Monday, April 9, 2012

Bike Ride

Peace Corps gives us access to basic Trek mountain bikes, and we a have a bike guru (Ben, Peru 18) here in Ancash that radiates a bicycling enthusiasm that can be very contagious. So one Sunday, a couple weeks ago, I took a 36 mile ride around the mountains near my site, and stopped by my site-mate's house, just to say how tired I was. It was roughly 4-5 hours of climbing, and involved me arriving at the zenith of my climb in the verge of tears, out of food, and without water. Needless to say a small tienda (store) owner in a small town I passed was glad to see me crawl in to buy nearly 20S/. of water and junk food. Judging by the dust on all the items, it was the best day of business she's had in the last decade. Here's some pics:
I woke up to a light dusting of snow in the Cordillera Negra. 

I was hoping to fish here. It looked good on the map, but due to landslide last month, the river was toast. 

Can't fish, might as well keep peddling. 


Headed down the Canon de Pato, but stopped after a few tunnels due to the traffic.

The first tunnel of the Canon de Pato. 


The otherside. 


On the way back up the valley, I caught this guying taking a cable car. 

A high up chacra. 

My stead after the second flat tire (had three in total this day). 

Taking a break on a rock... roughly 1/3rd through my ride. 

A furry buddy joined me at my rock. 

He was tied up, but at least he a had a view. 

Papas/Potatoes (I think) as far as you could see. This was a very well kept chacra. 

It started to rain on my return, luckily I was on the way down. 

This landslide had me a little creeped out, but made me glad I was on the bike and not trusting a combi driver in a hurry.