Rainbow Mountain, 5,700m (17,060 feet) up in the hills in the Andes, sounded like the perfect precursor to the Inca Trail and a chance for us to do some altitude training. Silly me had flown straight into La Paz, Bolivia a week before and it being the world's highest city at an altitude of 3,640m, I learnt on day one just how debilitating altitude sickness can be. Thank goodness there was no one else staying in my dorm room as there was a lot of vomiting that night. I was offered coca leaves to stew in a tea and chew on by the hostel workers the next morning, supposedly meant to help in lessening the altitude effects. Coca being the main plant cocaine is derived from, while helping with altitude sickness, is also a hunger suppressor and no surprises here a mild stimulant. I didn't care, it became my friend.

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Rainbow Mountain was only discovered as a walking trail a year or so before as the snow caps had melted revealing mountains of colourful sand. We just had to do it. Being backpackers we were too stingy to hire a guide or join a tour, we figured if it's a one way track to the top, why would we need a guide, we can do this on our own.

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The bus ride from Cusco to Rainbow Mountain was enough alone to get the heart racing, as when looking straight down out of the bus window you were staring straight down over a couple of hundred metres drop, there was no sign of the road underneath you were that close to the edge. It was a potholed filled, muddy, very narrow dirt road, a road clearly not designed for buses and the destinations growing popularity. At times on the drive in, I couldn't even look out as i was sure we'd fall off when trying to overtake other cars on the narrow bends. But we arrived at the starting village and it was a beautiful sunny, cool day. Margaret and I remarked at how good the weather was and could we believe that we were in a light sweater that this high an elevation. 

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We walked through small Peruvian villages home to the Quechua people who are believed to be direct descendants from the Incas. We got excited over seeing alpacas scattered across the green hillsides with the Quechua people using the wool to knit leg warmers, gloves and beanies all hanging on a fence for sale at the start of the hike which we thought we wouldn't need so skipped past and proceeded to start one of the toughest climbs I have ever done. Every breath was difficult because of the altitude. I would get puffed so easily even on the smallest of inclines so we just plodded along taking it slow, trying to avoid the dreaded altitude headache and nausea. Still, we were in the mountains, in Peru and we were so excited to be there despite the difficult climb. The mountains around were stunning and you could see the colours of the sands start to get more and more prominent the further up you walked. It was open mountains, no trees, just gravel and dirt like hills with streams running through the valleys. We reached a peak and got a brief glimpse of Rainbow Mountain but out of breath and struggling we put our heads back down and continued plodding away.

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We didn't have too far to go on reaching the top of Rainbow Mountain when out of nowhere we hear an almighty crack of thunder. Startled, we look back behind us and rolling in over the mountains fast were the blackest storm clouds. Crap! We were on a very exposed mountain with nowhere to go, no guide to tell us what to do. What do we do?

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The temperature dropped about fifteen degrees suddenly to freezing and it started spitting so we put on our rain jackets as well as everything else warm we had packed and proceeded to keep climbing. Our sunny day now a distant memory. The rain quickly turned to sleet and it was now coming in fast, sideways, stinging our face like we were being hit with shards of glass more and more with every step. I wrapped my scarf around my face to shelter it and we huddled together, low to the ground unsure of what to do. We were too far up to turn around and head back down and beat the storm and we were too close to the top to leave without summiting.

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The sleet soon turned to heavy hail and a wild storm came across with lightning and thunder all around. We had dismissively laughed off the Peruvians trying to sell us umbrellas at the base. What would we need an umbrella for on a sunny day? Now three quarters of the way up we were laughing at the stupidity of the people who had bought them and were now using them for shelter on an exposed mountainside in the middle of the thunderstorms of thunderstorms. In any case, I said to Margaret we just need to stay lower than those holding umbrellas as surely if lightning were to strike near us it would hit an umbrella. Suckers. The sound of the thunder cracking and echoing off the mountains was deafening and terrifying. Knowing all too well with the simultaneous lightening and thunder that it was well upon us. To our complete surprise the hail turned to snow and before we new it, it was a white out and so we again just crouched down, shivering cold and wet, we waited for the storm to pass. While everyone else with their guides started running back down the mountain as fast as they could.

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Having miraculously avoided being struck by lightening, it started to ease up and there were now very few people who remained at this point on the mountain. We were so close to the summit. I was torn. The summit was within reach and I didn't come all this way not to get there. With others still calling off the climb, an Italian girl, a French guy and I decided we would stay together and push on to the top. Margaret, freezing opted to head bac down to shelter. The path now teaming with running muddy water and ice everywhere, it added another level of complexity to our already tough climb. We were slipping back down with every step.

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Thankfully we had got a glimpse of the colours of Rainbow Mountain on our way up before the storm because it was now completely white and stripped of ay of its famous rainbow colours. I had made it though. I was at 5,200 metres. I had weathered the storm. I was proud.

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With the storm still lingering around and it still snowing, I didn't stay up on top for long and began quickly making my way down. Yet the mountains and valleys were now showing a different sort of beauty I had never seen before. It was white everywhere but coming through underneath the mountain was a deep purple colour. It was as if the valley was void of all its colours. 

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I paused to look around at the mountains and as I do a group of Quechua ladies and their alpacas and mules appeared up over a peak and they continued their journey across the hills in front of us. I'm unsure of where they had been sheltering but it made for a real 'I'm in Peru' moment. Those are my favourite types of moments. Where you are just in total awe of the place that you are, that all you can do is stop, take it all in and smile to yourself a the situation you find yourself in. 

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Finally back down and into the safety of our bus, Margaret and I sat exhausted, short of breath but still laughing, recapping what had just unfolded and wondering what on earth happened to our beautiful sunny day. Never did we imagine we would have an experience like this in Peru.