In the Colca with Macho and Stinky

In the last month of our big one-year South American journey that lasted three, we discovered one of the nicest little hiking spots : up and down Peru's Colca Canyon. It's erroneously labeled and marketed at the deepest canyon in the world. Even a Google search of "deepest canyon in the world" comes up with Colca Canyon as the top choice. While the real deepest canyons are all in the Himalayas, Colca's still pretty damn deep. And by the way, Colca and those Himalayan canyons are more than twice as deep as our beloved Grand Canyon.

Anyway, we set out in the wee hours one morning from beautiful Arequipa and arrived mid-morning at the edge of the canyon, where condors often surf the thermals. Without signs to guide us and with a crude hand-drawn map in hand, we set out for the canyon's lip, looking for the trail down. We immediately took the wrong path to an amazing viewpoint over a sheer cliff. Not that way.

A pair of black dogs found us at this point and led us away toward what turned out to be the real trail, where we found two Americans and a Czech. Thus the Fellowship of the Colca was formed. The dogs we named Whitey (he had dabs of white on his chest, paws, and tail) and Macho because we verified his sex first. The Americans farmers we named Anne and Caleb, the Czech microbiologist Katerina. And so down down we walked, seven hours that first day, until reaching Yahuar Lodge at the confluence of two rivers (and thus two canyons) and in between the geysers and hot springs. Pretty sweet.

From the bottom, we climbed deeper and upwards into the canyon on the second morning. On the way up, we discovered that Whitey and Macho could sense evil. During a snack break, an elderly indigenous woman weighing about 25 kilos hobbled with her cane toward us. Her eyes met the dogs'. She froze, the dogs snarled and had to be restrained. After she had passed and was a bit down the road, we released the dogs, and they proceeded immediately to attack that little old lady. That little old evil lady. And so it was, the dogs were as friendly as can be towards tourists, recognized by their large backpacks, pale skin, and abundance of teeth. And the dogs viciously attacked and tried to bite every Peruvian they could.

At the other edge of the canyon, we found some pretty impressive waterfalls, but nowhere to sleep for the night. And that whole village stunk like shit. Really. As our fellowship tossed around various theories why a tiny farming village on the far edge of the Colca Canyon would smell like toxic waste, fecal matter, and papaya, someone remarked that the stink was always strongest behind us, no matter which direction we were walking. Even the locals started holding their noses. Whitey, just moments before, had discovered a substance of mythical status among dogs : a mixed-up pile of rotting flesh and caca. And Whitey bathed in it. Within a few short minutes he was able to impregnate his new-found odor into the rocks, the walls, the doors, the clothes of the people. As far as we were concerned, Whitey died that very minute and was replaced by a much less likable dog named Stinky. We were exhausted from the morning's hike but hoping to put some distance between us and Stinky, so we made the decision to walk back down the canyon a bit and then hike another five hours to reach the nearest village.  

In the morning, Caleb, Anne, Pauline and the dogs were beat. They all decided to walk down to the Oasis for an easy last day. Katerina and I were feeling better and so walked up to another charming canyon village, then back down toward the Oasis. The Canyon is dry; it makes you parched and sweaty just looking at it. And from above, the Oasis looks as good as any mirage in any desert. So Katerina and I stumbled down the canyon to the bottom, crossed the bridge, where we saw some springs pouring out of the cliff face. The Oasis was a slice of Ireland in the Southern Peru desert, verdant and inviting. When we arrived, we saw bulging and shady palm trees, grass as soft as carpet with two dogs in a coma, and our friends swimming in a spring-filled pool. Oh yes, welcome to the Oasis.

We gave what food we could spare to those two blacks dogs, but they were really suffering. The hike up especially taxed Stinky, now slightly less stinky. And after an hour and a half of uphill-climbing, Stinky was nowhere to be seen. I waited for him for twenty minutes, calling his name. The other hikers who I met helped me in the search, "Stinky !, Stiinnnnkyyyyy !!!!" But still no Stinky. I left a bowl of water for him on the trail and hoped he could make it that far. The Fellowship with Macho regrouped on top and waited. Just when we were prepared to give up on him and leave, someone caught a whiff. Stiiinnkyyyy !!!