Track out the back of the shack up north

Our first city in Peru, Jaen up in the north, was just meant to be an overnight stop. There is not much to do there except stand out as one of very few tourists that come this way. But we had too much excitement there for myself.

As we were riding in a mototaxi to the bus stop to leave town with all our gear loaded up in the back of it, we were distracted taking photos from the seat and having fun. At some point we heard people yelling and then a car pulled up alongside us and started gesticulating toward the direction we came from. Looking around we saw that my big backpack was missing. Adrenaline surging, i became very excited to say the least!!!

The driver understood my excitement and our helper's message quickly enough and turned around on the divided road, dodging the oncoming traffic to get back to a point where some locals were indicating another street saying that someone had taken my backpack that way. It seemed like we were following the thief in the excitement as we had locals giving us directions for a while, but then the signals petered out as we arrived in the slumming areas. Just before they did i suspected that i had seen a door closing suspiciously with a face peering, but it could've been anything.

So i was accepting that my bag was gone and i would need to spend an extra day or two to re-equip myself before moving on into the colder climes we were heading. We went to the police station to make a report for insurance purposes and they were very helpful. After the report was filed, a detective came in, this cheered me up immediately as he was dressed like somebody out of Miami Vice: big mirrored RayBans, Hawaiian-style shirt and a low slung hip holster for his pistol. He got the story and took my email address (said to stay one night here at least just in case) and tried to make some reassuriing sounds which i did not believe. We left to go sit just out the front to have a cigarette before going to the hotel to check in again.

Before i could finish the cigarette, the detective and another senior officer came out the front and said to come with them, we would go now to try find and recover the bag now. Yeah right, let's go "find my bag", i felt like i was in a cowboy movie. So we hopped in their 4WD, up goes the pop-on siren, weee-wooo... We pull up at a residential corner with a few people standing about, out we get, the cops start berating the older woman, the detective goes upstairs (no warrant needed here) and a minute or so later comes down with my backpack. A major dopamine-seritonin rush comes over me that feels great. He asks me to check it, i do, it hasn't even been opened, everything is there.

Apparently she was a known reseller of stolen goods and needed to be paid off with a token sum ($7) for which i happily obliged. We offered to buy a case of beer for the officers back at the station, but instead we were told to take them out to "lunch" instead since drinking wasn't allowed in the station. So we went and had some beers with them and eventually ended up at the bus station quite drunk and with all our bags and headed out.

Eventually we arrived in Chachapoyas, an area in northern Peru with a lot of recently rediscovered ruins, and for the intrepid adventurer possibly many more still lost in the jungle surrounds. Matt was pretty sick from the food poisoning so we layed about for a few days planning our hiking. There were a few tourists around here but not many, so the leeches, touts and hawkers were few as well, but much more than the zero we found coming in the back road from Zumba to here. One particular guy named Angel did become rather insiduously bothersome.

We left with a tour that would drive us to several sites then leave us at Valley Belen to fend for ourselves on our 3 day trek and Kuelap visit. On the first day, camping in the valley we met some local campesinos who were working on various projects, one such being building a road across the beautiful valley, makes me happy to have seen this area before it had "progressed" so much. We shared our rum and they shared their coca leaves and everybody was happy.

For the next day we organised a local guide to show us the way to the ruins located on the mountain top near by, cheaper than bringing our own guide and better for the local economy. We found we didn't really need him, the tour operators in town had exagerated how difficult the ruins were to find, a common theme with many South American tour operators. Unlike ruins much further south in Peru, these were unrepaired and covered by jungle growth, so not as impressive but you feel a little bit closer to how Indiana Jones might feel. From there we descended on a well-built Inca road to the next valley, the Congon River basin, an isolated area without road access filled with mud and thatch style dwellings, for our next night's sleep.

We hired a pair of small horses and a driver to carry us and our gear to the top of the next pass. This was a good move as it took us almost 8 hours on horses to get there. It was raining and the path was dangerous, narrow, steep and slippery, causing our horses to slip sometimes. Once Matt fell off as his horse fell but no injuries thankfully. We left our driver and horses at the top of the pass and headed into the next valley towards a town near Kuelap. The next day we had trouble finding road transport to Kuelap, but eventually got lucky with an off-duty taxi driver showing a friend to the ruins that also would be able to take us back to Chachapoyas after we all had visited the ruins. Kuelap is a large Incan fortress city located on a steep sided mountain peak, it has been somewhat cleared of growth and repaired, and is very impressive.

From Chachapoyas we went to Cajamarca, the trip was meant to take 14 hours but the bus broke down 3 times and at one point we expected to sleep near the road but they substituted a broken part for some bark or something else luckily nearby. Along the way we cleared some of a landslide to ease the passage of the next vehicles. The last hour, of the 17 altogether, had me clenching my buttcheeks to withold something i'd eaten earlier that i didn't agree with, 'twas agony. Stool consistency seemed to becoming a fairly regular topic between us with all the trouble we both had.

Cajamarca is a beautiful city and a popular destination spot for locals living in northern Peru. The nightlife was great fun and we had a lot of luck meeting very pretty girls that were there on holidays. Though it was a shame that the most fun group were all 16 or younger. Quite a funny situation with one of their mothers being there chaperoning them, but having her stay at the table to look after our drinks and stuff, while she encouraged and pushed us onto the dance floor to dance with her young charges. We met up with them (mother as well) another night for some drinking in the town park square. Maryolyn's mother owned a hostel on the coast, in Trujillo our next destination, so we planned to travel with the girls there in the next few days.

At Trujillo we studied some spanish for a few days, but i found the lessons unsatisfactory. We also went to visit some ruins in the area. But the highlight was going out clubbing with the girls and visiting the local amusement park. If you ever wondered where all the rides that western civilization deems to unsafe for society anymore have gone, then go to Trujillo. The best example of this was the ride called disco wirly or similar, it spun us around so we'd have to sit down on the circular metal seat and then it'd try to bounce us off the seat and smash either our backs or heads against the seat. I was lucky to only have my small camera bashed and busted.

The next few days we visited more ruins in Chiclayo and then threaded our way through a partially tunnelled canyon which was absolutely amazing. Eventually landing in Huaraz, the next stage of our adventure.

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