Weekend Hike

Friday 28^th March

This week was very fun but also very busy, so I am very glad it is finally the weekend. Also, this is why I’ve had no time to post about last weekend, which was probably the most tiring weekend I’ve had since I’ve been here, but also one of the most beautiful and breath-taking ones. We decided to go on a hike in the Sacred Valley.

Ready to go!

We started on Saturday in Yanohara and ended in Ollantaytambo on Sunday. In total we walked for about 14 hours and camped one night up in the mountains. The views were absolutely stunning, but I have to admit it was very tiring and some of the parts were very uphill. The weather also wasn’t fantastic, as it rained a bit on Saturday and almost the whole day on Sunday. Nevertheless, I have to say the painful hiking was so worth it when I think back on how beautiful everything looked. There was variety in the landscapes too and I honestly felt like I was in an article from The National Geographic. Made me want to discover more and more of Peru.

Starting in Yanohara

Marina and I with our tourist hats

Mountains

Marina and Miguel :3

Protecting ourselves from the rain

Setting up our tents

Our camp site

There were 7 of us on the hike, which was nice as I got to meet new people. We had 3 guides (one of them being Marina’s friend) as they had never done this hike before. We were also joined by a dog who followed us the whole way (even when we got into a car at the end, but got very tired and gave up after a while), who we decided to name Lassy. On the way, we also met some local people who lived in the mountains we walked through. Our guide, Jose, spoke Quechua with them as they didn’t speak Spanish. It was the first I heard a full conversation in Quechua, and it sounded very odd, a bit like German I think.

Lassy!

Peruvian woman and horse

Peruvian kids

Another little girl

Llamas!

First time seeing llamas!

Lassy defending us from the llamas

A picture is worth a thousands words and these are a few from the hundreds that I took (I had the constant feeling I had to take photos of everything I saw but still the photos were never enough and don’t show how grand the mountains looked).