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Published: January 25th 2010
Bar No More!
There one night...gone the following morningWe hadn't planned to blog before next weekend but interesting events have occurred that pushed this ahead a bit...nothing as dramatic as what has occurred in Haiti, but certainly noteworthy for us and the region of Cusco where we hang out these days...here's our story...
In the past week or 10 days here, the rains have become more incessant and certainly the volume of water falling is becoming of great concern to local residents. Given that this is rainy season high in the Andean mountains everyone, including us, is expecting a certain amount of moisture most days...but the look of surprise on the faces of locals tells us that this year is exceptional. A little rain followed by a little sun usually keeps the moisture balance in check.
In the past few days, we are hearing...and seeing... the results of the massive rainfalls. We know that houses on the other side of this valley have slid down the hillsides, and we have been seeing and hearing smaller slides of dirt and rock on our very own street. We wake up in the night and can hear the tumbling and crashing sounds just down the street as another metre or
two of wet dirt and rocks hit the road. Fortunately, it appears that we are far enough up the road and protected by solid embankments on the far side of the street that we should be immune.
This Sunday morning as we headed out on foot about 8:30 am to catch a tour bus to the Sacred Valley-an agricultural and Incan historic area roughly 30 km. from Cusco-we passed an intersection a block down (as we've noted earlier, it's always either up or down here in Cusco!) the road from our residence. What caught our eye on the inclined roadway was a hole in the usual solid wall of storefronts and restaurants and bars. The bar that we had passed by the night before and where the owners were hanging a huge string of balloons out front to attract patrons, had now disappeared in a deep pile of rubble not unlike what we see in news reports where a bomb has hit a building. We assume the rains had saturated the adobe structure and it just collapsed with the weight of the water...we haven't heard yet if there were injuries.
After gawking for a moment, we carried on
Truck Trapped in the Muck
En route to the Sacred Valley near Cusco to catch our tour bus (in the pouring rain). The bus headed off and all was well...the first sign of potential trouble was just a kilometre or two outside of Cusco-two gaping holes probably 4 to 6 feet across on the right side of the road. Our bus driver ably and nonchalantly skirted well around them.
Very soon we encountered numerous small slides covering portions of the paved roadway leading to the Sacred Valley. There were many steep enbankments to our right as the bus maneuvered its way through the obstacle course of mud and rock of various sizes littering the road. No sign of any emergency vehicles or road clearing equipment of any type, just cars and buses happily meandering their way towards the Sacred Valley.
It seemed inevitable that small slides would eventually lead to a larger one (c'mon, we're from BC, big slides happen in the mountains!) and this premonition soon came true. A couple of cars and buses were pulled over to the side of the relatively narrow road and not moving- we spotted an 18 wheeler-type truck about 100m ahead kind of mired in red mud and rocks surrounding its left side. The
No problem...we can drive past this!
A lane is cleared and we're on our way again mud was only a foot or so deep but it seemed that this trip had met its end...after all in Canada, a road in this condition could be closed for a day or even a week until the mess had been cleared and stabilization of hillsides was achieved...BUT...this is Peru. Everyone (including us) jumped out of their buses and cars and some helped push rocks (like boulder-size rocks!)away from the truck while the rest of us
idiots took photos and eyeballed the cliffs nervously wondering when the next slide would occur.
Ten or fifteen minutes passed as the truck was still enmeshed in the goo, when finally one Cusco police SUV materialized and 4 officers slowly climbed out and examined the situation of this slide on a mountain-side cliff overlooking the Sacred Valley way below. No attempts were made to keep the growing numbers of spectators back or suggest that vehicles return to Cusco or ...well, whatever one might expect those in authority to do??
Fortunately, within 5 minutes or so of the polices' arrival, we could see a large Caterpillar earth moving vehicle winding its way on the roadway towards us from the opposite side of the
Looking up Towards Our Residence
Mud and rocks obscure part of the road between the school and our "casa" slide. A few back and forths of rock and mud by the machine and then some heave-ho pushes of the truck by a group of men and the trapped truck was sprung from its captive muck and moving forward. No further checking or assessing the state of the road was necessary...everyone hopped back in their cars and busses and traffic once again manoevred around the mud and rocks that remained on the road. We were on our way again...once more dodging the smaller slides and rivers of water that now routinely dotted and crossed the road.
The delay that resulted from the slide prevented us from one stop on our tour but otherwise it went ahead as planned and we returned back to our little room at Amauta II about 7 pm in the pouring rain...to be fair, I should mention that there was about 2 or 3 hours of warm sun in the mid-afternoon which was very pleasant...the rains do stop for periods of time!
So we are back "home" again now and as I type away here, our night house attendant named Efrain has passed by our room and told us that our street is now
Not All Rain and Mud!
The Sunday tour continued on to Ollantaytambo, a spectacular Incan ruin, where the sun shone and all was well, at least for a short time [:)] blocked to vehicle traffic because too many rocks have fallen onto the road below us to get a car past. We can look out our second floor window and see the rubble strewn across the road below us. Again, while writing this, I've heard a couple of deep rumbles and thuds as more rocks tumble and hit the road between our residence and the Amauta school's main building.
Speaking of Efrain, he informs us tonight that a state of emergency has been declared in the Cusco region. For him though, the danger of rain to his own house with his wife, son and 2 siblings is more immediate. The rains have damaged his adobe home and when not working, he has been digging ditches around the perimeter of the house and putting up plastic sheets on the exterior walls to guard against any further moisture damage. He claims that it's a "peligroso" -dangerous- situation, and we can see that it is a worry for him...
So, our little language learning escapade has quickly evolved into a weather adventure....stay tuned... we are safe, no worries ...
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Robin
non-member comment
rain
Holy cow!! I am glad you are safe if not dry.. The ruins look amazing . It actually has been raining in California and there has been snow in the Mojave desert.