Advertisement
Published: February 12th 2009
Previously on Rachel´s blog: (Wednesdy 14th Jan) We had got up at 5am to do the Devil´s Nose train ride (approx 5 hours) starting in Riobamba, Ecuador. We then got on a 5 hour bus from Alausi to Cuenca then another 6 hour bus to Loja (the bus from Cuenca to Loja broke down and we had to wait an hour for the next bus), then an 8 hour bus which left at midnight onto Piura in Peru, which included a border crossing. Somewhere along that journey the bus also broke but as it was ungodly hour of the morning I just went back to sleep while Lorna was busy stuffing all her money and bank cards into her shoes cos she thought we were being held up! We arrived at the border, which was a bridge across the river and got our Ecuador exit stamp, walked across the bridge and waited 10 minutes while our driver woke up the Peru immigration guy, filled in our form, got passport stamped, walked across the street to get our Peru card stamped by the Peru tourist police people and back on the bus to Piura. (Thursday 15th Jan) Later on the bus stopped,
I figured to let people off but no - the bus wasn´t now going onto Piura, which was about at least an hour from wherever the hell the bus dropped us off! There were about 10 of us standing there arguing with the ticket dude, while the bus driver kept going to drive off! This went on for about 5-10 minutes until the driver stuck his head out the window and yelled something to the ticket man and actually started driving off with my bag was still in the luggage bit! I got the ticket man to get it out for me and then off the bus drove once he´d got back in. Still don´t know what had gone on as no one spoke English and it was beyond our Spanish! The ticket man kept saying no your ticket is from Ecuador we in Peru and I nearly brained him with my drink bottle cos I knew that!! He couldn´t even tell us where we were on the map! But we got that there was a bus station that we could get a bus back to Piura from so got in a "taxi" thing and asked to go to the
Our steak lunch
best lunch of my life... so far (from the simpsons movie cos the ceviche in ecuador was pretty dammed good)bus station (was a 3 wheeled bike with a motor and tuk tuk style seat at the back). We got along into whatever town it was and he stopped and goes ok. There was no bus station so I asked him in spanish where it was. He said, no bus station and asked if we wanted a hotel.
We explained that no we did not want a hotel we were wanting to get to Piura so we could get a bus onto Trujillo, where the Chan Chan ruins were that Lorna wanted to visit. I think he said something like no buses today you need a hotel, so we went to the hotel and asked where the bus terminal was and got the same thing there were no buses going today we´d have to stay the night. This was not an option so we asked where we could get a taxi to take us to Piura and got told no taxis go there. This was getting very frustrating seeing as we´d not been to bed for over 24 hours and had no idea where the heck we were! We got one of the "taxi" things back to where the
cama bus to Lima
and my mozzie bites from Baños bus had pretty much dropped us off and asked if there was a taxi to Piura which all the men were like no, not today! I asked if there was a collectivo going and they said no not today. Some guy then offered his friend saying you can take a taxi there, he takes you. So we agreed on $40 and then a guy that had been on our bus asked if he could join and I said only if you pay some, but I think he chose not to understand that bit of it even thought I said it in Spanish!! We had no Peru money so our taxi dude paid the other taxi dude for us since he wouldn´t take a US$5 and give us change in Peru money. All fun and games!
So we spent about 2 hours in a rickety car on what can be best described as a donkey road full of bumps and holes, so obviously the main road had something going on with it cos there is no way a bus would make it along the donkey road! There wasn´t a lot to see along the way, mostly dried mud with dried
trees and some villages with a few houses. After about 2 hours we got to a bridge where there were police cars checking those crossing over and we had to show our passports and open our bags for them to look in. Next thing our driver had to go over to the actual police vehicle and we had no idea what was going on but then he came back to the car and a police man got in the back seat with us and was directing the driver where to go. Turns out our driver wasn´t a licensed taxi driver so was in a whole heap of something with the police. The police man spoke less English than we spoke Spanish so we kinda talked to him in Spanish, even tho I so couldn´t be bothered but you don´t diss a police man in South America!!
He asked where we were going etc and we mentioned that we had to return to Peru to go onto Ecuador for our flight out and he said something along the lines of he had a house on the beach town of Mancora and we should go and gave us his email and
say cheese...
NZ cheese in Lima supermarket cellphone number so we could contact him when we got back and he would take us to the beach!! We were like sure sure we´ll get in touch - (Tui moment) yeah right! Anyway we got to the police station and the police man called us a real taxi to take us to the bus station, which the free loader got in as well. Oh we had kindly actually paid the taxi guy the $40 but the free loader didn´t pay him anything. So we said to him you have to pay for the taxi cos we have no Peru money. He reckoned he had no Peru money either. We got to the bus station and again the taxi man wouldn´t accept dollars and give us change in peru so Lorna went into the bus station to get money out but had taken too much out before we got on the midnight bus so could only get out 20 Sols (which we learnt was the peru money). By now the taxi man had put the price from 3 sol up to 10 and the free loader buggered off without paying anything! Tho he gave us his email expecting us to
this sign made me laugh
thought you might like it bro contact him! Lucky you can´t send small pox by email or I´d send him that or something similar.
I went round four different bus companies and there was no bus leaving to Trujillo until 5pm that night, so we had about an 8 hour wait in Puira. We made the executive decision that we just wanted to get to Lima so booked a bus leaving at 6:30pm cos it had seats that went all the way back and gave dinner and breakfast for not much more than the one that had normal seats and no food. After having a student wash in the bus station bathroom we decided to treat ourselves to some proper food and got ourselves a steak which was soooo good! Although I think anything would have tasted amazing after the travelling we had just done. I spent a few hours updating my blog and Lorna went for a sit in the sun. The bus journey to Lima was uneventful which is the best kind! Dinner was ok and breakfast not so ok. The movies was a random one in English called Paradise Virus about a virus that breaks out on an island near america and
shopping in the Inca Market
no I didn´t buy one... am guessing it´s some kind of fertility god or something the morning movie was Flight 93, about the plane that crashed during the 9/11 attacks before it got it´s target. Had an awesome sleep on the bus, it was like a plane seat so you could put it back but it had a better foot rest so your feet weren´t dangling on the floor, even got a pillow and blanket.
(Friday 16th Jan) Arrived into Lima BIG YAY. Got a taxi to our hostel which was a really good hostel in Miraflores and right next to the beach. Got there about 11am and got a hot shower and then took our washing to be done (I had run out of clean undies so had to wear my swimming tog bottoms). Went for a walk round in the afternoon and did a bit of shopping in the Inca Market, found the post office so could send Granny her birthday card. Walked up to Huaca Pucllana that is a massive pre-Inca adobe mound and meant to have the hairless peruvian dogs in the grounds but it was shut. Went the supermarket near the hostel which had gourmet food so again treated ourselves. They had NZ cheese as well but the Vintage
my yummy breakfast
watermelon, banana and pineapple black label mainland, which I didn´t buy but got fresh fruit for breakfasts. One of the guys staying in our room came back and said that he´d been mugged by having drugs planted on him and then a plain clothes "cop" turned up and searched him and said if he didn´t pay US$1000 he would have to go to jail. Luckily he was only able to take out $600, and they gave him the 10sol for the taxi back to the hostel. We found out the next night that he had actually bought drugs of someone who then phoned a friend and the rest was true. Dumass!!
The Saturday morning we spent in the city centre, with another guy from the hostel who was from england. The taxi drivers always try and charge more to the white people, but if you ask the hostel first how much it should roughly be and can then argue it in spanish you get pretty much the right price. Was kinda weird cos the taxi driver was in a cage separated from the rest of the taxi! Makes you wonder how dangerous is Lima!! We first went to Plaza San Martin and walked
up to La Merced, where inside is the Cross of the Venerable Padre Urraca that the church goers kiss their hands and then put their hand onto the cross and pray. We continued on to San Augustin church, that has been damaged by earthquakes, to view "its glorious facade, one of the most complicated examples of Churrigueresque architecture in Peru" as per my book. We had time to kill before the changing of the guard so went along to another church, San Pedro which was very yellow, and across the street the Torre Tagle Palace, where Peru´s Ministry of Foreign Affairs is located but didn´t get to see any security guards with machine guns on the roof. We walked back along to Plaza Mayor to watch the changing of the guard which doesn´t compare to Buckingham Palace´s one and then went and had lunch. We had to walk back through Plaza Mayor to get to the San Francisco church and there were loads of the guard soldiers milling around and then they all marched back into the Palace.
We did the tour of the Monastery and Catacombs museum in the San Francisco church and got to go into the
crypts where there are the skulls and bones of about 70,000 people! Some were arranged in patterns others just thrown into the same hole. No photos were allowed but I snuck a few. A few mins walk from the church was the Museo de La Inquisicion (the Inquisition Museum) housed in what used to be the headquarters of the Inquisition for the whole of Spanish-dominated America from 1570 to 1820. The tour was free but an english one not for another 30 minutes so we visited China town, which smelt at the market bit, didn´t get pickpocketed and went back for our tour. Was interesting, got to go in the original tribunal room where "criminals" were first received and questioned. Only political and religious prisoners were tried here. The underground secret dungeons had been excavated and you could go in one of the cells, not sure if you were meant to or not though but the guide wasn´t down with us so we did. And they had the torture chamber set up to show the different methods of torture used at the HQ - only ones that would not leave a mark such as pouring water down the persons throat,
hanging them by their hands. If they confessed to crimes they´d get sent to jail for a shorter time and if they didn´t confess they´d get sent to a harsher prison for two more years of more torture and possible death and then retried.
That night a group of us from the hostel went out and had a chinese (and they got my order wrong even tho I pointed to what i wanted and confirmed it in spanish, I had wanted bbq pork but got chicken chow mein!!) and then there was a Pisco Sours party at the hostel while we played drinking Jenga, which Lorna lost twice although if you knocked it over you got a shot.... After the pisco sours ran our and we´d drunk our cheap beer from the corner shop we headed into Barranco which is the bars and clubs district. Again when we went to get taxis the taxi guy tried to charge us more even though we had local people with us! I just kept going no cinco (5) to him until he agreed was fun. When we got out the taxi at the other end there was a guy trying to get
us to go into a particular club and said if we went in we´d get free pisco sours. I asked what the deal was and he said we had to buy 2 beers for 25 peso (£5), which was doable. Turns out it was 2 litre jugs of beer and a litre jug of pisco sours so it was awesome! (someone here in the internet cafe really smells!!). After we´d finished our beer and pisco sours and had a dance we went to another club that was just a door on the street you almost had to do a secret knock to get in and go up some stairs. Looked like someones house converted into a dance club! I´d had enough drinking by then as had some others so we headed back to the hostel where I ate my left over chinese.
The next morning was a beautiful sunny day so we took the surfboards from the hostel and went and gave it a go down at the beach, once we actually found the way down to the water! It wasn´t a sandy beach, instead had big stones that got realllllllly hot in the sun. The water was strong
as well and had to even get into the water. I ended up just body boarding with it and then had another go later on and managed a kneel which was enough for me. Got my back very burnt even though had put sun screen on numerous times. When was coming out of the water I stood on something that left bits of itself in my toe, got some out at the hostel but a few of the bits stayed in until after the Inca Trail cos couldn´t get them out. Was a good way to spend a sunday after a night out. Even got eggs for my breakfast, after went and bought and cooked them. We had an early flight the next morning to Cusco (5:40am!) so got all our stuff sorted and I had an early night cos was sunned out.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.135s; Tpl: 0.016s; cc: 10; qc: 47; dbt: 0.0814s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 2;
; mem: 1.2mb
