We left Junin an hour later than our usual departing time needing the sun to be a little higher for more warms. Loaded with goodies from the market we hit the road at 9am. Hot in the sun - cold in the shade in thin air...like being on the moon I imagine. After a little bit of gentle climbing the road started following the Rio Mantaro. Our descend was hardly noticeable - the pedaling seemed so easy. When we reached the junction to Tarma the four of us decided unanimously to ditch the little beautiful village in the mountains and keep following the river flow down. (the road to Tarma was visibly winding it's way up again.....). I had no climbing legs at all - at least that is what I felt looking at the road up. The next village La Oroya was labeled the ugliest town in the world by a fellow cyclist who had come through only a few month ago.....Maybe it was worth experiencing? We had seen numerous beautiful village on this trip - but the ugliest is worth a visit we all agreed! Who cares about the village anyways...? The surrounding landscape was - once again- unusual and wondrous. The closer we cycled to La Oroya the more the surrounding limestone looked like it started melting from the top - reminded me a bit of guano (pelican poop on some rocks in the Pacific Ocean).
Not an entirely natural occurrence as we found out later:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La Oroya.
We had lunch there.....but we didn't buy any food - good thing! In wonder and awe we cycled further along the river and before we knew it we had cycled some 140km - the furthest distance in Peru yet- to the town of Jauja. As we kept descending the temperatures started rising - my bike started looking like a laundry line as I kept peeling off the layers.....I am not complaining....sunny, warm and slightly downhill. Slow enough to be able to look around, fast enough not to have to pedal too hard. In one sentence: a dreamy day on the bike!
The last 42km or so to Huancayo was a breeze the next day and here we are: Happy as clams in a warm friendly city with an abundance of food and things to do that does not involve cycling. The little hotel room at a quiet plaza five minute walk to the center of town is so pleasant that it is hard to leave the four tight wall around me. Being exposed to the wide world while cycling I find myself needing to be in a tight small place at times (the tent is really good for that too) and forget about how big our world is. My brain is full of impressions and exposures....I can't take anymore in. This is a place to be "weird" like that - it's OK!
