When we left off, we were headed for Huaraz.
Huaraz turned out to be a bit of a tease, because there are all kinds of great long treks and adventures in the nearby Cordillera Blanca mountain range, but we didn't have enough time or equipment to go on any of them! We'll add that as a thing to see next time. Instead, we spent a few days wandering around the town, and going for short day-hikes, all in view of the beautiful snow-capped peaks that were out of reach to us.
Then began our Odyssey home. We left our hotel room at 10 in the morning, hung about town, and took the overnight bus back to Lima. Dawn was just breaking as we rolled into Lima, where we dropped our bags at a hotel and spent the day re-exploring our old Lima haunts. At around 6am, when the streets were still empty with a light drizzle falling, we heard the unpolluted sound of hundreds of cooing pigeons in the square outside San Francisco cathedral.
At 10pm, we took a cab to the airport and proceeded to wait for our flight which didn't take off until 1:45am! Right as I began drifting off to sleep, they turned on the cabin lights and served us dinner and coffee at 2:30. (For those keeping track, this is night #2 without a bed). Back to the lovely Mexico City airport by the morning, we felt surprisingly chipper. We occupied our 12 hours there by sleeping some on the benches, enjoying our first non-nescafe coffee in 6 weeks, and doing some programming (me) and poker (Jen).
In the evening we took our final flight back to SF, arriving 63 hours after we left our hotel in Huaraz, to my wonderful parents who picked us up with La Costena burritos in hand.
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Odds and Ends
We've been hanging out (doing a little programming, playing a little poker) in a new section of Lima, about a 15-minute walk from the ocean. The ups include our extremely (really, extremely) friendly hostel owner and Lima's continual overcast weather. The down is that there are far fewer restaurants in this district, but since there's a big supermarket close-by we've started cooking for ourselves in the hostel, which is perfect. (I still like to get the excellent fried yuca at the local chinese restaurant).
Two great supermarket deals: A whole pineapple for 60 cents, and three delicious croissants for 60 cents. That's a great breakfast right there (minus the coffee). Speaking of which, for a coffee exporting country, it is extremely difficult to find good coffee. Everyone drinks nescafe. This means that cafe con leche is really leche con cafe, since they bring you a teacup of heated milk, into which you stir the instant coffee.
Another difference that has gone uncommented so far is the extremely high incidence of honking in the streets. Depending on the city, it's not uncommon for 2 of 3 cars on the street to be taxis which, if empty, will honk twice as they pass you to let you know they're available--even if it's perfectly clear you don't want a taxi. You can imagine how this honking adds up. Taxis also honk pretty regularly at each other as a kind of navigational aide to let the others know they're there. I've become pretty used to crusing into a 4-way, totally unctonrolled intersection at about 20mph because the taxi drivers seem to know their business pretty well. I also figure this is good training for Asia where matters are likely to be a whole lot more hectic.
We were going to be hiking in the north around this time with Club de Mochileros. Sadly, their main trip seems to have fallen through, and we've been having trouble reliably contacting them. Today we decided between the beach town of Trujillo or the mountain town of Huaraz, and opted for Huaraz on the theory that we'd see lots of beaches in SE Asia, and we like a good hike in the mountains. We don't have the time or supplies for any of their really serious treks (though this is something I'd like to come back and do a different trip), but we'll probably take a good day-hike or two.
A final peculiarity. When we bought our bus tickets online, they wanted our mother's maiden names, which we dutifly filled-in, being in form-completion mode. Only when the process was completed did we realize they wanted them to force their matriachical naming conventions upon us for our printed tickets.
Two great supermarket deals: A whole pineapple for 60 cents, and three delicious croissants for 60 cents. That's a great breakfast right there (minus the coffee). Speaking of which, for a coffee exporting country, it is extremely difficult to find good coffee. Everyone drinks nescafe. This means that cafe con leche is really leche con cafe, since they bring you a teacup of heated milk, into which you stir the instant coffee.
Another difference that has gone uncommented so far is the extremely high incidence of honking in the streets. Depending on the city, it's not uncommon for 2 of 3 cars on the street to be taxis which, if empty, will honk twice as they pass you to let you know they're available--even if it's perfectly clear you don't want a taxi. You can imagine how this honking adds up. Taxis also honk pretty regularly at each other as a kind of navigational aide to let the others know they're there. I've become pretty used to crusing into a 4-way, totally unctonrolled intersection at about 20mph because the taxi drivers seem to know their business pretty well. I also figure this is good training for Asia where matters are likely to be a whole lot more hectic.
We were going to be hiking in the north around this time with Club de Mochileros. Sadly, their main trip seems to have fallen through, and we've been having trouble reliably contacting them. Today we decided between the beach town of Trujillo or the mountain town of Huaraz, and opted for Huaraz on the theory that we'd see lots of beaches in SE Asia, and we like a good hike in the mountains. We don't have the time or supplies for any of their really serious treks (though this is something I'd like to come back and do a different trip), but we'll probably take a good day-hike or two.
A final peculiarity. When we bought our bus tickets online, they wanted our mother's maiden names, which we dutifly filled-in, being in form-completion mode. Only when the process was completed did we realize they wanted them to force their matriachical naming conventions upon us for our printed tickets.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Our trek pt. 3
I woke up on the third day with that kind of groggy out-of-it feeling I have when I get sick. I also seemed a little hot. On the other hand, it was early, and I could well have been sun-burned. How can one tell? I took an advil, and we started our third day of hiking.
Most of the morning hike was on a very uneven, rocky trail about a foot and a half wide with a sheer drop on one side that started at a few hundred feet, and grew to over a thousand feet as we climbed. Suffice it to say, it was a morning of very careful, awe-filled walking.
The map we had discussed had us climb to about 3/4ths the height of Cabanaconde on the other side of the canyon, then descend again to a town that sounded like "wasi". Here we could decide to spend a 3rd night if we wanted to. Otherwise, we would do a straight climb from the canyon floor, 3,500 feet back to Cabanaconde. Here is a shot mid-morning of that third day. Across the canyon you can see about the first half (maybe a little less) of the trail leading back up to Cabanaconde.
And here's a photo of me a little further along the same trail (with some really cool terracing).
Somewhere along the trail, it dawned on me that the town that sounded like "wasi" was actually "oasis" (imagine saying it quickly in spanish and de-emphasize the final 's'). From the hot, dusty trail above, it was not hard to see why:
After 5 hours of walking, we finally made it to Oasis. Here's a shot of Jen crossing the bridge that leads to the camp:
Jen had a dip in one of their lovely pools, and we both had a delicious lunch with some French tourists (there were a lot of French and German tourists in Cabanaconde). Having forgotten entirely about my morning discomfort I felt excited to attempt the climb back to town, and Jen agreed.
After lunch, we proceeded to walk up very steep switchbacks for about 3.5 hours, occasionally watching other people pass us riding mules as sweat soaked and exhausted as we were. Near the top, it was a real fight for both of us, but we finally made it, very proud of ourselves.
I bounded into town (as much as I was able), ravenous for a big dinner, only to discover the entire town had closed to watch the final bull fight, so I had to wait another two hours before I could eat!
It was only later in the night that it occurred to me I should have taken it a little easy instead of pushing myself, because I had a strong fever with a lot of coughing and sniffling into the night.
Most of the morning hike was on a very uneven, rocky trail about a foot and a half wide with a sheer drop on one side that started at a few hundred feet, and grew to over a thousand feet as we climbed. Suffice it to say, it was a morning of very careful, awe-filled walking.
The map we had discussed had us climb to about 3/4ths the height of Cabanaconde on the other side of the canyon, then descend again to a town that sounded like "wasi". Here we could decide to spend a 3rd night if we wanted to. Otherwise, we would do a straight climb from the canyon floor, 3,500 feet back to Cabanaconde. Here is a shot mid-morning of that third day. Across the canyon you can see about the first half (maybe a little less) of the trail leading back up to Cabanaconde.
And here's a photo of me a little further along the same trail (with some really cool terracing).
Somewhere along the trail, it dawned on me that the town that sounded like "wasi" was actually "oasis" (imagine saying it quickly in spanish and de-emphasize the final 's'). From the hot, dusty trail above, it was not hard to see why:
After 5 hours of walking, we finally made it to Oasis. Here's a shot of Jen crossing the bridge that leads to the camp:
Jen had a dip in one of their lovely pools, and we both had a delicious lunch with some French tourists (there were a lot of French and German tourists in Cabanaconde). Having forgotten entirely about my morning discomfort I felt excited to attempt the climb back to town, and Jen agreed.
After lunch, we proceeded to walk up very steep switchbacks for about 3.5 hours, occasionally watching other people pass us riding mules as sweat soaked and exhausted as we were. Near the top, it was a real fight for both of us, but we finally made it, very proud of ourselves.
I bounded into town (as much as I was able), ravenous for a big dinner, only to discover the entire town had closed to watch the final bull fight, so I had to wait another two hours before I could eat!
It was only later in the night that it occurred to me I should have taken it a little easy instead of pushing myself, because I had a strong fever with a lot of coughing and sniffling into the night.
Our trek pt. 2
Since we left at dawn, and were hiking in the bottom of a very deep canyon, we managed to do almost the entire day's hike in the shade--a vast improvement over the sweaty first day. We hiked a relatively gentle incline for several hours, followed by two hours of quite steep ascent to our second day's destination. About 5 minutes out from the small town a 13-year old girl ran out to meet us. She told us her name was Lucy, asked all about us, and told us that she had a hostel, which she enthusiastically walked us to. The rooms--indeed the whole village--is perched on a steep slope a few hundred feet above the river (high up one of the valleys, about an hour's walk from a waterfall).
Here are a few shots of our 2nd night's rooms:
The town itself is larger than this small cluster of houses. The rest of the town is uphill from where we stayed. All together, there were maybe 10-15 families.
Here's a shot of Jen helping Lucy's younger brother tie his shoe.
Almost against our will, we succumbed to a nap in the afternoon, and walked without our pack to the waterfall and back. Through pure dumb luck I also managed to beat Jen for the first time in gin rummy.
Our room was somewhat less solidly built than that of our first night, and the tarp they stretched under the thatching of the roof flapped in the wind off and on through the night. It woke us up, but was kind of exciting and fun (I thought) nonetheless.
Here are a few shots of our 2nd night's rooms:
The town itself is larger than this small cluster of houses. The rest of the town is uphill from where we stayed. All together, there were maybe 10-15 families.
Here's a shot of Jen helping Lucy's younger brother tie his shoe.
Almost against our will, we succumbed to a nap in the afternoon, and walked without our pack to the waterfall and back. Through pure dumb luck I also managed to beat Jen for the first time in gin rummy.
Our room was somewhat less solidly built than that of our first night, and the tarp they stretched under the thatching of the roof flapped in the wind off and on through the night. It woke us up, but was kind of exciting and fun (I thought) nonetheless.
Our trek p1. 1
We left pretty late in the morning (about 8:30) for the first day of our trek. Most of the first day's hike involved a 3,500 ft. descent from Cabanaconde to the Colca river at the base of the canyon. The size of the canyon is totally impossible convey in words or, I think, pictures, but we did our best.
In this shot, you can see some of the canyon (though not all the way to the bottom), as well as a later section of the trail we'd walk along.
Here we are a little further along. You can see some of the terracing and one of the small villages near the canyon base. You can see the edge of the Colca river in the lower right-hand corner of the shot. Look at how deep this appears and then remember that we took this shot after we'd already descended about 2000 feet.
Here's another shot of the mountain village across the way. (We actually never stayed at that one. On the first day we passed it from below, and on the third day we passed it from far above).
After the long descent, we crossed a bridge, and hiked more or less along the river (a few hundred feet up) for two hours, passing below the town in the photo above. Finally, we arrived at the second bridge (pictured below), and our accommodations for the first day (which you can make out on the very left-hand side of the photo).
It's more of a camping-outpost than a town. There are just two families right above the river. The trail terminates in a covered wooden balcony overlooking the river with tables to sit at. After our long hike, we were happy to sit and enjoy the view. Lip had told us to try and lodge with "the family on the right", though, so after a quick break we went across the trail and found Virginia.
She had a beautiful place. Here is a shot of our rooms from the side.
And here is the view from our door.
She makes some of her income renting these rooms to hikers, but much of her income comes from cactus farming. Here is a shot of our bathroom with some of the cacti.
Jen asked if she sold the cactus fruit, but Virginia told us that a whole bag of the fruit can only get 20 centavos. Instead, a species of insect lay their eggs on the surface of the cacti (what Virginia called a "plague"). Though it looks white, when you scrape it off, it's a deep blood red color. Virginia says that she scrapes the cacti every three months to sell this as a dye.
Virginia also has several sheep, ducks and chickens, a pig, a cat, two dogs, and a small garden where she's planted several kinds of trees. Jen and I talked with her for several hours about all kinds of things--she said it was nice to have guests who spoke Spanish because then we could get to know each other much better (instead of just "hola!"). She cooked us a delicious lunch and dinner, and agreed to have a breakfast ready for us at 5:30 the next morning for our second day of hiking.
In this shot, you can see some of the canyon (though not all the way to the bottom), as well as a later section of the trail we'd walk along.
Here we are a little further along. You can see some of the terracing and one of the small villages near the canyon base. You can see the edge of the Colca river in the lower right-hand corner of the shot. Look at how deep this appears and then remember that we took this shot after we'd already descended about 2000 feet.
Here's another shot of the mountain village across the way. (We actually never stayed at that one. On the first day we passed it from below, and on the third day we passed it from far above).
After the long descent, we crossed a bridge, and hiked more or less along the river (a few hundred feet up) for two hours, passing below the town in the photo above. Finally, we arrived at the second bridge (pictured below), and our accommodations for the first day (which you can make out on the very left-hand side of the photo).
It's more of a camping-outpost than a town. There are just two families right above the river. The trail terminates in a covered wooden balcony overlooking the river with tables to sit at. After our long hike, we were happy to sit and enjoy the view. Lip had told us to try and lodge with "the family on the right", though, so after a quick break we went across the trail and found Virginia.
She had a beautiful place. Here is a shot of our rooms from the side.
And here is the view from our door.
She makes some of her income renting these rooms to hikers, but much of her income comes from cactus farming. Here is a shot of our bathroom with some of the cacti.
Jen asked if she sold the cactus fruit, but Virginia told us that a whole bag of the fruit can only get 20 centavos. Instead, a species of insect lay their eggs on the surface of the cacti (what Virginia called a "plague"). Though it looks white, when you scrape it off, it's a deep blood red color. Virginia says that she scrapes the cacti every three months to sell this as a dye.Virginia also has several sheep, ducks and chickens, a pig, a cat, two dogs, and a small garden where she's planted several kinds of trees. Jen and I talked with her for several hours about all kinds of things--she said it was nice to have guests who spoke Spanish because then we could get to know each other much better (instead of just "hola!"). She cooked us a delicious lunch and dinner, and agreed to have a breakfast ready for us at 5:30 the next morning for our second day of hiking.
Views around Cabanaconde
Cabanaconde sits on the edge of the canyon, hemmed in by mountains on the other side. Beyond the central plaza, there are shops and hostels for 2 blocks along the main road which quickly turn into houses and then terraced farmland. There are no cars. When there's no festival going on, it's quiet enough to hear the whistling of the wind, and the air has that crisp, clean quality of being in the mountains. I really liked it.
Here are two shots of the central plaza:
On our first morning, we hiked up the hill from town to a small church and lookout point. Here's a shot of the edge of town from the hill. This view makes it clear just how abruptly the canyon drops away at the town's edge.
In the other direction, you can see more farmland, and their bull fighting arena. Apparently they held two bull fights on the last two days of their festival, but we were hiking at the time. In any case, Lip told us on our return that the tourists who had gone said it was pretty sickening so perhaps it was for the best. (All the vegetarian restaurants we've been in all over Peru have anti-bullfighting stickers with the slogan "ni arte, ni cultura" which mean "not art, not culture").
In the afternoon we made our way back to Pachamama and sat down with Louie and Lib to talk about hiking in the canyon. Our guidebook discussed several ways to hire local guides (or men with burros) to organize your trek. Since Louis was a trekking guide, we thought he should know, and it soon became clear that we didn't really need a guide. He gave us a map and talked us through a 3 day/2 night trek that he liked a lot. We wouldn't need to camp, because we would be hiking between small mountain villages which could house and feed us overnight. Unlike the Sierras, there are no dangerous animals.
There is a native plant whose milk can burn your skin or blind you if you get it in your eyes, but you have to break the stems to get the milk out, and it only grows in a small portion of our hike. So we figured as long as we didn't go breaking any stems we'd be fine. The trails are also extremely obvious, because they are all narrow paths along the canyon walls. From the lookout point at Cabanaconde we could see many of the trails we'd be taking into and along the canyon. In addition to their free trekking advice and map, Louie and Lip also let us securely store our bags at their hostel for our 3 days, free of charge. We made it a point to eat there as much as we could--which was easy because their restaurant was delicious--and we ended up spending our last night after the hike with them.
Here are two shots of the central plaza:
On our first morning, we hiked up the hill from town to a small church and lookout point. Here's a shot of the edge of town from the hill. This view makes it clear just how abruptly the canyon drops away at the town's edge.
In the other direction, you can see more farmland, and their bull fighting arena. Apparently they held two bull fights on the last two days of their festival, but we were hiking at the time. In any case, Lip told us on our return that the tourists who had gone said it was pretty sickening so perhaps it was for the best. (All the vegetarian restaurants we've been in all over Peru have anti-bullfighting stickers with the slogan "ni arte, ni cultura" which mean "not art, not culture").
In the afternoon we made our way back to Pachamama and sat down with Louie and Lib to talk about hiking in the canyon. Our guidebook discussed several ways to hire local guides (or men with burros) to organize your trek. Since Louis was a trekking guide, we thought he should know, and it soon became clear that we didn't really need a guide. He gave us a map and talked us through a 3 day/2 night trek that he liked a lot. We wouldn't need to camp, because we would be hiking between small mountain villages which could house and feed us overnight. Unlike the Sierras, there are no dangerous animals. There is a native plant whose milk can burn your skin or blind you if you get it in your eyes, but you have to break the stems to get the milk out, and it only grows in a small portion of our hike. So we figured as long as we didn't go breaking any stems we'd be fine. The trails are also extremely obvious, because they are all narrow paths along the canyon walls. From the lookout point at Cabanaconde we could see many of the trails we'd be taking into and along the canyon. In addition to their free trekking advice and map, Louie and Lip also let us securely store our bags at their hostel for our 3 days, free of charge. We made it a point to eat there as much as we could--which was easy because their restaurant was delicious--and we ended up spending our last night after the hike with them.
Adventure to Cabanaconde
Arequipa is about 100 miles from the Colca Canyon--a canyon twice as deep as the Grand Canyon and home to the endangered Andean condor--where we were planning to hike for a few days. We left the Arequipa bus station (pictured below) at about 2pm for a 7 hour bus ride to the small town of Cabanaconde. This shot is only about half the bus station. Notice how much bread the small shops have. We have no idea how they can possibly sell that much bread since we didn't witness even a single purchase during our hour wait.
The bus company we booked with was called Senior De Los Milagros (lord of miracles). Jen joked that she hoped their name didn't reflect their operating policy when a man at the front asked for everyone's attention while he prayed for the safety of our journey. Thankfully, he wasn't an official representative of the bus company, and this was only the opening ploy in his effort to sell children's instructional materials (books about physics and chemistry!) for a dollar a workbook. His 20-minute harangue was just one of several examples we would suffer of the refined rhetorical art of the hard sell. (My favorite part was his descriptive portrait of the scam artist, and how we could rest assured that he wasn't one--"I'm a just an ordinary guy like you all, telling you what I think").
Though the bus was full when we embarked, another 25 or so people got on at the first stop out of town, filling the center isle. Some of them had brought buckets to sit on, but many just stood or, (as the old woman next to me) elected to sit on another passenger's armrest. Every time we passed a toll booth, everyone in the center aisle ducked so the police couldn't see them from the road. Even though Jen and I are pretty sure this practice of overloading the buses is illegal, we are also sure it's universal, and more or less overlooked. To what extent this compromises safety is unclear. Since sunset is around 5:30 or 6, it was dark for most of our journey there. On the way back I only saw one overturned bus husk. In any case, about two hours outside of town the toll checkpoints stopped along with the paved road.
Around 7pm, we arrived at Chivay, where the only other tourists on the bus decided to get off because they “didn't have a place in Cabanaconda”, the even smaller end-of-the-line 2 hours away where, incidentally, we didn't have a place to stay either. As we waited to go, more and more locals crammed on board, causing the existing passengers to yell “esta lleno!” (it's full!) and “vamanos! Estamos hambre!” (let's go! we're hungry!). Jen and I started to get out our headphones to listen to music when the priest across the aisle advised us that we should be careful with our bags because "they would rob us". We were touched that he used the tu form with us for his warning. I reasoned that, taking confessions, he would probably know, so we discretely tucked our things away.
Two hours later, as we pulled into the narrow streets of Cabanaconde, we noticed somewhere between 50 and 100 squatting men lining either side of the bus, apparently waiting. Even the large cities we've been in shut down early, so the sight of so many people out in such a small town confused and somewhat unsettled us; something was definitely afoot and we had no idea what.
The bus unloaded in the small main plaza, where there was only a small crowd waiting for the bus. We bee-lined for the hostel, not 30 steps away, and secured what turned out to be a very lovely room for 20 soles. Five minutes after we'd settled in our hostel, the mystery of the waiting men resolved itself. We heard a cacophonous homophony of trumpets playing a sort-of bugle call. I captured a little bit of it from the hostel window (before we went out and joined them):
Apparently we had arrived at the beginning of a celebration of the town's founding that lasts 4 days. Though much smaller and less elaborate than the festival in Cusco, the musicians and townspeople more than made up for it in vigor and enthusiasm. As we watched from the center of the plaza, the parade and dancers made 4 or 5 laps around us since the town is so small there apparently isn't really anywhere else to parade to.
We had oven fired pizzas in a neighboring hostel (pachamama ("mother earth" in Quechua)) where we were surprised to find a young Belgian waitress who spoke to us in fluent English, the neighboring table in French, and another couple that entered in German. We would find out later that Lib (the waitress) was the girlfriend of the young Peruvian proprietor (Louie). Lib speaks 6 languages, and Louie had been a hiking expedition guide for 7 years before establishing what is unquestionably the hippest and friendliest hostel in Cabanaconde. The pizzas took a little while since their pizza cook had left for the festival, but it was such a friendly and welcoming atmosphere that we didn't mind just relaxing. At around 11:30 we returned to our hostel and enjoyed a very restful sleep (at least, until dawn when the parade, with its 30 trumpets, 30 baritones, and 20 drummers, resumed where they had left off the night before--directly outside our window).
The bus company we booked with was called Senior De Los Milagros (lord of miracles). Jen joked that she hoped their name didn't reflect their operating policy when a man at the front asked for everyone's attention while he prayed for the safety of our journey. Thankfully, he wasn't an official representative of the bus company, and this was only the opening ploy in his effort to sell children's instructional materials (books about physics and chemistry!) for a dollar a workbook. His 20-minute harangue was just one of several examples we would suffer of the refined rhetorical art of the hard sell. (My favorite part was his descriptive portrait of the scam artist, and how we could rest assured that he wasn't one--"I'm a just an ordinary guy like you all, telling you what I think").
Though the bus was full when we embarked, another 25 or so people got on at the first stop out of town, filling the center isle. Some of them had brought buckets to sit on, but many just stood or, (as the old woman next to me) elected to sit on another passenger's armrest. Every time we passed a toll booth, everyone in the center aisle ducked so the police couldn't see them from the road. Even though Jen and I are pretty sure this practice of overloading the buses is illegal, we are also sure it's universal, and more or less overlooked. To what extent this compromises safety is unclear. Since sunset is around 5:30 or 6, it was dark for most of our journey there. On the way back I only saw one overturned bus husk. In any case, about two hours outside of town the toll checkpoints stopped along with the paved road.
Around 7pm, we arrived at Chivay, where the only other tourists on the bus decided to get off because they “didn't have a place in Cabanaconda”, the even smaller end-of-the-line 2 hours away where, incidentally, we didn't have a place to stay either. As we waited to go, more and more locals crammed on board, causing the existing passengers to yell “esta lleno!” (it's full!) and “vamanos! Estamos hambre!” (let's go! we're hungry!). Jen and I started to get out our headphones to listen to music when the priest across the aisle advised us that we should be careful with our bags because "they would rob us". We were touched that he used the tu form with us for his warning. I reasoned that, taking confessions, he would probably know, so we discretely tucked our things away.
Two hours later, as we pulled into the narrow streets of Cabanaconde, we noticed somewhere between 50 and 100 squatting men lining either side of the bus, apparently waiting. Even the large cities we've been in shut down early, so the sight of so many people out in such a small town confused and somewhat unsettled us; something was definitely afoot and we had no idea what.
The bus unloaded in the small main plaza, where there was only a small crowd waiting for the bus. We bee-lined for the hostel, not 30 steps away, and secured what turned out to be a very lovely room for 20 soles. Five minutes after we'd settled in our hostel, the mystery of the waiting men resolved itself. We heard a cacophonous homophony of trumpets playing a sort-of bugle call. I captured a little bit of it from the hostel window (before we went out and joined them):
Apparently we had arrived at the beginning of a celebration of the town's founding that lasts 4 days. Though much smaller and less elaborate than the festival in Cusco, the musicians and townspeople more than made up for it in vigor and enthusiasm. As we watched from the center of the plaza, the parade and dancers made 4 or 5 laps around us since the town is so small there apparently isn't really anywhere else to parade to.
We had oven fired pizzas in a neighboring hostel (pachamama ("mother earth" in Quechua)) where we were surprised to find a young Belgian waitress who spoke to us in fluent English, the neighboring table in French, and another couple that entered in German. We would find out later that Lib (the waitress) was the girlfriend of the young Peruvian proprietor (Louie). Lib speaks 6 languages, and Louie had been a hiking expedition guide for 7 years before establishing what is unquestionably the hippest and friendliest hostel in Cabanaconde. The pizzas took a little while since their pizza cook had left for the festival, but it was such a friendly and welcoming atmosphere that we didn't mind just relaxing. At around 11:30 we returned to our hostel and enjoyed a very restful sleep (at least, until dawn when the parade, with its 30 trumpets, 30 baritones, and 20 drummers, resumed where they had left off the night before--directly outside our window).
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