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This was a 2 day 1 night trek from Arequipa. I arrived Arequipa after a long bus journey all the way from Nasca. The city is located at the altitude of 2,328 M . I was staying at Casa De Avila. The trek started the very next morning at 3AM. I booked the trek through my the hotel. The bus arrived at 3 AM to pick me up. We drove to Chivay and had our breakfast and then drove another few hours through bumpy road to Cruz-del-Condor for Condor viewing. Andean condors are massive birds, among the largest in the world that are able to fly. They weight almost 35 lb .
They are mostly scavengers, survive on carcasses. We spent about 50 mins and continued another half hour to Pampas San Miguel where we started our hike. About 3 hours into the trek we had crossed the bridge at the bottom of the canyon. From here it’s another half hour to the first village, San Juan de Chuccho, where we had lunch and a short break. I was not feeling well so was given few cups of coca tea to fight altitude sickness. We’ had continued hiking another 3 hours and passed through the villages of Cosnihua and Malata before arriving at Oasis de Sangalle around 5:30pm where we had dinner and spend the night. Though it was almost evening some guys (including me) plunged into the pool.
I was not very confident of the next day , it was a steep hike to Cabanaconde. Also unlike the group I had to take a 4M bus from Chivoy to Puno , so I decided to arrange a mule locally which costed 60 soles . The group started at 5 but I had the luxury to sleep longer. My mule handler arrived at 7.30 and we started our steep hike. Mules always take the canyon side path , this was a bit nerve wracking because path is made of loose gravel or boulder and I could hear loose stones are displaced with the footsteps of the mules and falling deep in the canyon.
There was some difficulty in locating the group and by the time I reached every body almost finished their breakfast. We had a 2 hour bus ride to the Calera hot springs. The bus stopped at a couple viewpoints for photos along the way. We had about an hour at the thermal baths before we continued to Chivay (10-15 minutes away) for a buffet lunch. From here I took the bus to Puno where the rest of the group continued towards Arequipa.
