Put to the Test

However, round the corner the view really opened up…

And, a little further down the valley I found a spot to camp…

Leaning on my experiences of chilly mornings, awaiting the sun to clear nearby mountains, I had checked with the Sunseeker app on my phone the night before and established that the sun wouldn’t clear the mountain until 8am!  So, after a very lengthy night of sleep (~10 hours), I waited until the sun arrived to get up.  It was definitely justified as one of my water bottles had a thick layer of ice on it!  Next followed the usual routine of making coffee, breakfast (mmm, granola from Lima!), washing up and then packing away my multitude of gear – sleeping bag liner, sleeping bag, inflatable pillow, inflatable mattress, cooking pots, stove, food, overnight clothes, bits and pieces, and then finally the tent.  This all has to be re-stowed, in panniers or dry bags, and mounted on the bike.  The whole process takes about an hour to an hour and a half.  It’s a little tedious but it’s the price that you pay for this lifestyle!

Since I was camped next to a stream, I had a plentiful supply of water and decided to wash my cycling mitts (short-fingered gloves), which were well overdue a wash.  This, however, was my major mistake of the day.  It ensured that fate would transpire to dirty my gloves imminently!  The first came in the form of a puncture as I rolled away.  The culprit was a small piece of wire which, I suspect, had probably been embedded in the tire for some time but had only just wormed it’s way into contact with the inner tube.

Tube replaced, I continued on, only to have some slight issues changing gears about 10mins later.  Fortunately, this was a minor issue that just required the realigning of a bolt.  It did, however, require removal of the rear wheel and fiddling about in a pretty mucky/oily area of the bike.  Lo and behold, within an hour of cleaning them, the gloves (and my hands and shorts) were pretty filthy again – so much for that!

I pushed on from 4100m up to about 4700m to Abra Suijo, which offered up the most incredible views…

High on life and altitude, I headed down to and across a relatively flat plain to the lake-side village of Tanta, where I found a hospedaje for the night.  The next day supposedly offered up a tricky 7km single-track section that might require a bit of pushing so I headed off early…

Leaving the lake behind, I followed a stream downhill that gathered in size, becoming the Rio Cañete.  The river disappears underground for 4km through a geological fault but then reappears, its waters incredibly clear.  I had heard that there were potentially some roadworks going on here and it appeared that they had started to bull-doze the single-track section which I mentioned.  They’d managed the first 1km or so but had some tricky work ahead of them.  About 5km of the remaining 6km section was rideable and it turned out to be very beautiful and peaceful… until I had to do some serious pushing, that is!