Day 2 of our trek was the most demanding by far, because this was the day where we went up and over Punta Union, a pass that tops out at 15,584 ft (4750 m). Starting at our camp at 12,795 ft (3900 m) around 8:45 in the morning, we slowly made our way upwards. The climb the day before was generally mellow, but day 2 had something else in store for us. Not long after breaking camp and setting out, we found ourselves on a narrow rocky trail that threaded its way uphill through plentiful switchbacks. As the trail climbed, the views in front of us improved every second. Huge 19,000+ ft mountains loomed in our sights, and pausing to turn around rewarded us with sweeping panoramas of the valley below and distant mountains on the other side.
We took our time with the ascent, stopping for water and rest relatively often. The higher we went, the more we were battered by a chilly wind, and as we ascended to an exposed ridgeline, we felt it the most. We decided to break to eat lunch and don more layers on the far side of the ridge, where the trail wound into the shelter of large boulders before beginning its final assault on the pass. Just before finding a suitable lunch spot sheltered from the wind, we looked up at a large rock face to our left and found icicles hanging from every ledge. As if we weren't already feeling cold enough, the sight of the ice reminded us of how high up we were, and justified our grumblings about the temperature.
Lunch was, again, bread, cheese, and avocado. By the time we stopped, we were all in a particularly silly mood, fed as much by the food as our relief to be out of the wind. We layered up with more jackets and hats, and since my fingers were freezing, I pulled out a pair of wool socks to cover them, which I promptly turned into sock puppets. Like I said, a silly mood...
Refueled by delicious sandwiches and ready to get over the pass, we continued on our way. Not far above our lunch spot, the trail crossed many huge slabs of rock, and our direction became, in large part, guesswork. We'd identified a notch in the ridgeline above us where we thought we'd find the pass, and so we wove our way over and up rocks towards that gap. At this point, we were all moving pretty slowly, taking a breath for every step or two. Whenever we needed a breather, it was pretty easy to just stop and look up or turn around...the views were still every bit as wonderful as they had been earlier in the day, and in some cases better, because we could see more and farther away. We measured our progress by comparing our height to another pass across the valley we knew to be 100 m lower than ours. Once we determined that we were at least as high as that pass, I felt more encouraged, since our own summit couldn't be far away.
Forrest was the first one to reach the top. He was a good 10 or 15 feet in front of me on the trail when he stopped and took a picture in the direction of the pass. I took this as a good sign, thinking he could see the top of it, and huffed up the last few stone stairs to see it for myself. The pass was a small notch carved in the wall of thick stone atop the ridge, and a sign greeted us at the top, saying that we were now 4750 meters sobre el nivel del mar (above sea level). None of us had ever been that high before, and so cold and windy as it was, we had to take a few minutes to celebrate. We were joined by a solo German hiker, coming from the other direction, who got to the top just a minute after we did. We took pictures for each other, exchanged pleasantries and the typical info about what brought us to Perú, and then he went on his way. Forrest, Travis, and I scrambled up the rock wall of the pass a bit to see what the view was like from the top. Man, was it awesome. Behind us were two 19,000+ foot snowcapped peaks that straddled the ridgeline, and below us were the valley through which we'd come and the one that now awaited us, both dotted with turquoise lagoons. I felt like I was on top of the world.
The only downer at that point was the knowledge that we still had to hike down, which was going to pose a painful problem for me. My right knee had been hurting since day 1, the remnant of a running injury from 3 weeks prior that I wrongly assumed had healed. While climbing up on a trail was generally okay, going down hurt much more because my legs had to bear my weight differently, and every step down with my left foot sent pain shooting up the outside of my right knee as it supported my body. This meant I had to go down slowly, but Forrest was feeling a headache from altitude, we supposed, and so we decided to split up. Travis stayed with me and made sure I made it through the bigger steps while Forrest went ahead to get to lower altitude and set up camp (which was still at 13,780 ft, or 4200 meters, so "lower altitude" was relative). It took me quite a while to get down, and Forrest even came back up to take my pack from me, but we finally all made it to camp right at sunset, around 6 or 6:15.
After a full day of hiking, having covered a lot of ground and been battered by cold wind, we were all pretty tired and hungry, so we got straight to dinner. Quinoa, soy chicken chunks, onions, and peppers lifted our spirits a bit, but it was time for bed soon afterwards. Forrest was the first to turn in, still not feeling in the best of shape, but Travis and I stayed outside of the tent and talked for a bit. As we stood there, we glimpsed a pair of shining eyes from behind a nearby boulder, and watched as a big red fox began circling our camp, looking for food. We chased him away, but he doubled back and tried to steal some morsels again, so we ran him off for a second time. He came back for thirds, but after that he didn't bother us anymore, and he was never lucky enough to make off with any tasty mouthfuls.
The second night of sleep was more restful than the first, partly because we were getting used to sleeping at altitude and partly because we had exhausted ourselves with the day's trek. We awoke in the morning, feeling better, to sunny skies, and relaxed at the thought that all we had left before us was two days of descent (more to come in Part 3).
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