12.8 mi / 9.9 mph / 162 ft. climbing
Home: Hostal Sol de America

While we’d been happy to have the traditional Peruvian chicken soup for breakfast the last couple times we’d been to restaurants and it had been the only thing on offer, we both prefer something more along the lines of “pan con huevos” (bread and eggs), which is both easier to eat and more-familiar. Yesterday morning following several blocks of our usual search, I had directed us inside the restaurant of a competing hotel (Milan) because its entryway projected a vaguely-cosmopolitan feel, and Rett did an excellent job of communicating/negotiating with the woman inside, getting us something even better than we’d hoped for: one fried egg on bread, and one omelette (a word we hadn’t even heard a Peruvian used before) with sausage on bread, along with our usual “cafe con leche” (coffee with milk, or more commonly, milk with coffee) and fresh-blended papaya juice.

It was so good we returned this morning and ordered the same. Despite us being the only customers both mornings, the cheerful and patient cook/server was put to constant motion, first running out somewhere while we were ready to pay, and then when she returned, she had to immediately run back out somewhere else to get change for us. Sometimes I wish cashiers would ask if I had more-exact change before immediately running off, since I might, and it could make both of our lives easier. I try to guess at what type of establishments would have plenty of cash on hand to make change for S/100 notes (the highest-denominated and most-common note delivered by ATMs), but my guesses are frequently wrong, with tiny bodega clerks frequently being like “yes, of course I can give S/89 in change for that S/100 note”, and then this reasonably-large hotel/restaurant business having difficulty when I give them S/50 for a S/44 bill?

Rett had been ready to spend a third night in Huallanca, to give her body a bit more rest before a big day to Baños. But I presented the idea of instead doing an easy day down to La Unión (which would then ease the ride back up to Baños), and she was willing to get on board with that.

Luckily we only had to do a couple hours worth of riding, because it was a bit of a disaster getting out of town. When we got back from breakfast, the exterior side door to the hotel that we’d been using had been latched closed, and the entry via the ground-level restaurant wasn’t open either. Rett had no luck with the phone number, but eventually I heard someone rustling around the kitchen, and we shouted over the wall to get him to let us in.

Picking up our bikes a block away went smoother, where remembering which door they were behind was the hardest part (my overwhelmed brain hadn’t been paying too much attention on the night I dropped them off after our epic ride); the friendly woman I remembered immediately answered my knock and we soon rolled our bikes back to reunite them with their panniers.

But then when Rett was loading up, her bike fell over, not only bending the steering-lock (which happens every time it falls over), but this time bending the derailleur hanger too (because the rear pannier that normally hits the ground first wasn’t yet attached to protect it). I did a quick tug to make it somewhat straighter, and the shifting still seemed generally ok, which I guess speaks well of the tolerances of the new Shimano CUES system we’re both running. If I hadn’t just special-ordered two new derailleur hangers sent from Tout Terrain in Germany (one currently installed, one spare) when re-outfitting the bikes before South America, it would have been a much bigger deal.

And then I had to pump the tires back up to pavement-pressures, a step we had skipped for the 4000-foot paved downhill coming into Huallanca (which ended up being a decent choice given the sometimes-bumpy pavement and interspersed gravel sections), but I figured now was the time.

Because the road between Huallanca and La Unión, which was bad pavement from 6-year-old reports, and a mess of a construction zone from 2-year-old reports, was now mostly-paved (with the still-unpaved sections being near-pavement-quality), according to recent reports.

It’s a massive, slow-moving project, backed by Chinese investment, but part of the reason I was interested in making the leap to La Unión today was the hope that on this Sunday, construction would be dormant. It was, and even better, there was very little other traffic. Which makes me wonder why they’re building it as the widest road I’ve seen anywhere in Peru! But that helped to make the ride really enjoyable and unlike anything we’ve done in in this country: we could coast and look around at the awesome gorge that the road and the river cut through, without having to worry about traffic, the road surface, or going off the edge.

It was nice to arrive relatively-fresh into La Unión, where we were welcomed at Hostal Sol de America by a young man just as friendly as all the excellent Google Maps reviews reported (changing to a hotel that was both better and cheaper than our Huallanca place was another reason to move). I thought it was great how he was quick to pull up Google Translate just to ensure that his communications were clear to me, though he also spoke simply enough (and knew a few words of English) that I would have gotten by fine without it. We had a blazing hot shower, and the west-facing windows of our room let the afternoon sun heat the space all the way up to 67°F, the warmest room we’ve been in since Eva’s in Huaraz!

After La Unión, while we won’t be entering the National Park again, or crossing the Cordillera Blanca, we’re still continuing the pattern of “a 3 day stretch of remote/few-services riding” that this country seems to require. So we spent much of the afternoon doing our usual walkabout collecting groceries (it would have helped if the town market had been open, but we managed ok anyway). It felt like there were quite a lot of people out in the restaurants eating a Sunday afternoon lunch, but then when we finally picked a place (serving very tasty chicharron), they were waiting for us to finish so they could close up. As good as we’ve gotten at understanding most of the basics in Peru, figuring out when restaurants may be open or closed still involves a lot of guesswork!