Goodbye Ecuador, Hello Peru

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After Vilcabamba we wanted to head to Chachapoyas in Peru, because we´d heard that the surrounding area had some impressively jungly ruins to explore. The main border crossing is notoriously grim and dangerous, associated with much hassling and theivary and the like. Because of this, because it´s the fastest way to get to Chacha, and because I am difficult, we decided to go to this really remote border town and do the crossing there. The other, smaller crossings have only been open a few years because aparently there has been a long running border dispute between Ecuador and Peru, including a minor war about 10 years ago, and they only very recently signed a peace treaty. There´s the sort of information I probably should have been aware of before coming here, wars and stuff. Never mind. The journey took two days, up in the mountains and through the cloud forest. It was some of the most stunning scenary I´ve ever come across, but also easily the worst roads and most aged vehicles. We saw for the first time a truck which had gone over the edge, reminding us that these things can and do crash on a regular basis. The first part was easily the shittest bus we´ve had so far. It didn´t exceed 30 MPH for the entire 8 hour journey, which was probably for the best all things considered, and I´m pretty certain that something important fell off while we were driving through a river. The thing was also a mobile shrine, absolutely covered in posters of Jesus and stickers that read "God is my car insurance". Personally I would rather have wing mirrors that faith in the divine, but whatever. I can just imagine what is running through the driver´s head... "shit another part of the engine fell off... maybe I should find a mechanic... or maybe more JESUS STICKERS!"

We stayed the night in a town called Zumba in a hotel room with no curtains and a flashing neon sign outside the window, the powersource of which we eventually located and unplugged. The next morning we got a rachetta, effectively a truck with benches on, another vechicle sponsored by Jesus, to the border town of La Balsa. The border was a totally unguarded little bridge over a river. The barrier was made out of bamboo, with a rock as a counterweight, and the immigration offices were the same little wooden huts blasting out the same awful music we´ve become acustomed to. It was the nicest, least threatening and most chilled out border I have ever come across. They didn´t even give a shit that Kit had lost the customs form that we´d been given on entry and instructed to definitely not lose, which I thought was a sure fire opportunity to demand a bribe. We wandered across the river and had to go looking for the Peruvian immigration guy, who appeared to be on his lunch break. He gave us Visas and told us to go to an adjacent hut to have our bags searched by customs. We looked for them but they weren´t anywhere to be found, so having skillfully evaded the border police we piled in a taxi, 7 people in a 5 seater, for the journey to the next town. I´d heard the standard of the roads went downhill when you hit Peru (aparently only around 10% are paved) but I don´t think this one even qualified as a road, more of a muddy river occasionally blocked by landslides and donkeys. We spent two hours rally driving through this, me sat on Kit´s knee, someone else sat on the driver. When we got to our first bigish town in Peru we had a minor crisis as non of our 4 cash cards worked, the one bank that accepted traveller´s cheques had a queue of 80 people outside it and no one would accept our few remaining US dollars. We started wandering around asking random strangers where we could change money and eventually found a vet (yes, veternerian) who exchanged our cash for us at a very favourable rate. The rest of the day continued in much the same way, cramming as many people as possible into a collectivo taxi and hoping from one town to the next until we reached Chachapoyas, pretty late at night.

On arrival, dazed and vulnerable after 14 hours travelling, we met the rather enthusiastic owner of the hostel we´d been recommended and somehow got talked into joining a 3 day trek to the jungle ruins, leaving at 5am the next day. I was somewhat sceptical because I like to research these things rather than just be harrangued into activities I know little about by a man with a mustache the size of a cat. It proved to be a good desicion though, and I´ll write about it later.

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Photos

View
Poor quality image of the scenary taken from (barely) moving bus.

Zumba
The view from our hotel window. We awoke to find a cloud making it´s way slowly up the main street.

Comments

[anonymous]

Maybe soooome Trrreck?