Laguna Llaca

 October 7-

The next morning Hisao came to pick us up at 9:00 I think, so we had plenty of time to eat breakfast in our hotel. They served papaya juice and no one liked it. I felt better after Kami said she and Leo don't like papaya, and nor does Megan. Some of us tried to force it down. I can't remember if it was right then or not, but that may have been when Hazel came up with our mantra for this trip which is, "Adapt and Overcome." :) She is very wise. 

Brett and Jethro also went out and got us some bread and cheese and things for lunch. Our hotel was right across the street from a market. Being in Huaraz was just crazy.  

Anyway, Hisao (he's the man. We all really liked him.) picked us up and we drove to Llaca Valley. The original plan had been that we would have had the day before to acclimitize, and we were going to have a short, easy walk around a small village near Huaraz to really ease us in to the high elevation. Since we were delayed a day, we just jumped right in to our first hike. But Laguna Llaca is an easier hike, so it was still a fairly good one to begin with. We may  not have all felt our very best, but the only one to really struggle with any altitude sickness was Orrin, poor buddy. (May have to do with the fact that we didn't drink enough on the bus the day before, and Orrin didn't like the bread so he didn't even really eat anything either.) When we started walking in the valley, and he felt sick, Hisaou had Jeffrey run back and tell the bus to come up the road farther so that we wouldn't have to walk back to it after we had made it to the lake. (Jeffrey was a 17-year-old boy who I'm not exactly sure why he was with us, but I think he was doing studies in business and needed to come along. I don't know. Anyway, he was the errand boy, kind of. He carried a baby carrier that was supposed to be for Navy if she ever needed it, which she didn't, and it wouldn't have fit her if she had, and he also carried Navy's backpack most of the time.)

Llaca Valley was beautiful, with lots of cows and horses grazing along the bottom, and a pretty stream beside us.

  And then we got to the lake, and it was so beautiful too! It was a wonderful duck blue with the snowy mountains, glacier, and cloudy skies surrounding it. We took lots of pictures--probably because it was our very first hike/lake/experience in Peru!

After taking pictures and eating lunch we went down to the shore and skipped rocks. There was a spillway that we walked up and Brett and I raced up it and he just totally killed me. Then Talmage and Jethro raced and Jethro totally killed Talmage. :)

Then we went to the van that was waiting for us just a short distance away, and we all went to the bathroom. I set down my backpack and fanny pack and picked up my backpack when I came out and went to the van. Luckily Hisao was after me, because he saw my fanny pack (which had all our passports, Covid vaccination cards, and wallet) and handed it to me. Miracle! What a nightmare if that had been lost.

Anyway, the hike wasn't too long, so when we got back to Huaraz, Brett, Jethro, Wyatt, and I set out to 1. get a sim card, and 2. get money from an ATM. It was crazy how long it took us to accomplish those two things. First, we were looking for the sim card. We would go to one little shop that looked like they were selling phone paraphernalia, and Jethro would ask if they have a sim card, and they would say no, but then point to a different place a few stalls down. This happened so many times. Then they would say go down the street. Then, around the corner. One could almost believe that they were all in cahoots playing a prank on the gringos to see how long we would continue to follow their directions. haha. Anyway, we finally found a store that had one, but even then it probably took 40 minutes to figure out how to get it to work correctly.  And then we looked for an ATM, which we finally found but it charged $5 so Brett decided to try for another one, and in the end he did find one that didn't charge a fee, so he said it was worth all the extra walking around.  And it was crazy. Just being in the throngs is wild and like sensory overload. But also awesome to see the markets and the people--some in modern clothes and many in the native dress with the fancy skirts and colorful scarves and super amazing hats.  Gosh, pictures just don't even capture it at all, the craziness that it was. And maybe also too because we were soooo new to it-- it was overwhelming. But crazy exhilerating!

The Plaza Del Armas

Then we went home and collected all the kids and we walked to a restaurant called Fogon, I believe, and we shared some dinner. It was really good. We had Lomo Saltado, and a Peruvian pasta dish, and I had a steak, and also a chicken that everyone shared. And fries and Jethro ordered the drink Chicha Morada to try. It's made from purple corn. I don't love it. But the food was really good.