1745 steps (I was informed of this by a welsh couple we met in the campsite the night before) while they drove backwards and forewords along the switchbacks. Slowly the numbers on the trail dwindled and before I knew it I was cresting the top of the hill, to my shock there was only one other person there, both of us had managed to beat even the staff bus and for a few minutes were stood slightly at a loss of what to do. My cycling fitness had obviously paid off and as the main gates were opened I was the first through and up to the view point, unfortunately I didn’t really know where I was going so I didn’t make it to the best spot until later in the day but still, having the whole place to yourself, even for just a minute was a pretty special experience and luckily the clouds parted just as I got in. I spent the rest of the morning trying my best to avoid the crowds while trying to eaves drop on the guided groups I couldn’t get away from. After 3 hours of aimless wandering I was done. Time to get back to camp, pack and make the 10km trek back out. There are no buses from Machu Picchu, you either take the crazy priced train or hike the 10km back the way you came in and get a bus from there. All in all this made for a crazily long day with way too many steps but at least we had made it and not been stranded as some of the tour operators told us would happen if we tried to get a bus on the day. Machu Picchu marked the end of our time in Peru, from here it was yet another bus to the Bolivian Border where we would once again mount our noble steeds and ride some more. We have had an amazing time in Peru and ridden some of the best trails of the trip, our bikes have been put through their paces and come out smiling almost as much as we have. We did treat them to a service in Cusco with some new fatter shoes as well as a spruce and a clean. We are excited for Bolivia but sad to be leaving Peru behind. This place has so much to offer, from the unbelievable mountains to be climbed to the endless back roads to be explored. I can confidently say we will be back at some point. But now we have a bus to Bolivia that will once again hopefully take four bicycles and be somewhat comfier than the last bus we took. Let’s hope the adventure gods and mother nature are kind to us and the rains hold off for just one more month!
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With a few days rest we were once again ready to take whatever the Peru divide could throw at us. What we didn’t expect was to find a paved route so tough! Well, more mentally taxing than tough but still, it hit us hard. This is probably the only section of tarmac we have ridden in well over 600km and although our pace was higher than our usual hill climbing snail like tempo, mentally we all struggled, whether we just needed one more rest day or not I’m not sure, but this climb was mentally taxing, so much so that with the now customary grey angry clouds we took refuge early in a small town, camping by a health centre. This one will not go down as one of our best camp sites! The following morning it was back to normal, after only a few kilometres of the black smooth stuff we took a side turn that brought us back to the good stuff. Dusty and bumpy yet comfortingly familiar we were back on the dirt. The road continued up with the vistas constantly opening up before us reminding us why we enjoy these dirt roads so much. Before we knew it we rounded one last corner and were greeted with a huge sign marking the summit. 5059m we were told, amazing, this was the first time we had broken the 5000m mark by bike… Ok, so our GPS said we were somewhat lower but who were we to argue with this giant sign?! With the customary photos taken we wrapped up and began the descent, we were given the option of a 5km shortcut but the road was steep and loose and Jess’ brakes are not performing as optimally as she would like so we carried on the mellow descent that took us round into the next valley and back again were we could meet up with Ryan and the bike-packers. From just below our meeting spot the road took a somewhat smaller trail, so much so that Johnny and Dang overshot, luckily Dean had his beady eye on the GPS and without too much hollering, and luckily without having to chase down the hill, we aroused the eager beavers attention and got them to ride back up. This narrow trail that didn’t feature on any of our maps really kicked up gradient wise, and deteriorated in surface quality so much so that after a only a km we were feeling the increased gradient and our now overly layered bodies began to overheat. Ryan, fearing the ominous black clouds pushed on from here before the consensus was out on what to do; we opted to eat before carrying on with the rest of the climb leaving Ryan to forge ahead and find camp. The black clouds were constantly threatening but never fully unleashed their pent up anger, a dusting of snow and hail made the sometimes un-rideable climb even more atmospheric and as we topped out the cloud had blown by to intimidate some other high altitude pass leaving us with unspoilt views down the valley in search of Ryan and a good spot to camp. The descent was long and fun but before we knew it we caught sight of Ryan’s tent tucked away down at the bottom of the valley, we rolled in just in time to get set up as the dark clouds we thought we had left behind made a re-appearance. We awoke the next day to some more friendly Llamas and the knowledge that we had our last climb on the Peru Divide. We rolled out with mixed feelings, excitement to make it to a descent town for a hot shower and reluctance to finish this epic route we started so long ago. As always the climb was long and as always the weather was constantly threatening to drown us in a sudden downpour. We once again opted to take lunch before the climb really kicked up and once again lost Ryan as he did his best to get ahead of the darkening skies. This climb saw more traffic than the whole of the route previously put together, we were using a road that lead to an active mine however the endless train of loaded trucks all too happy to pull over and wait as 5 pathetically slow cyclists meandered their way up the winding dirt trail. As we neared the top we had a small amount of route finding to perform, the miners seemed to be taking the rock straight from the road but with a little adlibbing and some not so helpful guidance from to workers at the top we managed to make our way back to the road on the other side. From here it was all-downhill, just as the weather let rip with some more snow and hail, no complaints from us though, we would take this over rain any day! Another super fun downhill and a reunion with Ryan in a small village were we were hoping to get served some hot sugary liquid, no luck however and with a long way to go we pushed on. The route led us into Licapa, a run down little town with nothing to offer 6 hungry, dirty cyclists. The town, if you can call it that, offered a rather anticlimactic end to our ride and before long we were all eyeing up the trucks racing up the main road that would take us to civilisation. This main road would be our route if we choose to ride it, infact we met two other cyclist in this town who made it very clear to us that they were hoping to make it to Ushuaia without the aid of a bus, we made it very clear that after riding the Peru Divide an aimless slog up a highway dodging trucks did not entice us one little bit and we would be taking a lift of any form if we could just find one. With Dean doing the talking in his best Spanish we managed to arrange a lift to Ayacucho in the back of a vegetable truck, not bad going to say there were 6 fully loaded bicycles as well as 6 very tired dirty cyclists. What we didn’t realise was that we would have to unload said vegetable truck of all its wholesome goods, this didn’t even warrant a discount which we tried to bargain for later on. With a two hour uncomfortable ride sat in the back of a truck having no idea if our bargaining skills had indeed got us a ride to Ayacucho or, instead, to a dead end road in the middle of nowhere where we would then be robbed of our precious belongings, luckily the doors were thrown open in a petrol station just 4km from where we wanted to be, a sketchy night ride and we had made it. Ayacucho is a small version of Cusco I had been told, (I can now confirm this after visiting both) it has a huge plaza with old colonial buildings and more importantly, good food. It was also from here we would be saying goodbye to our two bikepacking friends. Dean and Dang were going to carry on with the Peru Divide after already having been to Cusco. The rest of us, the original 4, were hoping to find a bus to take us to Cusco for yet more good food and the must see Machu Picchu. Our hopes of walking into one of the many bus stations, paying for a ticket and then relaxing were soon dashed when we were constantly told that a direct bus to Cusco was not an option. We were also told of protests that were making the less than ideal option of a collectivo into a nightmare option that would involve over 24hours of travel. We were stumped. Something we thought was going to be easy was proving rather difficult. Our last option was a company located in the out of town bus terminal; we had been told they offered a direct bus the only problem was the four bicycles we would be carting with us. A taxi ride and a nervous conversation regarding the protests and we were on, all be it a day later than we hoped.
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AuthorDanny and Jessica living the nomadic dream. Archives
September 2017
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