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Cuzco, Peru and the famed Machu Picchu

“I never said it would be easy, I only said it would be worth it.”

These words have never been more applicable than when referencing the Jungle Trek to Machu Picchu. I arrived at Cusco with an email directing me to come to Loki Hostel and see if they had room for me. I arrived at an early hour, so decided to make use of the internet and restaurant for the first half of the day. Vikki, the tour desk girl was invaluable; giving directions, insight, booking Spanish lessons and tours.  If anyone ever goes there, please give her a hug for me.

Cusco is an interesting city, apparently the only job available there is shoe-shine-boy, but somehow these same people were able to save up enough scratch for a church like this one.

Mauricio, a Colombian gentleman working for the U.N., and I were booking our trips at the same time and went to the tour agency for a debreifing at the same time, so we became somewhat acquainted with one another during the process. The trip to Machu Picchu ranges wildly in cost depending on what tour group you go with, and this particular group charged $185, or $170 for students. Amerigo, the pseudo Italian gentleman who runs the show, quickly passed us off to one of his guides and that was the last we saw of him for days. The guide gave us a quick run down in mild English on the days ahead and we went back to our hostels to sleep and await the 7:30 arrival of the guide the following morning.

7:30 came and went. 8:30 came and went. Finally, a large blonde Canadian tourist came stumbling into the lobby at Loki to inform us that the car is actually a few streets away, and instead of picking us up, we would have to walk to it. Thus it began.

Our van finally got underway around 10 am, which was no problem because we still got a full day of mountain biking in through rain and waterfalls, alongside gutwrendhing drops, and in great company. Our band was a great mix of people from around the world, mountain bikers from Wales, and abrasive woman from Canada (from whose many wonderful one liners came “My stomach can eat my ass!), scattered Americans, and a Kiwi; everyone spoke English, which worked out well for me.

By mid-afternoon we had all reached a tiny little town called Santa Maria. The 4 day members of our group all went to the hostel to get acclimated and Mauricio and I went down to the center of town to get on our transport to the next city, Santa Theresa. Transportation which we had assumed was already arranged. We were wrong.

Due to the recent rains, the road between Maria and Theresa had suffered a large amount of landslides. 7 or 8 of them were currently being cleared by work crews and a significant number of cars and people were trapped on the mountain roads waiting to get to Santa Maria. This information was accompanied by the revelation that our tour guide had not, in fact, arranged our transport onward, he had simply expected to find a car heading that way and stuff us into it. We were in for a wait.

Mauricio and I are of a similar sort that we are not the type to sit around, so we promptly set to work making friends with the dozens of people similarly stranded around the town center. Hours later, our biking group came into town to grab some dinner. We took the opportunity to sit down and eat with them and find out what their day was like. They were all rather impressed with the owner of the hostel, Fabio, and his coffee growing operation behind the hostel that he claimed to operate at a loss in order to employ some local labor. My experience of humans, especially Latin Americans, is that absolutely nothing is ever done at a loss. Regardless of my opinion, the guy seems rather cool when we finally got back up to his hostel. Mauricio and I had opted to change our tour to 4 days, as it doesn’t look like we have much choice. It was near 11 p.m. and the roads are not cleared yet.

After a while playing cards at the hostel with our group the guide, Angel, came to inform Mauricio and I that we need to get our bags because he is sending us off to Santa Theresa. Following this thunderbolt, Fabio pulled Mauricio and I aside and expresses his concern for our wellbeing and asks us to reconsider braving the mountain roads at night. Whether this was him trying to get paid for two more guests or genuine concern for another human I will never know, but I agreed with him. When we brought this up to Ange, stating that we were NOT leaving and would be remaining with the group, Angel chose to inform us that this would invalidate our tickets to enter Machu Picchu and return to Cusco thereafter, leaving us high and dry. Lovely.

Walking back to the town center was no picnic. The rain had taken questionable dirt paths serving as roads and turned them into shifting mudbaths. This sort of thing doesn’t bode well.

Around 11 p.m. we finally got underway through some undesirable and undependable roads. Around 12 a.m. our shuttle stopped in the middle of the road. The driver informed us that it was too dangerous to drive anymore so he was going to stop here for the night. Trying to catch any sleep was next to impossible, as I kept slumping over and hitting my head on the window, waking myself up again.

Around 3 a.m. things started getting interesting. A number of flashlight bearing, poncho clad europeans materialized out of the darkness and opened the door to the van. The resultant session of verbal abuse revealed that these people were force marched all day with no food and no dinner. They were told to walk into the dead of night and did so until nearly 11 pm when they happened across an old Peruvian woman who was finishing up her yard and invited them all in, made them supper, and gave them blankets to sleep on her floor. Then around 1 a.m. their “guide” came back to wake them up and tell them he had procured transport to take them to the next city. Waking them up and marching them out into the night again in the rain. They were then told to purchase flashlights and pochos at the next town as they would be riding in the back of an open cattle car truck with no protection from rain or cold to reach the transport that had already been paid for but whose driver had SOLD THEIR SEATS to locals, Mauricio, and myself. Upon arrival the “guide” asked them all to produce another 10 soles a piece in order to pay the cattle car driver. At this point, I thought I was going to witness a murder. The told the guide that he would need to have the agency pay his impromptu driver and then asked the guide if he would like to further press the issue and be left in the mountains. He wisely settled the debt himself.

The beautiful Polish girl next to me confided that she had paid nearly $300 dollars for this trip and so far it had been something akin to a prison camp. I love Polish accents. Mauricio and I feel a good deal better about our lot in life now that the rain has mostly stopped and we have to push on to reach Santa Theresa. The walk isn’t unpleasant, but it is no walk in the park. After a while we come to another distinctly obstructive road block. The faint at hear have turned back as it is still peppered with cascading stones of varying sizes; some nearly the size of semi-truck tires. The bold are running through the mess. The crazy are standing in the middle of it shooting video of the stones falling around them. Guess which category I fell in to?

The sign for Santa Theresa was a welcome sight. A short while later we rolled into town tired and a bit bedraggled. Our directions of “Find Nancy” actually turned out to be much better than we expected. After 30 minutes or so of talking to the locals, we landed at Nancy’s hostel which was apparently run by her 13 year old daughter. Nancy wasn’t there, so Mauricio passed out fully clothed on the bed and I strolled around town for a little while, unable to shake a feeling of unease. Eventually, I came back and lay down for a while, catching a blessed 2 hours of sleep.

After waking, I rousted Mauricio and we set to work making a plan. We had to figure out a few things:

  1. How to get out of this town
  2. Which way to go
  3. Where was Nancy

When we asked the young girl who I still believe ran the entire hostel herself where Nancy was, she told us that there were actually two Nancy’s in town; textbook “you couldn’t have told us earlier.”

The REAL Nancy was one street over, a good distance for a 4 street town, and was abundantly informative. The guide that we were supposed to link up with left town at 5 a.m. while we were walking through the landslides. With no clear path forward or back, Mauricio and I are forced to consider our options.

There were some taxis heading back down the road we had walked in on, but we knew they would only make it as far as the slide, then we would have to find another means of returning and that meant giving up on Machu Picchu; something neither of us was prepared to do. As we were talking a local teenager came in to the hostel, blue jeans and purple crocs, and gave us a nod. Looked like someone had finally cut us a break.

While speaking with Nancy and the local boy, our erstwhile group came stumbling in to town. Some elated reunion moments and we were all to be disappointed again when Angel told us that we two had to press on, guide or not. With the faith that only the Virtuous know, we left; accompanied by Xavier, his purple crocs, and instructions from Angel, “There will be people waiting at the train depot with your names on a whiteboard. If not, I think they usually stay at Hostel Jon.”

So our new local friend Xavier led the way with his purple crocs. We walked through water, rain, canyons, jungle, and just about every kind of terrain you can imagine. We even had to cross a river at one point on some crazy cable car contraption that “only killed 4 people last year.”

Eventually we arrived at a checkpoint for entering a train station; the end of the line somewhere in the middle of nowhere. Xavier told us that we had to pretend not to know him, as for some reason that no one was able to understand, the guards would not let us into the train area to buy tickets if they knew Xavier had led us there.

For the cost of 20 soles we were led through darkness and confusion by the purple all-terrain crocs of a 16 year old boy, when the combined efforts of numerous grown men and women and the added benefit of experience and thousands of tourist dollars had failed to accomplish anything that could ever be mistaken for a successful operation. Congratulations Peru.

The train led to Aguas Calientes, the town closest to Machu Picchu, where we debarked and looked around for the mystical individuals with a whiteboard. I don’t have to tell you the outcome.

In walking the city, Hostel Jon was easy to get directions to but rather hard to find. Eventually we found a sign that said ‘Hostel Joe’ and went for it. As we approached, sequestered behind another sign was a smaller placard reading ‘Hostal John.” Inside, god-forbid, was a woman writing our names on a whiteboard. We had to get a picture.

No one knew where our new guide was, but they did know that we had a room at another hostel. We stumbled across some of the other people we would be going with in the morning and they told us that our “guide” would be at a certain restaurant near the plaza.

Thus, safely within reach of Machu Picchu, Mauricio could devote ourselves to well earned hot showers. The town was named Aguas Calientes, after all. Not surprisingly, the hostel that we were holed up at, some unpronounceable name in a long desiccated local language, which professed to have hot water, had nothing of the sort.

Dinner came and our “guide” was as surprised to see us as we were to finally see him. In a lightning strike of fortune, the guide produced our tickets to Machu Picchu, and our return train tickets to Cusco along with my ID card they had used to get a discount on my ticket. This was also a surprise to all the other people we were eating dinner with, as none of them had been given their tickets yet, and when they were finally given their tickets, they were told they needed to pay another $15 dollars for the train.

Folks, this up-selling is an all-too-common trend. When faced with this, the best course of action is simply to refuse to pay the extra and walk away. These people entered into a contractual agreement with you, and you DO NOT have to pay for their idiocy. As soon as you have your ticket/food/ride, you are no longer held hostage. Don’t buy into it.

Mauricio brave, and clean, soul that he is decided to take a shower in the arctic water of our cursed shower. I gave it a pass and decided to simply smell bad for one more day.

4:30 a.m. comes early. The bus to Machu Picchu, a $7 and priceless ride, begins transporting people at 5 a.m. Mauricio and I got there before the bus but after about 200 people in line. Luckily, the group we ate dinner with was in line much earlier than us and we skipped forward a hundred people or so in line. This is key. Only 400 people, first come first serve, are allowed on to the Wayna Picchu mountain within the park. I only found this out the day before, but as you will see it is something of a big deal. Machu Picchu was worth every bit of nastiness we endured.

Throughout the day, I met numerous people, including a German girl, Viola, I had seen in several cities recently, and a marvelous Peruvian girl with the Arabic name Zulema who hiked Wayna Picchu with Mauricio and I.

I cannot find words to describe this place. It has withstood massive earthquakes without losing a stone; earthquakes that have leveled many other cities nearby. It is beautiful and strong, and it was abandoned. Go. Just go.

After Machu Picchu, we were tired; bone tired. It had been a long several days at high altitudes. For some reason, I had the bright idea of walking back down the unending stair case from Machu Picchu to the base of the mountain and then back into town. It was just rough.

Aguas Calientes is named such for some thermal hot springs that are situated a bit above town. Mauricio and I took some well deserved rest and sat in the pools for most of the remainder of the day. We met a ton of people there, Koreans, Europeans, Americans and everyone was abuzz with the wonderment of the day.

Finally, after yet another reunion with our first tour group, we went down to the train station. We were told, yet again, that there would be people at the train station with our names on a whiteboard waiting for us. Robbed of our faith in humanity, but renewed with our faith in ourselves and our unending resourcefulness, Mauricio and I boarded a train bound for Ollantatanbo; a city still 1.5 hours by car from Cusco and our questionable reservations at Loki.

Exiting the train, we climbed a hill with the rest of the struggling masses, seeing several people with signs, though none with our names. Finally, cresting the rise, we found our drivers.

They ushered us quickly, along with several others, up another road to a parking lot with a blessed white microbus waiting to take us to warmth, a bed, and salvation. There was another train arriving an hour or so later with the last member of our return bus group. The bus drivers told us that that train had broken down somewhere and there was no word on when it would be arriving and we had to leave without them. True to form, they were lying to our faces, as the train pulled in to the station as we were driving away. We stopped and collected our last man and went on our way. I have seldom been so happy to see a bed as I was when I returned to Loki. True to form, they had somehow lost my reservation, but had a last minute bed that I could use going forward.

The next day I went to the Loki tour desk and explained what had happened and Vikki called Amerigo and had him come over to the hostel. After much conversation, and a little help from Mauricio, I was refunded enough money to rent a Honda Hurricane 250, a complete set of safety gear, and pay for a tank of gas the following day. Score.

The following morning, Sunday, I wandered down to the motorcycle shop and happened to meet a guy named George who was renting a bike and taking off with a small group of people on a tour of the Valle Sagrada. As we were waiting on the street a smallish girl with a too-large helmet on the back of another motorcycle asked me if she could ride with me for the day. This can mean trouble.

She had hired the other bike and man as a guide for the day and opted at the last minute to ditch him and ride with the random stranger on another bike. Ballsy, I had to hand it to her. Some hours later after we stopped for lunch, I was to discover she was not only ballsy, but the most attractive British girl I had ever met.

A long and amazing day on the back of my bike saved her some money and gained her some bruises when I caught a rut the wrong way leaving an Incan salt mine. A quick left hand low side left her quite shaken. I was nearly untouched with legs and arms and boots and helmet, but she scratched and bruised her left leg at angle heel and hip. Trooper that she was, she insisted that we drive on to go see other ruins once the rest of the crew had driven back to Cusco.

If you are reading this, I tell you now as a friend, do not ride Peruvian roads at night. NEVER ride Peruvian mountain roads at night. In my collective life I have never honked a horn more than I did in that single night riding across Peru. Blind mountain corners must be preceded by significant honking as you go through the turn to let someone know on the other side you are coming. The heart-stopping moment comes when you hear the replying honks and you have to wonder what lane they are in and how big the oncoming projectile is. There were times when we were driving along and suddenly the road simply was not. In the space of 2 meters where the light shone, the road simply ceased to be and I had to throw the bike into the adjacent (read as Oncoming) lane until the collapsed road had come back again. This was not uncommon.

Finally, we stopped about 15 kilometers from Cusco at a small gathering of buildings and asked for some hot tea to stave off the chill of the last few hours of riding. We were nearing 4000 meters above seal level (over 12,000 feet) and it was not cold or friendly. Stopping for a while on Domingo Santa (Easter Sunday) we got to eat some neat looking pastries baked on questionable construction paper and weak but hot coca tea accented by some coca leaves I had in my pack. It was a godsend.

Riding into Cusco, we got to say hi to Neon Jesus and some of the locals with their extremely accurate directions around the one way streets to get back to the center of town to return the helmets and bike to the rental agencies. After returning her to her hotel and finishing the exit formalities, I had less than an hour to get to Loki, retrieve my bag and make it to the bus station to catch my next 20 hour bus to La Paz and my new couchsurfing friends. It was time to move.

This short bit of history would not be complete without ending it with a huge thanks to Mauricio, Hannah, Vikki, and the many other people in this tale who made this a harrowing and lively tale of success and teamwork. Thank you all!

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Travel Do’s and Don’ts: Guinea Pig Tasting

In Ecuador and Peru, I have seen an item on several menu’s called Kuy. When asking around, I discovered this was actually a guinea pig indigenous to the area. Something of a delicacy, and eaten only on special occasions, the guinea pig is served whole; ears, eyes, teeth, and claws all still attached. The following video should give you an idea of what you are in for.

For anything other than the novelty factor…

Travel DON’T

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Arequipa, Peru: The White City

I TRULY wish I had taken more pictures here.

The city of Arequipa is sprawling; truly spread out. This is something you would never know if you came here. The city center and everything nearby does a fantastic job of appearing very small. Everything is walkable, and the city lacks much of the smog and pollution I have seen in so many other places.

Arequipa has the nickname La Ciudad Blanca because the entire city center is built out of a special white volcanic rock. The effect is less dramatic during the day, but nothing short of splendid after dark. I don’t have any good shots, but I am sure Google can provide. The views in Plaza de Armas with a full moon overhead are not to be missed. When people think of old romantic Spanish cities, this is what they are thinking of.

To get to or from the city, you will want to catch a plane or a night bus. If you are taking a plane, go with Peruvian Airlines to get here from any major city in Peru for around $60 USD. If you are taking a bus, Cruz del Sur or Cromotex are the way to go; they have the cleanest record and the best equipment. Both bus companies run double decker buses, selling the executive lower level for about the same price of 100 soles, while Cromotex sells the upper level for about 40 soles cheaper than Cruz del Sur. Leaving Arequipa for Cuzco, I got a night bus with dinner included for around $18 USD.

I did not want to leave Arequipa. Great nightlife, excellent surrounding countryside, and free guided tours from the hostel owner really went a long way towards making me feel at home. However, I have an entire continent to explore and friends to meet, so I can’t stay in one place forever.

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Downtime in Peru

Taking advantage of a sick day today. As I’m finally able to sit up straight, I’ll do what I can to catch you up on Peru.

After the mess at the Peruvian border I really didn’t want to like Peru. I thought I would breeze through here, hit Machu Pichu and head to Bolivia. Such is not the case.

Everytime I turn around in Peru, I find another reason to like this country. People are quite talkative, the country is quite lovely, and I find that, albeit infrequently, some of the Andean genes combine to create some of the most beautiful women I have ever seen. Couple that with good music and an appreciation for new artists and I’m quite enthused.

Lima was fun, all inclusive with the Colon Tour.

Arequipa has been doing some outsourcing to Japan for their sign creation. It’s beautiful. The city is great, and looks lovely at night, but calle San Francisco is a little rowdy at night. Roxy, the owner of a local hostel, took the day off to go around town with me, show me the sights, the street all the hookers hang out on, serve me my first chicken hamburger, and get me some frog juice. Semana Santa is starting, which basically means that everyone takes off and drinks for a week.

Following this bit of levity, do not forget to be aware when crossing borders or switching transportation. There is a concept called transitional vulnerability that applies here. similar to a butterfly leaving the cocoon for the first time, you are uncertain and marginally unaware of your surroundings at border crossings, or when leaving airports or bus/train stations. Always take a certified cab, or have a hotel or hostel call one for you. My new friend Doug from Norway was just robbed at gunpoint of EVERYTHING he had except his clothes and the 100 soles he had stuffed in his sock because he got in a fake cab. Be Careful!

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Peru is F@#$%^&*ing Dangerous, and other well known facts.

When was the last time you used counterfit money to pay for something?

When was the last time you saw a gunfight?

When was the last time someone tried to kidnap you?

Before today, I may not have been able to answer these questions, but now, thanks to the miracle of the Ecuador-Peru border near Tumbes, I can. This border, between Loja and Piura, is the border I was told was more secure than the other crossing points between these two countries. After an all night bus ride, especially one as uncomfortable as last night, no one is ever at their peak performance level. Perhaps that’s why I got into some of the situations I did this morning. I tell you, if you are ever coming to Peru, stay on the tourist track, by all means FLY into the country, and never ever stay in a car with a man twice your size.

This may all seem marginally sensationalized, and I assure you, it is a bit over the top… but as my memory works, this is an accurate account of this mornings border crossing activities.

While on the bus ride to the border, I noticed a building slide past that said, ‘Migracion’ on it. I thought this was odd, but just laid back until we got to our stopping point a few kilometers later. Disembarking, there were a dozen or so guys with all manner of wheelbarrows milling around and trying to put everyone’s luggage on their cart at the same time. While this was happening a taxi wheeled up and some guy standing in the street asked me if I got my exit stamp yet.

No, I replied, I am heading down to the border.

Apparently, the bus company forgot to mention that the bus ticket I bought to go to the border, did not include stopping at the Migracion building, some 4 kilometers away beforehand. I turned to the busdriver who was still unloading bags and asked him if this was the case. He agreed that it was.

I needed to pee.

I stood around looking stupid for a couple of minutes until the bus pulled away. I figured I had better get going, so I harrassed a price out of the taxi driver and I jumped in the back seat with my bags. As my new friend and informant was opening the front door to get in the passenger side, a familiar sound rocked the street.

Boom.

I didn’t need to pee anymore.

I couldn’t see where he was hit, but a policeman and his motorbike tumbled into the dust and a rather standardly dressed man, aside from the pistol in his hand, jumped over the collapsing bike and man to make a run for several gentlemen seated along the sidewalk with briefcases in their laps. Quickly, several other forms joined in the rush.

Screams. boom. boom. boom. pop pop pop. Pounding feet. Screaming Women. Yelling men. The roar of an engine.

Two more men fell in the street before my taxi was well on it’s way out of the area. Later, at the border I was to learn that Peruvians are generally thought of as thieves in Ecuador and today was yet another attempt for a group of thieves to get money. The briefcases were moneychangers and each most likely had several thousand dollars in it. The officer wound up in the hospital in a nearby city, I saw the ambulance fly past us at the Migracion building. One of the thieves died before he hit the ground. The others are being detained or escaped.

My guide, standing in line with me at Migracion, unfurled the details of the story like yesterdays pants; dirty, but just old news. I was a little shellshocked, but after hearing Jasper’s drive-by-shooting story, this just sort of becomes another piece of the puzzle that is Latin America. When I tried to hand my passport to the man behind the window, he directed me to the next window. When I stepped over there, the man gruffly told me that the system is down. He then walked away. 45 minutes later, another man walked up to inform me that the system has been down for two days, and I will need to drive another 10 minutes away from the border to find a Migracion building that is stamping passports manually.

For another $5 round trip, my taxi driver agreed to take me there, wait for me, then bring me back to the border. This seemed fair, so my guide and I made to leave. When a Peruvian girl asked to ride with us I tell her to get in and then she is summarily dismissed by the taxi driver and made to go to another car, even though we both had to go to the same building. I spent the next ten minutes hounding the two men as to why in the hell they wouldn’t let another person get in the same cab. It comes down to the same reason those men were shot today; Greed.

The line at the second Migracion building was full of familiar faces from the bus and the first building. It takes a while, but I managed to get my stamps and a taxi ride back to the border. Before crossing the border I decided to change a few US Dollars in for Peruvian Soles. $40 gets me about 112 Soles, and I’m on my way across the border.

Once I crossed the border, a man named Arturo started talking to me and asked if I needed a taxi ride to the Migracion office for Peru. I said, No, but he mentioned it was 4 kilometers to the office. Asking a police officer walking by, he told me it was 2 kilometers. Turning to Arturo, I said, “are you joking?”

“Well,” he replied, “Maybe it’s 3.”

He then directed me towards his cab. After walking about 20 feet through the market, I noticed a large dirt lot with several derelict looking cars in it and almost no humans. I turned a 180 and marched right back up to the street telling Arturo, “No, Thanks.”

Arturo followed me back up to the street chuckling and telling me I was right to be cautious. He then offered to pull the car up to the street and we could leave from there. I told him to do so and walked off in search of another taxi. None presented themselves in the 30 seconds or so it took Arturo to materialize with his driver and car, so I hopped into the back. Remember that I said this; Never put your bag in trunk of a car. Never.

So I hopped in the back of the car, with both my bags, despite the insistence of the cabbie that I put it in the trunk. Arturo asked me if I had the money to get across the border; citing the often written, though seldom enforced border rule of ‘sufficient funds.’ I replied I was fine,though never gave him a specific dollar amount when he mentioned $100 US.

Very quickly, the taxi driver mentioned that he would like to pick up some more people for the trip to Migracion; stating that his taxi was actually a colectivo. I disagreed and told him to keep on driving, but he pulled over at the next corner and two men jumped in the other side. One of these men was gigantic; Andre the Giant.

My large bag was rather uncomfortable between my legs, but despite the insistence of the driver, I kept it close at hand. At the border, I again chose to keep my bag close at hand, a practice I firmly endorse, and entered the migracion checkpoint with bag in hand and Andre close by my side. After a bit of a wait in line, Arturo managed to get one of the policemen to scoot me to the front of the line. Oddly, Andre did not push forward with me, but sits back a bit until Arturo and I round the corner. About 30 seconds later, the big man joined us and the other guy outside. When I asked both of them pointedly if they got stamps, they both agreed emphatically; one of them going so far as to tell me he paid the policeman a dollar to rush him to the front of the line. Once back in the car the subject of sufficient funds came up again, this time in reference to an upcoming police checkpoint; only the amount magically became $200 and Arturo insisted I answer his questions as to how much money I have. I may have been a little slow, but I knew that dance. There were cars stopped a distance ahead of us in the road. I am hoping this is the police checkpoint he was talking about. Arturo is holding the other two guys’ papers in hand and asking for mine. I make my move.

Before Arturo could retract his hand, I had a firm grasp on the migracion papers in his outstretched hand. He tried to pull away from me, but it only loosened the papers enough for me to pull them free. When I looked at both papers neither had stamps. The driver wasn’t able to see behind him and was slowing down for the police control point. I immediately asked why the papers were not stamped and everyone in the car started talking at once.

First I was told the stamps were just for foreigners, then I reminded them that they had just told me they were Ecuadoran. Then everyone tried to tell me that there was an agreement between the two countries. The driver pulled into the oncoming traffic lane and started driving around the stopped cars. Times up.

I popped the lock open on the door and threw the door open and started yelling “Stop” over and over. The driver slowed down a little bit uncertain of what to do and, bag in hand, I rolled out the door. We were about ten meters past the police and the driver pulled over quickly and Arturo jumped out while Andre shut the door quickly. Arturo ran up to me demanding that I get back in the car. I said no thanks. He put both his hands on my bag and said I needed to pay him $30 for the ride; a far cry from the $1 he initially offered. I told him to fuck off and he dropped to $15. I fished into my pocket for the weird money I had just received from the moneychangers and told him I would pay him the dollar I initially agreed upon. As my hand was coming out of my pocket, he made a grab for the money, pulling a $10 bill from my hand and dashed back to the car. The car drove away as I turned around to find the policeman had made it to my side.

As quickly as I could, I relayed all the details (in broken Spanish) to the Officer and he confirmed that they should have had stamps on their paperwork and then said that the police would be looking for the car and the men.

The rest of the day was spent in semi-shock wandering around Tumbes, a horrible scorched border town in Peru. I tried to pay for food with the money I got at the border and was turned down almost everywhere because it was Effing counterfeit! Eventually, I managed to pay for bus fare and a meal with it. I’ll be humped if I am going to take a $40 hit because Peruvians are corrupt. If you are ever stuck there waiting for a bus, go to the Costa del Sol. It has free wireless, air conditioning, and pretty good food.

All night bus rides are never that great, but I managed to sleep a good deal getting in to Lima. I reiterate, bring bandanas when you travel. There are a million and one uses. Lima thus far has been less than exemplary other than I had the best coffee of my whole trip. We’ll see what else happens.

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Jumping off of things: Ecuador Edition

I feel I must tell you; there are a great many things to jump off of in Mindo. I, the intrepid explorer, have done my best to bring documentation of said things to you, my wonderful readers. Behold.

Camera 1:

If you think that was stupid, check out Camera 2:

Ecuador rainstorms smell different. Rainstorms smell different this close to the ground. On angel wings, you don’t catch that smell of earth; of loam… but here we are. It is hard to find reliable weather information online, but tripadvisor.com, which is fast becoming one of my favorite sites, has a three day forecast on the review page for each listing on their pages. Tomorrow it looks like lightning.

I’m going ziplining and then tubing in the Mindo river.

Definitely a good day for lightning. Good thing the camera housing is shock-proof… isn’t that what it means?

Ecuador has a couple national beers, Pilsener being one of them. You can pick up a 750 ml bottle of it on just about every corner for a dollar and you get 15-25 cents when returning it, depending on how much you paid for it. A pretty good deal, except it seems that you can drink these till the cows come home and never catch a buzz.

Mindo is a pretty cool little town. As soon as I got off the bus, a local woman walked up to me and asked in English if I needed help. I gave her the name of my hostel and she gave me immediate and accurate direction on how to get there. I was flabbergasted.

Gareth gave me the name of the place I am staying at. He left Quito one morning, feeling not quite 100% and was deathly ill soon after arriving in Mindo. This family took care of him for nearly 6 days while he regained his strength. As soon as I tell the matriarch of the house that I am friends with the sickly English guy, she becomes excitedly chatty asking all about him and even taking 20% of the cost of the place. Not bad for 10 seconds of work.

My room is splendid. I have three beds, yet again, and a private bathroom with what appears to be hot water in the shower. I think I need some friends to travel with, because if I keep getting stellar deals on three bed habitaciones, I would rather split the cost three ways.

My ankles itch tremendously from all the little ankle-biter bugs that I encountered walking the canyon in Quito. I’m doing my best to just put Benadryl on them instead of scratch because each place that I scratch the skin is a place where flies or infected mosquitos can lay all manner of worms and parasites that will skip right past your skins protective layer and right into your body and potentially kill you. This is the reality of my life. These are the concerns that I have replaced traffic tickets and vehicle maintenance with.

The cloud forest above Mindo is breathtaking. And not just in that Audrey Hepburn way… I mean seriously… to get to the top of the Cascadas, a series of waterfalls running through the forest, it is about a 7 kilometer hike to the entrance. I was quite out of breath. A 7 kilometer hike sounded a lot better to me than paying $15 for a taxi ride up there. If you ask around, however, you will find a trolley of sorts that drives people up en masse for $1; I just didn’t bother to ask before I left.

I had gone up there mostly because I heard that it provided some good views of the forest, you could swim in the river, and I purchased a $10 ticket for a canopy zipline tour. If you come to Mindo, ask the locals which tour group to go with. One of them is local so do what you can to support them.

If you come to Ecuador, you must come to Mindo. This place is delightful after the metropolitan sprawl of Quito. Cooperativo Flor de Valles runs numerous daily buses here for $2.50 USD. You can afford it.

After you reach the park entrance and pay your $3 entrance fee (well worth it) you can hike down to a platform looking over this amazing view. And then you can jump off of it.

When I asked the guy in charge if I could jump with my camera in hand, he gave me a look that said, “We are jumping off cliffs with a string attached to some underwear on the outside of our pants. If you wanted to jump off with a kitchen sink, I wouldn’t stop you.”

Once you get tired of this… ah who am I kidding, no one in their right mind would ever get tired of this… but it costs $3 per round trip, so, once you run out of money you can continue hiking down to the floor of the canyon and the Cascadas. Take your time, look around, and bring a rain jacket. It isn’t called a cloud forest for nothing.

Once you have hiked another 2 kilometers or so, you will come to a fantastic sign standing next to a cement platform; which you can jump off of.

There is also a toboggan slide next to it, which, in a manner of speaking, you can jump off of.

A little farther down you will find some gentlemen talking, possibly grilling up some lunch at a small outpost next to the largest waterfall in the Cascadas. One of them will happily take you over to a small mirador set over the waterfall… by now I’m sure you know where this is going.

The rope in the video is so they can ensure you don’t get dragged underwater. It is quite common for Latin Americans to have no idea how to swim, and the rope has become something of a rule. The actual height of the jump is just under 40 feet. This jump is free, but I suggest you tip Xavier and his friends as they are honest and hard working. As well they should be; they are the highest paid people for miles around, making more than even the hotel owners. Remember to tip your guide, but don’t worry if you only have so much coin… they will get by.

Before I left for the mountain, the power went out in the whole city… around 8 a.m. At 5 p.m. when I return the power has not been restored. The story, however, has percolated to the town. Apparently a car was forced off the road by a bus and struck a power pole or line and took out the connection.

The whole ride back down the mountain on my newfound $1 shuttle bus, I spoke with a couple guys traveling from Korea. They know a guy who knows a guy and they are staying in the priests quarters at the local church. I’m off to find them.

As luck would have it, Mindo is small and en route from some delightful Ginger tea, I bump into the only two asians for maybe a hundred miles around. The Father has already fed my Eastern companions, so they come sit down and regale me with stories of their travels and homes and lives. Before long we are neck deep in questions like “Why am I traveling?” “What do I want to return to?” and “Why the hell does everyone need an iPod?”

This conversation is one of the reasons that I am on the road. Fresh perspectives, old questions, that sense of camaraderie that comes when someone else is asking themselves the same questions you are. I’m not sure if the answers we came up with are correct, but we all had stars in our eyes to accompany a renewed sense of purpose and connection. Hyoung and Puck, you guys really made my night. Thanks for investing the time in a stranger.

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The things you can see in Quito, Ecuador

Quito is a big city. It looks and feels like almost any large city in South Americs in some parts. That being said, it is set in an amazing valley that is absolutely breath taking once you get out of the city proper.

Some of the parks have clever looking structures of wood, metal, and even entire old trees stacked together; all of which are absolutely begging to be climbed all over. With little to no idea of what to do within Quito other than take Spanish lessons, I head for what appears to be a prominent backpacker haunt in between the much lauded New Town and the auspicious Old Town. Before you jump into a taxi, be sure you are at the bus station you think you are. The North Bus Station is extremely far north of the city and can cost you to taxi to and from.

L’Auberge Inn is definitely serviceable. Their wireless is decent and you can keep a decent signal if you get the second floor rooms facing the main street; this also gives you a balcony and a great deal of traffic noise in the morning. L’Auberge has a restaurant inside, though I would recommend either of the restaurants directly across the street for a much cheaper and delicious lunch, or one of two bakery/breakfast places about 2 blocks to the south on the other side of the  main road. Neither of the breakfast joints seem to have names, but you’ll know when you get there. If you are going to eat at the hostel I would recommend avoiding the spaghetti bolognese. For dinner or snacks there is a grocery store on the same side of the road about one block north of L’Auberge inn that has a mildly English speaking attendant and everything you could want out of a third world country. Frontera (CabSav) seems to be the best available wine for any price. It adds a touch of class to the city night, as you can see.

Gareth is a young English bloke from Reading, England. He is one of the most friendly and talkative people I have ever seen. He is bristling with information about Ecuador and is ready to go find some adventure; his Spanish is terrible, but that never stops him from trying his best. For the two days following my arrival in Quito, he and I bounce around the city and talk to the varied inhabitants of the hostel; the highlight of those being a four member motorcycle loving family from Texas, including their Six and Eight year old children who have been traveling South America for the past year.

At the recommendation of the guide book I’ve been lugging around and cursing for some time, I decide to head up to Mitad del Mundo; the Middle of the Earth. Gareth has already been there so I am off on my own; braving the metro bus system. The trip there, on my lovely blue bus, is relatively uneventful and even with the rain I have a great time playing with tourists and snapping pictures. I even manage to find an espresso machine.

As I am leaving Middle Earth, a green bus rolls up to the bus stop and tells me they are headed to Quito. Not one to stand in the rain, I hop on and go for a ride. Map in hand, I attempt to engage the change collector in discussion about where I need to go and when to get off. The gentleman cannot seem to communicate with me, one of the minority of people in Ecuador who is too heavily accented for my to understand. Nearly a half hour passes on the bus whilst I try to get someone to direct my gringo self to the proper bus stop. During this time I am ignored, babbled at, and even given the opportunity to stare at a rather well formed brown breast as a woman decides to breast feed her baby while we are talking. You can imagine my surprise.

Finally, I seem to have conveyed my message through blunt force and the driver of my green bus speeds up, cuts off a blue bus, forcing them to a stop, and I jump out and board the blue bus. Two relatively antisocial Norwegians, red and blonde hair respectively, are at the back of the bus and I attempt to speak with them until we get to a bus stop I recognize. Walking in large cities in Latin America can net you some pretty impressive sights. It’s neat what people will do for a dollar.

The following day, having been told that Quito was a marvelous place to take Spanish lessons, I ask the hostle to summon up their partnered professor for a couple hours of my time. I was told he would be onsite from 9-11 and I could meet with him thereafter. This was not so, and the gentleman showed up some time after 11:30. After clearly stating that I wished to study 2 hours that afternoon, and 2 hours the following morning and that I needed to practice future and past tense verb conjugation, he proceeded to try and teach me present tense irregular verbs. This went on for about 30 minutes before I asked him to cooperate or leave. He decided to cooperate.

What seemed like an eternity later, seemingly out of material, he handed me a book to read out of; lists of vocabulary. Staring at him, I asked him the time and he said that we had been going for three hours. I bid the good man adieu and packed up my bag, setting off for someplace less frustrating.

I found an absolutely wonderful couchsurfing host with magnificent dogs and the nicest house I have entered south of the US border. Victoria and I spend an evening cooking and chatting and even watching some inestimably foreign English tv show. She gives me a run down of the house and her pets; the dogs who eat everything (keep the doors closed), the cat who eats only bread (keep the cabinet doors closed) and avocados, and all their various maladies. Victoria even takes me on a walk to a simply marvelous little canyon nearby down some of the most bug addled dirt roads that exist on this planet. Victoria tells me that there are so many lights burned out in the house, that she can’t see to get her keys in the door or use one of the bathrooms. One night, she resorted to simply scaling the garden wall to get inside; after hearing this I take the keychain flashlight off my daypack and put it on her keyring.

Friday morning, and Victoria is off to work before I am awake. Unfortunately, she left both the cabinet and her bedroom door open; all the bread is in absolute ruins around the kitchen, and her bedroom floor looks like this.

Breakfast in my belly, I load up on camera equipment and, packing a pug, I head off to the canyon. Apparently it is field trip day, so I take the opportunity to talk to some of the children running around and snap a few pictures.

4 hours of hiking later, the pug, the stray, and I are all beat when we get back to the house. I manage to make some guacamole, replace all the burnt out light bulbs and break her guest bed in one afternoon. I’m not sure how that balances out, but I feel like a complete retard. Victoria is a gracious host and simply moves me to another room.

My close friend and team mate, Joe, has been toying with the idea of taking a couple weeks away and coming to Argentina and Brazil with me. He finally manages to lock in the ticket and sends me the itinerary. It’s like Christmas.

With Joe’s arrival date now locked in, this gives me one month exactly to make it to Argentina. Including a week in the Jungle, 4 days at the Salar de Uyuni, and travel time I realize I need to get moving. Mindo is barely a word in my guidebook, which makes me think it must be wonderful, so Saturday morning means more busses to a new town. I have the name of a family who hosted Gareth in my moleskin, an invaluable present from Mark, and a bus ticket. This should get me there.

In all my life, I have seen few places to rival the beauty of the mountains of Ecuador. If you ever come here, get the hell out of the city. Do not spend one more minute in Quito than you absolutely must because the secret to this country is away from the metropolis; it is in the verdant loving (mosquito-addled) embrace of the jungle and mountains. The sight of the mountains, rivers, and vegetation on the bus ride coupled with the kid falling completely out of his chair when he fell asleep completely made up for the motion sickness from the drivers Andretti impression. If you are ever coming to the mountains of Ecuador, bring Meclazin.

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The Jungle Plan: Ecuador and the Rio Negro

Dancing is not my forte. That being said, I actually like dancing, or at least the idea of it, quite a lot. Hence, my reason for coming to Cali; to take salsa lessons. Cali has become the beginning of so much more.

The Guest House Iguana in Cali is a welcoming place filled with all manner of people. The overweight “vegetarian” who, despite having been here two days, doesn’t know if the shower has hot water. The requisite Scandinavian. And a mad diminuitive monster of a man, covered in tattoos from far away places and tribes, none from a gun, but rather wooden spikes and hammers, needle sharp copper rods, and other equally foreign objects. Jimmy, sporting last years mutton chops and no shirt tells me his plan:

“We go to Quito, meet a local who knows a little bit ab out the river, I’ve got a map, but there is a 7 way split that I’m not quite so sure about, buy a boat, some rifles for us, ammunition, and gifts for the tribe and then we’ll set off up river.”

This is the plan. It is some of the most primitive medicine on the planet; drinkable psychotherapy, Jimmy calls it. It is possible to find local men who will supply it in a safe location such as a living room where you can drink it and experience it. I encourage you to read the article in the link and see if that sounds like something that should be done in a living room. There is a tribe that will allow certain individuals to visit, provided adequate gifts of medicine, food, ammunition, and whose shaman will induct said visitors into the experience of ayahuasca. The idea is spend at least 5 days there, enough time to go through a couple of sessions with the shaman and perhaps go blowgun hunting with the men of the tribe; the tribe who as recently as the 1950’s was still actively practicing head shrinking. The tribe is not the only group out there… this is where it gets sticky.

The Rio Negro is the only way into their lands. This is tribal held land that is not policed or patrolled, prone to all kinds of nasties. Much of this land and the river are in conflict, as which tribe actually owns it is contested. This is effectively a warzone.

The key points are as follows:

  1. Boat: must be purchased or rented in Ecuador
  2. Guide: Jimmy has a map, but even he agrees we need more
  3. Guns: I don’t want to have to convince a jaguar not to eat me without one
  4. Gifts: So the tribe won’t eat us
  5. Sanity: this really isn’t in question…

There is no way in hell I am going to let this opportunity pass.

p.s. salsa is hard.

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Adventures in Bogota.

There are pink striped girl’s pajama pants on the floor of the bathroom. I really can only image why.

Bogota mornings are cold. Colder than any I think I have seen so far. I didn’t bother to take off my underarmor or undershirt until some time after I arrived at the Platypus Hostel. The Platypus is pretty nice and has a number of people here, ranging from this pretty severely homeless looking French guy who actually lives in the dorm here full time, to a hardened New York girl who is only here for 4 days.

Dallas is from Australia. Dallas and I are off in search of the Museum of the National Police. There is a problem in some of the dodgy areas of Bogota that men dress up as fake policemen and harass tourists and elicit money as bribes, etc. Dallas and I are staying in a marginally low rent district. Dallas and I are approached in the street by two very young looking policemen.

After some mangled Spanish and confused looks, one of them invites us (in English) to go to the Police Museum; the place we were headed in the first place. Luck of lucks, We get an escort to the museum and a fantastic English speaking guide named Jason. Jason was a member of the Jungle branch of the National Police that went through the FARC controlled jungle areas of Colombia hunting Guerrillas. Jason was in the jungle for about a year before they found out he could speak English and transferred him to the Museum. Jason enlisted when he was 18. Jason is 22.

The museum is relatively cool, but the highlight is definitely getting to play with all the exhibits. This museum would be nowhere near as much fun in the USA.

Neither would the courthouse.

The Platypus hostel where I am staying is almost always full. Call ahead if you want to stay. If you don’t need wireless, this is all you could ever ask for. Jasper was supposed to show up today but I haven’t received a reply to my email or seen a sign of him.

Yesterday I emailed Jasper before taking off to see a little bit of the city and the gold museum. The gold was sure glittery, but it was the writing on the wall that stood out to me.

I’m starting to get a little antsy for more, new, and different. I love Colombia, but it’s getting time to move again. In looking online I found another Aires ticket; this time for $4. The taxes were about $40, but it is still worth the 9 hours of my life I will save by skipping the bus.

As I am planning to climb Monserrat with a number of pilgrims tomorrow as they make offerings or some such in the morning, I book the flight for the afternoon; 3 p.m Sunday. Here are a few pics from the city. I like it, and after some down time, Dallas and I go out to find a local hang out spot, a nearby plaza that fills with local youth and street perfomers at night. It’s election night, so I think it will be hopping.

It is rad, the place doesn’t disappoint and there is a New Yorker running a great coffee bar there that breaks the law and serves us some irish coffee while the country is on lockdown prohibition.

Morning comes a little later than I had anticipated, and I find out that the pilgrimage road, which is too dangerous to walk during the week, is actually closed from some rain damage, so I get to skip the whole “robber” aspect, and just take a cable car up the mountain with everyone.

Five of our intrepid band, including two other Americans, leave for the mountain. I immediately start harassing the locals, as I just happened to have a white bandana in my pocket, which just happened to be the uniform of the cafeteria workers at the top of the mountain. The girls were horrified and the manager was not amused.

Today, the gigantic fruit market in Bogota is also a gigantic flower market, when all the local flora growers bring their wares in to town to sell them off. This late in the day, it is a little less than spectacular, so if you are planning on going to this, go early to see the best and brightest. Public transportation busses are quite easy to catch. Look for the ones with the “P. Quemao” sign in the window; bus ride costs about $0.75 USD.

We did miss a lot of the flowers, but Dallas, I, and the rest of the crew buy up some fresh fruits and veggies to make lunch with and head back to the hostel, buying bread and pollo along the way. Halfway through lunch, Jasper shows up.

I have to leave to catch a plane soon, but it’s great to see a familiar face, so we take some time to catch up and I grab a taxi to the airport; which, by the way, is where all the famed beautiful Colombian women actually are… working at the airport.

The flight is fast and easy. When exiting the airport at Cali, grab the collective bus to the City bus terminal for about $2 USD. Then from there catch a taxi into town for around $3 USD. This will save you the $12+ USD fare for taxi from the airport to town.

Next stop: Iguana territory.

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Eating Giant Ants in Bucaramanga, Santander

Santander has been a running joke between me and a friend Jason in Arizona since we had to travel there for work a few years back. Bucaramanga is in the Santander district of Colomba.

When we arrive at the station, Carlos even goes to a store and buys me a container of fried ants and we eat them together along with a couple of guys from Holland. They taste rather like popcorn at first, then get a bit of a mineral or iron aftertaste. Also, one may wish to have a drink around as the pieces of the exoskeleton tend to linger.

I am staying in the worst part of town. Suprisingly, the hotel room is relatively clean and quiet. I need to pay the guy, so after stashing my bag, I take off in search of a cajero, and ATM. On the way, I manage to pick up a short bald guy named Bernardo and he gives me a guided tour of the city, entirely in Spanish, and then takes me to the ATM and to a good cheap restaurant for a gigantic steak and yucca. What an opener.

In the morning, now that I am actually in Bucaramanga and I have all the ants I could possible eat, I don’t really know what to do with myself. I do know that I am in desperate need of a haircut, so I wander back to where bald Bernardo’s barber, being part of the tour, is located.

I will reiterate, I love the barbers south of the border. I may never go to a salon again. The level of detail these people put in with that effing scary blade is startling. Once I am beautiful again, and covered in hair, I decide to walk around and find some food. There is a great place called something like Nutricom that has a fantastic lunch spread and an English speaking busboy for about $3. I just happened to be walking down a street and liked the placement of tomato on the sign.

Relatively unimpressed with Bucaramanga as a city, I am resigned to getting my bag and catching an all night bus to Bogota tonight. All over Colombia people stand around hooked up to cell phones on chains like some form of telcom octopus and charge people to use the telephone. A well placed call to Carlos, who works for a bus company, tells me that I can show up at the terminal every hour on the hour all night and catch a bus to Bogota.

As I am handing the phone back, and before I can pay, the young girl running the booth starts speaking to me in Spanish. “Yo quiero hablar con usted,” she says. Translated, I want to speak with you, sir.

Laura doesn’t speak any English, she understands a few lines pertaining to age, nationality, etc, but won’t speak anything other than Spanish. Lacking anything better to do, I just sit down on the curb next to her and spend roughly the next hour chatting and entertaining myself with her and her customers. Laura makes about $10 USD a day and she works four days a week, 14 hours a day, and attends college the other three days. She is 16 and she lives on her own. Knowing what little I know about the economical and social forces at work here, I am astounded and impressed by her fortitude and willingness to work so hard for what she wants.

At one point, another young girl with braces (veeeeery common in Colombia) walks up to me and begins speaking in English. She tells me it is truly dangerous for me to sit out on the street like I am. She can tell I have a camera and probably have money judging by the shoes I am wearing and that even in Broad daylight I am running the risk of being robbed every minute I just stand here. She is gracious and sincere and I can’t remember her name for the life of me. Given her warning I decide to go put away my stuff and figure out the rest of the day.

I’ve traveled around the city a good deal and through each city have kept my eyes open for a type of teas called aromaticas. They are supposed to be the real deal with herbs and plenty of local mojo. Finally, on a whim I dropped into a shop across from the Sagrada Familia and they have them! This thing smells awesome!

Visiting the Sagrada Familia in Bucaramanga takes a little less time and a good deal less money than visiting the slightly more popular partially constructed church of the same name in Barcelona. It seems to have gotten it’s name from the actual statues of the sacred family perched over the doorway.

By now I have stashed my bag at another less dodgy hotel and am mostly killing time till Igo to the bus station to head to Bogota. I wander back through the bad section of town to chill out with the phone girl and practice my Spanish. We kick around a cafe for a while and she starts asking me to translate rap and reggaeton lyrics for her. She helps me negotiate the taxi to the station and I make it about 15 minutes before the bus leaves.

This bus is effing cold.