Saturday morning, 8:00am Roberto the guide rings the bell. We are more or less ready. Some of us had a short night. We finally take the road for Pico Tunari. Like every day here the sun is heating our fresh mornings. The goal of the day : a more than 5000m high peak near Cochabamba.
After a two hours’ drive, half in the city, half in the endless turns on a rocky road, we can breathe the fresh air of a no man’s land environment. Matt Damon in The Martian is almost a beginner beside us.
Roberto prepared us a sandwich and some drinks for the day. We start our three hours trek by walking by a lake and take some pictures of lamas. What looked like a Sunday walk in Hyde Park is finished… We start now to trek properly. The oxygen is rare and there is no formal way to follow.
Roberto try to guide the first ones and encourage the ones behind. Every once and again a break is needed to recharge the batteries. We don’t have that much air to breathe but the landscape is even more breath-taking.
After few stops we finally reach the top. That sensation to get to the peak and discover the 360° panorama is something which lets you speechless. Two condors even pass over our heads to say hello. We take some selfies to immortalize our achievement of the day.
Even if a headache made its apparition because of the altitude the way down is a piece of cake in comparison with what endured before.
On the way back in the car we saw some lamas again and we literally felt asleep lulled by the Bolivian folkloric music of the radio.
What a day !