We thought yesterday was an early start, today our pick up was at 5.30am with a private car who took us to meet the minivan waiting at Albergue Benkawasi, where Andy ad Carlee were staying.

With 15 people on board, we headed 60km north on main highway, passing slowly through a really busy market village, to Yungay. It wasn't long before the sun was rising, lighting the snowy peaks on our right and warming the colours of the Cordillera Negra range on our left.

The current town of Yungay is built 1,500 meters north of the destroyed and buried old town. On 31 May 1970, the Ancash earthquake caused a substantial part of the north side of a mountain, Nevado Huascarán, to collapse and an unstable mass of glacial ice about 900 meters wide at the top of Nevado Huascarán to fall. This caused a debris avalanche, burying the town of Yungay and killing 20,000 people. More than 50 million cubic meters of debris slid approximately 15 kilometers downhill at an angle of about 14 degrees. Speeds between 200 km/h to 400 km/h were achieved. Only 92 people survived, most of whom were in the cemetery and stadium at the time of the earthquake, as these zones were the highest in town.

At Yungay, we turned off the main highway and started the 40km up the mountain's steep and windy dirt road. We stopped just before the National Park entrance so people could have a hot drink/breakfast or perhaps more importantly a toilet break. The boys had coffee while the girls went for the traditional mate de coca which was made simply by stuffing a handful of leaves in a mug of hot water - no tea bags here.

To make things simpler, the driver collected everyone's National Park entrance fee of s/10 before we set off again. Once inside the park, we drove up the side of Llanganuco Chinancocha and stopped in a forest of 'paper trees' for a photo opportunity of the lake's most brilliant blue colour. A little further up the road, Llanganuco Orconcocha had equally stunning coloured water.

The start of the track was at 3,900m at one end of a valley. This part of the valley was also used as a camp for overnight stays. There were heaps of donkeys and horses roaming free in amongst the tents. We walked up the gently sloping valley, following a river, and arrived to what appeared like a dead end with 2 waterfalls crashing down from high above.

There was a series of switch backs on the steep sided valley wall. It was only a 300m climb in elevation but being over 4,000m above sea level, the air was thin and we, like most others, were feeling it hard going despite walking slowly and taking plenty of breaks. The path led us in the direction of the waterfall and we assumed that Laguna 69 would be over the crest of the valley wall we were climbing. As we walked off the valley wall, we were suddenly in a wind tunnel. We were in another valley, this time at 4,400m but it wasn't Laguna 69 there to meet us, it was only Laguna 68 with it's green, crystal clear water...

The track continued on a flat plain until there was seemingly nowhere else to go, like before. And as before, the answer was simple, it was more switch backs although this time it was a particularly steep section. We were walking up at a snails pace, resting in every corner. It was a hard slog even if it was only 200m vertical, but we all made it up and caught our breath again.

We seemed to have entered a bowl with snowy peaks surrounding us and Chacraraju towering over the others at 6,400m. As we walked a few more metres towards the centre of the bowl, we caught our first glimpse of Laguna 69's electric blue water - it was startling!!

We continued closer to the lagoon and stopped in awe, our breath had been taken away, not just from the altitude of 4,600m but the picture postcard view. Bluebird sky, snowy white mountain peaks and the electric blue glacial water of the lake.

We had lunch and a half hour break at the lakeside, enjoying the view and the sun, before starting our journey back down again. We knew the trip down would be quicker but we still didn't want to rush, to make it back to the bus in time. It was much easier and faster coming down, we didn't need to stop so much to take photos; a convenient way to catch your breath back.

The walk uphill had taken us three hours and we had made it back down in two. That wasn't too bad for a 12km walk with a vertical rise of 700m to 4,620m - we were quite pleased with ourselves.

In the campsite at the start of the track, we watched as groups set up their tents and laughed as the donkeys and horses got in their way and inquisatively searched through their bags.

On the way back to the bus, we stopped off to take some photos of Llanganuco Orconcocha, before climbing up to where the bus was parked. Annoyingly, we were back 5 minutes before the agreed time but only the 2nd group to arrive. We had to wait a while for the rest of the group to slowly come back, and it was an hour before the last two arrived.

It took two and half hours to drive back to Huaraz and we were starving so we decided to head straight to Chili Heaven for dinner but it was full. We decided to book a table for 8pm and rush back to the hostel and shower. Despite the wait for the curry, it was worth it - it definitely has to be one of the best curries in the world.