Blogs from Tumbes, Tumbes, Peru, South America

DAYS 35-36 Today we farewelled Equador although the 6.30 am taxi to the bus depot was not welcomed by the group. Loaded up with breakfast & lunch supplies for a 5.5 hr local bus to the Peru border where we had to change busses after clearing customs & immigration. The trip was generally downhill from the highlands heading towards the coast. The outlook was more lush valleys scattered with agriculture & dairy farming communities. On levelling out the land was noticeably drier yet we came across vast bananas plantations. Our guide offloaded us at the border turn-off & arranged taxis instead of remaining on the bus which proceeded to the next town before going to the border. The move proved to be a godsend in saving about 45 min at the notoriously slow border crossing. It ... read more

Peru was awesome. As great as our trip was through Chile and Argentina, there was so much more to Peru. The food, the people, the culture was all fantastic. I do not have as much to share in a wrap-up of month 2, but here are a few things: Peru is incredible for budget travel. We did not really miss out on anything, yet spent half of what we did in Chile/Argentina. The babies in Peru are incredibly well behaved. They are put on long bus rides, loud crazy buses, the works, and never even blink. Partial entry never completed... read more

Armonia dias means Harmony Ten, and we loaded up a minibus to go see them (150 sol, there and back with the driver waiting for the performance to finish). While we waited for the performance we set up in a beer tent, which is where the rooster was photographed. The performance was quite a drive inland from Tumbes and cost 25 sol each to get into the enclosed soccer field to see them up close. If you were poor, you could still see and hear them quite well from the other side of the fence, which I thought was a nice touch. Couldnt see that happening in australia really. We went in almost first and staked out a spot in front of the stage and stayed there all night. Everyone got quite drunk and enjoyed themselves ... read more

Grandma´s birthday is one of the primary motivators for Victoria and her Australian family to travel to Peru. The rest of the Australian group arrived around lunchtime on the day of the party, rested and recovered to be ready for the night. The venue is actually the family home owned jointly by grandma and all of her children. A lot of effort and expense went into this event, bunting on the walls, catering, a band for music. All quite impressive really. As with any event of this nature anywhere in the world, every freeloading friend or relative showed up, whether or not they had contributed to the expense or effort involved, but it managed to go off well anyway. In any event, the party guests consumed 80 crates of beer (960 longnecks) plus whatever individual guests ... read more

In Tumbes and presumably most of Peru, car ownership is unusual if not rare in most cases. If its too far or you´re too lazy to walk, you catch a taxi or a mototaxi. Taxis seem to be any car that can still move. Most are adequate, some are good and a few are almost dangerously bad. To take a trip from Victoria´s house (a suburb refered to as poyango but actually named andres araujo moran) to tumbes takes maybe 10 minutes and costs 1 sol per passenger (about 40c each). To take special trips, longer distances or late at night, it gets more expensive. It might cost 10 to 20 sol for the 1/2 hr trip to peurto pìzarro or 10 sol to get home after a night out for example. Mototaxis (motos) are purpose ... read more

The family and I piled into a taxi and drove quite a distance to a completely obscure and well concealed restraunt. The food was good and surprisingly cheap, even for Peru. 7 adults food plus drinks and beer for 65 soles total, maybe 28 dollars Australian. Apparently the Tumbes provincial president (kind of like a state premier I think) was there as well, but I didn´t know until later. There is a rather cool cactus hedge along one side of the place. Made me wonder how long it takes to grow something like that, cactus is not famous for its lightning growth rates. We visited this place again just recently with 18 people. The bill came to 130 soles this time... wow. After the second visit we went to a swimming hole in the river, very ... read more