Hiking, Chasing Dogs & Our Last Service in Huánuco

Orgullio and I with the Incan Crown. 

My friends, Katrina and I have had our last church service in Huánuco. Thursday we fly back to Callao and fate will decide if we ever see our Huanucenan friends again. Let’s recap.

In true Huanuco style, this week began and concluded with a few hikes. Monday we loaded up in a collectivo (shared taxi) and headed to Corona del Inca (the Incan Crown) with Orgullo, Victor and Olinda. The Incan Crown isn’t ruins, it’s actually just a collection of giant rocks in the shape of a crown. We crawled in and out of all of the rocks, taking sporadic jumping pictures along the way and taking turns falling down on the way back. After the crown, we went had a little Picante de Cuy (guinea pig) for lunch, then headed home.

Katrina, Eynor and I gettin' our Bingo on. 

Wednesday was our next big day, starting out with a trip to the pool with Eynor. Unfortunately, Eynor’s favorite pool was closed, so we had to go to the awkward pool that’s inside of a bar. This means that you flop around in the water and creepy men in a corner drink beer and watch you. Fun, right?

Anyway, after our pool show, we showered up and got ready for the Unheval Anniversary Celebration. Unheval is the school that Eynor attends and where Orlando teaches and apparently its anniversary is a big deal, since the students got three days off school to celebrate it. After sharing some coffee and fantastic tamales with Orlando, we headed down to Unheval to watch dances the students had prepared.

Guinea pig anyone? 

We showed up in time to watch 4^th – 11^th grade perform their dances. A majority of the classes chose to perform dances from the jungle and were decked out in face paint and grass skirt. A few groups chose to pefrom dances from the mountains and a few chose the ever popular dance of the “negritos.” After the dances, we treated ourselves to some less than healthy food from street vendors and prepared for the main event: BINGO! I’m not sure why, Peruvian Bingo is a little different; instead of making a line across the board, you form a letter out of your bingo markers. For example, one round you had to make the letter C around the edges of the Bingo board. Unfortunately, nobody from our group won the 300 sole main prize, but we rather enjoyed ourselves while trying to.

Friday we had a home visit in Junin with Victor and a few of his children. While we had some fierce competition (the season finale of Esto es Guerra was on tv) it was nice to sit and chat with them. Victor and his family often don’t make it to church in Huancachupa, but they are undeniably an integral part of the family and the community here.

(From top left) Henry, Silveria, Cristian, myself and Eynor. 

Saturday was our next hiking adventure, this time in Huacora, the pueblo where Orlando and his brothers and sisters grew up. We started the day with breakfast at Silveria's house in Pampas, the pueblo just below Huacora. We chatted, had some sopa verde and played with the cuy that were scampering around her kitchen (yes… we played with our food.)

After that, we made the 40 minute hike up to Huacora, where the altitude kicked my butt. You get out of breath at that kind of altitude and it hurts to get it back. Eventually, we made it up to Huacora, put on a little sun block, and took a siesta in the late morning sun.

After we regained our strength, we hiked around Huacora, jumping around the rocks and running down the hills (while trying not to fall on our faces.) Hungry and exhausted, we hopped a collective back to Huánuco, then went straight to Pizza Hut to treat Eynor and Cristian to their first ever slice of pizza. The verdict: Eynor says pizza is a 1 on a scale of 1-10 (10 being delicious.)

Cristian, Katrina and Henry jumping for joy in Huacora. 

And that brings us our last church service in Huánuco. Things started out a little slow—the service is supposed to start at 5 p.m. and by 5:30 p.m. we only had two attendees: Eynor and Grandpa Antonio. Determined to make things happen, we went ahead and started the service, and by the time Katrina started preaching our attendance was up to 12.

Perhaps my favorite part of the service was singing a round of “Gloria Al Senor” where everyone sang in rounds, jumping up and down campfire-style (Grandpa Antonio included.) After that, there was a little time for testimonies, and it gave me a lot of hope to hear Vanessa, Orlando, Eynor and Grandpa Antonio happily share their stories.

Mojada's new boo. 

After church wrapped up, we shared some bread and juice with the family to celebrate our last service in Huánuco, then spent a few hours playing Phase 10 with Henry, Noel and Vanessa. Something I love about the congregation is that there are so many people in Katrina and I’s age group that are game to just sit and play cards for a few hours. There was a very church-camp relaxed feeling about it and it was a wonderful way to end our last Sunday in Huánuco.

And—that’s about it. We’re trying to plan some fun things for our last few days here, then Thursday it’s Adios to Huánuco. In the meantime, my newest hobby is kicking all of Mojada’s “suitors” out of the yard. Mojada is in heat for the first time in her young life and I believe she now has more boyfriends that I’ve had in my entire life. I’ve taken up the hobby of chasing them away and locking them out of the yard like an overprotective father, although I must admit, she has some very handsome choices. They’ll just have to wait until her mother hen goes back to Callao. Until next time!