The Way Inn Eco Lodge - Huaraz

So after our first achievement of mountaineering we decided that a few rest days in the national park at an eco lodge retreat were in order.

The eco lodge sits out near a very small village half and hour by taxi from Huararz called Pitec. The lodge is situated at 3700 meters and isolated on the side of the mountain, there is no permanent electricity or internet, and no escape.......

The lodge is owned by an English guy and his mother, he set the lodge up 10 years ago and it is doing very well. They provide 3 course meals in the evenings from a great chef and the food was amazing, some real authentic English home cooking!!!

We decided that we would stay in the dormitory to try to save a little money, at 35 Soles the dorm beds are around £8 each which includes a good breakfast. The dormitory itself is called the cave!! It's made part from a large boulder and part built which gives the effect of a cave, its amazing! You get big warm down duvets that keep you toasty warm all night.

From the lodge you can complete several day hikes around the area (when I said rest days I meant not multi day treks......day hikes don't count....)

On our first day we decided to walk up the Coujp valley, a glacial valley littered with giant boulders that the glacier has left in its wake.

Can you see James on top of the rock????

In the evenings at the lodge we were treated to spectacular light shows in the sky, again these sunset shots are not doctored or use any filters it was amazing!

Our second day at the lodge saw us re-trace our steps to the valley that was our base camp for the summit trip. The walk is an all day walk of some 10 hours. With it being winter there are not really 10 hours of day light, so once you have breakfast and leave by around 9 its hard going, So we left knowing that we may not make it all the way to the glacial lake.

In the end we didnt make it to the glacial lake, however walking along the river from the lake was equally beautiful.

We had a 3 hour walk back to 'The Way Inn' from this valley, and looking at the sky we felt for the first time in almost two weeks we were going to see rain......

Yes we were right; hail and rain poured down on us as we ran the last 10 minutes back to the lodge. Thank goodness we turned round when we did!!

We were lucky enough to meet some great people in the lodge, it seems to be the type of place that similar people go to stay, so finding people you get on with is natural.

We met a couple from Norway, Ingunn and Anders who were at the end of a 8 month trip and on their way back to Norway.

Beth a girl from Colchester who had been in Central and South America for 9 months.

A Canadian couple who had been travelling South America for 10 months in search of a new home. They had so much useful information for us it was unbelievable!

Last but not least a couple called Simon and Katlin, Simon from London and Katlin from the USA.

We decided that on our final day at the lodge that we, along with Simon and Katlin would walk to Lake Churrup. It's 'another' glacial lake at 4450 meters (we never get bored of them). The walk should take between 4 - 6 hours with an 800 meter ascent.

The start of the walk to the Lake- it's over the top of this 'hill' at 4450m.

We set off early to beat the strong Andean sun, the walk is almost all incline to the lake with very little flat. Towards the end of the walk is a very steep rock section that sees some fairly easy put precarious climbing with wires.

Once at the top you are delivered views of Lake Churrup and Mount Churrup.

We stopped here for a spot of lunch and the customary photos!

The way back down the mounatin includes abseiling your self back down the wires which was actually quite fun!!

On the return journey views out over the Cordillera Negra are your vista.

Just before returning to the lodge one last look to see where we came from.

This more or less wrapped up our time in the lodge, however we are hoping to meet up with several of the people we met here in Southern Peru and Bolivia.

The Andes really are a special place and anyone who visits South America without spending time in this place is missing out. I have never seen beauty and grandeur on this scale anywhere else in the world. We have spent over 2 weeks here in Huaraz and its not barely been enough to scratch the surface! This place holds a special place in our hearts.

We headed back to Huaraz on the 4 th day with 2 days "real" rest (well we did go to the gym??) until our next summit expedition, YES our next summit expedition! We have decided that once was not enough so we have booked on to summit another mountain. 

Mount Pisco stands at 5756 meters above sea level so a new record and new challenge!! 

As I said Onwards and Upwards!!!