Over the Semana Santa (Holy Week) break Micah and I decided to do the Ausangate Trek that he's been wanting to do for a few months now. But because it's 3 hours from Cusco, which is already 10 hours from Arequipa, and the trek is supposed to be 5 days, we never had time for it. Even now we didn't really have time for it because since I have the lovely job as academic coordinator I needed to be back 2 days earlier then the other teachers, giving us only Thursday through Sunday off - 4 days. We went around to some tour agencies here in AQP to ask about prices and all of them were calling Cusco and coming back with prices anywhere from $240 to $400 a person and they could do a 4 day trek but most said 5 or even 6 days minimum.
So we looked around a little more and found a blog that had a local guide's phone number and email address. And I'll pass it along here since he was so good and we were glad to find him: Alejandro 984 382333. So we called and he said no problem and only $130 per person for 4 days. So we were off.
We took a night bus to Cusco, arrived at 7 am, took a 3 hr bus to Tinqui (which stopped a town early in Ocongate), then took a taxi to meet Alejandro in Tinqui.
We had originally asked for a 4 day hike because we didn't have time but we really still wanted to do the circuit and when we told Alejandro that he ended up charging us the 5 day price or $160 a person, but we didn't mind because we wanted to do it so badly. And it turned out that we were so happy we did because the circuit is so incredible.
The first day was only a half day. We picked up the horse, loaded all of our big bags on him and headed into the hill side to Aljandro's home to get his friend who would take the horse around. So we had two people and a horse for only us 2...
For some reason the last hour before reaching camp made me really sick. I guess my body finally realized it was above 4,000m. Needless to say, that meant no dinner for me that night.
The next morning started out rainy but cleared up pretty fast. There was about a half hour of 'island hopping' on these tufts of grass or I don't know what to call those hard clumps of plant material that were growing in the marsh fields.
Our first pass, albeit the lowest one, was really difficult for me because of the altitude. We only climbed 500m from camp up to 4,700m but I had a really bad headache.
Well at least the mountains (nevados- snow covered mountains) and glacial lakes that we could see from the pass gave me a little respite from the pain.We descended into a valley of lakes and waterfalls banked on both sides by 6,000m jagged mountains with colossal glaciers that were too close and too big for a picture to do justice.
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| Waterfalls from the glaciers |
We had lunch and a little break in the valley before climbing another pass at 5,000m to get out of the valley. That climb up to the pass was flanked on both sides by rough, jagged mountains covered by glaciers. Even though this pass was higher than the first I don't remember it being as hard. Coming down the other side of the pass, we could see the camp where most people stop on the second day. It looked so tiny, and we knew that we had to continue up the other side of the valley, over the next pass and into the next valley before we could stop to sleep.
That last pass of the day was very difficult for me. I felt exhausted by that time in the afternoon and my headache was unrelenting. We did eventually make it up the the 5,200m pass, and we were super excited too. Even though it was pretty windy up there we still had good weather as the sun was starting to set. 
That night we accepted a bed in the house at the camp because we were so tired. And we knew that it would be a lot faster getting going the next day if we didn't have to mess with our tents in the morning. The bed we got was funny because I think it was just a pile of alpaca fur with a mat over it. It was so bumpy. In the morning we found out that there had been a baby alpaca sacrifice hanging from the ceiling all night, but we couldn't see it because it was so dark.
That next morning we had amazing weather for what I think was the best part of the hike. We walked along the river for the better part of the morning when the sun wasn't too strong. I don't know if the picture can even do justice to how tranquil and peaceful this place was. Off to the side was a waterfall. I can only imagine how quiet and simple a life up there must be just raising alpaca day in and day out.
Heading up to the next pass was very long and gradual. We thought that we could see the pass for hours but every time we went around a slight bend in the valley some more gigantic son covered mountains came into view. Again, I can't even begin to put into words how beautiful it was up there. We had great weather going up and for most of the morning we were hiking in one pair of pants and a t-shirt. If we had had more time I would have liked to take more time on that part of the hike. |
| Entrance to the pass |
At that time the clouds rolled in very quickly and it started snowing just like that. And just to balance out the long approach up to the pass, the pass itself was also about an hour. We were just walking along the this mountain face as the snow and hail pelted us in the face.
After a few more hours winding down through the valleys we came to a small village with roads and electricity. This was the village of Pacchanta that was actually touristy and had hot springs and women hawking alpaca scarves, hats and gloves.
We slept in our tent that night and said goodbye to Ausangate the next morning with a 3 hour hike down the road back to Tinqui, where it all began 4 days earlier. Unforgettable :)
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