Tired legs, smiles

 We're back from our trek!  Lindsay and I went hiking to Choquequirao this week -- a 4 day demanding hike.  The city is high up in the Andes over the Apurímac River, a river that's 3,000m below the surrounding peaks at times -- twice as deep as the Grand Canyon in the US.  The city hasn't been excavated for long, and is 30% uncovered to date.  The tour was interesting, because lots of questions about origins and uses of the buidings in the city were answered with "we really don't know....".

We had a memorable time, and got a workout in the process. 

Editorial note: The day before the hike, I got a little sick.  I'm fine now, but it worried us for a couple hours.  Let's just say I lost my lunch violently.  I spent that evening in a local clinic having simple tests done to see what I had.  The doctor said I didn't have anything crazy, just a significant bacterial problem, probably from food. He put me on antibiotics to fix things up.  Lindsay and I realized later that it was probably a tomato I ate for breakfast that I failed to wash well enough.  I'm fine.  On to the hike.

Day 1:
Up at 4AM for a 4 hour drive, then a 15 mile hike, with about 1,500' of elevation change, first down to the river, and then back up again.

Day 2:
Up at 6, for a short 3.5 hour hike into the ruins themselves.  We explored the upper ruins before lunch.  The ruins are large and well thought out, with sweeping views of the mountains from every perspective.

After lunch we explored the agricultural terraces below -- about a 45 minute hike down switchbacks from the ruins above.

Day 3:
We headed home.  We were up early, and hiked about 15 miles back.  First flat, then down a long way, then up a long way, then flat again to camp.

 Day 4:
It rained all night the night before.  We slept well, though.  The night before, we were in a bit of a makeshift campsite on the side of the trail.  There were cows and mules walking past our tent all evening.  The mosquitos (which bite HARD by the way, and leave a mark on you for 5 days afterwards) were persistant.  Once we built a tiny fire, the mosquitos and the cows stayed a little farther away. 

The views the night before had been incredible, but it also rained from about 2AM all the way through day 4.  We had been camped at the bottom of a steep slope.  We woke up in the morning with wet beds from all the runoff coming down the slope, under our tents, and into our backs.  It wasn't totally comfortable, but not bad, either.

The hike the last day was simple enough -- just 2.5 hours back into town.