Taking a much needed rest the last few days. But we’ll have more posts soon! The the meantime we have updated our Bucket List, Best Hikes in the Southern Appalachians and Local Hikes pages. We are also finished with all of our preparations for the Tour Du Mont Blanc, now just a few weeks away! Brian is hastily cramming to […]
Is the Santa Cruz Trek for You?
The Santa Cruz Trek: Logistics and Planning What about me? Can I do the Santa Cruz Trek? This is what you may be asking yourself. The scenery looks great, sure, but can I do it? How hard it is really? If you are an experienced hiker with lot of time spent at high altitude the answer is an emphatic yes, […]
…And Of Course the End is Always a Downer
Santa Cruz Trek Day 4: The Final Day **An older version of this post originally appeared in 2015 on the old legacy blog. We hope you enjoy this updated version! The last day of our hike is here! I emerged from the tent to clear blue skies and three freshly deposited cow turds. Folks I will say this up front…if […]
Landscape With a History of Violence
Santa Cruz Trek, Day 3: The Santa Cruz Valley **An older version of this post originally appeared in 2015 on the old legacy blog. We hope you enjoy this updated version! Waking on the third morning I was greeted, as I stuck my face from the tent, by a cow. This animal, standing about twenty feet away, took one look […]
The Other Side of the Mountain
The Santa Cruz Trek, Day 2: Punta Union We awoke the next morning to the sound of the guides already up and busy with the camp chores. Sylvia had, as she often does, suffered through the whole night from cold feet. We had brought along a pair of hand warmers to counter this but, considering the next campsite promised to be […]
Nevado Huascaran
The Santa Cruz Trek: Day One **An older version of this post originally appeared in 2015 on the old legacy blog. We hope you enjoy this updated version! Before we began our hike we had to get some logistical complications out of the way. In Peru, almost all logistics involve complications. These can involve traffic, cars not showing up at […]
Where the Roads Fade to Paths
The Santa Cruz Trek: Huaraz, Peru…Arrival *This is the third in our series of “reboot posts” of our Peru trips that were featured on our old legacy Blog, but have never appeared on BecauseItzThere.com. The first was our Trek to Machu Picchu via the Salkantay Route in 2012. The second was our successful hike of Colca Canyon and somewhat less […]
Into the White: The Santa Cruz Trek
The Santa Cruz Trek, Peru Can you name the single most impressive thing you have ever done? We can. In July of 2014 Sylvia and I embarked on what was the greatest hiking adventure of our lives…The Santa Cruz Trek in the Andes Mountain of Peru. We had already completed a tough hike just a couple years earlier when we […]
Countdown to the Alps!
***The Tour Du Mount Blanc is one of BecauseItzThere’s Bucket List hikes. It will be our headlining trip of 2018, and our fourth Bucket List trip completed as a team! The Alps is Three Months Away! ANY hiker worth his or her salt wants to take their game to the Alps. If I have to explain why…then you probably won’t understand […]
Under The Volcano
Day 1: Misti Volcano While Colca Canyon is by no means an easy trek, it did not break any new ground for either of us. Arid canyons, steep trails and multi-day hikes at elevation were all things we had done in the past, thresholds we had crossed before. But the next hike promised to push us far past the limits […]