Valle Del Colca
Peru
March 10, 2009
The early alarm rang, there was a knock on the door. “The driver is here for you!” Outside on the square a white ‘colectivo’ was waiting, two people already sitting there looking sourly at me as I boarded. The driver gunned the engine and we rocketed off. Instead of leaving town the minibus went around town collecting other people until the vehicle was full.
All aboard then, and we pulled out of town, most everyone trying to find some place against which they could lean their head. Further sleep was next to impossible because of the road’s bumpiness and the constant chatter of some passengers. The slight lightening of pre-dawn saw the minibus turn left off the main road, to then shake like a Mexican jumping bean as the new road turned to the surface of Mars.
For many, many kilometers the bus jerked, veered, slewed and jammed as the driver navigated the moonscape of potholes that pretended to be the road to somewhere. For more than 40 kilometers the road was a disaster – and the main reason why we had to get up at 02:30 am for what is a 90km distance trip.
Dawn seemed a long time coming, but when it did, it came with a rush. Finally I could see our surroundings, rocky, grassy rolling hills with snow touched mountains far in the distance. “Richard”, I called out to the driver, “can we stop for a few minutes please? I need to stretch my legs and maybe the others do too”. He pulled over and everyone piled out.
I scrambled over the rocky field to see the area more clearly. At the top of the slight incline was a ceremonial rock pile, the type that in other cultures is used to mark a grave or a sacred place. The colors were stupendous – red rocks, the early sun flushing them with a suffused orange, the dark mountains in the distance, snow sparkling from so far away, the sky a wispy, frosty, icy blue.
The driver was in a hurry; we all headed back to the minibus. Not too much further along the road and we halted again. “This is the highest point of our trip today”, said Jesús, the guide for the tour. “We are now at the Paso del XXX”, he continued, “4810 meters above sea level.” Again we clambered out. I headed up the hill to see the stone huts at the top. The white stuff I had seen on some rocks earlier turned out not to be guano, as I thought it might have been, but wind sculpted ice. These huts must be set up as shelters, like in the Alps and the Rockies, their battered doors bright red against the now azure sky.
On we sped, heading down an ever steepening hillside towards a valley below. The driver was careening round the curves way too fast; one of the younger Canadian women was getting visibly worried. “Riccardo, slow down – we are very uncomfortable in the back here!” It worked for a few minutes. Once down on the valley floor we came through a toll where we paid to enter the Valle del Colca; quickly after that were in Chivay, parked by a hostal/restaurant. Breakfast was being served. That’s why he was rushing ..
I finished in about five minutes, leaving the others to carry on. I walked around Chivay a little, seeing some people gathering in what I suppose was a marketplace but in reality is a bare, muddy corner of ground; others were clambering into an open truck to head off somewhere. Many of the men were dressed in jeans and workshirts, the type you’d find anywhere; the women were mostly dressed in a more traditional style, black shows, stockings, pleated dress arching to the knees, blouse with two cardigans, brightly colored scarf and hat. The sun was bright, the air quite alpine, the temperature fresh. Half an hour later we were back in the bus, threading our way through the valley towards its ever narrowing neck.