Brimbles Bolivian Blog Begins

Another episode... another fun bus journey. This time we boarded a ´direct´ bus from Cusco to La Paz, which confusingly ended up involving 3 buses, a ´combi´(mini-bus) and a boat, as well as a 3 hour breakfast stop, and an hour and a half for lunch. I am slowly starting to remember that when quoted lines such as ´you will definitely arrive in La Paz by 1:00´ actually means ´you will be very lucky if you have crossed the border from Peru to Bolivia in time for supper´.

Anyway we made it to Bolivia and are thoroughly enjoying the return to Mineragua, bowler hats and the sheer chaos that La Paz is so prompt to provide. However, the closer we get to the animal refuge, the more we are longing to be there, and after dinner with Nena, the park director who told us how desperate they are for volunteers we have decided to cut our stay in La Paz short. So it is that tonight (after we FINALLY get to spend a cultural afternoon watching the Quantam of Solace, and recovering from a hangover which I am also remembering is not a lot of fun at 3700m altitude) we are catching our very last night bus - for the near future - (will you miss our bus stories? Or are they just getting a bit tedious now?!!) from La Paz to the animal refuge to embark on our true bolivian adventure.

For any of you that have even more free time on your hands than just to read the blog, and fancy writing to us (or sending christmas presents / packages / telegrams / well wishes) then please write to

Address:
Matt & Sarah Brimble
c/o Comunidad Inti Wara Yassi
Casilla 1600
Cochabamba
Bolivia

Mobile Phone

Sarah: 00591 70160131

Matt: 0059170160173

Lots and lots of love to all,

Sarah & Matt

Apurimac

Controversially claimed to be the source of the Amazon, the Apurimac is located in Peru´s second deepest canyon, and is claimed to be one of the top 10 white water rafting spots in the world. Although I had rafted the apurimac once in 2005, I have been going on and on and on about it to Matt ever since and so it seemed only fair to give him a taste of it too!

The Group

There were 18 of us on the trip, and although it seemed hard to believe that we had gone over 2 weeks of travel in South America without much interraction with Israelis, this was obviously not to last and 11 of the 18 were those wonderfully responsible, friendly and interractive nationals - note the subtle sarcasm. For those of you that have not encountered Israelis on your travels then maybe I should take a moment to explain, before you think I am the ultimate racist: I have never been to Israel or encountered an Israeli in their home land and therefore have no idea what the ´true´Israeli is like, however whilst travelling they have a distinctly... ´unique´shall we say, reputation. Israelis, unlike most other travellers who are generally quite keen to stear clear of people from their home nation (hence why they are travelling), appear to have a particular need to meet and travel only with other Israelis. It is therfore not possible to encounter just one or two israelis in any one place, there must always be in a group of a dozen or more, and whilst I appreciate that when many people from any one nation meet with one another, they will talk in the common language - hebrew in this case - it must be said that Hebrew is not exactly the most INclusive of languages, and therfore one can feel somewhat EXcluded when amongst such a large group. Oh, and whilst I am complaining about them, they smoke too much. Is it really necessary to have a cigarette between rapids whilst on the raft? I don´t think so. OK, enough complaining. Anyway, unfortunately the 11 Israelis on this trip were no different and so it was that we had one raft of 6 ´extranjeros´(german, suiss, french, dutch and english) and 2 rafts of isrealis during our three day trip.

The ´extranjero´ raft

After a hair raising 5 hour bus journey along unpaved, narrow, hairpin roads (class V roads), the first day consisted of practising all the commands, as well as plenty of raft flipping and swimming, and some low grade rapids, in order for prepare us for day 2. Just as well, as on day 2 we spent 7 hours on the water and it was A LOT of fun but very very tiring. We rafted rapids upto class 4 and managed to avoid flipping, although Matt chose to swim or ´body raft´ most of the rest of the river and quickly became known as ´la sirena´(the mermaid!). Once we got to our camp site the guides set up a zip wire from the opposite side of the river to the campsite, where we climbed up some very slippery rocks and then slid down and dropped into the river. After almost an hour of setting the zip wire up and a lot of shouting at each other across the river, I tentatively asked one of the guides if it was the first time that they had done this, to which I received a very half hearted and mumbled ´no´, which I instinctively took as a ýes´, however despite Matt´s risk assessment coming out as red (how do you spell L.O.S.E.R?), we safely dropped into the river and it was brilliant fun. Definitely one to try at home (just joking mum). Finally we dried off and had an amazing dinner infront of a camp fire. Extranjeros on one side, Israelis on the other. Much like a school dance .

Zip wire

The Calm Before the Storm

So far everything was going smoothly. That night Matt and I romantically decided we wanted to sleep under the stars (cue: ahhhhhh), and decided not to bother with the outer of our tent - I mean what the worst that can happen? A thunderstorm? An avalanche? (I am aware that the outer of the tent would not have been great protection in this case!), Yup! Turns out both! I was having one of my first bouts of ´travel belly´ (first of many no doubt) and so was awake as I heard the first droplets of rain coming and so begrudgling (and ´accidentally´kicking matt on the way out but he didn´t get the hint) I got up and put the outer on and crawled back into the tent. The rain grew steadily heavier as I contemplated the joys of voming and diarreah in the rain, before the most ENORMOUS crack of thunder came - I´ve honestly never heard anything like it! Fair enough, I though to myself, even if lightning strikes, didn´t Matt say something about it hitting the high places? So I am sure being in a canyon is the safest place we could be. These were my somewhat naive contemplations as I fought another wave of nausea. Very soon after an equally loud sound came which sounded remarkably like stones falling... yup it was an avalanche. As numerous heads popped out of tents wondering if it was on our side of the valley, our rafting guide exploded out of his tent so quickly that he broke the tent door, only to find that the avalanche, which repeated itself a few hours later was fortunately on the other side of the valley.

The rain continued on well into the next morning and so the ´rafting games´which were to be played that morning were abandoned for a few more hours sleep, or in many cases, to ring out sleeping bags and clother which had become drenched (turns out we weren´t the only ones with romantic notions of sleeping without an outer!). Feeling somewhat worse for wear we navigated throught the hardest of our rapids - class 4+. However, the stuning surroundings, as well as spotting otters, condors and seeing the first locals we had seen in 3 days - 2 guys who had walked 5 hours from the nearest village and were panning for gold at the river side - made it easy to forget about the previous night, and enjoy an amazing end to a fantastic trip.

Back in Cusco now and we have decided that if we leave for Bolivia tomorrow night we may just have time for one last trecking or biking adventure in La Paz before heading to the park.

Lots of love to all, sarah & matt xxx

Cusco

We made it!

The buses weren't all that bad.... hold on, what are we saying? They were TERRIBLE!!!! The first bus left Huaraz promptly and also promptly began leaking! Sarah had the window and I had the aisle, unfortunately right underneath a roof-vent, which haemoraged water for the entire journey (despite it strangely, not raining!) at some points quite forcefully. Add to this our driver was going for a new personal best time along some quite uneven road surfaces, imagine any vehicle bouncing around in the middle of the night - bad enough - but being at the back of a huge double decker bus - not sleep enducing!

So we arrived in Lima slightly bleary eyed at 5:30 in the morning, wondering around Miraflores trying to find somewhere for breakfast and ending up playing two hours of ´s***-head´in a street cafe. After our breakfast we made a flying visit to Villa Maria, a shanty-town project that Quest run on the outskirts of Lima. The project provides a day-centre for underprivelidged children, where they can play and interract with other chilren in a safe and supportive environment. As soon as the kids saw us, we were immedately treated as a new novelty toy and we were swamped by dozens of kids. In Matts case boisterous boys who wanted to use him as a climbing frame, and in my case the more reserved girls who coyly wanted to hold my hand and play with my hair. As if I wasn´t broody enough before we arrived!!!

Villa Maria Shanty Town

After our fleeting visit we embarked on our mammoth bus journey of almost 20 hours! We had sweet seats, 'panoramico' at the front of the bus with lots of leg room and fortunately no water falling from above our heads! The bus was really good, we were served a hot meal of a staple favourite of chicken and rice! And got to see 6 films! We didn't get much sleep, but we were comfortable, which was just as well as the bus was 3 hours late arriving in Cusco.

Back in Cusco we are enjoying chilling out a little, reunions with old friends and some of our favourite Cusquenian restaurants. The benefits of having friends here include upgraded, free accomodation and not being able to pay for dinner no matter how much we insist! It's proving hard to spend our money here, so we are 'splashing out' and going on a 3 day rafting trip on Weds. We are rafting the Apurimac, the biggest most exciting river in the area. It will be my first time, but Sarah is an experienced pro, either way we're both really looking forward to it.

A small taste of our suite at the Fallen Angel.

HuayHuash Trek

After a frantic dash around Huaraz after our day walk to buy food, re-pack, sort tents, gas, stove and pans, all to Matts frequent moans of ´but this is what the Quest students are for´, we headed into the Cordillera Huayhuash for a four day treck.

The village where the trek starts - Llamac - was deep in the throws of a parents inter-village sports day when we arrived, which was a truly entertaining sight: Peruvian women who one might associate with working the fields with a baby strapped to their back huddled in a generous layer of skirts and thows, were hurtling themselves across volleyball courts with suprising gusto, clad in violent purple and blue ´Llamac´or ´Pocpa´( the next village) labelled rugby shirts (some still with the giveaway layered skirts and wooly socks underneath). Needless to say we were the only ´gringos´to be seen and so had to endure frequent ´gringo - da me un caramelo´(whity - give me a sweet) from the numerous children.

Our guide - Percy - was a born Llamac citizen, and enthusiastically told us that he was to become President of the village this forth coming year... as well as that he was ´the king of Huayhuash´, ´famous in the region´, and self-confessed ´incredible´for having walking the Huayhuash circuit in 3 days. I feel we learnt a lot from such humility, however I would be lying if I said that it did not wear somewhat thin after 4 days...

The first night before setting off we camped in Percys garden - and it truly was a beautiful garden, however there was something very very wrong about it. It was almost quintessentially English with a young apple tree and a pink rose bush, and to cap it off, a little cage with 3 beautiful, squeeking guinea pigs. However, it did not take long to realise that a man in his 30s was not keeping the Guinea pigs as pets... you can see where I am going with this, particularly if you are aquainted with my History of Guinea pigs (Marshmallow, Paddington, Victoria... RIP). I did try to translate these little squeeks to Percy as ´Percy! Please don´t eat us!!!´, however I think he thought this was just another gringo eccentricity as he declared he was saving them for his names sake day. :o(

Anyway, I digress. The first day of the treck involved climbing 1000m over a 4300m pass, which was stunning and excellent practice for me on how to deal with moaning students (love you Matt :o).


Pampa LLamac Pass (4300m)


After reaching the pass it was probably fortunate that Percy was more concerned with getting his ´educated´ donkeys to the camp site before the rain set in and they got wet, so we were able to go at our own pace, and didn´t see Percy most of the day. Even more fortunately a dog which was creatively known as ´perrito´ (doggy), followed us all the way from LLamac and showed us the way to the campsite, which was next to a beautiful lake called Jaguacocha.


The view from our tent at Jaguacocha


The next day we set off in search of the point where Jo Simpson´s ´Touching the Void´ took place. After an hour and half of trying to chase Percy, who insisted in marching up the hill as quickly as possible until he was out of sight of us, and then lying down and looking extremely bored and as if he had been waiting for hours as soon as we caught up with him, we arrived at a lake which was known for its trout fishing. At this point Percy declared that we would not be able to make it to the pass, as there was too much snow to get through. It is important that you understand that despite all of Percy´s shortfalls, he was very passionate about wildlife: particularly about his donkeys and about trout. Therfore it did not come as a huge suprise to us that our ´day´s walk was to end after an hour and a half so that Percy could fish. Feeling a little miserable and cold I decided I wanted to go back to the tent and sulk, however fortunately it was Matt´s turn to be the adult and he suggested that we leave Percy to fish and carry on walking... and how glad we were both were when we climbed another 300m up a scree slope to find a stunning emerald green lake at 4700m that Percy appeared to have forgotten to tell us about (see video). How ironic life can be when we returned to Percy after 2 hours to find that he had not caught a single trout.





The third day was the highlight for both of us as we both felt healthier and more acclimatised, and happy to walk at our own pace. We climbed upto a stunning pass at 4800m, before descending to our camp in Rondoy, through a snowstorm. I would love to say that I shared Matt´s sentiments of what an adventure it was to walk through a snow storm - however if I am honest what comes to mind is having needles thrown in my face for an hour. I can honestly say it was worth it though for the views that we saw from the top.


Pass at 4800m


The last day was an easy 3 hour walk down a dirt road, (which helped us thaw out after shaking off all the ice from our tent - I think I´m starting to regret bringing my 8 year old 2 season sleeping bag to camp over 4000m when its still then end of winter here). We finished off back at Percy´s house and got ´combi´(mini-bus) along a narrow and winding (= terrifying) road to a town called Chiquian, followed by a coach along an even narrower and windier road back to Huaraz, where we arrived yesterday evening in need a of a good shower and some food that wasn´t pasta.



Last nights camp at Rondoy with Percy President and his girl-friend / servant... not quite sure.


Tonight we are catching the nightbus back to Lima and then getting a coach for a whopping 20 hours to Cusco, where we will way up our options of another treck... or perhaps stay in the city and visit friends and do ´cultural´ things (mainly in the sense of drinking local beer).

Lots of love to all,

Sarah & Matt x

Laguna 69

Once Matt had decided that he wasn´t going to die of Man-Flu we made it on our first day walk to ´Laguna 69´.



The stunning drive there gave way to some phenomenal views (as shown above) and the surrounding only became more extraordinarily beautiful once we started walking. However, appreciating them wasn´t easy at all times: Matt quickly discovered that training consisting of 2 years of sitting at a desk with the odd Tuesday night kick about, man-flu, and a recent 24 hour trans-atlantic flight were possibly not the best preparation for walking upto 4400m, and I am ashamed to say that my 20 minute interval training on the treadmill didn´t quite cut it either. Very soon after starting the walk the ´swearing-above-4000m-definitely-allowed´ rule was introduced, and, whether right or wrong, I am pleased to say it got us all the way to the top!

Huaraz

Casa Maria, Huaraz

The view from our hostal, featuring the hostal dog, Shelek.
Matt still feeling a bit under the weather today so have been to some thermal baths... and have been badly beaten in scrabble.

Big Beardy Ray, Forgotten Reservations and Swanky Night Buses

After 2.5 years of waiting to return to South America, we are finally back! We have both realised that whenever we remembered South America, we were thinking of Bolivia and so Peruvian civilisation has come as something of a shock. Globalisation is in full swing in Lima, the capital of Peru where we flew in to, with a Starbucks or TGI Friday on every other corner, and so thankgoodness we have made a swift move from Lima to the mountains in the north of Peru. Here´s our little journey so far...

I won´t bore you with ALL the details of our 26 hour journey from Heathrow to Houston, but here´s a few high- and lowlights: Highlights include front row seat on plane to Houston with chicken and mash for breakfast (totally underrated), jaegermeister shots at Papadeux´s bar in Houston airport with our new found texan friend - big burly Ray; Papdeux´s seafood gumbo - didn´t know what it was but if its good enough for Forest gump...
Low lights include broken seats that didn´t recline on flight to Lima, no room for hand luggage in overhead compartment so wedged in all around us, a forgotten reservation in Lima so no where to stay at 2:00am after the longest journey in the world. Character building. And we´re still talking to each other!

After a day in the polluted city of Lima which largely comprised lying on the sofa of our hotel watching MTV (the ultimate in cultural exploration) we got on the swankiest night bus I have ever seen. It had a door man in a full length coat (missing top hat though), complimentary food service, fully reclining seats with leg rests... and wait for it... we were gently woken in the morning by the sound of bird song and pan pipes. Which were great for the first 30 seconds...

So here we are in Huaraz in the north of Peru, a ´mecca for international climbers´such as ourselves (???) and it is stunning. Surrounded by the Cordillera blanca, we have clear blue skies today, and so are planning a day walk to some lakes tomorrow to acclimatise, before hopefully embarking on a four day treck after that. Matt is struggling with a touch of man flu, so hopefully he will stop being a pansy soon and then we can get into these beautiful mountains! :o)

Lots of love to all,

Sarah & Matt