So four days after our salkantay trek we thought we would back it up with a three day trek through the Colca Canyon in Peru, The worlds second deepest canyon and a must do according to every traveller we met in Arequipa!
There are heaps of tour compaines offering the trek but as we are on a budget and had no interest in being rushed around by a guide we decided to trek it on our own! We also bought a tent a few weeks earlier and needed to get some good use out of it!
We hitched a ride on a tour bus that picked us up from our hostel at 3am. It’s is slightly more expensive than catching a local bus, but the local bus left at 1am and we couldn’t stomach getting up that early.
After an early 6 hour trip we finally arrived at the start of the trail, or what we thought was the start of the trail. The tourist bus dropped us where their group would start their trek down to the Oasis Sangalle (a very man made area at the deepest part of the canyon and the main destination for Trekkers to the Canyon). We decided to miss the Oasis and head for a less touristy part of the trek, a small village called Llahuar. Little did we realise the trail to this village started no where near the trail to the Oasis. After searching for over an hour for the trail head we finally realised the bus was meant to drop us in the actual town of Cabanaconde we were in fact a half hour walk out of the town, and a hour walk to the start of the trail.
By the time we actually started our hike it was 11 am. The sun was out in full force and there was no cover once we started the walk down the canyon. The trail is 3-4 hours downhill, faster or slower depending on your fitness. We struggled to say the least. The trail is steep, hot, dusty and unstable; walking on rocky rubble for the majority of it. It was hard to take in the scenery because we had to constantly look down at where we stepped so not to end up sliding down the path.
We made it to Llahuar in about 4.5 hours exhusted and coated in a layer of dust. There is a camping spot in the village called Llahuar lodge that offers cabins, food and a grassy patch to set up your tent down by the river. The best thing of all though was the hot natural springs right on the river edge. It was like reaching paradise! For 10 dollars each a night you got unlimited access to the hot springs and a very green patch of grass for the tent with cold showers and clean toilets nearby.
We set up the tent in record speed so we could jump in the hot springs where we spent the next few hours relaxing.
We had a grand plan of hiking four hours the following day to Fure, another small village with a waterfall that was apparently a must see, but we loved the camp site so much we couldn’t bring ourselves to leave. So we lazed around the following day and spent a second night… And we can definitely say we didn’t regret it one bit!
The next day we decided to leave and head back to Cabanaconde but the thought of climbing backup the canyon the way we came down was just to much. We had heard there was a local bus that left once a day and went past Llahuar so we decided to be on it! It left at 12 pm and cost approximately $10 each. I can easily say this was the scariest bus ride of our lives. On one side of the road was a shear drop off the canyon, on the other side was an extremely steep unstable rocky hillside.
At one point the bus got bogged while attempting to cross a small landslide. All the men, including Brett got off the bus and attempted to clear the road of rocks so the bus could pass, I got off the bus and stood at the other end of the landslide as I was sure the earth was about to come crumbling down on top of the bus. A few pushes and rearranging of rocks and the bus passed, all the men ran across behind it while rocks started coming down behind them. Two gruelling hours later we made it back to stable land and boarded a 6 hour bus back to Arequipa.
All in all, we both didn’t love the Colca Canyon hike. What we did love though was the amazing little camping spot we spent the two nights and being there was worth the walk in…..
Leave a Reply