Day 17 – Hualcayan to Laguna Collicocha
To preface our wake-up, let me just say that we always sleep with the tent door open, to minimize condensation. We woke up to the sound of a little girl’s voice: “hola”, “hola”. I opened my eyes to see a tiny girl – 4 or 5 years old, standing over me. “Carmelo?” she asked. Grudgingly, Alex and I woke up and got ready for the day.
It was a very hard day indeed – 8.5 hours with 1450m elevation gain. I finished my daily rations at noon and regretted it. The views down towards Hualcayan and across the mountains were spectacular. We got a sense of how small Hualcayan actually is – a grass/gravel main square surrounded by some houses, surrounded by vast farmlands. Throughout the day I was intrigued by the irrigation system – a network of cement or rock canals, about 1 or 2 feet wide that takes water from the lake far above and distributes it through the lands and into the village.
It was a hard day for both of us – the longest yet (exculding summit days) and definitely the most challenging in terms of endurance. We moved slowly but surely up and up and up the switchbacks all day long.
We were most happy when we finally arrived at Laguna Cullicocha with one hour to spare before sunset. We rewarded ourselves with 3 eggs each of scrambled eggs before moving on to dinner.
We quickly and efficiently set up camp after dinner, just after sunet as it was getting dark. Journal written, 8:15pm, time for bed!
| Published on June 17th, 2011 | | Posted by admin |