✍️✍️ Jobs + Peru Update ✍️✍️ — January 25
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Happy Tuesday folks! Thank you for bearing with me this week. I got back from a truly amazing trek to Maichu Pichu on Sunday, and the team and I hustled yesterday to get the job board updated for today.
I've written about the trek and included some photos below, so do take a read. I can't recommend the trip enough.
We’ll be back in your inboxes later this week. Until then, have yourselves amazing weeks and be sure to reach out if you need anything. 👋
Thought of the Day 🤔
Chasing something that isn't there sets us up for the ultimate disappointment. How does one know if something isn't there? That's decided before the chase even starts.
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Conquering Maichu Picchu ⛰
We’ll start in Cusco, the birthplace of Túpac Amaru II and where most treks to Maichu Picchu begin. Being located 3,399m/11,152ft above sea level (asl) brings with it serious altitude sickness, a pounding headache and subtle dehydration and leads to a constant quench for water.
The locals use coca to assuage those ailments, mostly in the form of tea, candy or raw leaves, which are the base ingredient for cocaine. Coca leaves have been chewed by Peru’s Indigenous peoples for as long as time, and is a mild stimulant that’s comparable to a couple cups of coffee. And man did it help. After two days of feeling like crap, the sickness finally subsided on the first day of the trek.
Cusco’s famous San Pedro Market
This old-school job board gave me some ideas…
Organized trips like these absolutely love early starts, which meant I was picked up at a chilly 4am having barely slept — Cusco might be the original City That Never Sleeps. Our first stop was the teeny town of Mollepatta, where I first discovered that I’d be lucky to find a toilet that had a seat or paper, if it wasn’t just a hole in the ground. Having just recovered from a gnarly bout of food poisoning and diarrhea, you can only imagine what that did to my anxiety. Two poops later, we were off to begin the first of 87km/64m that would kick our asses over the following days.
Perhaps the hardest thing my heart and lungs have ever endured was the one-mile hike up Humantay Mountain. I consider myself to be a pretty fit young lad, but I’ve never experienced such an assault to my internal organs. Each time I stopped to try to catch my breath, it felt like my heart and head were about to implode.
About an hour later, we eventually made it to Humantay Lagoon. And boy was it worth it…
Next up was another beating for my poor organs. On the second day we snaked our way up to the highest point of our trek, which took us to an insane 4,600m/15,000ft asl. Luck was unfortunately not with us, so our view of Salkantay Mountain and Humantay Mountain was absent. Either way, here’s one of me holding on for dear life…
After four days of hard trekking and breathtaking sights, we finally made it to our final destination. It’s a strange feeling finally ticking one of your bucket list items, and one that’s incredibly difficult to describe.
There was of course the sense of achievement after walking so damn much, with almost every muscle hurting for evidence. But looking down on Maichu Picchu and seeing what I’d seen countless times through secondary images for myself, really was an out-of-body experience.
Say hello to my little friend…
Having spent almost a month in Peru, I’d learned to expect the unexpected, and the fun wasn’t over…
January is part of Peru’s rainy season, which pretty much means anything can happen as it pertains to the natural elements. That includes landslides, and as we arrived back to Aguas Calientes — the small town at the base of Maichu Picchu — we were greeted with bad news.
A devastating amount of mud had forced its way down one of the main roads in and out of the town, and completely covered a large part of the train track in the process. All trains back to Cusco have been suspended until Thursday, which meant we were back on our feet for a short 11km/7m trek to the nearest bus station, before a seriously-unwanted eight-hour bus ride back to civilization.
Right now I’m back in Lima to catch my breath and enjoy the gorgeous coastline, before I fly to Argentina tomorrow. I’m going to do my best to have something prepared for Friday. Hope you enjoyed today’s update and we’ll speak again soon! 👋
Video: Landslide hits Maichu Picchu