Yet another part of Peru that seems to have been made for the Instagram generation, Rainbow Mountain is as spectacular in real life as it is on any travel website, but that isn't the reason you should visit.
I couldn't come to the Sacred Valley without seeing the natural phenomenon that is the colourful mountain that not even Joseph could've dreamed about.
I'm not going to lie, part of me thought it was clever PhotoShopping. That I'd get all the way there and see the brown valleys I would've seen climbing the hills of Reading.
There was a feeling of dread as I was picked up at 5am from my hotel. This was the part of my trip I didn't really do any research about, so I had no idea what to expect.
I naively thought the bus would take us pussy tourists to the top, we'll take a few photos and we'll bus down.
As I looked around at the other people piling onto the bus, I realised I was underprepared. Massively!
Everyone was wearing hiking boots, Northern Face jackets and ski goggles. I was wearing my festival Primark raincoat, mock Converse shoes, vest and leggings. The only thing I bought that was mildly suitable was a water bottle and sun cream.
The guide, Miguel, a young lithe Peruvian, addressed the bus. He told us the Rainbow Mountain was 3.2km from the car park and he could walk it for 40 minutes, but he was giving us an hour and a half to do it. He gave us the option of walking back via the Red Valley. Sounds great!
He then warned us of the dangers of altitude sickness and we should buy cacao to combat it, that we shouldn't wander off and that weather conditions are predicted to be treacherous. He threatened us with rain and snow.
My first thoughts were, I'm fucked. I have all the fitness levels of a Londoner in a sedentary job who never does any exercise other than walking to the pub. And the outdoor prowess of Mark Francis from Made In Chelsea. No denying it, I was out of the depth... Er, above my level... [insert being high up while being fucked metaphor].
We stopped off at a little rustic house for breakfast for tea, jam and bread. It was what I needed, having not eaten anything and was about to embark on a Bear Grylls type adventure. I chatted to a Spanish couple who were showing me their photos of Nasca Lines - that's what I should've done, not this cockamamie hike 5,200 metres above sea-level.
Before we started the descent through the Sacred Valley and up the Andes we need to cross a stream. The only way we could get the coach over this stream was for the driver and the locals to lay some timbers across it, get us all off the bus and drive over. No joke. Incan engineering has obviously been diluted over the years.
The bum-squeaking bridge was worth it. As I discovered on my trip, everywhere you go in Peru, you're greeted with the most arresting views of mountain ranges, river valleys and snowy peaks. Truly, Pachamama is the world's greatest architect. See Instagram below.
We pull into the car park. It looks like the Poipet border crossing between Thailand and Cambodia, but without the post-apocalyptic feeling or signs warning against fucking children. It was a row of blue tents housing locals using the tourist trap to sell ponchos and walking sticks.
Luckily, my tour guide had spare walking sticks and snapped one up (not literally, I needed this motherfucker).
Once you got away from the amenities, you're surrounded by the most striking vistas - green, snowy, lakes, rivers and piles of rocks that look like something from Blair Witch. I turned to people in my group and nervously joked "perhaps they're the tombs of people who tried to climb this before".
We walked along and a little boy, no older than 11, who was Miguel's helper, walked along with the group shouting "Groupa Cacoa" in order to keep us all together. This was the sound that gave me the reassurance that I needed. He was there to make sure I didn't die and his voice gave something to follow.
The walk was pretty easy until I got to the section of the path, seen behind me on the photo above that looks like an irregular beat on a heart monitoring machine. Ironically, this is where I thought I wasn't going to make it. The air got thinner and it got more and more difficult to breathe. Oxygen wasn't getting into my muscles and they ached. I started to remember my biology lessons where they talked about anabolic respiration and hitting the wall, I wondered if this was happening to me.
I stopped to look around. To take in the view, more than anything. To have a contemplative moment and connect to the universe. As I looked around, drinking in everything, including what oxygen my lungs could find, I realised I was fairly far ahead from a lot of the people in my group.
It is possible to get a horse and trott up the mountain with a guide walking beside you, but this was all levels of wrong. I couldn't be bothered to haul my fat arse up a mountain, I shouldn't expect a horse to do it for me and certainly not with a local walking alongside. Could anything be more white privilege?!
The final leg was really steep, although very short. Breathing was nearly impossible at this stage.
It became clear that Rainbow Mountain was the second pinnacle I could reach. There was another mountain top passed the spectrum of colour and up. I decided I didn't need to get to that point. I came for the mineralogical marvel, which was well within my reach. I didn't need to be a hero and I had nothing to prove. I got what I came for.
The mountain itself is impressive. The colours are as they are in photos, they're unfiltered and unedited (other than the watermark). And looking over at the Red Valley, you knew where it got its name from. While others decided to push themselves for reasons I will never understand, I stayed at the platform with a couple of food sellers, like-minded hikers and the condors
The views up here are much better than the technicoloured dream rock. Every angle was like looking at a different country.
I sat there, looking out, among the condors and mountain dogs and realise how incredibly fortunate I was. I was lucky to be here and experience this. I proud of myself for making the hike with no preparation and doing better than the "pros".
The sprint down was stupidly easy - for me, at least - the stick was great for pole-vaulting over the little ravines that cut through the path. I was the first one to get back to the bus.
I spoke to a couple, American girl and Brazilian guy, travelling in Peru - her first time leaving America. He was waxing lyrical about how great Bolsinaro is and how capitalism doesn't work. He also assured me that all the Amazon hating was fake news and he was actually undoing his predecessor's eco-terrorism. I politely nodding, not believing one syllabal of this bullshit, but I didn't have the inclination to argue it. So I moved the conversation to the Premier League. He was jealous about me being Chelsea born...?!
The trip home was quiet, most tired and falling asleep, even those who got a horse there and back. But as our muscles were beginning to relax and our eyelids giving into the weight, we stopped at the little house for a proper Peruvian homecooked meal of all the carbs and guacamole.
It was an incredible experience. Full of achievement and something I will never forget.
Originally published 30 September 2019
