Annual Palca Hike, October 2016

Possibly due to unfortunate timing (the day after Oktoberfest at Colegio Aleman) or due to the threat of rain, only a small group of brave people showed up for this year’s Palca Hike.

Here is the group at the start of the hike (excluding Raphaela, who took the picture):

As usual, we let the kids go first to find the best route, and identify the hidden mud holes. Here Kamila showed us where NOT to step.

And here we arrived at a dead-end, where the stream had turned into a small lake that was impossible to cross.

The dead-end made the hike considerably more challenging, as we had to climb the tall, muddy walls to get around the lake. Here is Camilo climbing the almost vertical and very unstable river bank.

And here is Lykke in a similar situation.

And Marcelo.

Apparently it was the burning season in this area, because we came by several scorched or burning fields.

Meanwhile, there were dark clouds, thunder and lightning threating with rain, but we just made it back to more level ground before it started, and fortunately we had seen the weather forecast and were well-prepared for a rain shower.

We had lunch below an overhang, which is not the safest place to be during a rain shower, but it was the only dry place.

Due to the small group size and the very agile members, we arrived to Palca already at 1:30 pm, an hour before scheduled pick-up by Osvaldo and Nicky, and the earliest we have ever arrived. While waiting at the main plaza of Palca and considering our transportation options, we saw this boy with four sheep in the trunk of a car.