Salkantay Trek Day 1
Day 4 of trip - Wednesday May 9th
Let me talk a bit about the Trek itself. I booked it through the hostel we stayed at and in the end ended up walking with 1 guide and 11 other hikers. This meant that we all slept in the same camp, but often walked in personalized groups or alone (I really enjoy that sort of thing and made a point of getting away from people for parts of the hike). Having said that we walked as a group a lot on day 1 and spent a lot of time together otherwise.
We met up with our guide Nilton (named after the Brazilian footballing legend) at 6:30pm on Tuesday, the night before the hike began. He went through the itinerary, a checklist of things we would need, what exactly was involved, answered any questions etc. Only 3 of us from our eventual hiking group stayed at our hostel; Me, my buddy Steve who accompanied me to Peru from Canada, and an American named Gary from Colorado. Nilton briefed us on the hike and then went to meet other people from our group elsewhere.
In any case, here is a short version of the itinerary for the day:
3:45am - Wake up @ hostel
4:50am - Bus Pickup @ hostel
7:00am - Arrival in Mollepata, breakfast
8:15am - Start of hike
1:30 or so - Lunch
5:50pm - Arrival at campsite
7:00pm - Dinner, cards
9:30pm - Sleep
This was the first day of the hike and we started off by only getting a couple hours of sleep. We had to wake up at 3:45am because the pickup was supposed to be at 4:30am and we still had shower, go through our bags a bit, re-pack some stuff, leave it behind @ the hostel, pay, check out, etc. The bus ended up arriving a bit late, giving us time to enjoy the drunken ramblings of a Jewish playboy type guy in his 20s who was having a fairly loud & obnoxious conversation with another drunk friend, mostly about women, their reproductive organs, and ways by which a man might become acquainted with them.
So me, Steve, and Gary, sat there being amused & annoyed by the conversation, still half asleep, waiting for the bus. It finally arrived and took about 2 hours to get us to Mollepata - a small village in the Andean foothills @ about 2,900m (does anyone want me to convert each altitude/measurement/whatever to imperial as well? Cause I will if people want me to)
One by one future members of Team Kevin (more on the naming of our group in a later post) filled up the bus and when we arrived in Mollepata we were ready to have our first group breakfast! Coca leaves & other medicinal and non-medicinal teas were placed on the table by a Quechua villager, we ordered breakfast, started talking among ourselves, and then dug in!
After that most people sat aside 2-5kg of gear to be carried by the mules (there was a 5kg limit per person). I ended up leaving my sleeping bag, a bunch of clothes, and other assorted things I would probably not need while we were still walking. The mules drop off all this stuff @ the campsite, so each one of us had access to it once we arrived at our destination on day 1. This happened every day except for the last, when we had to carry everything ourselves.
We finally started walking at 8:15 or so and at first had to get out of the village of Mollepata itself. It wasn't that big, but it was the first day of walking, I wasn't feeling quite comfortable with the high altitudes yet, there was now a 12-14kg bag on my back, and the trail was taking us forever uphill.. We were walking slowly and things were going well, but I soon discovered that the hike was going to get a lot more complicated and difficult than I ever thought might be possible.
We were walking as a group and we were for the most part all introduced to eachother at breakfast, so the first 2 hours or so of the hike were rather "chill". There was a lot of "wow, look at that scenery" talk going on between people, more introductory and "So what kind of stuff are you into?" type banter between all of us, and instructions & history/fauna/flora lessons from our guide Nilton. My body was continously asking me to stop and take a breather - I literally had to take short breaks where I'd breathe heavily for several seconds. I was walking as the last person of our group, but the guide made sure that I wasn't falling behind too far.
By 11am we reached a beautiful raised plain that overlooked a lot of the surrounding countryside. It was the perfect time for a break and I eventually ended up catching up with the rest of the group. The problem was that they had a head start on me in terms of rest - so when we started walking again I was not quite ready to go yet.. The spot Nilton picked for our break was amazing though - most of us took the time to sit back, take some pictures, and eat some snacks.
My body was complaining more and more, the higher we went. At this point the climb was at times rather steep and I had to make more and more stops. By this point the guide had made sure that I wasn't showing any symptoms of high-altitude sickness, which can kill you.. it was mainly a "my body needs more oxygen and energy" type of thing, not a "i have a headache and i feel sick" thing, which would have likely sent me back down the trail, as Nilton doesn't need to have no deaths on his resume.
There were times when I had no idea how I was going to find any more energy within myself to keep going. I was walking with walking sticks in both hands, which really helped, but even my arms were refusing to move. I was taking 5 minute long breaks every 10 minutes.. This wasn't looking good!
Eventually the cramps in my left leg started and I had to take an even longer break.. several times, culminating in shooting pains all throughout my upper left leg. I started massaging it in an attempt to get rid of the cramps, but I didn't really know what I was doing. On my trip to Chile 4 years ago my hiking buddy managed to massage a cramp out of my leg.. It hurt like a @%&*!$ - I ended up screaming at the top of my lungs basically.. but afterwards the cramps were gone forever.. so I was trying to do something like that, gut I didn't know how exactly, so I was potentially inflicting unnecessary pain upon my left leg.. It wasn't really working and it seemed to get worse and worse.. and there I was sitting all by myself, wondering if the hike was going to have an unexpected early finish for me, when another hiking group came up the trail and the guide did the .. you know.. the thing they do at soccer games to players who get cramps. It hurt a lot but it helped. I was able to get up and continue walking.
I powered ahead and kept telling myself that I'm somehow going to get to the first campsite and then that I'm going to rent a horse for the next day and that it's all going to be fine (the horse option was explained to us at the briefing - day 2 was the hardest part of the hike and 3 hours uphill followed by 7-8 hours downhill.. a lot of people ended up having to rent a horse for the uphill portion due to the demands of day 1). It was psychologically not to mention physically INCREDIBLY tough, but I just sort of powered ahead and kept going.
Our walk was basically taking us higher and higher on a curvy path, but we couldn't quite tell where exactly we were headed in terms of the surrounding landscape, a lot of which was still ahead & hidden from view... but by 12:15pm or so it became more and more clear that we were walking at the side of a valley, now heading in a definite direction instead of going upwards on a curved path. You could see the valley opening up towards the right; Our walk took us left-wards and uphill.
Looking back from where we came - if you followed the path back, you would end up exiting the valley and circling to the right
There was often a drop to our right as we walked towards the snow capped mountains around which we would hike in our journey to Machu Picchu.
Somewhere around here we took a break in terms of lunch. Soup was served and my back was killing me (yeah, I was totally falling apart).. I thought soup was all there was going to be in terms of food, so I went to lie down so that my back would feel better.. but Nilton stopped me and we ended up each getting a big plate of rice, beef, veggies, and other goodies. There was also a shack where you could buy bottled water, which I took advantage of. It was a good half an hour long break and I REALLY needed it. The rest of the hike this day wasn't as challenging.. and while parts of it continued uphill, long portions were very gradual in terms of elevation change - parts seemed almost flat. I don't know how I was still walking, but it was definitely easier.
The more we walked, the more snowcapped mountains we could see around us and it was more and more clear that our campsite was going to be surrounded by snowcapped beauties. The trail continued upwards very gradually, but the whole area eventually had a bit of a plateau/valley floor feel to it.
We came across a private hotel that apparently costs a couple grand a night.. Yep, $1,000+ a night. Contrast that with the $6 we were paying a night at our hostel in Cusco. I'm not sure about the accuracy of that $1,000+ amount, but judging by how remote and nice the place was and how mindblowingly beautiful it was in all directions, I wouldn't be surprised if it is true
By the time we got to our campsite, it was already cold as the sun had lowered below the mountain peaks a couple hours before our arrival. It got dark fairly soon after that.
Me and Steve (we were walking together right near the end, helping eachother with morale) picked out a tent (it was inside the blue tent on the left.. A tent in a tent - to minimize temperature drops caused by the wind), we unpacked, got changed, got everything ready for the next day's hike, then ended up at least 20 minutes outside blown away by the stars above us. There were just.. SO MANY STARS! It was beautiful and we couldn't stop staring. Steve had a tripod (a tiny one) but he couldn't find it.. and none of the googleSky (or whatever) apps were working due to the high mountains and a lack of satellite signal (I guess? Nobody could find a GPS signal and it was impossible to align the sky software otherwise due to all the stars. there were seriously too many)
After that we all sat down for dinner (Peruvians usually eat dinner later than 6, but we were all tired and needed to sleep), more coca tea, some beers, socialized a bit around the table, played a bunch of a-hole (What's another name for this game?? We ended up playing it quite a bit on the hike, so it will come up again..) and got to know eachother a lot more..
There were 11 or so of us not including Nilton the guide, and there was a large French-speaking contingent - a couple people from France, a couple from Quebec, as well as a couple people from Switzerland. There was also a German and the American guy I mentioned already... so around the table you mainly heard French, but also a lot of English, then some German and Spanish. The French speakers dominated but tried hard to be inclusive - if there was a lot of laughter for example, Audrie or whoever would turn to me or Steve and explain what they were laughing about - turns out that for the first 10-20 minutes the people from France and the people from Quebec were making fun and laughing at eachothers pronunciation and use of the French language.
We went to sleep early because most of us were so exhausted. The next morning we had to wake up at 5:30am.
Day 1 of the hike was done and I was filled with such a positive sense of accomplishment lying there in my tent.. but I also knew that a lot more hardcore hiking was still ahead.. and wasn't sure how my body would react. A lot of emotions were racing through me when I quickly fell asleep that night.
edit: I usually take at least *some* time to do some post-processing on my photos but these are all untouched. By the time I'm printing my favourites off they're going to be processed slightly, at least some of them