Hiking Nebaj to Todos Santos – Part 3
The day following the Altiplano was somewhat calmer in many ways, but rewarding nonetheless. It was on this day that we made our way into the Cuchumatanes range proper and enjoyed some hiking through some pretty high and beautiful mountains.
In the morning on this day, we awoke at the much more reasonable time of 6 am and walked the rest of the way down to the floor of the ravine that separates the Altiplano from the Cuchumatanes. The river at the bottom has a very high lime content, which gives it a bright blue color and which it deposits on the bed of the stream. These deposits then form cascades and pools in a process that can also be observed in Havasupai in the the USA or Plitvice in Croatia. We stopped for breakfast in this spot, a process that took some 3 hours once everyone had gotten their swimming done.
Afterwards it was an hour or so to get up the other side of the ravine and continue the hike. The day was rather uneventful, and Venla and I found ourselves hiking mostly alone, a half mile behind the "fast group" and a half mile in front of the "slow group". This situation suited us just fine, and we enjoyed the views and sun in privacy.
At the end of the day's hike, we took a pickup for a short but very cold ride to the accommodation for the night, a small town near the base of La Torre, the highest non-volcanic point in Central America, called La Ventosa. Here we stayed with a family of rather well-off potato farmers who let us sleep in the ground floor of their multi-storied house. We had a surprisingly tasty dinner of mashed potatoes with tortillas and another Temascal to clean up, and crashed on the cold, hard floor.
We hope you enjoy the pictures of this uneventful but beautiful day!
