Don't look down (part II)

It is later. Maybe minutes, maybe hours, but dusk is beginning to fall. I am shifting myself down a channel of grey slate, one stone at a time. Elkin said I would be able to walk it, but I can't because it's too steep. My butt and my legs are grazed and bleeding, and my progress is beyond slow. I don't know where Amanda and Dave are, because I can't see them anymore, and I hope they're OK, and I worry for them because they both have kids.

How to channel anger

I feel anger well up inside me, and I hold onto it because it will drive me forward and get me down this godforsaken slope. In my head I compose an email of polite, yet firm complaint, and I'm surprised at how detached I can be from the situation when I'm thinking of what I'll say about it after. I think about this blog, and what I will be writing. That today is one of the worst days of my life. That I would probably take a day of rock bottom depression over this.

As the anger builds, I say my thoughts out loud to the slate as it moves and slips under me. Fuck you, Elkin, for putting me here. For putting Amanda and Dave here. For making a really, really dumb decision. And fuck you, Mount Veronica. I don't believe in God, and I don't believe in you. So if you don't mind, I'll have those coca leaves back and you can do one. I believe in me, and I will reach the bottom of this goddamn mountain if it's the last thing I do. But it won't be, because I'm stronger than that and I'm buggered if this is going to defeat me.

A large rock clatters down the slope and misses my head by about a foot. Fabulous. I have to put up with flying rocks now too? Don't you bloody dare.

Mind, you better do something bloody good with that cash I raised. Because this is for the others. This is for the people whose families and friends don't understand, for the people who thought that the way out was at the bottom of a bottle, for the people who think they might not be worthy of their lives. And I can take this hellish slope if it means just one of those people can feel better.

And finally, to the people who didn't sponsor me because they thought I was just going on a jolly, fuck you too. I'd like to see you go through this, and hold it together the way I am. Because if there is anything to learn from this, it's that I am a freaking badass.

Girl, alone

To my left, Joel appears, holding out a hand to pull me up out of the channel. I grip it and tentatively follow in his footsteps. It is almost dark now, and we are picking our way around the mountain by the light of a pocket torch. He stops intermittently to blow a whistle and flash the light into the valley, from where faint shouts are reaching us. He got help.

We get to a path, and he stops facing the valley. After a few more minutes of the whistle and some shouting, he hands me the torch and tells me to wait. I shine the light in the direction he tells me, and he disappears into the night. It's cold now, and I can't see much except for the lights of the houses down below. I want to be there with some soup and a blanket. In a burst of childlike longing, I want my mum.

Joel does not come back. The torch beams in the valley weave about, and one disappears. The other is moving far off to my left, heading (so I think) for Amanda and Dave.

Don't leave me. Please don't forget me. I'm here. Please... The tears come. I'm scared now, scared of being stuck here on my own all night with no protection from the cold, no water and no food. I don't want to be out here alone. Please find me. Please find me.

Superman wears a poncho

It must be 20 minutes later when Agustin appears. He approaches shyly, asks where Elkin is. I don't even know how to say, 'I don't know' in Spanish, so I just shrug and hold out my hands. He heads off up the path and the fear that I'm being left alone again floods over me. But he's back in a couple of minutes, and shoulders Joel's pack, which has been left behind. Then he takes my hand and leads me back the way he has come.

From the moment we set off to the moment we arrive in camp, he has my hand firmly in his, bracing his forearm against mine to guide me along. We hold branches for each other, exchange awkward smiles in the dark, and inside I am close to worshipping him. Forget Henry Cavill. Forget lyrca and capes, and wearing your pants over your leggings. Superman is a chef and wears a poncho. Sweet, shy Agustin who has barely said three words together all trip, is now a giant as far as I'm concerned. Between watching my step and avoiding further scratches from scrubby bushes, I contemplate asking him to marry me when we get to camp. I will make it to camp.

Twelve hours after setting off that morning, we arrive at my tent. I am suddenly exhausted. I put my bag down and throw my arms around his slight frame. Gracias. Muchas gracias. He brings me a bowl of soup that I savour despite my tiredness, partly for its flavour and partly for its warmth, and I climb into bed. For a while I lay, straining my ears for the voices of my companions, but sleep takes me and I know nothing until the following morning.

Don't look down (part I)

Marcus Aurelius is credited with saying,  "Look well into thyself; there is a source of strength which will always spring up if thou wilt always look there." Although I didn't think of it at the time, I would apply these words to the third day of our trek. 

It begins well: we wake up to one of the most beautiful sunrises I will ever see. After breakfast, we stand together watching the light play and the clouds shift across the Veronica glacier, enjoying the peace of the early morning. There are times when total isolation is a comfort, when it's a relief to know that your frenetic everyday world cannot touch you. This is one of them. There is no phone signal. There is no-one but us. Only a handful of Europeans have ever stood on this spot and allowed this view to administer its healing balm to their aching souls. Now, we are among them.

To the sun gate

We set off at seven and are walking for three hours or so before hunger gets the best of us. By now we've realised that timing goes out the window when you're trekking. If you're hungry, you eat, whether it's usually considered an acceptable time for lunch or not. We sit on a rock looking down at the sun gate and nibble on sandwiches and fruit. Dave seems to be the only one for whom altitude has had no effect on appetite. I pick, eating slowly and saving half my food for later.

This sun gate is not the one that faces Machu Picchu. That one, Elkin explains, is not a 'true' sun gate, as it faces the abandoned city, rather than facing east towards the rising sun. The one that we are heading to frames the Inca goddess, Mount Veronica. The path to the sun gate (or Inti Punku in Quechua) is probably the flattest one we encounter during the whole trek. Reaching the gate itself is another moment where a sense of achievement is mixed with wonder, and the last point at which all three of us feel entirely positive.

The way down

It's after this that things go south. Instead of taking the clear path back from the sun gate and down to the town, Elkin instead leads us across the side of the mountain where there is no real path. To say that we are careful not to look down would be an understatement; we are practically pressing our bodies into the rock wherever possible and fixing our eyes firmly ahead.

Instead of being a ten minute ordeal, the descent turns into an eight hour nightmare as we shuffle and falter and curse our way down an incredibly steep mountain that has no path. There is no room in my brain for fear as I negotiate the slippy ground and sharp rocks, holding tight to a hand when it is offered and otherwise hoping my poles will see me through. My mind and muscles are entirely focused on inching myself down the slope. 

Before long I am out in front of Dave and Amanda, purely, I think, through my eagerness to get off the mountain. The sun is thudding onto my neck, my arms, my face. My toes, pressed against my boots because of the angle, are throbbing dully with every step.

At around 3pm I run out of water. I am sat now, resting for a moment and reapplying sunscreen before I can continue. Suddenly a shout goes up: "Condor, condor, condor!" I look up to see three magnificent birds silhouetted against the deep blue of the sky, wheeling and gliding on the thermals. One approaches, flying close enough for me to see his white collar. For precious seconds I forget my sore feet, my aching legs, my hot skin as I make sure this sight is etched onto my memory. I have seen real, wild condors. It crosses my mind that there are three birds, and three travellers, and I hope it's a sign that we will all arrive safely in camp before too long. 

It's a relief when, at around 4pm, the sun begins to sink behind a mountain, offering some shade. No matter how far I seem to descend, the valley looks a long way off, and I'm beginning to wonder if any of us will make it before nightfall, but I press on, my optimism hanging on with gritted teeth and broken nails, unaware, as yet, that the worst is still to come.

The summit

We're woken at 5am with coca tea and a bowl of washing water. It's still dark and removing myself from the snug warmth of my sleeping bag feels like a terrible idea, so I stay bundled up, clutching my mug and sipping until I can face the dash to remove my thermals and don my trekking gear.

Gradually, sunlight slides over the mountains around us, casting an orange glow on the land. Over breakfast, we watch with anticipation it advances over the valley floor to our little table, and bask in the early morning heat when it reaches us. To our right is a little school, painted in bright red and attended by children from miles around - we are far from any village here - and behind us is the path we are due to take this morning, a track that climbs around the mountain and up to the highest point of the trek.

An encounter

We start out around 7am, immediately climbing and before long we're looking down on our campsite, hundreds of metres below. After an hour or two we run into the only people we will meet that day - a mother and her two children who are shepherds on this land. As we are battling the altitude, our lungs heaving with the unfamiliar strain, the two kids run around with no problem at all, leaving us with a mixture of admiration and shame at our apparent lack of fitness.

We ask the mother for permission to give our snacks - oranges and chocolate - to the children, who accept graciously and allow us to take their pictures. It is a moment I will not forget; a moment of pure, innocent humanity, out here beyond nowhere with nothing but the forbidding Andes to bear witness to our shy exchange of smiles and broken Spanish. I think of them still, am torn between feeling lucky to live in Europe and have so much, and a lonely kind of envy at their uncomplicated lifestyle and a fortune richer than any I could earn: waking up each morning to the untamed beauty of those mountains.

An offering to the goddess

As we approach the summit across a track of red sand, we stop to wait for the team and horses to catch up. This is a moment we want to share, and it's made all the more special by the joy of the Peruvians as we reach the top. It isn't just the three of us who are delighted to have reached this beautiful spot; the mule drivers and guides are excited too because it's a journey they seldom get to do, and rewards us with incredible views not only of the way we've come (we can see right to the mid morning stop on the previous day's trek), but also of the Veronica Glacier.

It's here that Elkin grants us an extraordinary privilege. Beside us on the ground are little piles of rocks that are, he says, where offerings to the gods are left. We each take a pinch of coca leaves from the tub he's carrying and he shows us how to offer them to Mount Veronica in exchange for safe passage across her lands. I am not religious, but in the shadow of this imposing example of Nature's power, it's easy to see why the Inca turned to her as an object of reverence and looked to her for protection. It's an undeniably special and spiritual moment that I am grateful to have experienced.

We slip our coca leaves between the stones and take another pinch to chew before beginning the descent. It's here that my camera runs out of battery, and I content myself with simply looking at the curves and edges of the scenery. An hour or so from camp we come across the bones of what I think is a sheep, stripped bare by scavengers and bleached in the sun. It's a reminder of the fact that here, life and death exist side by side, always cycling through one another.

Tonight, we camp in view of the glacier, on probably the flattest piece of land we've seen all day. It seems the sun has got to me: I'm feeling headachey and my stomach isn't happy. Nevertheless, I eat to keep my strength up and we are all asleep by 7.30pm.