LAGUNA LLANGANUCO TOUR...DAY 2

The night before our tour, Danny and I had realized we had forgotten to pack my camera charger so we decided to get up extra early so we could have time to look around for another one. We found a weird charger shaped like a little cell phone in a Kodak photo store less than a block from our hostel for S/10. Since we had a little extra time, we decided to have breakfast at one of those little breakfast carts that was almost right in front of the hostel. An elderly woman was selling sandwiches and drinks for S/.80 each. We ate very quickly and headed back to the hostel because we hadn't see our tour bus stop by to pic us up. The receptionist old us we had missed it and gave us directions to the office nearby. We ran most of the way over there. Luckily, it was only 3 blocks away. We made it just in time because we were the last ones to get on the big yellow bus. We managed to find two empty seats in the back next to a few European tourists and within a few minutes, we were off. Our tour guide began speaking in Spanish and telling us stories. We thought he was going to translate what he was saying afterwards so we didn't really pay much attention but after about 15 minutes we realized the tour was going to be in Spanish the entire time.

Carhuaz Main Square

On our way to our first stop, Carhuaz (kar-WHAS), a city just 34 km from Huaraz, our tour guide told us about the wonderful fruit ice creams made and sold there. The ice cream is actually made from real fruit. It's thicker than the regular ice cream. The guide only gave us about 20 minutes to walk around, get ice creams and take pictures. He made it very clear that if we weren't back in time, we'd be left behind and would have to find our way back to Huaraz. We stopped at a very small ice cream stand. The woman gave us two cups of ice cream for S/2.50. We could choose 3 flavors for that price. Some of my ice cream was really good but not all of it. The main square wasn't much to look a. A lot of people in the area had traditional clothing on.

There also were a few little souvenir shops nearby. The guide called us back in but a few people were missing. He waited about two minutes for them but they never showed, so we continued without them to Yungay (yoon-GUY). A city that was almost completely wiped out by a mudslide in 1970.









At Yungay we had to pay S/2 to get into the historical. I don't remember how much it was for kids. We had to run a little catch up to our group. We stopped about 500 meters in to listen to a local talk about the tragic event that occurred in May, 1970. He had a book with old pictures that weren't very good. We mostly listened to him tell the story. A brief summary is that on May 31st, 1970, a 45 second 8.0 earthquake off the coast, caused 10 thousand tons of ice to break off of El Nevado Huascarán (whas-kah-RAHN: Mount Huascaran). The earthquake caused almost all of the houses to instantly come crumbling down and a smoke cloud covered the city within seconds. At the same time, the ice that had broken off the mountain had started rolling downhill, picking up dirt and anything else in it's path, heading towards the city. Three minutes after the earthquake started, the 20,000 or so people that had inhabited Yungay were dead. Less than 400 of it's inhabitants survived. For the full story, check out this link.
 

Yungay Cemetery

After he finished telling us the story, the guide told us the local accepted tips lol. We continued walking until we got to Yungay cemetery, where some people fled to the day of the earthquake and survived.

It's a little tiring going up the steps to the Christ statue (Christo de Yungay). I was huffing and puffing on the way up which amazed me since I had been running a lot the months prior to the trip. Our guide told us not to breathe so heavily because according to the people who live in the area, those who have difficult breathing are unfaithful people :P so we all tried to breathe as normally as possible after that lol. From the top you have a nice view of the area. After about 15 minutes, we began walking down and followed our guide to the area which used to be the main square.

The bus remains

On the way, we stopped where a crushed bus from the day of the earthquake was. A big bus, like the ones you take to travel around Peru or what the British refer to as "coaches," had been crushed by the immense pressure of the mudslide.

After we saw what used to the the old main square and the famous 4 remaining palm trees, it was time to go to Laguna Llanganuco.

The cathedral remains.

View of the area

The bus had to take a sort of zig-zag route all the way up to El Parque Nacional Huascarán (Huascaran National Park). When we arrived at El Parque Nacional Huascarán (Huascaran National Park) we had to pay 5 soles to get into the park. Our guide came by our seats to collect the money and then we were off again. Within a few minutes, we were at Laguna Llanganuco, 3,850 meters above sea level.

Our guide told us we only had 45 minutes and gave us two options. The first option was to take a little boat ride at an additional cost. The boat ride lasted 30 minutes and I don't remember how much extra it was. The second option was to hike around the area which would take us about 20 minutes or so, so it was impossible to do both.

 

Here's a video I found that shows what the lagoon looks like.

We decided to go hike around because it was an ugly, cloudy day so we weren't really intrigued by the boat ride since the water didn't look as beautiful as it normally does. We began walking along a trail and it was a little hard to breathe. About halfway along the trail, there was a area with a sort of mini-dock where you could walk out a little into the lagoom. When we finally finished exploring, we headed back to the front because there were some provincianas selling food and we were starving. It was around 3 p.m. and we weren't gonna get to eat for another 90 minutes or so. They had emoliente to drink, corn on the cob and cuy (guinea pig). The had some other things but I don't remember what else. The potatoes that came with the cuy were pretty good but I was afraid to eat the actual cuy. Daniel liked it and gave me a piece. It was pretty ok. It had a smoked taste to it. Three minutes later our guide was calling us back to the bus and I asked him to take a few pictures of us. He ended up making us pose for three pictures lol. I hadn't expected him to be so nice. We got on the bus again and were on our way to Caraz (kah-RAS), my grandmother's hometown. We stopped at this "resort" that had a restaurant. We had an hour for our extremely late lunch because by then it was probably close to 5 and then we went to a place that made different types of manjar blanco (MAHN-har BLAHN-koh). We were there for about 20 minutes, trying the different types of manjar. From the store, we could see one of the mountains. I don't know which one it was but it was pretty. We got back on the bus to go to our last stop before heading back to Huaraz.

A few minutes into our journey we stopped to look at two mountain peaks. It was getting dark quickly and a couple of tourists were getting really upset about not having arrived at that spot earlier to take pictures because by then it was pretty dark. We continued on and about an hour later we stopped at this small craft store. We got to watch a craftsman make a clay teapot with an opening at the bottom of the pot and a lid that was unremovable. The design made it so that you had to fill it up from the bottom. It was pretty cool actually. I wanted to buy one so badly but I thought it was going to make my bag weigh more than it was supposed to at the airport and they were going to charge me for the extra weight. We left after about 30 minutes and that was the end of our first tour. We arrived in Huaraz around 8 I think and were extremely tired. We had to be up early again the next day for our next tour, the Chavin de Huantar Ruins.