Walking through the “desert”

After visiting the shrine of the moon (Huaca de la Luna) I got the idea to walk on top of the nearby hill. My friend said immediately “Yes, let’s do it so.” There was no doubt about this idea. 

So we started walking with our Flip Flops and without any water bottle. I mean this hill seemed to be pretty small…well first problem we got was walking in the deep sand with our “shoes”. It didn’t work out too well, so we continued to barefooted. Wow, that was hot! After some minutes I thought my feet are going to be burned. Anyway we kept on walking. My strategy was walking 5 minutes with Flip Flops and 5 minutes barefooted.

After a while we got a bit higher and reached the rest of the hill, out of stones.

Since the stones had big holes and there were a few bees flying around, we decided not to go any further. As well it still looked quiet far and we were already exhausted from the heat. But still the view was really nice from higher up.

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Huaca de la Luna – Shrine of the moon

Huaca de la Luna lies a bit outside of Trujillo and it is worth visiting. It reveals the culture of the Moche, a very old civilization in Peru a long time ago. It is best to read about it out of an original sources. First i went to the museum “Huacas de Moche” to get a first impression of the new culture.

 

After a visit in the museum you can take a van to the former village “Huaca de Moche”. It is impressive and it lies in a big desert.

 

 

You have to go with a guide first, who explains how the former city lied in that area.  Around and in the Shrine of the moon the excavation is still going on. From the Shrine of the moon you can look at the Shrine of the Sun. This is quiet impressive. But before the tour started i saw an peruvian hairless dog, my first and only one. Well i m not 100 % sure if it is a pure race or a mix but still, it was an interesting dog.

 

And here I will be showing some pictures of the Shrine of the Moon:

 

On the picture above you can the the Shrine of the Sun. It is still under work. So we only visited the other Shrine, which was huge and interesting as well as you can see on the other pics above.

After this walk we wanted to climb the small mountain which lies in the background of the “Huaca de Moche”. (left side you can see the “Huaca de Moche”, middle the “mountain”, right the museum)

 

Trying to go on top of the mountain wasn’t a good idea at all…i tell you more soon!

Trujillo and surroundings

As far as I can remember the bus ride from Chiclayo to Trujillo is around 5 hours. In comparisons to my ride beforehand, it was quiet short. But it is always enjoyable to look out the window inhaling new impressions. My plan was to stay a few days in Trujillo and then go to Huaraz. Huaraz is located on an altitude of approximately 3.000m, where the climate is fresher than at the coast. For that reason I wanted to stay a bit longer in Trujillo to enjoy the warm climate there.

As I arrived in the night time, I only had a look at the city center the next day. The main plaza is really nice with all the colorful houses around. A friend and I just walked around through the city. Later in the evening time we went to watch the football match between Peru and Colombia. Colombia won! Well, I was happy – it was an enjoyable day with good company.

The next days I planned to go to Huanchaco and Huacas of Moche. Huanchaco is know for its beautiful beach and good waves for surfing. It is a cute village. A friend and I went there for the whole day. It was enjoyable. I also had the chance to try Surfing. It was fun but it needs a lot more practice. Next time….

I’m looking forward to show the pictures from Huacas of Moche…

Chiclayo

And there I was – in Chiclayo, first city of my backpacking trip in Peru. Well, I was a bit nervous because I didn’t really feel comfortable at that bus terminal. But finally I found my way to the city center.

First of all, I needed to shower and to change my clothes. It was really hot, although the locals of Chiclayo call that time of the year “winter”. Fair enough, for me as a European it was pretty warm and I was looking forward to a shower. After doing a walk around and checking the price offers, I booked myself into a cute hostel and went straight to the bathroom to refresh myself.

After that I felt more like human being. Now I was relaxed and enjoyed my walk around and through the city. I had some lunch and visited the local market, where the people are selling everything from fresh fish or meat over cleaning supplies to everyday needs…well I always like it and in every city it is very interesting.

The next day, a friend of mine showed me the nearby places, called Pimentel and Santa Rosa, which are located on the coast. It was a beautiful day and not busy at all because it is winter 😉 and because it was actually to late for the fishers to work. We got there at around 11 am, so the fishers were latest out on 6 am and back earlier than 11 am.  There were not many locals or tourists, a bit strange, but what can you do…and someway I really enjoyed myself! You can imagine that, I guess.

For lunch I was invited to a really nice and good restaurant. There I tried some local food and I had to try Ceviche again. I already ate it one time in Lima, where I couldn’t finish it, somehow it was too spicy and to strong. But now I was presented to different types of Ceviches. Wow!! When you eat it in small portions, it is really good.

For your info, Ceviche is fresh raw fish marinated in citrus juices. Before that I already had fish soup. I have to tell, that my stomach was not working properly since I left Bogotá. But you know what!?! After that lunch, I was feeling so good and after that I didn’t have more problems. Thanks to the good Peruvian food and of course thanks to my new friends and the nice locals, everything was fine. I was delighted, thankful and pleased.

Later on, we had another beautiful walk through the city and a drive with the “taxi” :).

After all, my stay in Chiclayo was really good, but too short – I only stayed there one night, but I would like to go back and visit the nice folks, I met there. Moreover it would be awesome to try some surfing when it is actually summer time there. Thanks very much.

Border Crossing: Ecuador-Peru

My trip from Ecuador to Peru started in Guayaquil (Ecuador). From there I took a bus in the evening time, around 8 pm, I guess. Arrival time in Chiclayo was predicted to be 10 am. So I entered a bus and unfortunately it wasn’t that comfortable. The climate condition of the bus wasn’t working probably and the movie which was shown wasn’t that great either…moreover you could forget about the sight viewing during the bus drive because it was getting dark outside. Fair enough, I had a lot of thoughts in my mind and I was dozing in my seat soon.

After a short time before midnight I fall asleep when suddenly the bus stopped. We were at the border of Ecuador (Machala, I think). We, all the people inside the bus, had to get out of the bus to exit officially the country Ecuador.

Then half an hour or more we crossed the border, only to stop a bit after again to enter officially the new country Peru, this was in Tumbes, I think.

Everyone warned me before that crossing the border Ecuador-Peru is really dangerous. Luckily, everything went fine and it wasn’t dangerous at all. This could be because we the only bus to enter in Peru at that time – it was now 1.30 am. Perhaps I was too sleepy to notice some danger, but I don’t think so. But interesting it was indeed. Some luggage of some people was searched inside out by the police, only because they wanted to or because the luggage looked suspicious. I had luck and they didn’t want to empty mine.

After this we continued our way down to Chiclayo. At around 6.30 am we were in Piura, to let most of the people out. Piura is said to be an interesting town as well. But time is short so I wanted to go further south right to Chiclayo. And now I could enjoy a bit of the countryside. Well it is all deserts but still it was interesting.

But I fell asleep a lot of times. In the morning time we arrived at the town of Chiclayo. I was still tired and didn’t want to leave the bus but it was the final station. I actually hoped that this isn’t Chiclayo at all and that we will continue, but I had to live with it…this is Chiclayo. I don’t know why but the first impression wasn’t so good. But I think it was only that strange way to the terminal of Chiclayo. When I finally was in the city center I found myself in a small and cute city. That I will tell you soon 🙂

Riobamba – the Rio de Janeiro of Ecuador, we wished…

After our retreat from Cayambe, we were happy to get to warmer regions in Ecuador. We wanted to relax before starting our last and biggest project – the Chimborazo, the highest volcano of Ecuador. It is 6.267 m high – an impressive altitude.

To get easily to the base camp of the Chimborazo you should be in the city Riobamba. On our way from Quito to Riobamba, Banos was on the map and so we decided to relax there for a few days.

When we got to Banos we were happy to take a hot shower and unpack our backpacks.

The following day we had a late breakfast and still decided to do a cycling trip from Banos to Puyo, which is a small city located in the Amazon region. This trip is a 58 km cycle. During this tour we were passing different climate zones, which was amazing and very interesting. You end up in the Amazon region, where you find different food and climate. I was impressed. Now I really was looking forward to see and feel more of this fascinating region.

All in all it was a nice and funny cycle trip. In Puyo we got a bus to Banos. The bus driver was not amazed about carrying our rented bikes with the bus but we persisted. So just in time we got to the bike shop in Banos to return the bikes. Our shower was deserved!

The following days we prepared our project and went on to Riobamba. There we wanted to do the last bit of shopping, revise our plan and request the last missing information. Personally I was looking forward to go to Riobamba, the second Rio de Janeiro, at least the name sounded like that. But Riobamba was more Pampas than anything. When the bus driver said we already got to the Terminal in Riobamba, we couldn’t believe what we heard. But sure, you accept fast that you are in Riobamba and so we had to look for a Hostel, which wasn’t that easy either. After a through-the-city-run we finally found ourselves in a descent hotel.  Then straight away after getting rid of our heavy luggage we searched for camping gas, food and for more information. Still we weren’t sure how to get to the mountain hut “Hermanos Carrel” of Chimborazo.

We had luck; we found the Andean Adventures place where we met John, the guy who is working there. We talked with him and he gave us a lot of helpful information. After he heard about our project he offered us a lift to the base camp the next morning because his guide would take some clients up there anyway.  This was really nice and helpful.  So now it was fixed. We were going to leave Riobamba and going up to the base camp of Chimborazo the next morning. How exiting! In a hurry we went to a supermarket to buy the missing food and then more or less straight to bed. Some important days were waiting for us.

But first, some more impression of our stay in Banos and surrounding:

Mountains and more mountains

After the Cotopaxi, the Cayambe

Did you actually know that there are so many Volcanos in Ecuador? Of course you did and as I’m a student of an Alexander-von-Humboldt School, I’ve to say, that this guy named the valley between the Cordillera Oriental and the Cordillera Real „Straße der Vulkane“ – the streets of volcanoes.

Out of the possibility to climb many volcanos we decided to try the Cayambe next. The Cayambe is less popular then the Cotopaxi, so we supposed that we won’t have any problems to enter there. And finally we were right. The volcano Cayambe is 5.796 m high and with its altitude the third highest mountain in Ecuador. The volcano is a complex volcano. This type of volcano occurs in location of principal vent area and asks the mountain climber for good mountain reading abilities.

The first man to climb actually this volcano was Edward Whymper from England. He actually also did the Chimborazo and nowadays the refugee at 5.000 m is named after him. But from the Chimborazo you soon will read more in my next articles.

Fair enough, now we were prepared to start our expedition to the volcano Cayambe. We left Quito in bus and got to the city Cayambe. From there we went up with the Jeep to the refugee “Ruales Oleas Bergé” which is located at 4.600 m.

We only left late the city Cayambe which, I think, was my fault because I was a bit sick – bad stomach and the flu. So I took my time in Quito and in Cayambe for the increase of altitude. We needed two hours to get near to the refugee. The Jeep had problems passing the road. It was really muddy with deep lanes.

Well there wasn’t any possibility to get straight to the refugee so we had the chance to walk the last bit, which was as well a good preparation for our peak climbing plans.

The walk was nice but there was a lot of cold wind and it was getting darker and darker. My friends already got to the refugee but I with my flu and bad stomach, I was slow and now as well really cold of the wind…got there of course as well but a bit later.

In the refugee we met two guys, one from Germany and one from Switzerland. They were really nice guys and they planned to do the peak this night. They wanted to leave in a few hours with a local guy.  After a nice talk we went outside to find a place to camp. Wow this actually was really difficult and uncomfortable – it was black and dark, with a lot of snow wind. But finally we were inside the small tent and found our sleep in a really stormy and freezing night. I hold my thumbs for the other expedition, knowing that this climate won’t make the access of the peak easy.

The next morning the guys from the last night woke us up to tell their story of their climb…but this I will tell within a short time!