On to the mountains!

Last night we arrived in Nazca, home to the Nazca lines, which are the mysterious formations in the desert of animals and other designs. Upon arrival, a nice, although insistant woman escorted us to a hostel for a look around. Hesitant at first, we were convinced by the kitchen on the rooftop, complete with thatched covering and view of the city, desert, and surrounding mountains. Off in the distance, we could see the highest sand dune in the world. Sorry Indiana Dunes, you´re off the list.

The terrain between here and the coast (and along the coast) was very surprising. I knew it was a desert, but the only deserts I´ve ever seen are the deserts in the states or Mexico. This made me feel like we were in the middle east--ranging from rolling sand dunes as far as the eye can see, to rocky scab-like terrain which brought places like Afganistan to mind, although I´ve never been. Anyway, very alien environment for both of us. Alien enough, in fact, that we bailed altogether on going to reserve on the coast (more desert and the reason for heading south in the first place) and caught a bus to begin our journey into the mountains.

This morning was spent wandering around Nazca, trying to find food suitable for our upcoming 5 day trek into the ruins of Choquequirau (known as the "other machu picchu"). There was a staggering amount of tiendas selling anything one could ever want...As long as anything you could ever want consisted of white bread, crackers, cookies, shampoo, and soda pop! After a seeming eterity, and numerous frustrated glaces between the two travelers, we finally found una SUPERMERCADO!

Then came trying to find a bus to Abancay, the nearest large town close to where our trek will begin. We thought the ride would be 6 hours, and upon learning its actually 10 hours with the only departure at 4pm, we were faced with arriving in Abancay at 2AM--not considered the safest option. After a lot of shitty spanish exchanged with ticket agents, we caught a cab to the "other" part of town to invesigate the locals´ buses. Anyway, long and rambling story short, our adventure has truly begun and we´ll be leaving Nazca tonight at 10:30PM tonight, putting us in Abancay in the morning.

We´ve learned so much through trial and error the past couple days that it feels like we´ve already been here a week. Hopefully all this wonderful learning will lead to smoother(er) operations in the future. One lesson we spent multiple hours and many failed descriptions learning was that while there is no "white gas" to be found anywhere for our stove--initially a very troubling situation, we can burn unleaded gasoline in it...simply requiring more cleaning. Until learning that liberating fact, it was a pretty depressing feeling to think we may not be able to cook our own food, therefore make it very hard/impossible to access the backcountry.

Adios,
Samuel