Intro
I’m writing this from a wooden table in a house that isn’t mine, while the wind rattles the window frames of Ayaracra. The day started at 4,600 meters with a layer of frost so thick it looked like the world had been dipped in sugar, and it ended in a village where the only light comes from whatever the sun managed to trap in a few solar panels. The gravel today was loose, the air was thin, and my legs are currently vibrating from the effort of 46 kilometers that felt like 100.
The Ice and the Horns
- The morning was a lesson in thermal physics. I woke up at 4,600 meters inside a tent coated in a fur of white ice crystals. It was 6:30 AM, and even inside my sleeping bag with my heavy jacket on, the cold felt like it was searching for a gap in the fabric. Breakfast was a logistical challenge. I had to shove a squeeze-bag of peanut butter between my legs for twenty minutes just to get it soft enough to spread on a rice waffle. I sat there in the silence, waiting for the sun to crest the ridge at 7:30 and melt the frost off the flysheet. I didn’t roll out until 10:15, mostly because I was stalling, waiting for the canvas to dry and my joints to stop clicking.
- The first four kilometers were a brutal introduction to the Jatunchacua Pass. It was only a 200-meter vertical gain, but the road was a mess of loose, shifting gravel that made the rear wheel spin out every time I stood up. Halfway up, I had to stop for a different reason: two bulls were locked in a head-to-head fight right on the edge of the track. I watched them for fifteen minutes, the sound of their horns clashing echoing off the rock walls, before they finally tumbled down the slope and let me pass. When I finally hit the summit at 4,800 meters, I pulled out the orange sponge cake I’d been carrying from Oyón. The artificial scent of citrus was the only thing I could smell besides my own dusty base layers, and eating it in that thin air felt like a genuine victory.
Ten Gates and a Drainage Ditch
- The descent into the valley was ten kilometers of fast, vibrating gravel that led me to a small schoolhouse. I stopped there at 1:30 PM to assemble some avocado wraps. A local man working on the drainage system sat with me, and we talked about the road ahead while I chewed. He was the first person I’d seen in hours. He confirmed what I already suspected: the ‘easy’ terrain promised by the map was a hallucination. My lungs were still heavy, and the ice crystals from the morning felt like a distant, frozen memory compared to the dry heat of the midday sun.
- The afternoon became a repetitive cycle of gates. I counted ten that I had to physically unlatch, drag open, and close behind me to keep the livestock in check. Another twenty were luckily propped open, but the stop-and-start rhythm killed any momentum I had. The road wound through high pastures where herds of vicuñas watched me with total indifference. Even though the elevation gain was technically minor, doing anything at 4,400 meters feels like breathing through a straw. The wind picked up, blowing cold and steady across the flats, and by 4:30 PM, it was clear I wasn’t going to make it to the rock forest at Huayllay. I adjusted my sights on Ayaracra, a tiny speck on the map near the shore of Laguna Punrun.
The Dark Shore of Punrun
- The final fifteen kilometers along the lagoon were a slow burn. The sun began to dip, turning the water into a sheet of hammered silver and then a deep, bruised purple. It was beautiful, sure, but I was too hungry to appreciate the aesthetics; I was daydreaming about that orange sponge cake and how quickly it had disappeared. I rolled into Ayaracra in total darkness. There are no streetlights here; the village is a collection of houses scattered along the road, powered entirely by small solar panels that had long since given up their charge for the day.
- I found a building with a ‘Bodegita’ sign, but the door was locked tight. Two doors down, a faint yellow glow spilled through a glass pane. I knocked, and an elderly woman opened it. When I asked about a place to sleep, she called for her husband, Pedro. He didn’t hesitate. He led me up a small hill to a vacant, furnished house he owned. It was rustic—the bathroom looked like it hadn’t seen a bucket of water in a decade—but it was solid stone and out of the wind. Pedro returned a few minutes later with a steaming thermos of hot water. The sound of the water hitting my metal mug was the best thing I heard all day. I sat at the small dining table, stirring angel hair pasta and fish into a pot, listening to the absolute silence of a village without a power grid.
Overnight
I stayed in a vacant house provided by Pedro and his wife in Ayaracra. It offered a solid roof, a table to cook on, and a break from the wind, proving that a wooden floor is better than a tent when the temperature drops below freezing. The steaming thermos of water he provided saved my gas and my mood.
Reflection
At 4,400 meters, any claim of ‘flat’ terrain is a lie told by someone looking at a map from sea level.
Route summary
- Date: 2026-05-17
- Distance: 46.77 km
- Elevation gain: 514 m
- Elevation loss: 818 m
- Duration: 9 h 19 min
- Time in Motion: 4 h 41 min
- Average Speed: 10.0 km/h