Spokes and Shoes

Intro Today was a rest day in Oyón, though the word rest is a bit of a misnomer when you’re staring down the barrel of a three-day remote stretch to Huayllay. The sun was out for once, finally drying the paved streets of this mountain town while I pivoted from Read more

Intro I rolled out of Antacallanca just after 9:00 AM today, a start time that felt reasonable until the scale of the Andes reminded me otherwise. The sky was a hard, dominating blue, and the sun felt thin against the gravel tracks that climbed steadily toward the mining outposts. The Read more

Intro The morning in Paracsha was sharp and cold, the kind of air that makes your lungs feel brittle until the sun finally clears the eastern ridges. I started the day on a steep gravel pitch that lasted two kilometers, a blunt reminder that the Andes don’t offer easy starts, Read more

Intro I rolled out of El Tambo at 9:00 AM, my nose still running but my spirits significantly higher than they were during yesterday’s miserable crawl. The plan was to tackle the 10-kilometer climb I’d bailed on when the rain hit, and for once, the gravel under my tires felt Read more

Intro Today was a slow, wet 18-kilometer crawl that felt triple the distance. I rolled out of La Union with a head cold and a sky full of heavy grey clouds that promised a soaking before noon. The initial six-kilometer climb on pavement was a two-and-a-half-hour grind that tested my Read more

Intro I’m still holed up in La Union, where the rhythm of the town is currently dictated by the intermittent showers that slick the paved streets outside my window. My mood is as flat as the heavy grey sky, mostly because my head feels like it’s been packed with damp Read more

Intro I am writing this from a room positioned directly over a hardware store in La Union, where the smell of oil and galvanized steel drifts up through the floorboards. The morning began in the stark, thin air of the Pastoruri Glacier complex, under a sun that felt more like Read more

Intro The day began with a puzzle of physics: hauling seventy pounds of aluminium and gear up a fifteen-meter embankment of greenery to reach the main road. By 7:45 AM, the sun was already a dominant force in the Cordillera Blanca, turning the gravel track into a pale, reflective ribbon. Read more

Intro I rolled out of Huaraz this morning with the kind of clean-chain motivation that only follows a scheduled pause. The pavement was hot and the air surprisingly dry as I swapped city traffic for the long, steady grades leading toward the glacier, feeling the chalky grit of road dust Read more

Intro Huaraz is quiet tonight, save for the occasional bark of a street dog and the distant rumble of a truck on the main drag. Today was a scheduled pause, a day for the legs to recover while the brain wrestled with logistics under a relentless, bright sun. The pavement Read more