Riding High in Peru

LIMA, Peru — It's not unusual to have a headache at 4,781 meters above sea level. It is unusual to be on a train at that altitude, however. Pills don't provide relief up here. Instead, my elixir came from savoring the carnival atmosphere and the miraculous scenery.

I was aboard the monthly Lima-to-Huancayo Ferrocarril Central Andino (FCCA), billed as the highest passenger train in the world. The railway slinks 336 kilometers through the central Andes Mountains of Peru and is easily one of the greatest engineering feats of the 19th century.

My journey started in Lima at a painless 100 meters above the sea. I was staring into a plate of Chinese fried rice and thinking, “I just have to get on that train.” It was 7 o'clock on a Friday evening and departure was in 12 hours! I ate hurriedly, then scurried to my hotel where I obtained a telephone number from guests John and Sheila, an amiable English couple, who already had tickets.

“I want to go too,” I declared breathlessly as I reached the hotel porch. “Who do I call?”

Forty minutes later, Luis 'Lucho' Hurtado, who looks strikingly like
a shaman, was at the door with my US$30 return ticket. And just like that, I was booked for the world's highest train, forsaking my plane ticket to Ayacucho, also for the morning. The spur-of-the-moment trip, made in the first week of a two-month independent journey from Lima to Santiago, Chile via Bolivia, ultimately proved a favorite memory.

Under dawn's chilly blanket, the Britons and I shared a taxi to the deliciously refurbished Estacion Desamparados, built in 1912. The
station's old-style design and yolk-yellow finish sent a romantic chill up my spine. Inside, the red and yellow train cars were cozied up to the platform.

I climbed aboard coach 1023 and nestled into seat 67. It was literally the last seat of the last carriage, next to the toilet, where a passenger locked herself in. With a jerk, and a thud from the lavatory, we were off precisely at 7am.

This was going to be a friendly ride. An aura of expectation filled the air. Everyone was chatting, swapping seats, and sharing snacks. John and Sheila were two carriages up the line curled up in conversa-tion and a green velvet booth. I remained there for the duration of the 12-hour journey.

“I love this train,” Lucho announced into the train's PA. He was hosting a radio-like talk show surrounded like a rock star by passengers from the world over. “I am so happy all of you are here today,” he confessed. I knew I was.

“This is much better than a plane ride,” I said as John, a science teacher, prepared his altimeter: A partially blown-up plastic bag. “There! That'll tell us how high we are,” he instructed. The filth and fray of Lima's outskirts felt like a descent, however.
But the scenery soon changed — frequently and wildly. There were varying earth tones, mighty rivers, tree-less highlands, secret lagoons, and majestic peaks too numerous to count. In fact, in only 172 kilometers, the distance between Lima and La Galera, the highest point on the line, the train traverses six climatic zones at an average speed of 28 kph. It crosses 61 bridges, slinks through 65 tunnels, sways past 1,115 curves, and zigzags between 21 switchbacks (like a hiker zigzagging up a steep hillside).

From Lima, the route ambles along the Rio Rimac, initially follow-ing a valley before climbing steeply through gorges and ravines. The train hugs the tracks chiseled into the brown mountains. For much of the time, the view to one side is of a rock face while the other side affords views of the world, a long drop below.
En route, location and altitude announcements kept passengers informed. “We are now passing Chosica, 802 meters above sea level ... The next station is Surco, 2,000 meters ... Casapalca, 4,200 meters.”

At Ticlio, the highest passenger station in the world at 4,758 meters (15,606 feet), we disembarked for a few minutes of leg stre-tching and deep breathing. What the station is needed for was not apparent. Other than beauty, I couldn't see a thing. Not even a tree.

For a few passengers, the altitude was lite-rally breath-taking. They remained aboard taking oxygen under a nurse's supervision.
For others, coca tea assuaged their altitude sickness.
After the breathless photographic frenzy, we pressed on, passing through La Galera tunnel and the zenith of the rails. We celebrated in the dark knowing it was all down hill from there.
It was also time to eat. Nearly 1 o'clock, I'd been deferring lunch until after La Galera because, like John's now taut altimeter, I was bloated. Besides, drinking more and eating less is recommended for acclimatization. But the train staff came down the aisle carting plates of chicken, rice, and vegetables.
The beauty of lunch was outdone by the ugly of Oroya (3,735 met-ers), an industrial town known as the 'metallurgical capital of Peru'. The filth and ecological devastation stretched seemingly to infinity.

“Not a thing grows here,” said Lucho, as if anyone needed telling.
But life returned to the vistas by the time we reached Llocllapampa (3,464 meters) and the Rio Mantaro. From there, the train rumbled along a fertile valley, then descended on time into Huancayo station (3,260 meters). We alighted into evening's chill, warmed by the vigorous sounds of a local marching band which was on hand to greet us.

“I was born in this station,” said Lucho. “My father was a train worker. As a boy I used to go to the trains and get passengers for the hotels. That's how I learned English. When the train stopped running, I was determined this could not be for long. But even with an old frie-nd, a former mayor of Huancayo, now serving in Congress, this has not been an easy task.”
For two days in Huancayo, Lucho was my tour guide, along with ten others in a shared van.

He arranges day trips to nearby villages and nature spots in the Mantaro Valley, a better option than hanging around the dirt and din of Huancayo, a modern city of 300,000 souls with not much more on offer than its popular Sunday market.

A Lima-Huancayo train was the brainchild of American entrepreneur and financier Henry Meiggs. He once boasted, “I can get a train wherever a llama can walk.” The line itself was designed by Polish engineer Ernest Malinowski. It was constructed between 1870-1908, principally for transporting copper and zinc from mountaintop mines and farm produce from the Mantaro Valley. The rails have been carrying freight, and passengers, ever since.

Travel writer Paul Theroux is one of the best-known globetrotters to have made the trip. He wrote about it in his 1979 book, "The Old Patagonian Express". Perhaps since then, the ride has become a must-do for train enthu-siasts and adventurers alike. But the line hasn't always been safe.

Terrorists blew up the Mal Paso bridge near Jauja (3,552 meters) in 1991, suspending passenger travel (though not freight) for the next seven years. Suspended services sapped thousands of incomes. Lucho, an expert in Huancayo history, has been working tirelessly to change that. Even his mother participates. She's the boss at La Casa de la Abuela (The House of the Grandmother), a budget hotel where I stayed.

The return trip to Lima was something of a downer (no pun intended). Many of the same people were aboard, though fewer passengers overall, Lucho included. (Many people take a seven-hour bus journey back instead.) Second time round, the scenery was equally impressive but somehow different without the festive spirit.

Back near sea level, headache-free and respiring normally, the English couple and I commented to one another how good we felt. “Remarkable, isn't it,” noted Sheila, “what a little altitude can do?”
Then we went for a Chinese dinner and I was back to where my train journey began.

Text & Photos: Jono David