Waterfall at Gocta

Gocta; 3rd highest waterfall in the world

"The Department of Amazonas, which includes Chachapoyas and the ancient walled city of Kuelap, is where the main trunk Amazon River violently carves out a valley in the Andes, deeper than the Grand Canyon to enter the Amazon Basin. This is the land of the Cloud People or Chachapoyans who live in the "ceja de selva" or eyebrow of the Amazon. This is the cloud forest of eternal mist, high in the Andes, overlooking the Amazon Basin." Anonymous

One of the very first weekends I was in Chachapoyas, I took at full day tour to a very remote valley that would involve a 4+ hour very strenuous hike(hardly any level portions of the trail and mostly steep hiking going up or steep down) into the jungle to the upper waterfall named "Gocta".It was first discovered in 2006 by a German explorer and by his measurements, it was determined to be the 3rd hightest waterfall in the world.This day, we would just be going to see the upper part of the falls. It would take another whole day to see the lower portion.  4 of us left by taxi from Chachapoyas and were driven to a very small village where we were met by an older local man who was in excellent shape to guide us along the trail to Gocta. He did not speak a word of English, but thank goodness 1 of the men in our group was from Lima and spoke enough English that he could translate for us! 

Me along the trail with waterfall in the back; less than 1/2 way there

Lots of potatoes growing along the first part of the trail; clear, clean, beautiful air and sky

Our guide explaining how they make an alcoholic drink made of sugar cane. Tasted very sweet and very strong! I only had 2 sips and that was enough to make me light headed. To left is the man from Lima who could translate for us!

Extremely beautiful and serene hike

Waterfall in the distance!

About 1 1/2 hours into our trek to the waterfall, I was getting tired...! Every 100 yards or so I would ask our guide, "Donde es Gocta?!" to which he would point ahead and laugh at me! I knew a few words in Spanish so I also asked him how many times he did this hike and he answered 2-3 times per day! I was absolutely in awe of his physical condition since I knew that he must have been older than me...

The other couple that were in our group, were chewing on coca leaves and sucking on limes, but obviously this was not having any boosting physical effects, since they were both just as tired as I was!

Finally made it!

The other couple in our group(coca leave chewers) below the falls in the canyon

Pool at the bottom of the upper falls

Trail on our way back down. Parts were very scary; straight down and very narrow rocky trail! This would be illegal, I think, in the US.

 

Horses come to rescue hikers that are too exhausted to make the trek back!

Our worn out hiking group at the only restaurant in the village. We're waiting on fried chicken for lunch; the lemonade could not go down fast enough!

Lower Gocta Falls

This was another full day outing to get to the lower falls. A group of us from the school went in 2 taxis to the village where the hike began.  Another very strenuous 4 hour hike but a little bit easier on my knees!

Gorgeous colors of the rocks

Me