Ancash Adventures

July 28^th is Peruvian Independence Day and volunteers get to take 4 free vacation days. I felt kind of guilty going on vacation when I only have been in my new town for 2 weeks, but I also really wanted to get out of Cajamarca for a while. A couple other volunteers planned the whole vacation to a department called Ancash. Ancash is internationally known amongst big time hikers and moutain climbers. The capital city of Ancash; Huaraz, is a pretty touristy place. We wanted to come for a visit to eat delicious food and try to do a little hiking. We have been talking about the bagels and micro brewery beer for months amongst ourselves in Cajamarca. (bagels are really hard to find and there is a cafe in Huaraz known amongst the volunteers for it's awesome breakfast food-especially bagels)

It is a long trip between Cajamarca and Ancash. First I had to get myself to Cajamarca city which took about 6 hours of bus rides. Next I took an overnight bus between Cajamarca and Trujillo; a bigger city on the coast. The following day I had another night bus to catch between Trujillo and Huaraz, but it left me with a day of waiting around by myself in Trujillo. Trujillo is a big city and I don't know it too well, but I found out that the grocery store in Trujillo sells green tabasco sauce, Heinz ketchup, and Snyder's brand pretzels. I was super excited to eat a big mac at the McDonalds-I hadn't eaten McDonalds since last year before I left the states. Peruvian McDonalds unfortunately does not have a dollar menu, but along with ketchup and mustard you can also serve yourself aji or peruvian hot sauce on your burger or you can have an Inka Cola instead of a Coke for your drink.

Thursday I finally made it to my destination Huaraz, Ancash. I met up with 4 other volunteer friends; Ellie and Jennifer also from Cajamarca, Allison a U of M grad too who lives in a department called Piura, and Julianne who lives in Lambayaque. The first thing we did after we put our things down at the hostel was to go eat bagels and drink good coffee. We spent the rest of the day walking around Huaraz and planning which hike to go on. We ate delicious Indian food-I know can you believe it Indian food in Peru!

On the second day in Huaraz we woke up at 5am to catch a combe; which is sort of like a extra large van that serves as the main form of public transportation, out to the national park where the girls had picked a hike. The hike was to a glacial lake called laguna 69, and it was supposed to be about 3 hours from the trailhead. The driver we had hired to drive us up to the park from the main highway where the combe let us off told us that we needed to meet him back at the trailhead at 3pm because he said the park would close at 3:30.

I'm not an experienced hiker, none of us are. The altitude got to us fast. The views were amazing and we were so determined to get to the lagoon. We started out the hike with a young Czech couple, but they passed us pretty early on. The directions we received from the driver were that after the first little lake it would only be about a half an hour until the big lake. So when we reached the first lake exhausted and freezing we just kept walking. The trouble was that the trail was pretty much unmarked after that and we were starting to run low on time.

So the sad part is that we did not make it up to the laguna 69, because we were starting to get worried about missing our car out of the park. Plus, we were exhausted and the trail was unmarked so we weren't even sure if we were climbing the right trail. We went back to the little lake to eat a packed bologna and cheese sandwiches. It snowed while we ate.

I got it in my head before we went to Ancash that I wanted to do a naked lake jump. It's something that a lot of volunteers do and I thought I should do it since I probably won't have another chance to jump in a glacial lake. It was very cold and I didn't really jump in. It was more of a fast dunk during which I shouted curse words. I cut my foot on something in the lake, but I didn't notice until we got back to our hostel. I must have been too cold to feel it very much. When we got back my sock was full of blood.

On our third day we went out to visit 2 other volunteers that live in Ancash. Their site was beautiful. We cooked lentil burgers and sweet potato fries on Katie and Ben's cocina mejorada or improved cook stove. It was so nice to see them. Katie and Ben are a married couple. Katie is a health volunteer and Ben is an environment volunteer. Their home was so cozy and nice. They are so happy and that made me feel good.

And that was the last day of vacation. After that Ellie, Jennifer, and I did the 2 days of overnight bus back to Cajamarca. In Trujillo we met up with another volunteer Christina and we all went to see the new Batman movie at the theater, and it was IN ENGLISH!!!!! We also walked around the stores in the mall and it felt like we were in the states a little bit. Especially, this one store called Sodimac which is bascially Peruvian Lowes or Home Depot.

The rest of the week was mostly uneventful so I'll just include highlights. My new host brother Sergio turned 12 and we had a really nice family lunch. He and I made a banana bread for a cake, but he also had some cake that his mom bought from a bakery. He also got a new puppy for his birthday. It is the tiniest dog I have ever seen. I worry she is too little to be away from her momma yet, but they assure me she'll be fine. Her name is Lulu and she is so little she doesn't even know how to eat food yet. Most of the roof guinea pigs that my host family raises are bigger than her.

Diamond and I got our first real assignment. We planned and gave a very successful training session for local health promoters. The topics were good communication, how to plan a class or training session, and how to do a good house visit. In Peru home visits are emphasized for more rural communities, but the health posts are often too overwhelmed with patients to go out and do door to door promotion. Local volunteers are supposed to get trained and help work as an extension of the health post, but it doesn't usually work that way. In my previous community the health post would claim a list of names as trained health promoters and gather the money from the ministry of health to fund the program. However, those people didn't actually attend any trainings or do any health promotion. It was just a way for the health workers to get a little extra money for parties or buying lunch.

I finished up all my secondary medical school applications, except for Wayne State I'm still waiting on them to send me theirs. I am so lucky to have my amazing Mom, Dad, and friends Carol, Laura, and Diamond who helped me proof read all the essays. I really appreciate all the help.

Also Diamond and I went to Conchon to visit Ellie to inaugurate her new gas cook stove. We ate sweet potatoes and tea for dinner. And I learned how to make a fishtail braid on Ellie. It was a good 2 weeks.

Chau for now,

kb

the pictures are a little out of order...

Dinner at the Indian food restaurant Chili Heaven

views during the hike

Host sister Yossy and brother Sergio at the family birthday lunch

Lulu the world's smallest dog

Lulu meeting a baby guinea pig

Diamond and I at our first real charla or talk

preping for the lake jump

lake jump surprise

Jennifer said that this donkey stunk

Jennifer and I rode the whole way up to the national park in the trunk of this guy's car to save a couple soles.  Boy was that an uncomfortable ride.  The road was really bad and one point the driver even had to pull over to change a popped tire.

visiting Katie and Ben in Shirapucru