You nailed that pain in my soul, perhaps to make me surrender, or perhaps to distance me from your altitude, to test the adrenalin experience that Marcahuasi gives us in every trip. I don't know ... maybe I don't write about this experience then that would be to accept the reality that I lived ... and how I lived it in my second trip to the sacred mountain.
I'm not well, I'm not well…!
"How to forget this place, to forget the agony, to remove it from my memory and my soul that afternoon when I felt you leave ..."Everything went well until Chushua (half way between San Pedro de Casta and Marcahuasi) where we stopped to provision ourselves with water, have a brief rest and to eat. But then somebody said "Here is a little wine" and almost everybody responded "we need to drink it then!!!". This drink arrived as if from the Gods to their thirsty guides!
When we continued the hike something strange happened. We started to feel unwell. Alexis, the third guide, very enthusiastic, and supportive specially with the ladies, when we went up, he went ahead a good distance and left his rucksack and came back down for another and another rucksack, and like this he undertook a large part of the hike ...
I decided to be the last in the ascent, so then I was witness to the protests and complaints that are now well known. When they asked me "how much further ?" I only said the same that they said to me "We're close ... just past that next rise ... no more" that and the classic worst lie "almost there!". Lies that made us continue with the real unforgettable pains
The hill continued and never ended, with heavy rucksacks, cutting into our sweating backs, and words of encouragment that had no value. The words now had no effect on these surrendered, tired bodies and then I heard "Hey" "Hey" - Alexis was off the path wanting to vomit, with a smooth paused voice saying "I feel weak, ... I don't know what's happened to me ... I'm ill". At first I thought he was joking, but I encouraged him and we continued the ascent for a while, but the distance between him and I was increasing, as it was also with the rest of the group that was much further ahead.
"The emotions that I lived in Marcahuasi, I try to describe, sometimes with happiness, sometimes with sadness. What crazy passion ..."
I heard my name twice and this call worried me this time. I took off my rucksack and shouted to the group, breaking the eerie silence. "You continue, and I will look after him". I don't know if they replied to me, but with strides I went back down and arrived in front of him, with his head down, pale, with a strange stare, without energy to make another step. "Christ ... you were serious!" I said. He didn't respond and I took his rucksack and water container and took them with my own, and then I returned and gave him lots of encouragement; encouragement that this time had no effect on him. I put his arm on my shoulder and we walked slowly. "I feel bad, I feel bad" he repeated and I stopped to attend to him and put his coat over his shoulders. What I saw was a mixture of fear and desperation. Alexis didn't realise, nor did he feel the blood that stained his nose. It was a confusion that destroyed right down to my soul, I'd never lived moments like that.
Suddendly two travellers reached us and when they saw us they shouted ... "the skinny one is ill, you have to go down". Their words made me more desperate. By now Alexis was like the grey afternoon that surrounded us. To arrive at the amphitheatre was difficult, but it would have been much further to go back to San Pedro de Casta. A casteño that came back down with his mules was my hope, and despite my pleas and what I offered he would not help me, and looking at my friend without stopping he said to me "Grab that herb there and rub it strongly in your hands, and put it on his forehead, his elbows etc so he smells it", and then continued his journey down.
His pale cold, quiet, bloody face made me fear the worst. I took the herbs and rubbed them in my hands, and the herbs sparked ... perhaps they were capable of anything ... anything, so that Alexis spoke a word, and returned to be the man he was an hour earlier. I lifted his tired body and, supported him against a large rock, and wrapped us up with everything we had, prepared to spend the night there ... or death.
"When you say nothing, it is an eternal silence, an emptiness of pain, pain for an eternity ..."
With watery eyes, a sadness, and a silence I separated from him, contemplating the immense hills and the few rays from the sun that still escaped. I don't know if I regretted having come. Initially an impotence grabbed me, cursing everything, until ... I don't know who orated, or asked or implored, that they helped me to get out of this situation. My faith was an avalanche that the night was witness to. My cold tears broke without permission, and a strange force took control of me. A voice broke the silence, pain and fear, fixed on the hills and rocks of Marcahuasi and I said "How can you punish me like this ... I come here in search of your enchantments, not of suffering. Help me, now!!"
"This four-legged ambulance buried the pain that afternoon when it was my turn to live ..."I waited for my tears to dry with the cold, resigned and decided to spend the night and share the agony with my friend, discarding everything else. I protected myself more from the cold and the night that was hiding us, until the body that fought somewhere between life and death, that was asleep and didn't feel it, a voice breaking through the blanket of the night ... "come, come"
I remained immobile, with an amazement. I stored up my words, I wasn't dreaming, it wasn't a lie. I swear to you that he got up without my help. Looking at me, pausing and said to me "I'm feeling better now. Don't prepare anything. Going slow I can get there. Don't worry any more. Everything is passing now.". I looked at him, and listened to him incredulous. I lived a mix of truth and lie, I wanted and didn't want to believe. I thought it was a product of some ending. They were instances of madness. But Alexis was walking slowly, so slowly that I didn't accept the truth. While I put everything back in the rucksack, I couldn't stop thinking ... like the grey night.
Everything that I am living is a miracle? My begging was heard by someone? Is it a question of the hills? What is happening to me? Was it a physical energy, or spiritual, or something else? I'm only sure that something happened, and that experience is mine.
"Those of us that have climbed up to Marcahuasi by the long route know of the pain that this small rise causes!""Now we were left with the final climb to the amphitheatre. This is a steep hill, where the tiredness is extreme, and where the flight of all of the trek charges us dear for this amazing adventure. In truth I feel tired, exhausted .... the cold and the night was over us. I heard something coming and everything changed. I stopped and there were two mules coming back down and their owner came behind. I threw off my rucksack with a shout. It wasn't a request, nor an order. I said. "Hey sir, look at how this man is, if you don't take him up, I will say that it was your fault that he died."
The man stopped ... I don't know if he was shocked or fearful, but he listened to me. I continued giving him orders. "Bring that mule and help my friend up. These rucksacks can go on the other donkey, with the water containers too!"
I don't know if the owner looked at me or at the walking dead, but the first thing he did was put a price for this pain! When the four-legged ambulance left for the final climb, with sadness the owner of the golden-balled donkeys said to me "allow the animals to go slowly sir. They're tired. You cannot hit them".
The response was "Yes, sir", but despite him being against it, what a beating those donkeys got to get us up the final climb quickly. I only wanted to get to the amphitheatre. And we were close, yet dependent on the strength of others. I wanted the final hill to end, and that we see and pass the final archway.
"This is the place where we all desire to arrive and conclude the ascent, here ends our dear path ..."Alexis, despite this experience, returned many times with me. I don't know if he will continue returning. I only know that Marcahuasi made us lived something together; something that we will never forget, and so that I can tell this story. My begging, and appealing were so deep that I woke the Apus and Soctacure. Everything so that you didn't leave
Read the original post (in Spanish)
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Photos : John Ysrael Guevara
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