Adventure Motorcycle Riding Peru's Huascarán Region
Update 27 (April 2023)
Lima to Piscobamba, Peru
Riding into Lima affirmed my decision to spend Easter there. Coming in, my side of the road was easy going until the last 5km, whereas the exit side was crawling from 50km out. A contrarian approach is always good at Easter.
I should say the whole protest movement had faded by now and I haven’t seen any active evidence since leaving the Puno and Bolivia border area. The Peru Government produces a website to report any incidence. It seems there may still be some events closer to the Ecuador border. Time will tell.
After Easter, I decided to head inland to the mountains again. The coastal highway is a much faster option but it gets a little boring and frankly Peru has some bad litterers, so it is not very appealing to look at a lot of the time.
It took a while but I was away from the coastal dryness and back to the greenery. Laguna Conococha at 4,020 metres above sea level. And it was cold again. Lima was a minimum of 24°C to 29°C, but it was about 10°C and rainy now.
As I rode along a valley I spotted this group of men across the other side. It was quite a way away but I am guessing the landslip had blocked an aqueduct. Given there was a fairly significant river below, maybe this aqueduct picked up better quality water from higher in the mountain, to provide the town’s water supply? But it looked pretty precarious and difficult to resolve to me. See the next image.
I stayed overnight in Monterrey, near Huaraz, where I met a nice Peru/German couple. The next morning I reached Parque Nacional Huascarán. 30 Pen to pass which was fine. Apart from the cows in the park it was a very pristine area. The road follows a valley for a while and then heads higher through a series of switchbacks until Túnel Punta Olímpica, 1,384 metres long and the highest tunnel in the world at 4,735 metres. UPDATE – I think China has beaten it by about 30 metres now. FURTHER UPDATE – I rode through the one in China in May 2024, but the countryside was nowhere near as adventurous and appealing.
I have been following the Andes Mountain Range for several months now. I still find the scale and beauty of the scenery mind boggling.
Through to the other side of the tunnel which starts heading down as soon as you enter it.
The weather was trying to clear, to show me this mountain peak but it wasn’t quite getting there.
I arrived at Piscobamba at around 4:30pm to find the town undergoing some major infrastructure work. The mustard coloured building on the right is the hotel I wanted to stay in. I was the only guest and as you can imagine they were more in construction mode than running a pretty hotel, but I was just glad to have a bed.
The hotel owner had some parking for my motorcycle in the building and wanted to manhandle the bike through a series of steps. But he thought it was a normal local bike and once he saw it, understood the weight and risks involved. As it turned out he also owned the ferreteria (hardware store) and had a storage building about 700 metres down the road.
While this discussion was going on the town was preparing for some type of festive event. I never found out what, but the towns folk in their traditional dress, many with musical instruments were also heading the same direction as my parking. This is the first time since Argentina that I have been referred to as gringo, and it continued over the next few days as I moved further into rural areas. I suppose I am a classic gringo with my blonde hair and tall stature.
A quick snap of some of the locals.
Just like home. A flowering eucalyptus takes centre stage in the town square. There are a lot of eucalyptus in the area and seem so widely spread that you would think they belong there.
Yanque to Camaná to Lima, Peru
Update 26 (April 2023)
Piscobamba to Trujillo, Peru
Update 28 (April 2023)