24 de Septiembre
We woke up early, then took a bus to Riobamba where we spent what felt like hours (actually it was an hour and a half) waiting for a late bus. This bus went to Cuenca and the journey was 5 hours. When we arrived at the bus station a man persuaded us to stay in his hostal because it had carpet in the rooms (we hadn't seen a carpet since Phoenix!) From there we went and found some dinner.

25 de Septiembre
We woke up, had just enough time for a cup of tea, then got a taxi to the Cuenca bus station where we got a bus to Huaquillas - the town on the border with Peru. On the journey we went though many different terrains including: paramo (high altitude grass land), mountainous deserts, cloud forests low jungle with lots and lots of banana plantations, paddy fields and desert. When we arrived on the border we had to go back into the town to get to the migration office, then got a taxi back to the border and another taxi to the 4 kilometres away Peruvian migration office, and next to another town where all the men were trying to get you to go on thier buses by shouting with hoarse voices which were hoarse because they were shouting! We decided to go on a minibus belonging to a man with a particularly croaky voice and stayed on all the way to Mancora, which is in the desert, where we found a hostal, left our bags there then went to the beach. After a swim we ate tea had an ice cream each, then went to bed.

26 de Septiembre
We woke up then Dad, Granny and Jack went for a swim while Mum and I stayed in bed. Here's what else we did: got breakfast - before we could cross a road to get breakfast we counted more than 26 tuktuks passing in one direction, we didn't even see how many there were on the other side, never mind count them! We went in the swimming poolu at our hostal, had lunch (submurged in my soup were 2 chicken feet - I wonder did this chicken think it was a bath and then accidentally leave it's feet behind?), went to the beach, had tea, then hung around and went to bed.

27 de Septiembre
We spent 7 hours on a bus that smelt of wee today, we wizzed through the desert on a long, straight road past brown bushes, miles and miles of rocky sand and the occasional shack made of straw. We bought yummy fried potatoes from a lady who came on the bus, but the little bit of meat at the bottom surprised my (vegetarian) dad. When we got to Chiclayo (the city we were going to that has nothing to do with chicks laying eggs) we got a tiny taxi to find a hotel. The taxi was so small that only Dad's and Granny's rucksacks would fit in the boot so Mum's went on Dad's knees in the front so Mum;Granny; Jack and I went in the back with our two rucksacks. 5 people plus the taxi driver, 3 big bags and 2 smallish ones in a little car about the same size as an old mini! We found a fancy hotel that made swan shapes out of the towels, but unfortunately we were on the 5th floor.

28 de Septiembre
We woke up, not too early, had breakfast then got on a mini bus to Sipán-huanca Rajada. First we went to the museum with dead skeletons and ancient stuff, then we saw the burial chambers of the skeletons. The burial chambers had fake skeletons in, as the real ones were in the museum - the light and weather would make them disintergrate if they were outside. One of the bodies was in an awkward position, archiologists think that she was pushed in and died like that instead of the normal way. When the lord of Sipán died he had to be buried with his wife, 2 other ladys - his girlfriends (I think), the warrior priest, the warrior lord, a child, a sentry, a guard, 2 lamas and a dog - what a lot of people and animals! The animals are just killed then put in the tomb, but the humans had to drink something to put them into a kind of trance so they didn't notice that they were suffocating when they were buried. Sometimes they had to cut off the peoples feet to make sure they didn't run away. Ergh. He also had lots of gold and about 1037 pots!! When we finished staring at the skeletons we got back in the mini-van, had lunch, and went to the Pirámides de Túcume. Here we climbed up a pyramid where we met some school children at the top. Going up the pyramid, I counted 187 steps. Next we went to Museo Tumbas Reales de Sipan - a museum full of gold! It was really interesting. At the end there were loads of pretend people who moved and some looked as if they were playing instruments in thier hands. I think it was some sort of ceremony. After the long day we had tea then went to bed.

29 de Septiembre
We didn't really do much today until in the evening when we got on a bus stayed on for ages then got of, had hot chocolate, and waited in the bus station for about 2 hours. Then we got on another bus and went to sleep, just to wake up again at 5 in the morning when the bus arrived in Huaraz.

30 de Septiembre
In Huaraz we found a hotel and went to sleep. When we woke up at about 10 'o clock we had breakfast then went for a long walk up a high altitude hill and had cake at the top. At the bottom it started chucking it down with rain. Nowhere except inside was completely dry! ¡Es muy muy mojado! It's very, very wet! By the time we got inside we were soaking. After tea a lady called Luna - who has a dog named Peanut - taught us how to make a nice type of friendship bracelet.

1 de Octubre
We woke up, had breakfast, then went on a really long walk up a mountain to a not so impressive lake. The walk was very hard. It's hard to walk up a hill at home because it is up hill, but here it is very tricky as it is up hill and it is hard to breathe in the high altitude plus we kept taking wrong turns. By the lake we had the last of the cake. On the way down again near the end we cheated a bit by getting a taxi back. Back at the hotel we had tea then went to bed.

2 de Octubre
We did nothing all morning except eat porridge for breakfast. In the end we decided to visit some more thermal baths, so we caught a collectivo where we were all very squished. We accidentally caught it from the wrong side of the road, so we had a free tour round all the streets of Huaraz, and back past where we had got on! The bath was like a brown swimming pool - I wonder why it was brown? When we had finished playing in the warm water, we went to the market to buy some food for supper, then back to our hostal.

3 de Octubre
We woke up early to go up a mountain to another lake: the last one wasn't very impressive so only Dad really wanted to go up. The 5 of us got in a collectivo to a town called Yungay, then a taxi to the start of the path. Before we started to walk we had breakfast! The first part was easy, because it was flat - I was a bit sad when we crossed a river and the path went upwards - I enjoyed the flat.

Walking up the hill we spotted lots of cairns, I decided to make my own. It started getting really steep and really high. We thought that we were almost at the lake - Lago 69 when we were at a super steep bit, but as we got over the ridge we saw that it was just a different lake. From here we went down hill then flat to another very steep part. After hours and hours we eventually got to the amazing lake at an altitude of 4700m. At this height I was really out of breath, and didn't feel too well, Jack on the other hand had raced up to the top chatting all the way.

The lake was such a lovely shade of turquoise blue and looked so inviting, but when I put my feet in the water it was freezing cold! It was melted glacial water, of course it was cold! We then had lunch and started back down again. It seemed to take ages although it was not as long as going up. Luckily the taxi driver had waited 8 hours for us, I wonder what he did for all that time? Went to sleep? Read the newspaper? Played on his phone? All of them??? On the way down we picked up a man, who, because there weren't any seats left, sat in the boot!

4 de Octubre
Today we walked up another mountain to a lake called Lago Churup. Half way up we got to a waterfall that we had to scramble up the side of with the aid of a cable that wasn't always properly attached to the rock - the climb was awesome! We had been told that the lake here was even more impressive than Lago 69 as it was the same color blue but also clear! But when we got to the top we were a bit disappointed, yes it was clear but it wasn't the same colour, and it didn't have a waterfall by it or have a glacier behind it. However Lago 69 didn't have such an interesting climb!

We raced down to the bottom where we found Granny hiding behind a rock. We then set of to the village to find some means of transport back to Huaraz. We walked down a mountain track where we were joined by a shepard, a shepardess, a big flock of sheep, a
couple of donkeys and something that looked like a cross between a panda and a lamb! They had been up on the mountain all day and were just bringing the animals back home. When the shepardess came to her mud brick cottage, she went and her sheep cleverly separated themselves from the others and followed her! Then we left the rest of the sheep behind and found the same collectivo that had taken us up the hill in the first place. We jumped aboard and bumped down the hill back to Huaraz.

5 de Octubre
No more mountains or lakes today, just a relaxing day buying stuff in the market and then off to the hot springs in the afternoon. Whilst we were swimming a boy was racing his friends then Mum asked him if he wanted to race me........... he did, and I won by miles. We found out that he was 13 and was called Brian. After a while he challenged me again. Guess what? I won again! My Mum was so pleased with herself that Dad told her off for humiliating the boys. Sadly we leave Huaraz today on a night bus. One of my favorite things in Huaraz was that on the pedestrian crossings instead of the usual red and green men for crossing the road, when it was safe to cross the red man turned green and started walking, he got faster and faster until he was running, which meant we only had a few more seconds to cross.

Grandma What a lot of buses. The walks sound hard at high altitude. Why was Granny hiding behind a rock?How do the sheep know where they live. AND where was the rest of the chicken. Poor veggie daddy did he have the soup too?The museum sounds really interesting but Im quite glad they dont do things like that now. Lots of love to everyone.

Oct 19, 2013

Garage and the Whippet Hi josie did you like chicken-with-a-leg-in-soup? were there any burglaries of all the gold from the museum when you were there? I wish we had awesome traffic lights too maybe we should buy some and stick them around ? well done on beating the boys by the way. Did the man like sitting in the boot I bet it would be fun hope you have more fun on the adventure XxX

Oct 19, 2013

Gra Great to hear the latest news from you all. Buses smelling of wee, meat in your fried potatoes and freezing cold lakes, things you'll never forget. Keep having fun!

Oct 19, 2013

Tammy Another brilliant blog! Hurray for beating the boy at swimming. All the walking sounds a bit tiring though. Like Grandma, I also want to know why granny was hiding behind a rock!!! xxxx

Oct 19, 2013

Wendy Loving your Spanish Josie!!!Sounds like you've been to some literally breath-taking places.I hope your Dad's not starving with the lack of confidence in vegetarian food - the skeletons sound a bit scary ... appropriate as halloween is approaching.

Oct 23, 2013