The mountains here in Huaraz are beautiful. I took this from the rooftop terrace of my hostel (the Alpamayo Guest House). You can see Mt. Huascaran (6,768m or 22,205, the highest peak in Peru). I’m nursing a bit of a headache from altitude. Huaraz is located at 3,050m (10,000′) and I’ve spent all summer down at sea level. Wine and ibuprofen are helping.
While I’m excited to go hiking and backpacking here, I’ve found the thing that interests me the most is just trying to talk to people. My broken Spanish and google translate help alot. I’m struck by how good so many people’s English is here, especially the guides and hospitality folx.
I talked a bit with a Peruvian family here on vacation. Their son, Pedro, is 14 and wants to be a police officer. He likes playing fortnite and just started boxing lessons with his father’s friend. He’s training their dog to be a guard dog. I showed him the game, Zombie Gunship, on my phone.
They invited me to eat lunch with them and we had a meal of homemade lomo saltado. It’s a common Peruvian meal of beef, onions, bell peppers, potatoes, and rice. We drank Inca Colas.
For dinner, most of the hostel sat down together and we had pasta. One of the guests, Bernardo, is Italian and works as a chef in Bologna. He and his wife Petra, prepared a simple Italian meal for us.
They mentioned that they’d like to make a pizza, but that there’s no oven here. The hostel staff ran out AND BOUGHT AN OVEN. We are having margherita pizzas tomorrow.
I’m going to dayhike a bit over the next couple days. I am planning to spend 4 days doing the Santa Cruz trek. I may hire a local guide and go climb.
And yet, I have this feeling that just sitting down to a meal with warm strangers will be what I remember most about this trip.
Outside Ed Blog 