Day 61 and 69, this is long...

So I've made it through my first 2 months here. Yay! Has been good so
far, I expect it will continue as such.

So I'm in Cuenca. It is AMAZING here! The whole city still has all
its colonial architecture, but it feels very classy and
sophisticated. There are very modern stores selling things that I
didn't even see in Quito. It's generally cool everyday, with rain
showers around 1-4 in the afternoon. Interestingly, there are much
fewer beggars here than in any other city I've been to so far, but
the ones that are here tend to congregate around the doors of the
many churches in the city. Altogether though, this place has a very
high-end vibe, and I've been living a bit jet setter while I've been
here.

So, going back to last Thursday, it had become apparent, talking to
the visitors from other cities that were congregating for the party
the next evening, it being the Dia del Muerte, that I was living in a
singular cloudy, wet, mudhole, while most of the rest of the coast
was in sunshine. Decided to leave soon. My walk on the beach that
morning that the beach there seems to be "the" place for sea turtles
to come and die. Didn't really too a terrible amount that day, helped
Miriam and Fernando move muddy strips of bamboo in the pouring rain.
After dinner, I went with Aurelio to his father's house, where a
bunch of guys, Aurelio's nephew, a friend and one fellow who was
quite drunk, were all drinking rum. Listened to them talk, in fast
Spanish, about car accidents and the weather. The drunk kept asking
if I liked the rum, as I'd had a little taste of it.

My Spanish must be getting better, I can pretend I don't understand.

Friday. After dinner, for reasons unclear, David and Fernando decided
to go surfing in the freezing ocean. Very entertaining to watch them
try. We went down after to their grandfather's house, where the party
was getting started. There was dancing all night long, but I found I
got really tired after the first few hours, so I came home early.

Saturday being wholly uneventful, everyone was recovering from the
party, I move to Sunday. I spent the morning saying goodbye, although
I am coming back, when it's sunny again. Packed up, Miriam made
ceviche, a fish and veggie speciality from this part of the world,
for lunch. On to the bus to La Libertad, where I changed to another
bus to Guayaquil. Uncomfortably, I was standing for a large part for
the journey on the first bus, my head kept hitting the roof. The
buses here are built for shorter Ecuadorians. The sun finally made
it's appearance, after a week long hiatus on my trip, as we rolled
south along the Santa Elena peninsula. Then the high end vacation
homes of Ecuador's rich began to appear; this is the resort end of
the coast, despite the land around looking like the Alberta badlands.
Arriving in La Libertad, I found, after asking for directions 3
times, a bus to Guayaquil. The highway in was the most modern road
I've seen here yet, a well-maintained 4 lane highway. My pack was
jammed in my lap because the girl in front had her seat back. The bus
terminal in Guayaquil is massive, modern, and, as well as most of the
northern suburb area I went through, very clean. It wasn't
oppressively hot like it was the last time I was there, at least not
in the evening. I took a cab to the Dreamkapture Hostel, in the
Alborada neighbourhood. The place was fabulous, with a small pool,
couches, clean tile floors, and a soft bed. Very higher-end, not
surprising, as it's owned by a Canadian woman. I slept really well,
and when I woke up, I didn't feel sticky, my clothes were all dry and
had a good breakfast. Life can be so good to you sometimes. They have
a collection of tropical birds and what look like three marmosets in
one of the cages.

So packing up and heading back to Guayaquil's enormous bus terminal,I
proceeded to navigate through the throngs of people heading to all
kinds of places and got on a bus to here, Cuenca, via Parque Nacional
Cajas. Out we rolled, last as usual onto the Panamericana. The man
sitting next to me appeared to be carrying some unknown animal, it
sounded, and later smelled, like a puppy, but he had it in a bag, and
quite honestly, I didn't really want to know. It made regular
squealing sounds throughout the journey. We passed through a small
town which had the distinct feature of every building having at least
3 TV stick aerials on top of it. I suppose the reception must be
appalling there. Heading south, here be banana country. Plantations
crowded the roadsides and stretched off into the horizon. This is the
part of Ecuador where the bananas that we buy in the supermarkets
back home come from. This is also the area of some of the gravest
human rights abuses in Ecuador, involving underage children working
on the plantations, often for the powerful American multinationals
that control the world banana trade (Dole, Del Monte and Chiquita).
Out we rose out of plantations, back up into the cloud forest. When
we finally got out of the clouds, it was unbelievable. The Andes here
are rocky, much like some mountain ranges in BC, rather than the
forested look from the northern highlands, the valley is this
pastorial setting with long grassy fields with little creeks running
through them and little homesteads, all colonial style, some quite
expensive looking, dotting the hills. I'm going to try and go out
there for one day, either this week or later on, I'm almost certainly
coming back here.

Now Cuenca, besides being extraordinarily beautiful, with large
colonial-era buildings with clay tile roofs (check my gallery
www.andres-paz.deviantart.com ), cobbled streets, with men and women
walking around wearing suits and generally dressed very well, sitting
on park benches in the plazas reading the daily paper, little
children in school uniforms everywhere; this could be some city in
Europe. It was raining when I arrived, so I took a cab to the Hostel
El Monarca. It is extremely colourful, in bright oranges and greens,
with paintings of half-naked women on the walls, tye dye ceiling
hangins and extremely creaky floorboards. Bed is the saggiest I've
slept on so far. Had dinner in one of the city's numerous cafes,
hell, the entire city seems to compromise shoe stores, women's
fashion boutiques, cafes, and internet places. I walked through the
streets after, all the churches and plazas are lit up at night, gives
it a very noble feel. Some in the middle of the night, I woke up to
what I imagined sounded like a small monkey playing with flip-flop
sandals. Whatever it was went down the hall and it got quiet again.
The next day, I went out and wandered through the streets, selling
just about everything under the sun, lots of jewelry and cooking
utensils though. Visited El Calderon, the city's central, iconic
cathedral (gallery, the one of the distinctive blue domes). Bought a
newspaper (I favour El Comercio, it's like Ecuador's Globe and Mail),
I've decided while I'm here, living expensively, that I'd work at my
Spanish reading skills, and went to the Cafe Austria. On the way
down, I got caught in a crowd of people, a man was having a heart
attack on the floor of a movie shop, and the ambulance and paramedics
were everywhere. Watched him get helped into the ambulance and driven
away. It's interesting how events like that always draw a crowd very
very quickly. Now, the Austria. This is, by far, the best cafe I've
found in the city, and I'm going there for lunch everyday, reading
the paper, watching the city go about it's business, and having the
best damn coffee I've found yet, it's supplied by the Illy Coffee
Company, one of the largest and most prestigous Italian companies in
the business. It has a very Euro setup, with classical music in the
background and lots of pastries and cheesecake. In general, for my
time here, it's been a much different way of life than anywhere I've
been so far, much more higher class, and generally contrasting a lot
of what I've seen in Ecuador so far. It's interesting to wonder how
Cuenca ended up so different from the rest of the country, even Quito.

I came back to my hostel after an afternoon of exploring, and
managed, for the second time on this trip, to lock myself out of my
room. Went and had dinner while I waited for the hostel owner to come
back, he'd gone out somewhere earlier in the day. The El Moliendo
cafe is run by a Colombian bloke, Miguel, who is extremely friendly
and seems to like to chat with the many foreigners that come in, this
place is highly recommended in almost all of the major guidebooks. I
met a woman from Holland, Teresa, who was staying here for one night
on her way south, she's heading to Peru, where I will be following
her, probably in a couple of weeks. I bought an umbrella on my way
home, the rain here doesn't really justify a coat. Arriving back at
the hostel, the owner and I proceeded to try every key he had to open
my door. It appears, that he has a spare key for every lock in the
entire place EXCEPT for the door to my room. Feeling rather pissed
off, with myself and the owner, I took another room, and we'd deal
with the door this morning. Waking up the this morning, I found the
owner trying to jimmy the catch on the interior window to the room. I
went down for breakfast, and he'd managed to open it with some steel
wire when I went back up. I had to crawl through the window down onto
the bedside table to get back in, with the key sitting on the bed.
This is actually cracking me up now, writing about it, and knowing
me, it will probably happen again before this trip is over. Once
again with access to my things, I did some research and checked
travel warnings for Peru, I hope to be down there in about 2 weeks or
less. Apparently, due to the Shining Path rebel group, there is a
heavy warning against travel to a whole whack of places throughout
Peru, so it looks like I won't be spending that much time there, with
many places considered too dangerous to travel at this time. Went and
checked the exchange rates for the Nuevo Sol, Peru's currency, (3
soles=$1US), I also saw that the Cdn. has reached $1.10 against the
greenback. That's freaking awesome, and makes my travel here a bit
cheaper! After lunch, I went out looking for a new blank journal, as,
with the entries and poetry I've been writing, the one I have is
running out of pages. Spent 2 hours looking, without success. Lots of
datebooks though. Since I've been feeling particularly spoiled today,
I went to place called El Fornance, and had pizza and ice cream. In
the middle of my dinner, a protest march, anti-xenophobia, came down
the street. They were a bunch of young people, all of them with signs
and posters expressing tolerance and acceptance, (check gallery, my
camera was a little tempramental). This was a truly brilliant way to
end my day, and right now, honestly, I feel great! Went for walk down
by the river, watching couples kissing on the bridges and everyone
going home from work.

Day 69

Soooooooo, things, as they tend to do, have not worked the way I hoped they would. I'm in in the town of Chachopoyas, in the northern highlands of Peru, still 2 or 3 days travel from Arequipa. I have to wait 8 hours for the road to the coast to open, so I figured, seeing as my budget is already skyrocketing, I'd do my emails.

So allow to fill you in on how I ended up in this predicament.

So going back to Thursday. Thursday is Cuenca's market day, although the market is not tourist orientated (aka polyester, poultry and papaya), but it was nice to go around and see the comings and goings of the people. In the paper, I found that the road I took from Las Tunas to Guayaquil has been blockaded by protestors, apparently feeling a little neglected in the face of government reforms. Friday, the newspaper reported that the Peruvian Congress ratified a free trade agreement with the USA (ironically, the Spanish acronym for it is TLC). So, although I haven't seen anything in the 2 days I've been in Peru so far, there is general unrest amongst the people right now. Feeling pampered, peaceful and ready to move on, I got things together to leave the next day.

So, Saturday morning, packed up and rolled out on the 5 hour bus ride to Loja, the last big city before the border in the Andes. In the station, I chatted with a Swedish woman, bound for Quito. She was in Ecuador doing her thesis on migration, and had been conducting interviews here in Cuenca, she told me the reason Cuenca is wealthier is because a large concentration of families here have relatives working abroad. Now we know. Out on the bus, we gained a lot of elevation and very briefly, for the first time since arrival, saw snow. The man sitting beside me kept craning to look out the window, despite it being foggy for much of the trip, with not much to see. He got off, and a few stops later another man sits down next to me. It became quickly evident taht this one had been in the rum, and asked me several times where I was heading, even after I told him the first time. He was difficult to understand; he kept slurring his words. Sometime after he fell asleep, his head lolling all the way out into the aisle. Arriving in Loja, drunk man asks if we have actually arrived, with half the bus already getting off. A few other foreigners who'd been on the bus asked if I wanted to get in a shared taxi to Vilcabamba, but it being late, and the rate being $5, I declined, and took a cab downtown to a hotel. We drove by a wedding on the city bridge on the way there, the taxista slowed down, not sure if it was out of respect or simply to gawk at the beautiful bride. All in all, I great way to start out a new leg of the trip.

Sunday. The place where I went to breakfast made these large, fabulously decorated cakes, they looked so good it was hard to believe that people could bear to eat them. Listened to a group of three American girls talk about their dissatisfaction with Ecuadorian food and restaurant service. Why did you bother leaving home? Went around on a brief wander of Loja. I sat through almost all of a church mass at the rather pretty Church of San Sebastien. The process is, more or less, like the way it's done back home, maybe a little less orderly though. Hiked up to a statue of the Virgen de Loja, with a beautiful view of the town and the mountains (check gallery in a few days). It looks like the city has carpeted the hills and valley, but is about as busy as the forest around it. Packing up again, I went to catch the bus to Vilcabamba. On the way, I helped a very old, slow moving indigenous man across the street, mostly to make sure a car didn't shmuck him and to get him onto the sidewalk. Arriving at the terminal, a bloke called Pepito, looked to be in his mid 50s, came up to me and insisted to show me where to buy a ticket to Vilcabamba. This seemed a little suspicious, as the terminal is very small, he seemed a little over-eager, but he spoke English, which I think was why he approached me, so he could test his language skills on me. He kept telling me that my Spanish was really good, despite the fact that I couldn't have said more than 15 basic words to him. Saying goodbye to Pepito, I got on the mini-bus to Vilcabamba. The driver, evidently, had a fetish for classic, Western rock, and a very limited selection of music, which meant I was listening to Van Halen and Pink Floyd, over and over for the hour and half to Vilcabamba. The geography here is surprisingly like B.C. with large, forested, mountains that look so neat as plate tectonics have folded the land up and rivers carve designs down the sides. Quite beautiful, and it made me think about how beautiful the area where I live in Canada is.

Arriving in Vilcabamba, there was a mountain bike show in progress, whereby a group of bikers went off a couple of jumps and went down stairs, nothing particularly spectacular. Setting up in a rather hostel with a really nice room, I went out looking for dinner. I found this one place, Natural Yogurt. A pair of men were sitting out on the patio, and one, Royo, immediately greeted me and made room at the table. The other's name was Alonzo. Over dinner, I talk with them; Alonzo is an English teacher at the local school, having learned from all the foreigners that come to this little town. Interesting note, the slang term for a young person is a 'pollo', lit. chicken. Royo works at a horse riding establishment in town. Met another bloke, Isaac, from California, who has been here for 6 weeks teaching English at the school with Alonzo. I like that I finally can have an intelligent conversation with a local, in Spanish without stumbling too much over the words.

Monday, I woke up to brilliant sunshine coming over the mountains, with the clouds rolling back off the mountains, leaving golden landscape painted in blue and green. Had breakfast watching the valley wake up, the relaxing vibe here is so strong, like Mindo. On a quest to find a place that did laundry, I discovered, that in the year since the publication of my guidebook, one hostal, and one lavanderia have gone out of business, haven't found that before. Took a hike up the road to a restaurant out of town for lunch, taking postcard-worthy photos of the valley, and the huge mansions of expatriates that have moved here, no doubt because of it's beauty. A woman I met on the road tried to get me to buy some local natural medicines, which I declined, it being mostly plants for sicknesses I didn't have. Arriving at the restaurant, I learn that it is only open for breakfast and dinner, not lunch. Coming back to town for lunch, it was at this point that I would make the fateful desicion to go to Peru the next day, via the crossing at Zumba. More on that in a minute. Went to the place in town I'd been assured exchanged for Peruvian Nuevo Soles, the Peruvian currency, they didn't have any, told me to check the following morning. So, Tuesday morning. Packing up, I went to find the next bus to Zumba. Going to 3 different offices, I am told the next one is at 3:30. Checked with the store, still no soles, but was told there was another bus to Zumba at 10:30. As it turned out, the bus at 10:30 was coming FROM Zumba, cleared that up and waiting until 12 for a bus out.

Here is where the fun begins.

The road from Vilcabamba to Zumba is unpaved. Bumpy. The road also has, literally, no straight sections, it's all switchbacks and curves. Swaying. Add in the fact there's a lunatic driver at the wheel and a cliff drop off the right side of the road. Very unnerving. Winding our way along, we pass through a collection of villages and hamlets, with no evident economic activity, in probably one of the most remote areas of Ecuador. Often it would just be 3 or 4 homes perched on the side of the mountains. 5 hours this went on for. The glances from the other passengers suggest that while it isn't surprising to see a gringo out here, it doesn't occur very often. Finally, we arrive in Zumba. Zumba is not actually on the border, but simply the point of no return before the border. The rain is coming down, and I've got this guy who will take me to the border for $20. Had lunch and waited until 5:30 for a ranchera, an open sided truck, to come back to take me out, $1.75. They told me it was an hour and a half to the border at La Balsa. It was 2. So off we go in the truck, the brilliant tropical green wilderness rolling by. Passing more odd little villages, we're now racing a large thunderstorm across the valley, with the truck roaring along and the valley, now dark, illuminated every so often by sheet lightning. The storm caught up with us at the military checkpoint, my 1st military checkpoint. Determining I was a foreigner (the young soldier lisped the word, extranjero, which made him difficult to understand), I had to write my name in a little book. It would appear, that the only foreigners that venture out there are all either French, or Canadian. Go figure. Going on, now with rain coming in at the side of the truck once in a while, I was slightly damp when we arrived at La Balsa, on the border. It was around 7:30pm. With no real idea of where I was or where to go next, I get my exit stamp from the official and cross the bridge there.

Welcome to Peru!

This side looks exactly like the other, expect the Peruvians had a few ducks and small pigs running around. Trying to get to San Ignacio, the next town of signifance into Peru, I find this rather stubborn taxista who was going to charge me $20 to San Ignacio, this was reasonable, due to the 2.5 hours there, and the time of night, and with no actual other transportation, I end up having to take it, after chewing him a bit for the high cost. The road was absolutly appalling, no one has evidently checked on it in years, but the driver, with experience, managed to navigate it. Over the course of the trip, we nearly hit dozens of donkeys, pigs and dogs. The Peruvians, as I have found out, love their donkeys, and can be found everywhere, employed in many different ways. We arrived in San Ignacio, the man takes me to a hotel and being exhausted, fall straight to sleep. This closes the truly grueling leg of the travel from Ecuador to Peru.

Yesterday. Was woken up by some bastard in the street bleating away on a bicycle horn. Still without any clear idea where I am, I decided to try and get to Cajamarca. Went to change to soles, found that the greenback is losing ground against the sol, and lose about a dollar in the transcation as a result. Finding a rather odd breakfast of rice and potatoes, I get on a minibus for Jaen, the next major town in from the border. Rolling along in the bus, the geography and climate has changed a lot. It is much warmer here, the Andes are now much rockier, the middle cordillera region now, from the tropical Ecuadorian section. There is a large, muddy, torrent of a river on the left side of the road, and now, instead of banana plantations, there are kilometers of rice fields. Dodging the occasional herd of cows being herded along the road, which, was really a long road of potholes, interuppted by a patch of old tarmac. Then quite abruptly, several things changed. Tarmac, smooth and without potholes appeared beneath the wheels of the bus, and road signs appeared, telling the distances to towns, the name of the road (5N Cajamarca Highway), signs that say "respect the rules of the road" in Spanish, and speed limit signs (which the driver was doing double the speed of). The highway was in far better condition than most of the roads I'd been on in Ecuador. The valley began to widen out, so the Andes disappeared, replaced with huge bluffs of bright red clay, and the rice fields interuppted with the occasional patch of papaya trees. For most of the trip, the guy sitting next to me kept fiddling with a small radio, trying to get something, without success.

Then the back tire blew out.

The tire, which I saw was balder than Patrick Stewart's head, basically blew because the pavement had burned a hole through the rubber. Stand around watching the driver, quite quickly, change the tire. On we go, dodging more livestock, and overtaking with bare feet between us and oncoming traffic. Arriving in Jaen, I take a mototaxi, one of the 3-wheeled, open-air, motorized trikes to another station and get on another minibus to Bagua Grande, where I could get transport to here, Chachapoyas. I must have dozed off a few times on this bus, I seemed to keep falling into the shopping bag of the woman next to me. At last we get to Bagua Grande, another mototaxi, and with no buses at this time of day, a shared taxi to Chachapoyas. This is the memorable part of the journey, the part that made it all worth it. We arrive at the provincial checkpoint from Cajamarca province to Amazonas. The land suddenly took on a surreal, breathtaking quality. It was sunset, so massive soaring peaks that had risen up were inlaid in gold light, clothed in bright shades of amazonian green. The river running alongside the road isn't as muddy as the last one, and is flowing in the opposite direction. The hills have circlets of cloud with these massive walls of banded rock and huge cliffs. The place shrieks, mystic, forgotten land. The driver senses my interest and points out a waterfall and various interesting point along the route. What strikes me is that only a handful of people that visit Peru see this, with almost all foreigners going from Lima to Cuzco to Machu Pichu, and see nothing else in this country. There are road signs that pop up every so often with an environmental bent, things like, "Water is life, don't pollute it", "Garbage has its place" and "Deforestation prohibited". The evening is cool in this rainforest area. We come to a road stop, they were doing survery work, and we had to wait an hour and a half for them to finish. I talked with the driver, who was probably one of the most friendly and helpful people I've met in the whole time I've been in South America, and told me about beautiful ruins and other things to see in this area that doesn't see that many tourists. I'm definitely coming back one day to check this part of Peru out. Overall, as well, I've found that the Peruvians I've come into contact with, are very friendly, tolerant people. They are the people though, that call me gringo, a term which I only heard once in Ecuador. The sun goes down, and we finally get moving under the moon and stars at 7:15. The next section of the road was unpaved, which meant for most of the way to here, we were choking on the dust of the cars in front of us. Then we encounter the convoy of vehicles coming from the other end of the closed section of the road. Pulling into the cliff side, we watch as monolithic, overnight buses from Lima, various freight trucks, and a few cars go by. Going along, at some point we got back onto paved road and arrived here in Chachapoyas, which was very alive and busy, even late at night. It got up early this morning too. Found a good hotel, with ice-cold showers.

This brings us up to now. I found that getting to Cajamarca is extremely difficult to do from here, despite the direct road, so I have a ticket on the 6 pm bus to Chiclayo, on the coast. They have the road closed until this evening, which is why the bus doesn't leave until that late. I tried to persuade the ticket man that his competion was selling tickets for less than 30 soles ($10US, more or less), he came up with some excuse why that didn't matter. Changed the rest of my allocated moeny to soles, as apparently the greenback has lost even more ground. I should be in Arequipa, where I want to be, by Sunday. Met a few other foreigners here, having the same travel difficulties I am. All travel seems to be related to Lima, literally, all roads lead to Lima.

This has been a wild week, and I can't say it's been boring.