Welcome Home...

One of the nicest treats of our trip was staying in charming and cozy lodges along the way.

After a long day of hiking, we can think of few things better than being welcomed into a quaint retreat by friendly staff offering hot beverages, a warm hand towel and a roaring fire.

The Mountain Lodges of Peru are not open to the general public, and can only be booked through tour groups, often a year in advance.

The lodges themselves are small and can often only accommodate one tour group per day, which offers complete relaxation.  

Each lodge has a comfortable sitting area where we would meet before dinner to go over the itinerary for the next day or watch some of the videos that Pepe and Manolo had made with the BBC etc. about Peru and the Amazon.  If we had some additional free time, we would sneak away to the hot tub to enjoy a quick soak and watch the sunset before dinner.

The lodges also all have a long communal dining table where the group sits down for dinner together.  It is hard to believe but we actually gained weight during our trip, in large part because of the hearty meals we enjoyed several times a day.  Lunch and dinner were each three courses and the wonderful chefs who traveled with us did a superb job at accommodating for our diverse dietary restrictions while introducing us to local dishes.

Manolo and Pepe also introduced us to local beverages with a tutorial on Pisco Sours and Jugo Especiale, a popular breakfast drink which included bananas, condensed milk and the delicious local beer, Cusquena Negra.

Manolo also showed us the true local eating habits, drinking lots of Inka Cola (a incredibly bright yellow soda that tasted like bubble gum) and pairing seemingly every meal with a generous dose of mayonnaise.

After dinner, we would tiredly crawl into bed, being warmed by the delightful hot water bottle that had secretly been placed there.  Pure joy.

The sunset as viewed from our bedroom window

Our lodges included:

• Salkantay Lodge and Adventure Resort at Soraypampa (11,800’) with views of Salkantay Mountain (translated as "She who will not be tamed") 
• Wayra Lodge (12,000’) in a vast alpine valley with views of both the mountain peaks and the valley
• Colpa Lodge (10,300’) located 1,000 feet above the confluence of three rivers 
• Lucma Lodge (6,600’) built right into the mountainside and offering views of the local coffee plantations

The amazing horses who carried all of our bags