Day 1: Cashapampa (2900m) to Llamacorral (3700m)
The bus drive to Jaraz was very dangerous! The road was good, the car was also good, but the bus driver was a nightmare: there were no seatbelts and the driver was about 60y old and thought it is a kind of formula one race! Always too fast and extremely risky passing manevreus! Maybe he had too much coca leaves! I dont know! But it was the most dangerous part of my Peru stay! The next bus to Cashapampa was OK! The road was smaller and dusty but it worked quite well! So I reached Cashapampa already at 10:30! Here I negotiated a bit with non-English speaking porters and finally I hired a quite old guy (maybe 60y old) for the first 3 days! I paid him extremely well with about 300 Soles (120 USD) for 3 days help of a grey donkey and he has to return then alone on the 4th day! Today the donkey got 12kg and myself still about 34kg! My porter looked not sporty at all with sandals and it became clear that he would ride on a very nice, black horse instead of walking! They were much faster than me, so I sent them to the first camp and finally after 5h I found my black bag there! The porter was not there - I think he continued to base camp of Alpamayo or he was looking for a shelter in the mountains for the cold night! He told me that he will not need a tent but knows a protected place where he will sleep!
For me it was exhausting, as of thin air at 3800m and because of a very sunny hot day! Yes it is winter but feels like summer, even at 3800m altitude! I have seen plants and birds that I have never seen before in my life! Then a lot of donkeys, horses and cows! I like the donkeys most! Currently they are around my tent and eating grass! Very nice animals! And more intelligent than horses! Though they have only 62 chromosoms, horses have 64! And mules 63! And how many chromosoms do you have? :-)
I have coca with me for 3 months! The helpful guy of the hostel not only guided me through Huaraz for more than 2h, helping me in organizing everything (park permission, maps etc), but he also gave me huge packages of Coca leaves! So I start today with a nice Coca tea!
Great campsite here with soft grass and some other hikers! i met a young couple from Switzerland! They and other hikers acted as translators! :-)
So I will sleep very well tonight! Tomorrow I will give my donkey 5-10kg more! They wont complain those nice animals! And I have it easier hiking to the next place, which is already at 4200m altitude! Today porter with horse and donkey was at least an hour faster than me, so 4h whereas it was 5h for me!
Good night!
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