Friends are there no matter what. Friends travel long ways to see and to feel. To feel like home among friends. Thank you for being here.
This week Tina, Phillip and I have had a reunion in the Sacred Valley here in Peru. Tina and I were already here, but Phillip came all the way from Brasil with the bus to see his sister, who is doing a voluntary year in Peru, and of course to see us. This feels almost like home. Having friends around has a certain vibration which is very familiar to our bodies and souls. This definitely makes us happy and we can charge up our "batteries" just by spending some time together. Apart from that there is not much to say. We are experiencing this together.
Sometimes it is wise not to say much or not to name everything in detail to experience the whole beauty. This is applicable for many situations, doesn't need to be a reunion of friends. But nevertheless this is good stuff!
Basically we are just enjoying the time together, going to the markets in Calca and Urubamba, where you can have lunch for 5 Soles with are roughly 1,3 EUro. Therefore they serve you a soup, rice, lentils, tarwi (high protein grain). That is incredibe good food and the price is extraordinary. Slender around the markets, check some prices of certain things, have a ice cream and so on.
And of course some exploring. We went on a bigger hike up into the mountains from CHINCHERO to LAMAY yesterday. Taking a collectivo and a bus up to the pueblo (town) called CHINCHERO from Urubamba took us roughly 1 h to get there. In Chinchero we were already quite late (10:00 am). Thus we took a motor taxi to the start of the trek. The trek starts past the lagoon and there is a sign to HUCHUY QOSQO. You have to pass the lagoon on the left side. From CHINCHERO it is about 6 km. So if you are early, you can walk through the little village and with the lagoon it is a beautiful scenery.
After about 1,5 h walking into the valley and hiking up to the highest point to your right. Where you hike over a pass and reach 4350 m.
Up there your will see this...
Andean beauty and no other hikers on this trail for the day. It seems that not many people know about it. Or they just start very early in the morning. For us it was a nice day walk, as we were well taught by SALKANTAY. Around the lagoon you can see on this picture (not the one past Chinchero) we saw some lamas/alpacas in the far grazing an enjoying their "freedom". About 10 minutes walking before this point you can actually walk all the way to CUSCO. Which would take you about 8 h, as far as people told us. But you better double check on this one.
Lunch at the highes point where it is a bit protected from the cold wind, we enjoyed our lunch. From the highest point it is kind of a steep walk down to the ruins I mentioned above. Within one or two hours we arrived there and the climate changed again from cold and windy at 4350m to sunny and warm in a little valley or channel formation. Not sure how you call a small V shaped rock formation, where you walk through at the bottom. On the way down our companion that arrived at the house the night before told me about different connections between biblical predictions, actual events, other life forms and activities of the universe. Which was very impressive. Even tough I am not sure whether this helps me in my everyday life or not?! But anyway. Arriving at the ruins opened us again an insight in the sophisticated constructions of the incas. For examples they had irrigation channels, very fine constructed stone buildings and intelligent terrace agriculture. The ruins HUCHUY QOSQO were at 3700 m and the Sacred valley below is at 3000 m. For students they charge 10 soles and for adults 22 soles. We were lucky and paid 10 Soles without student ID. And again there were hardly any tourists when we arrived there at 14:30. The first thing we did, we took a nap on the flat plateau that you can see on the right side of the ruins. The view in the Sacred valley is breathtaking. The incas loved to build their "cities' high up, probably because of the view. Most of the building material they had cut our of the hillsides, so they didn't need to carry stones up and where they took it out, they build terraces for agriculture (CORN, AMARANTH, QUINOA). A little research this morning on amaranth made clear that this is a superfood with all essential amino acids, calcium, potassium, vitamins and iron. Lately that is our daily breakfast with cacao, macca and fruits.
On the way back to Calca we stopped at the market to pick up some fruits, vegetables and algae (Which I lost on the way home). Next time I will have the chance to try those algae from a lagoon high up in the mountains. Also a very special salt is coming from MARAS. Which is between URUBAMBA and CHINCHERO in the mountains. If you have paid attention reading above you know how to get there now (Kind of). We haven't been to the salt lakes, but we bought some salt at the market in URUBAMBMA. As I tried to explain the woman what I wanted, who sitting on a small chair and having one big pile of salt on her small table and 3 equal sized piles of 1 kg each in front of her. I asked her to give me a quarter kilo of Salt and I explained that in many ways. 250 grams, 1 kg divided by 4 and a quarter of a kilo. Seriously she did not understand what I was telling her in my proper spanish. Finally she sold me half a kilo for 1 Sole. I was not sure about the amount so I went to another lady to weigh my salt and it turned out to be kilo. All in all a slightly confusing situation. The salt is really good though!
And that is what the market looks like in URUBAMBA...
