Blogs from Chachapoyas, Amazonas, Peru, South America - page 4

Chachapoyas Before I start this blog I just wanted to say thanks for reading and checkin out the pics and coming along my trip with me. I really appreciate the comments and remember, I respond to every one so leave me one and check back in a few days for the response and feel free to drop another one. Happy New Years y´aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaal...here´s my lates entry.... While we were in Cajamarca, we were torn on whether to go to Chachapoyas or not. It would be a 20 hour trip. Tour companies were offering a 3 day trip for $250 which includes a comfortable ride in a 4x4, all our food and accommodations. The problem is that that’s over double our budget for 3 days. So we decided to do the trek ourselves and find our own ... read more

After the Galapagos Islands, I headed south through Ecuador staying in Cuenca for a week to learn Spanish, however I picked up a stomach bug the day before I was to start my first lesson! which made the whole experience even harder trying to study for 4 hours every morning and then returning home feeling shattered! From there I went to a place called Vilcabamba for a couple of days and then it was onto Peru! I wanted to visit a place in northern Peru called Chachapoyas, a small town that is difficult to reach to say the least! What an adventure it was getting there I can say. Left Vilcabamba on Sunday morning to a place called Zumba, it took 5 hours of beautiful scenery in the National Park of Podocarpus. Arrived in Zumba ready ... read more

Hallo ihr Alle, mit Chachapoyas hatten wir dann auch unser Basecamp fuer unsere Ausfluege in die Welt der Chachapoya (=der Wolkenmenschen) erreicht. Hier im suedlichen Teil des heutigen Departamentos Amazonas befand sich der Lebensraum der Chachapoya ab dem 9. Jh.n.Chr. Bis heute ist ihre genaue Herkunft unbekannt - ihre Zahl wird auf ca. 300 000 - 500 000 geschaetzt. Die Chachapoya wurden als sehr gross & relativ hellhaeutig beschrieben und ihre kahl rasierten & im Gesicht rot bemalten Krieger verbreiteten unter den Inkas, die es auf die fruchtbare Region abgesehen hatten, Angst und Schrecken. Die Inkas schafften es erst 1470, nach vielen blutigen Feldzuegen, die Chachapoya zu besiegen. Aber auch nach der Eroberung kam es immer wieder zu Aufstaenden und selbst mittels uebelster Strafaktionen konnten die Chachapoya nie ent... read more

The Chachapoya culture and people were in the region for thousands of years before they were conquered (like the rest of South America) first by the Incas and then shortly after by the Spanish. It is thought that the Kuélap fortress was inhabited for over 2000 (possibly 3000) years. They were great warriors as they constantly had internal conflicts and were later used by the Incas as a kind of SAS (or cannon fodder depends on how you look at it). They left hundreds of now ruined cities in the Chachapoya region. Some estimations go as high as 500 cities. It is likely that this figure is even higher as the region is not well studied (only Kuélap was really studied so far) and the sites are in remote corners of Peru where not too ... read more

The day I left the Galapagos Island was completely dedicated to travel to Peru. It started with a two hour speedboat trip at 6am, after that a bus, ferry and bus combination to the airport, then a flight, then another bus to the bus terminal from which I took a bus to the border town between Ecuador and Peru. From there I took yet another bus towards a town in Peru. Unfortunately I didn’t realize that the immigration office for Ecuador is actually 4km before the border town and the border line. So when I showed up at the Peruvian immigration they told me to go back and get the stamp. Normally not such a big deal but by then it was midnight. One of the guys who worked there jumped with me in a mototaxi ... read more