Love & Light and everything bright...

FROM URUBAMBA, PERU

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Day 10: Taking a High Road to Heaven (Mt Ausengate)

MT. AUSANGATE, Peru, July 7, 2008 - We got up at 4AM this morning to get ready for a long bus ride to the foot of Mt. Ausangate, from where we are to hike on foot for about four hours to our base camp.  Everything we have done so far has been a mere preparation for the remainder of this trip.  We expected it the four-day high mountain portion of our journey to be hard on us physically and psychologically.  After all, Apu Ausangate warned us about it, too.  But we were also hoping that the spiritual lift might be more than enough to compensate for all the hardships to come.  Apu Ausangate also promised us that.  And he said he would talk to Father Sun about the weather.  So I felt we were in good hands, as good as they come, anyway.

We were too sleepy to note the name of a town we stopped at to use the restrooms and get some supplies.  The only thing I remember was a statue in the middle of the square with an Inka rainbow flag (left).  Most people were snoozing when we finally arrived at a location where breakfast had been prepared for us (the remaining three pictures above). 

"This is luxury camping," I said on the bus.

"Luxury?" a grumpy and sleepy fellow traveler replied.

"Sure.  We are having everything done for us... meals cooked, bags transported on horses and mules, tents set up.  Can you imagine what it would be like if we had to do it all ourselves?"

I did not get a reply, only a grunt.  Which was okay.  We were all tired after going so hard for 10 days already, and having to get up at such an ungodly hour.

Breakfast was good.  As for the "restrooms," "just use the bushes," Jose Luis said.  "And close your eyes so no one can see you."  :-)

After breakfast, we continued on our buses up a torn up mountain road.  One could have called it a mountain rut.  The bus engine overheated at one point so the driver and Don Adolfo ran to the nearby stream to get some water with which to cool off the radiator (left).  As we were getting closer, the beautiful Mt Ausengate was getting bigger (two middle shots).  Eventually, we arrived at a school at which we were to deliver the supplies and gifts we had purchased for the kids (right). 

Jose Luis has been doing it for year.  It felt great to be a part of such a humanitarian action.  Check out a short video clip I made of the gift presentation ceremony...

Ausengate, Peru school donations ceremony (July 7, 2008) (35 secs)

I noted the elevation - 13,900 ft.  And this was just a start of our hike up to Mt Ausengate.  I wondered at what elevation our base camp would be?

And so, off we went, up the hill. After about 1.5 hrs of hiking, Jose Luis made us take a pit stop. The weather was great, cool but clear, and the scenery breathtaking.  That more than made up for the shortness of breath on some steep slopes.  I took the opportunity to baptize myself in the mountain creek.  I also drank a few sips of water from it.  When I told Jose Luis about it, he said, "at least we've got some Cipro around" (Cipro - antibiotic).  We have all been told that in Peru, we must not drink anything but bottled water, for fear of infection.  Yet I figured since Apu Ausangate was so welcoming the other night during our Conversations with the Spirits, then why should I worry if I drank "his" water?  As it turned out, nothing happened over the next few days as I drank more water from other streams on the mountain.

As we were getting closer to the snowy and icy part of the mountain, Mt Ausangate was getting closer, bigger and more majestic with every passing minute.  Eventually, we passed some beautiful emerald color lakes - right...

... and also above.

When we eventually arrived at our base camp, I was a little surprised how easy it was to get there.  In a little less than four hours, we had gone from 13,900 ft at the school level, to 15,500 ft elevation where we were to spend the next three nights and four days.  Since we arrived first, we also had a first pick of the tents.  I picked one in the middle of the "main street."  I had not camped since I was a teenager, and never at this elevation.  So I knew I'd be in for a few surprises, especially during the night.

And that's all she wrote from this Day 10 of our Peru adventure. 

Love  Light 

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