THE INCA TRAIL
the big South American adventure rally
Day 17: Huancayo - Lima (390km)
What goes up ...
Course Opening Car poses briefly for its fans in front of the world's highest railway line. |
Inca Trail entrants mingle with Peru Automobile Club members' classics in a tremendous display at the El Pueblo resort. |
Fiesta time at El Pueblo |
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Lima at last - and time to party! |
The road cuts back and forth across a railway line here. After another climb, the route reaches the Ticlio Pass, or Abra Anticona. The railway line makes another appearance at the summit - claiming to be the highest railway line (and indeed level crossing) in the world. The road is likely to be the highest asphalt main road in the world, too: certainly it's the highest in the Americas. Many crews paused here for photos as the day was more relaxed thann of late, with time controls just at the beginning and end of the day.
What goes up must of course come down - and from Ticlio it's downhill all the way to Lima in some of the most impressive hairpin sequences imaginable.
At the resort complex of El Pueblo - a setting reminiscent to those who remember it of the 1970s series The Prisoner - tremendous treats awaited the crews. Many had cars to look after, of course, but it was worth trying to make time to relax a while.
The Automobile Club of Peru had prepared yet another brilliant welcome for the Inca Trail: in the tented exhibition area that all crews drove through as they arrived, a display of some 50 members' cars waited for our classics to join them.
After a few hours' relaxation for those without car worries, it was time to party. We were promised a barbecue .. but it was accompanied by music. Then the fireworks began. And finally, stilt walkers, carnival characters and dancers created a fiesta. Soon the entire rally was dancing like there was no tomorrow. What a way to begin our 'weekend'.
Long memories
Bill Price, one of HERO's mobile mechanical wizards, was surprised to be turned into an instant celebrity as his Course Car pulled into the rally car park at El Pueblo.
Bill was one of the BMC Works Team mechanics on the original 1970 London - Mexico World Cup Rally, still vividly remembered around these parts. Among his charges then were the Landcrabs - including the Evening Standard - sponsored car of Rosemary Smith, and three Triumph 2.5 p.i. s, including one driven by Andrew Cowan. Word had got around among our hosts at El Pueblo that Bill was expected. He was brought out of his car and into the exhibition area. In front of TV cameras he was asked to autograph a Mini Cooper belonging to one of their members, who, it turned out, is a friend of Andrew's Peruvian co-driver Ulrico Osio from their ill fated World Cup drive, which ended when they ran over the edge in Argentina.
Footnote: A day later, Osio himself arrived at El Pueblo - to be one of our guests at the Leg One prizegiving cabaret and gala dinner.