The trip to Kuelap was an adventure. We decided to go after hearing from a few travelers and our guide book about how amazing it was. We heard that it was recently rediscovered and is the future Macchu Picchu of northern Peru, just not as touristy and busy. So even though it wasnt in our original travel plans we decided to go for it anyway. The only problem was how we were going to get there. We were in Cajamarca when we decided to go, and there were two options to get there: rough it by jeep for 20+ hours on [View Full Entry]

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We finally arrived in Cajamarca after a long and bumpy bus ride from Chiclayo. Cajamarca is an old historical city in the andes of northern Peru and is most famous for being the place where the Incan empire began to collapse to the rule of the Spaniards. The Spanish conqueror Francisco Pizzaro ambushed and captured the Inca emperor Atahulapa, and eventually executing him after he handing the Spaniards all his treasure. We decided to go there after hearing good things about it from other travelers while we where in Chiclayo and Mancora, otherwise we probably wouldn’t have ever come to [View Full Entry]

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Chiclayo After weeks of inactivity, I’ve decided to return to the world of blogging and try to remember what we did while in Peru……if the words aren’t all there, at least the photos are here to give you a bit of a visual idea of what my eyes saw while in Peru. So we begin with Chiclayo. We entered Chiclayo mid-day after a relatively short (about 4 hours) bus ride from Mancora. The first thing we noticed was that Chiclayo is a big city set in the middle of a dry desert, with many white and light coloured buildings. The minute [View Full Entry]

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Our entry to Peru from Ecuador was problem-free at the border. Stepping foot in Piura after a long overnite bus ride was another story. The first thing that we noticed that was different from Ecuador is that in Peru there are no Terminal Terrestres, which are bus stations which hold spaces for all the bus companies. Instead, we were told that we had to take a taxi to a different station where our next bus would take us to Mancora. So we trusted our taxi driver to take us there safely for $2 USD. The moment that we began loading our [View Full Entry]

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After 3 ½ weeks in Ecuador, we decided to move on with our journey into Peru. The border crossing in Macara was problem free, as we arrived by our overnite bus at 2am. We were surprised that no questions were asked, just our passports were stamped; an exit one from Ecuador and an entry one from Peru. It was definitely different than border crossing in any western country, as we did not get grilled for our purpose or motives. I guess it was obvious that we were just gringos backpacking through foreign lands. Another thing that we found weird was the [View Full Entry]

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After Guayaquil we decided to go to Vilcabamba, which is known as the valley of youth. Many people there grow to live much longer than most, plus we heard that its very nice, beautiful and relaxing, so we just had to go and have a taste of what water they are drinking! We took an executive 10-hour overnite bus from Guayaquil to Loja, the nicest one we have been on so far. Each passenger got a bag of goodies with a fruit drink, very nice. We arrived early in the morning, and took another hour combi ride to our destination, Vilcabamba. [View Full Entry]

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After a fun weekend partying with our new friends from Guayaquil in Montañita, we decided to take up their offer to show us around their city. We left Montañita by a 15 seater van with a couple of friends from Columbia and from Spain and arrived in sunny Guayaquil in time for dinner time. Guayaquil is Ecuador’s biggest city, and is much quicker and crazier than Quito. That first night we indulged in some McDonalds, the first time in weeks that we saw one. They put guacamole in their McPollo’s, but it still tasted like the garbage at home. That was [View Full Entry]

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We decided to take a bus from with the 2 swiss girls that we met during our jungle trip, to Montańita, a small surf village off the coast of Ecuador that is known to have a wild night life. We found that to be true when we arrived at midnight after a LONG trip from Bańos, which included having to switch buses at a crazy chaotic bus terminal in Guayaquil, and being stranded in Salinas before taking a cab to our destination of Montańita. We arrived in Montańita to a argentinian hippy with dreads greeting us and offering to take us [View Full Entry]

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Arriving in Bańos in the morning after a long overnite bus from the coast was a much welcomed surprise. Bańos is a small town located in a lush green valley with an active volcano overlooking it, and is full of adventure travel things to do. The first day we spent the morning catching up on lost sleep in the nicest hostel we have stayed in so far, called Hostal Marquez. We got a spacious room with really comfy beds, with a nice balcony and a view of the main waterfall in Bańos called the Virgin. We decided to do a night [View Full Entry]

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Last week we decided to do a jungle trip to the Ecuadorian amazon outside the city of Puyo. We hunted around Banos looking for the best deal in an all inclusive package, and found the right scenario with a company with the help us a good friend named Xavier. We started our trip at 9am, and met with our new group that we shared good times with for the next 3 days. We were lucky enough to be put in a small group of 4 with Denise and Franchesca from Switzerland and our Ecuadorian guide named Marietza. It was a perfect [View Full Entry]

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