The Lone Road, Peru

Various circumstances have led to each of us blazing a solitary trail. The road that I pursued led back into the Cordillera Blanca on a seldomly trafficked route that approached a pass that flirted with 5,000 meters. As I rounded and early corner on the mud-caked track lined with sub-alpine vegetation, the glacier that hung at the end of the valley growled with ferocity compared to the complacent bull that stared dumbly at my passing. There appeared to be more life in the crevasses than in the livestock. Movements of such masses of ice and rock are perceived on a macro-scale, sculpting intricate valleys with such patience that they give the illusion of sedation. Cattle, on the other hand, are as empty as their eyes appear.

The climb wore on and the precipitation changed states a few times, disproving the Dutch theory that sneezing three times forecasts good weather. Squinting through splattered sunglasses at an ascending gradient of gray to white, I could imagine the peaks to be as tall as I wanted them to be. Topography be damned, I prefered fantasy. Later, when the stacked switchbacks alternated directions to and from the clouded vista, the cloudcover dissipated, momentarily revealing the cirque in its entirity. Surprises like these are fully appreciated at a pedaled pace. Topography be hallowed, I worshipped these peaks.

As the sun descended, the clouds cast a deceptively warm light onto the frozen landscape. While the light faded, a surge of a different sort grew. Thunder clapped from a great distance, and as it bounced off the canyon walls that drained the cirque, it sounded like canon warfare. The ricocheting rumbles instigated a rockslide that added to the chorus of chaos, and the avalanche gained a variety of aggregate as it tumbled down the precipice. When the last reverberations had been silenced by the growing density of fog, the full-moon revealed another phenomenon. From the northern knife edge came pouring a bank of clouds that resembled the diffusion of dry-ice over a dance-floor. The bank of clouds soon descended upon the cirque, enveloping everything in a churning, white broth.

Before this series of spectacles began, I had discovered a deserted shack tucked next to an eerily blue lake that collected the runoff from a niche in the cirque. Wrapping myself in layers of synthetics, I watched, partially numb, from the bouldered porch. The next morning, from between the cracks of the metal storm-shutters, I could see slivers of daylight reflected off my breath. It took courage to peel myself from the straw-strewn floor within the thick walls of dry-stacked stones, but as I did, my grogginess dissolved with the blinding light of a freshly painted landscape. White was the color of choice, excess was the idea. Snow-days are rare occasions to lounge around, and I couldn´t have asked for a more inspiring setting to cancel my activities. As soon as the stove cooled from one batch of tea, I fired up another, repeating the process more times than was necessary. Stillness prevailed.

The following day presented a similar dilemma, but when calculating my dwindling food cache, consecutive snow-days didn´t compute. The frozen road to Punta Olímpica was glazed with vapor as it sublimated under the morning sun, but as I pedaled the last remaining switchbacks, the track disappeared under a blanket of snow. If keeping my balance at 4,900 meters wasn´t difficult enough, the snow made it next to impossible. So, with moronic humility, I pushed my way through the slice in the rock, postholing through drifts toward the perfectly framed Huascarán, glowing with pride at being the biggest of them all. I, too, beamed with a bit of pride at having maximized the lone road around the Cordillera Blanca.