Our last dance with Huaraz

Chey and I had been having this awesome fantasies about getting higher up North, and making plans in our heads that involved boats and jungle... but it was in our last few days in Huaraz that we decided that the money situation was no longer sustainable, and that we had to slowly start heading South, back to my hometown where we had a place to stay for free.

Huaraz had been so nice to us, with the great hiking and the sauna-birthday, and the delicious clay-oven pizza and spicy curries, that we really wanted to give it a proper goodbye before heading back to Lima.

We went to the tourist info place and asked them what was there to do that wasn't more of the same things we had already done, and didn't require expensive equipment (that we didn't have) or many days (that we didn't have either).

When traveling Perú I seriously, SERIOUSLY recommend you to combine word of mouth, your traveling guide of choice (in our case it's the Rough guide) and Tripadvisor references with IPerú, the official tourist info spots. They have offices in pretty much every city, and do a great job. And they don't mind silly questions or seeing your damn face all the time. Every. Single. Day.

After a long conversation with one of the info place guys, we decided to go on a last hike to a lagoon up a mountain right outside Huaraz.

So we grabbed apple cakes and a lot of water, and headed outside town (just a 15 or 20 minute drive, so we took a taxi because the buses were too full and not stopping).

We got off the taxi at a bridge, and as soon as we crossed it we got up to a natural lookout where we could see the wonderful rural landscape.

Later we saw a guy bathing in the river (with soap).

From the lookout we had views like this one.

And this one. Like a modern day The Shire.

 I was still pretty weary of the altitude sun (that had given me heatstroke after the 9 hour hike to the Secret valley of awesome), so I wrapped my head with my everythingie* in the hippiest fashion and we started the walk up.

The road wasn't like the one of two days ago, but instead it went consistently up though a village of scattered clay houses and farming terraces.

Many of the houses look like there's no-one living there, but in most
of them, there are people still.

Chey, looking very gringo next to the crops.

Beautiful golden fields.

 We walked by pigs, hens, donkeys, sheep and beautiful wheat fields that whispered in the wind.

Happy chickens walking around, oblivious to their dark fate.

As were this cute piggies.

Sheep family.

We also crossed paths with so many dogs.

Most times the dogs you meet while traveling (just like the people) are friendly and only want to meet you. But sometimes, out of nowhere, you'll get crazy feral dogs that come at you as if they had just escaped from the dephts of hell.

And that was the case of a dog gang we encountered halfway through our hike.

We grabbed rocks from the road and stood our ground, showing them we had no fear (which was a blatant lie).

After a lot of staring and measuring each other we won, and the dogs let us through.


The one thing I couldn't stop thinking about as we went up and kept seeing this adobe constructions next to the farming fields, was how different life seemed to be in those villages.

People live without most of the things we believe essential (wifi), and their lives are basically made of work and family. The houses, mostly, have no superfluous details. Most of them don't even have windows. It seems so minimal, so far from everything we know to be normal.

Again, it was like traveling back to a simpler time.

Ominous decoration: a message for trespassing owls.

wtf

Another cute piglet.

A bull with a tiara.

Harvesting the crops.

How pretty is this?

Pretty sure it's wheat.

Next to the fields (notice how I'm not wearing the turban for the photo)

More lovely landscapes.

More lovely landscape and an even lovelier Australian boy.

A donkey that was too fluffy for its own good.

 On the way up we met only three gringos walking together (we let them go ahead of us, expecting to arrive to the lagoon when they were leaving, because by then we were used to lonely natural places all for ourselves).

We also saw a couple of locals going downhill with their donkeys. Otherwise it was all peaceful solitude.

Hard working people and hard working donkeys.

The fluff.

After a few hours of walking (it was much lighter than our previous Huaraz hike), we arrived to the hill summit.

The lagoon was beautiful and full of wild ducks, the grass was green and soft, and there was a little lonely house by the water, where some kids were playing football (soccer, for our lovely gringo readers).

Kids being the lovely stereotype of latino kids.

The lagoon.

Chey walks by the lagoon.
The weather was ridiculously nice.

We went to the edge of a cliff to look at the view, which was honestly stunning.

I've never seen mountains like those.

One happy gal.

Chey looks like he's about to fly.

Then we had a little picnic, and lingered there for a while, enjoying the sun and the wind, and a sense of accomplishment, and maybe a little bit of a sense of being close to the end.

It was a perfect place for picnic.

Wild duck.

 This was our last little adventure before starting to head back South (which we knew was going to be an adventure on its own). It was just perfect.

When we returned to town we had clay oven pizza and craft beer, which made the day even more perfect.

*Random fact: Everythingie is the name I give to a sarong I bought in Bali, which I use for pretty much everything (as you do with sarongs): from yoga mat to blanket, dress, skirt, turban, picnic blanket, shower courtain, scarf, shawl, furoshiki-ish wrapper for stuff, sheet, bus pillow, and probably other things I can't remember now.

A sweaty, happy birthday

 When Chey turned 26 he was in Huaraz (with me!), and it was the day after that unbeatable awesome secret valley of amazingness.

He had a birthday while traveling South America, though, which I still think is pretty epic.

That morning we got up at a normal hour, had a nice breakfast and decided to visit some ruins not too far from town.

He was relaxed about birthday fun, sice he said his Australian birthday (the day before) we had had a great time, so now we could relax and do whatever.

We bought some snacks and then took a cheap taxi towards the ruins.

Our taxi driver was really nice and chatty, and he told us about Huaraz history, Andean food, and plenty of things to do and places to go to (all of which will have to wait until our next visit).

Huaraz born taxi driver.

He dropped us outside the ruins (can't remember the name, Perú has way too many!) and left.

But when we made it to the entrance, the caretaker lady told us that it was Perú's "National Museum Day" or something of the sort, and therefore all of the ruins and museums were closed.

Right on the day we had decided to go visiting ruins (insert frustrated face emoticon here).

Part of the ruins we only got to see from behind a gate.

We didn't let it affect us too much though, and after sitting down to enjoy the view of the surrounding farms and sharing some crackers with a friendly puppy, we decided to walk down to the closest village and take a bus to the hot springs close-by.

A nice farm next to the ruins.

It was a lovely, sunny day.

Eeyore looks for shelter from the sun.

 That thing people say, "it's not about the destination, but the journey" keeps proving to be true in every step of our trip. And it was just like that here.

The walk downhill we were surrounded by tiny farms, tall gumtrees (the smell of them keeps reminding Chey of home), and the cutest farm animals.

 Sometimes I get the feeling that Perú is mainly made of countryside, and I love it.

A pretty green graveyard.

More cute donkeys.

So, we got to the village, took a bus and then a taxi. 

Turns out, the famous "hot springs" of Monterrey are man-made, a bit dirty, and too crowded to be relaxing. Instead of going there, then, the taxi took us further away from town. And further. All the way to Chancos.

Stuff we saw on our way to Chancos.

More stuff.

 We ended up driving down a dusty gravel road, it was a long way.

We managed to get a RIDICULOUS (cheap) price for such distance.

And finally we arrived to the community baños termales (thermal baths) in Chancos. A super local place, where they built sauna-cave-rooms carved out of the mountain, and the thermal water is fully natural. And it's crazy cheap.

Locals wait for the baños, or sell food outside them.

 It's basically a natural sauna, where mostly local old ladies (but some families as well) take their own medicinal herbs and spend 20 minutes getting rid of toxins and just relaxing, which sounds really foreign in a place where everything seems to be hard-work-culture.

They also have hot water pools, but it was way too sunny to enjoy them.

At the entrance.

 We patiently waited for our turn to get into one of the most tame sauna-cave-rooms. Only 48° C.

 I didn't really know what to expect, but it ended up being a great experience, kind of like a spa but without the pretentiousness.

I was guessing the rooms would be a communal space, but luckily every spot is private for you and your family group, so we had our 48° room just for ourselves.

There will be no photos here, because the cave darkness of the place doesn't really allow photos to be taken.

 And also because nudity.

Twenty minutes in there flew, and after a cold shower to get fully rid of all the toxins and bad stuff your body expels with the steam and the heat, we headed outside feeling lightheaded and light-muscled.

Local lady sells crafts outside the baños.

We stayed at the community place for a while, hunting for a place that served any non-meaty meal, but had no luck in that regard so we ended up heading back to Huaraz for a birthday dinner.

Which we had at an AWESOME place called Chilli heaven.
Please disregard how awful I look in this picture.

It ended up being quite a good birthday for Chey, and altogether another beautiful day in Huaraz.