El Laguna de los Condores Trek: Part 2

Most of you will know that feeling you get when you hear the rain falling on the roof, or tent, early in the morning. It's somewhere between depression and laziness, where all you want to do is pull the covers around your head and forget you heard it. We felt it around 6am on Sunday, just as our watch alarm went off. With the bathroom light on so we wouldn't hurt our sleepy eyes, we packed up our stuff, leaving behind a few things we didn't think we would need. Grabbed some breakfast around the corner from our hostal and met up with our new Guide.

He had the horses all saddled up in the hostal courtyard, so we brought out our backpacks all ready, packed to perfection, the lightest we've had them yet, only to find out that they are too big for the horses. He wanted us to unpack our waterproof backpacks, stuff everything into thin plastic bags and then into woven saddle bags. I was looking up at the rain falling thinking about how nice and warm and dry the bed was right now. We switched over to the Peruvian way of tripping and hopped up into the saddles grumbling to ourselves inside our ridiculously looking ponchos.

For the last three days of our trek we decided to go see some Mausoleums that are located on a cliff above a Lake, a days ride from Leymebamba. They were created by the Chachapoyan culture that lived in the mountains around northern Peru before the Incas came and told them how to live (who in turn got told by the Spanish how to live). To get to El Laguna de Los Condores (Lake of the Condors) it's about a 9 hour ride/hike up a muddy trail through some beautiful country.

We rode out of Leymebamba on our horses early and because of the rain it was pretty quiet. It rained through most of the night so the trail was completely swamped. I haven't ridden many horses before, and the few times I did, was on flat dry trails. Needless to say the rocky, wet, muddy trail was a little bit nerve racking, especially after falling off a few days ago. After leaving and suffering through the gloomy morning, the day turned out to be allright. We crossed two very swollen rivers, climbed up to 3000m, peered down a hole that was supposedly 300m deep. We arrived at the Cabaña just after 5pm, thoroughly exhausted and ready for a sleep.

The Cabaña is on a slope just over the hill from the Laguna, surrounded by lush mountains. We peeled off our raingear and got into some warm clothes. It was getting dark, and the nights up in the mountains are pretty chilly, so we relaxed by the cooking fire and drank tea. Clement prepared some glorious spaghetti, and we bonded over the meal. Clement San Ignacio is a farmer from Leymebamba, a small town south of Chachapoyas by 3 hours on a very very bumpy road. He farms corn, wheat and potatoes mostly, and works as a guide when he can. He worked on the restoration of Kuelap for awhile, and has two children. He had just returned from another trek, and was leaving the next day with us, but his son didn't want him to go. Easily persuaded, his son caved when it became apparent that if he didn't work he wouldn't be able to buy chocolate anymore.

Also living at the Cabaña was a family, husband, wife and their son, who looked after the cows and sheep that grazed on the fields nearby. He works out there for 6 months, a long time to be so isolated from everyone. No phones, no electricity, no cars, no internet.... paradise no? We crawled into our bed under 5 blankets that were as heavy as lead and drifted off. The sleep was fairly restless, because of the cold, and because of the relentless barking of the dogs. They keep a few dogs on the ranch to scare off the foxes and pumas that try to eat the sheep. Not quite paradise afterall.

We woke up on our own time with a light rain falling, drank some more tea to warmup. Breakfast was avocado and bread, so I tried explaining to Clement about porridge and how good it would be right now. We suited up in raingear and set out on our archeology hunt. It really felt like we were the ones discovering it for the first time, as Clement hacked through the bamboo on the trail there. Up sketchy(heh) ladders, over rivers, through cloudforest. We discovered ruins from a very large Chachapoyan city beside the Laguna, numbering three to four thousand citizens. The ruined houses are all round, except for a few rectangular ones that had been built by the Incas after conquering the area. The Chachapoyans built round for the strength since they used small stones. Most Inca buildings were constructed using larger carved blocks so were strong enough without needing to be round.

After walking for about 2 hours and hacking our way through the jungle we arrived at the Mausoleum site. It's about 30 meters up from the lake, and situated under a very large overhang that protects it from the elements. There were a number of different mausoleums that contained about 30-40 mummies in each one. Back in 1997 archeologists excavated the site and transported over 200 mummies to a museum in Leymebamba. The site is still in fairly good shape, and they left a few artifacts behind for us diehards. The walls were painted with pictures of animals and spirals that might have meant longevity. We sat and ate lunch with a few skulls that still remain at the site, one still had hair. It was amazing to see how well preserved most of the stuff was. There was cloth that was used to wrap the mummies, rope made from a plant, and some wood carvings. They think that the Chachapoyans believed in reincarnation, and that the closer you were to the sun and heaven the better chance you had of getting a good gig in the next life. That's the reason they built these crazy tombs up on hard to get to cliffs. Most of the tombs overlooked cities or faced towards the sun as it set or rose. I can only hope my kids put me somewhere cool when I die.

Relunctantly we left and hiked back haunted by thoughts of ancient peoples. It's definitely not comfortable up here, or easy to get to, and it's not much fun unless you can make it, but it's really very cool. The ride back to Leymebamba was a little drier, the rain had let up a little bit and the creeks we crossed looked nothing like the raging rivers of two days ago. We arrived at the Museum around 3pm and the sun was shining without even a hint of guilt. It would have been nice to see it yesterday. The museum itself was full of pottery and artifacts recovered from the Laguna de los Condores tombs, and was very well laid out. I couldn't help but feel a little disinterested after actually travelling to the site and seeing the ammount of work and devotion that went into the Mausoleums. The best part of the museum was seeing the room that had shelves and shelves of mummies, all wrapped up. Some of the wrappings had deteriorated or been removed and you could look at someone maybe 1000 years dead looking back at you. Creepy.

It was really worthwhile week, we learned a ton, saw even more and got to practice our spanish talking to our guides. There wasn't another tourist to be seen the whole time, and most of the registar books showed lists of peruvian tourists. It's neat to learn so much about a culture that lived here that isn't Inca, since that's all we ever hear about in Canada. We are back in Chachapoyas now, after a long and very very bumpy road from Leymebamba. Taking it easy today, updating our epic, and we head out tonight on a overnight bus for the coast, where it will hopefully be sunny, warm, and perhaps a hammock.
Cheers.

fotos to follow...

Gran Vilaya Trek: Part One

So, for the past 7 days we have been on a trek around northern Peru! This means that there are lots of stories and photos to share. We are breaking our update up into two parts. This is part 1.

We left Chachapoyas 8am in a taxi with our chauffeur, Hermando, and our guide, Carlos (who is only 18 years old, and takes out treks as his summer job!). Within 10 minutes we could tell that there was some sort of problem because the two were talking nervously upfront, and then we pulled over as our driver started searching through his papers. They didn´t find what they were looking for, so we kept driving, and then in another 5 minutes or so, our guide was explaining to us that we were going to get out of the taxi and walk down the road for a bit and that Hermando would meet us a bit later. Hmmm. As we walked down the road we approached what apeared to be a police check point (we had no money or passports though because we were told to leave anything of value behind) and Carlos was telling us that if the police man asked, we were just on a day hike in the valley. Hmmm again. The police man didnt believe Carlos so he explained the real story (we think). We tried to keep up with their conversation, but they still talk way too quickly. What we think happened was that the taxis are not allowed to work outside their province, unless they have special permission, and Hermando didn´t have that permission. Thankfully we were allowed to continue on our trip, but we never really knew how they resolved the issue. A great way to start off.

Our first stop was Karajiha, an old burial site for one small village of the Chachapoyians (this is a preInca culture about 800A.D., that was eventually overtaken by the Incas, and then the Spanish...this is not the modern city we were just coming from). We left the taxi behind and hiked for a good twenty minutes before arriving at the bottom of a small cliff face. Pearched on a small ledge in the middle of the cliff were six statues (each holding one mummy). They used to be people of great importance, and so were buried here so they could look out over the small valley and the village. It was really great to see something so ancient still intact and sitting amoung farmland (and we were the only people there too, an extra bonus).

We had lunch in the next small town and then headed up further into the mountains on the very bumpy dirt road. We even had to stop and pile out of the taxi to move a fallen tree off the road because the road crews had not been up that way in awhile. We were finally able to squeeze the taxi between the tree and the road´s edge (which dropped steeply into more cloud forest) and we continued down to the valley bottom, Valle de Balen. We left Hermando to breve the long drive back up the mountain, and the three of us hiked down through the flood plains to the trekking company´s cabin. The valley was very green and had hundreds of cows and horses spread over its length, grazing between the meandering river. As Carlos went about fixing the cabin up and searching for Victor (a man who apparently looks out for the cabin while it´s not in use), we explored the rivers and streams and Colin tried to make friends with the cows.
That night after dinner we tried some Liquor de Leche, and Colin braved chewing coca. That whole process seemed very complicated, chew very slowly in your cheek and then add powdered chalk (or something else...language barrier) with this pin to the center of the chewed coca...Carlos was telling us his brother wasn´t careful and stabbed the pin through his cheek! Colin says it ´tasted like leaves´. The locals chew coca as they hike from village to home because with the long distances and high altitudes it helps their energy or blood flow but we´re not sure on the science of it quite yet. We played cards with Carlos and another valley friend, Arturo, and swapped teaching games... Go fish was the popular game of the evening. We slept in bunks in the cabin and layered our beds with five or six blankets, the valley is very cold at night, especially living in a mud and log cabin.

Day two of our trek we hiked from Valle de Balen to the much larger Gran Vilaya valley. We hiked across the flood plain and up into the mountains, following an old preInca road (basically an old rock pathway that has deteriorated over time). Carlos took us on a side trail into the jungle\cloud forest to see some ruins from another Chachapoian village, which have only been known for the past three or four years. Apparently the Valle de Balen has many similar ruins, but there isn´t enough money to research or excavate right now. Where the houses once stood were now fallen circular walls with trees growing in them. We walked several trails and everywhere we looked were buildings, we felt like we were in an old Indiana Jones movie. We had lunch in the forest surrounded by all the trees and roak walls and then started on a two hour hike straight down the mountain. Our knees were crying by the end, but we reached the nest nights accomodations, a family´s house and where they grow coffee and raise chickens.
We got to try some of the coffee and (with a lot of sugar) was surprisingly good. The chickens were very amuzing too... at dusk, all the chickens wanted to roost in the top branches of one of the trees. The process of watching them flap and sqwack was histerical. We even took a photo.
Day three we rode horses up out of the valley and then met up with Hermando, who took us the rest of the way to Maria. The large horse (which was brought for Colin originally) endded up carrying me and our two large backpacks, and Colin rode the slightly smaller horse with fewer things. Our guide and the horse driver walked and chewed coca as we climbed up through the cloud forests. The paths were very muddy and rocky and slippery, not ideal conditions for horseback ridding. We walked a few times in dangerous areas and to give ourselves and the horses a break. We reached another site of Chachapoian ruins and explored the old village. It was almost identical to the first village. A five minute walk from the ruins is a house where we ate lunch, they have convieniently named the spot Launch after the english word. We climbed back on the horses after our feast and continued the climb. Within the last five minutes of the ride (as we could see the top) the rocks were getting steeper, more slippery, and we could tell the animals were having more trouble than earlier, but we kept ridding to the insistance of Carlos and the horse driver. As I became more and more nervous, and my horse kept slipping, eventually his back legs comepletely slipped and he fell, but the horse driver was there in miliseconds pushing the horse up the rock. As I recovered and turned around, Colin´s horse began slipping and fell and Colin fell off his horse and somersalted backwards twice down the rock!!!!! He only scratched his hand, and the horse was alright too, but he walked up the last two minutes, and I was quick to jump off my horse at the top of the hill. Woah.

Our taxi was not at the top to meet us, so we began walking down the road, and Carlos eventually caught us a ride to the next small village where he called to find our taxi. As he was talking on the phone, Hermando came zooming up the hill and we flagged him down and were all piled in the car within minutes to Maria, where we ate dinner, showered, and slept slept slept.

Day four started early because we had so much ground to cover that day. We headed off to Kuelap, yet another Chachapoian village, but this one has been excavated and is being restored, and is sitting up on the highest mountain and overlooking a cliff. It is built on a large base, which only has three entrances. Anyone army wanting to attack would have to file through the long entrance ways single file and risk being pelted upon by thrown rocks from above. It being still before 7am, Carlos tried to sneak us through the impressive first entrance, which has been under construction for the past two years and is off limits. We almost made it through, but were caught, so had to walk all the way along the village´s outside wall to the next long entrance way. After climbing up the entrance to the top of the base, we explored the restored village, the houses (with kitchens and exterior balconies), and were able to see the village without the jungles that the other two sites had. It was pretty amazing, and the more famous ruins of the area.

We had breakfast then had a long drive to our next site, Revash, another burial site. We hiked up for about an hour to the cliff face where we saw some house-like structures pearched on the cliff face. Inside each of these ´houses´ there were 20-30 mummied bodies, and along the whole cliff face were several other buirial sites. The Chachapoians buried their dead on the cliff faces to overlook their villages and so the bodies were closer to the sun (also to protect them from robbers). Sadly, when this site was discovered, the archaeologists took their discoveries back to their countries, so now the mummies, ceramics and other findings are in museums in Vienna, Italy, and LaLouvres in France. Peru doesn´t have the money to buy back these things. We ate some of the best oranges everWe hiked back down to the taxi and drove off to Leymebamba, several hours away and had lunch at 4:30. From there we said ciao to Carlos, because the next three days we were to have another guide. We skipped dinner, having just eaten, and packed for a 7am departure for the next day.

The first four days of the trek we had great weather, lots of sun and saw tonnes of old preInca sites (we are starting not to like the Incas actually because they came and took over everything). Sadly the photos aren´t loading fast enough and we leave for the coast in a few hours...be patient and they´ll be here soon!
Later gaitors!