An aqueduct on the road to Andahuaylas
Sometimes our most ambitious plans for the day form before we actually wake up. Lying in the darkness of my room at the hostel I mapped out a day of epic proportions. First I would run--at least ten miles, hard. I would ascend the steps of Sacsaywaman with brisk, powerful strides; probably while the sun came up. The Rocky theme might be playing at this time. After the run, I would do the load of stinking laundry that I had been carrying with me. Then, before the afternoon, I would be at the bus terminal, beginning my glorious adventure to Ayacucho in the Central Highlands and be well on the way towards the Cordillera Blanca.
What actually happened started with me lying in bed for about another hour. I was feeling a headache when I finally got up so I decided to delay the run and blog for a little bit. Hunger was close behind and I made some Qwichua (like oatmeal) for myself in the hostel kitchen.
I went down to the hostel courtyard to do some planning. Based on the maps I had looked at, it would be possible to take roads out to Ayacucho and Huanaco and cleverly bypass the sprawling hell that is Lima. Looking at the guidebook, I realized that the busses were slow, the roads were crap and this plan was going to take several days. My dream of getting to Huarez without touching Lima was beginning to seem more like a nightmare. For instance, the stop I had planned for that day, Ayacucho was actually a 22 hour bus-hell of bumpy mountain roads distant. Then the book stopped talking about busses except for ones that lead to Lima or back to Cuzco. I got the impression that nobody actually did what I was planning and probably for good reason.
Still, I wanted to at least get to Ayacucho, partly so that I wouldn't have to see Ica again. Ayacucho was supposed to be a real off-the-beaten-path cultural gem with very few tourists. Plus, in the nineties, it had been the home base for the Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) Maoist Terrorist group, and that gave it some street cred in my book.
I sat in the courtyard pondering the different bus companies, whether I would stop at a city between Cuzco and Ayacucho or make the whole journey in one bite. This indecision kept me from doing anything until the afternoon when I decided I would do laundry, get lunch and then go to the bus station and wing it.
The sun was incredibly hot where I was sitting but I found myself getting cold and then hot again. I became aware of some gastrointestinal activity that was unusual and disturbing. Christ; now I was getting sick.
Shaken, but alive, I resolved to get the laundry done. I went into town with a great sack of my stinking clothes slung over my shoulder. Combined with the weight of my backpack, I thought that my spine was going to twist over with a clean snap. I could feel the heat of the sun beating down, but I had goosebumps on my arms and was shivering. To cap it all, none of the laundromats in town were open. It's Sunday stupid. There was one place that was open, but they wouldn't be able to wash my clothes until 7:00 that night--exactly when I planned to be on the road.
I shuffled off to a tepid lunch place where I ordered a sandwich and a hot chocolate. Shivering, I nibbled the cold bread, and watched one reggaeton video after another play on the small television in the corner.
I got back to the hostel, packed my stuff and caught a cab to the bus station. It was already dark out. Hilariously, I ended up gyping the cabby out of fifty cents because I couldn't find all my coins. Wait, that's not funny, its terrible. Then again, the cabbies have ripped us off on a lot of rides and it was only fifty cents. I still feel kind of bad though.
When I got to the bus station, I couldn't find any rides for Ayacucho until the morning, but I had the option of waiting until 11:00 and leaving for Abancay, a town about four hours in that direction. Fine. I had had enough of Cuzco. I sat down in one of the chairs at the station, looking out of place bundled up in my parka while all the normal people wore their summer clothes. Was I going to die?
A French woman, basically the only other white face in the crowd, ended up sitting next to me. Her English was alright and I managed to keep a conversation going, even though I was feeling worse by the minute.
"Uh...could you stay here and watch my stuff. I gotta go."
I leaped out of my seat. The dam was cracking. General Brown had come to town so to speak. And it was going down. I staggered up to a terminal and asked where I could find the nearest baño. Naturally it was a pay-toilet, but the attendant was able to read the look of desperation written across my face and let me in. I charged into a stall just in time to beat the mudslide.
I emerged in a daze and payed the fifty centimos. Like a shell-shocked veteran who had just witnessed unspeakable horrors, I wandered back to my seat and started shivering again.
"Thanks." I told the French woman. "Bit of a crisis there."
She laughed and told me that the same thing had happened to her after a bad salad. I nodded miserably and popped some anti-diarrehal pills, followed by ibuprofen to cut the chills. I had a packet of GU energy gel that I had brought to replenish my stores in such an event and took that as well. The French woman gave me some magnesia stuff that she swore by. I promised to take it in the morning if the symptoms persisted. It was another one of those great international moments: two strangers on their separate journeys, reaching out to talk about the best way to deal with the shits.
In a couple hours I ended up riding the porcelain again, but with far less violence than my previous episode. I also began to switch from shivering to sweating. I welcomed this as a good sign and kept my jacket on despite the waves of fever--it was just good to be warm again. I figured that by overheating, I might kill whatever bacteria or virus had found me. A fever can also kill brain cells if it goes to far, but I considered it to be a worthwhile trade.
Finally, I got aboard the bus. I spent the four hours inside of my sweaty parka, switching between fitful sleep and waking misery. We arrived at Abancay at three in the morning. I had the option of either finding a hostel and sleeping in it, or else waiting it out until six to catch a van to Andahuaylas. Even though I was feeling cold and wrung out, I decided to do the intrepid thing and wait for the van. While waiting, I had a semi-proficient conversation with at genetic engineer. It turned out that we would have to wait an extra hour and a half for the van to show up.
The van ride was more traumatic than riding the bus, especially because the driver left his window open the whole time, leaving me shivering again. I managed to get about forty-five minutes of sleep We bounced and buckled over the broken dirt road, going past scores of women in native dress and an even greater number of barking dogs that chased our van. My enthusiasm for going for a run later dimmed. Still, we went by some amazing mountain scenery, including terracing and aqueducts that were reminiscent of Colca Canyon.
At last, we arrived in Andahuaylas, a good-sized town with multistory buildings and a garbage-filled creek.
The van dropped us in front of a gas station. I caught a cab to the hostel where I bought a room for 25 soles. I didn't even take the covers off the bed. I fell on top of it and fell asleep with my parka on.
Illustrative murals in Andahauylas: good environmental
practices, vs bad. Don't shit in the rivers.
I woke up around mid-afternoon, feeling perfectly disgusting but sick no longer. At last, I ventured out into town, reeking sack of laundry slung over my shoulder. After some wandering I successfully found a laundromat which would get my stuff washed within 24 hours. So I was rooted. For dinner, I went to Il Gato Pizzeria near the Plaza de Armas, a place that specialized in wood-fired crusts. The whole place was filled with delicious, carcinogenic smoke. I'd hate to work there and get black lung, but since I was only visiting, I decided that a little carbon monoxide inhalation was worth a good pie.
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