While stopped at the lake, we agreed that it was a great place for Ustadza to get dressed in her Belly Dance gear and take some pictures. It was a little bit on the cold side, but despite her shivering she managed to get beautifully done up and we took a whole bunch of great pictures.
Part of why it was so cold is that it was quite windy, which made for some interesting times watching Ustadza try to control her silk veil.
But I think she did a pretty good job of it!
We took a break to change backdrops...did I mention it was cold?
Some more fashionable poses
And of course we needed a picture of the two of us! Courtesy of James
The first town we had seen in about 4hrs of driving
Another hour and we came across the first place we had seen with a restaurant, so with no further ado we made ourselves at home. They have an extensive menue consisting of fried trout, fried trout, or the house special of...you guessed it!...fried trout. Heidi had her first ever fish, and I'm not going lie, it was some of the best darn fish I have ever had.
Yep, pretty darn good!
Sheep farm along the way
We hit some more pavement and made really good time headed for Ayacucho. By now we had realized it wasn't a 3 day trip to Cusco, it was 4 days.
Apparently there are some springs over there...
Some amazing skies headed into Ayacucho.
We stayed the night in Ayacucho, though to be honest I have no recollection of the hotel or hostel we stayed at. We got up early as we were now getting quite behind schedule getting to Cusco (we had planned 2 and were starting our 4th day) and still had a ways to go. But it was a good start, the roads were well paved, and we had high hopes....which ended shortly after leaving Ayacucho, which is where the pavement once again ended. Yeah, that is a whole lot of dirt road stretching out infront of us, and yes, those are indeed rain clouds...
There aren't a whole lot more pictures from that day; it rained, the roads turned to slippery mucky snot, and we drove like hell. We finally made it out of the mud only to descend into dusty buss on the wrong side of the road hell for most of the rest of day. We had a tuktuk (not sure what they are called here?) run us off the road into a ditch, raking the underside of the car on bowling ball sized rocks. It was a miracle that we came out of that ditch! At one point I had to get the car across a section of construction that had been absolutely destroyed by the busses. I'm proud to say I was successful, but I had to keep the car, through pure mush, straddling the (I **** you not) 2 foot deep ruts left by the busses, with the right side of the car inches away from a trench big enough to burry the entire buss. The construction guys tried to stop us, but I pretended I hadn't noticed because at this point it was too far to go back and there was no other road...they were in shock when we came out the other side with out sliding into those ruts or the trench, scraping the belly of the car through the mud the whole way. The girls closed their eyes. After that we hit the most glorious pavent I have ever seen. By now we had given up on Cusco for the day, we just wanted to make it to Abencay, which was the next town that we might be able to stay in. Even though James was not allowed to drive according to the rental agency, I turned it over to him as I was too exhausted to drive anymore. We ran wide open on the pavement, but as we had now come to expect, that didn't last. The road turned back to mud again, and the fog set in. It got so thick that we couldn't see 5 feet infront of the car, and it started raining again. Then it got dark. We agreed we were going to stop at the next town we saw, but town after town was abandoned or closed down, so we had no choice but to press on, there wasn't even a place to pull over for a nap. The truck and buss trafic continued to be insane, and then we saw a solid line of trucks coming towards us. Why would there be such a convoy at this time of night? It was now 9pm. Why we asked? Because there was a landslide that had closed down the road to one lane of 6inch deep muck. We patiently waited for the mass of trucks to pass going up the hill, then hoping that the minnivan taxis going up didn't have that much more clearance then we, James floored it. I'm not even sure the tires were touching the bottom of the ruts, but momentum carried us through and we came spitting out the other side (go James!) only to be stuck in total gridlock.
Looking behind us
and infront
Thanks to some very vocal truckers they shuffled trucks around until we could get through and we pressed on. Every vehicle we ran into headed up the mountain stopped us to ask if the road was passable. I tried my best to say yes with the caveat of traffic, but I doubt any of them heard anything past si. Hours later we were finally through all the switchbacks and hit pavent. Only 10km to Abencay, HERE WE COME BABAY!!!!!!! Or not...14hrs is how long we slept in the car, wandered around the mud, and cursed murphy only 5km short of a hotel and a bed...
Our sleeping arrangements, to which we finally resigned at 1am
The reason for the delay, taken the next day
Finally the road crews got through with a bunch of heavy machinery and cleared the road enough that the trucks could get through, then the 4x4's, then the higher clearance vans...but wait, a taxi car just went past, there is hope! There was a lull in traffic from the other side, and knowing a car just made it I disconnected the air filter box (it breathes from below the bumper) jumped in the drivers seat, and made a run for...****, the cop says hell no. I backed into our parking spot and killed the engine while they let another hours worth of trucks come form the other side. Turns out this worked out for the best as we ran into Anders, who is riding his KTM 990 ADV around the world. You can see his stuff here;
http://www.andersaroundtheworld.com/ Finally they stopped traffic from the other direction and it was our turn. One more pass of the road grater and we were first in line with the lowest clearance car in the whole bloody country (not really, but it sure felt like it, I miss my Toyota!) But no worries, all rental cars are 4x4, so a little liberal application of some throttle and we made it across all the bolders and the water no problem, not even a splash in the windows! There were two more such crossings, but they hadn't filled with boulders like the first, so we crossed no problem. The last one however was much deeper, narrower, and faster flowing. I didn't want to get washed away, so I stopped, rolled up my window, and hammered the throttle. Made it no problem and didn't get washed sideways at all...but James was too busy getting the video camera going to notice I rolled up my window. His remained down so he took a large face full of river water through the window. That gave us some laughs! Lets hope he gets his act together and posts the videos tonight!
Lunch was had in Abencay (the first food in almost 24hrs besides snacks) and we and Anders beet feet for Cusco. It only took 5 days, not the planned 2, but we had finally made it! Not only did we make it, but we saw some of the most amazing scenery any of us had ever dreamed of, and saw places few tourists get to see. It cost us Lake Titicaca, Arequipa, and the Nazca lines, but I would say it was well worth it. We were still going to see Machupicchu and none of us gave a crap about the rest!
Clark
