Adventures in Peru

Hurricanes can be destructive, obtrusive, and incredibly intimidating. But for us there was no stopping us from exploring the beautiful country of Peru in early October 2009. Not even in the wake of a hurricane.

We packed up our entire luggage and survival gear and our pal Mike drove us from our home base of Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario to the Hilton in Buffalo, New York the night before our flight. Expecting a very early morning and an extremely long 2 weeks, we hit the sack right away. In the morning we ventured across the street to the Buffalo International Airport and waited for our plane. Eventually we got on the jet before daybreak and started our flight. We had a brief stopover in Atlanta. Now, for those of you who haven't been to the Atlanta airport, you've most definitely got to check it out. It's huge! Not only is it a big airport but all of the terminals are connected using a subway system. I guess if you're from a large city where this is common, it's not such a big deal, but for us it was really cool. It was stormy outside so we just travelled on the subway between terminals taking a look at all of the cool displays while waiting for our next flight.

We arrived late that evening in Lima, Peru and our first order of business after getting through all of the security and luggage checks was to go pick up our vehicle. We rented a small manual Suzuki SUV. Technically it could seat 5 people. But realistically, after we packed it up with our gear, it could only seat about 2 persons. Luckily, there were only two of us. How perfect. At this point it was 2am.

The airport parking lot funneled us into a very eerie part of town. The roads were all gravel and the there was no distinction, aside from random elevated dirt piles and grass, between the road, the boulevard, the sidewalk and the adjacent buildings. Speaking of the adjacent buildings, most of them were closed and boarded up. Those that were open were extremely well accented with neon lights and surround buy loitering hoodlums. It was definitely a place that we needed to get out of. As Pat sped through all of the red lights, I guided him out of the city using the GPS on my Blackberry. Eventually we made it onto the main highway. After driving for about an hour, and passing through some not so welcoming towns (at least that is what they seemed like at night), we hit our first toll booth. We paid the toll with whatever soles our friend from Canada passed on, and were on our way. When we arrived at the second toll booth, well, we didn't have enough money. We offered to pay in American dollars, as that was typically okay in South American countries, but the clerk wouldn't accept. We backed up the car to where we saw a police officer directing traffic and asked him for help. He said that there was no way that they were going to accept American dollars and that this "wasn't Columbia". Awesome! Just what we wanted to hear. So what did we do? We couldn't drive backwards because we were too low on fuel to look for a place that was open late. Those that were close enough were closed. So we just pulled over and slept until sunrise.

We woke up the next morning at the crack of dawn with a local couple knocking on our window trying to sell us potatoes. Peru has nearly 3,000 varieties of potatoes! I guess mashed, baked and French fried, just wasn't cutting it for them. We politely refused and turned around and drove to an open gas station where we took some money from a bank machine and headed onwards. As we drove north along the coast in the sunshine all we could think about we just getting to our destination. The brief sleep in the car was painful. To our unexpected surprise, a police officer jumped out of the bushes and pulled us over. Perfect! Just what we wanted! He started giving us the business about speeding even though we clearly weren't speeding enough to justify this. I've been in this situation before and I knew what to do. Just pretend like I don't know what he is saying. Pat was not as fluent in Spanish as I so he was completely lost to what the officer was ranting about. I knew that he wanted us to pay him $50 on the spot. After about 40 minutes of bartering I gave him $7 dollars and a cheap two dollar pen. He seemed happy. And we, well, we were back on the road.

Still our first day in Peru, we were entering the mountain range which until now, we had only seen from a distance. The mountains were empty and desolate with no vegetation and even less life. Once in a while we drove by a small shack and a stray pig but there was no one around. "Creepy" was an understatement.

Our destination was Huarez, a small (or so we thought) town in the Andes. The directions to our hostel we simple and very straight forward. All we had to do was find the main city square and go 2 blocks north. Easy! Right? No way! This place has a population of over 200,000 and they don't build their buildings up. They build out. So now we were lost. Huarez was buzzing with people and activity and all of the roads were under construction. We called the guy offering us the hostel, which was also going to be our biking guide, Julio, for the afternoon, and asked for help. We tried to describe where we were, but not even he knew. So what did we do... well we kind of just sat there in silence and just tried to take a breather. We were tired. We drove into town and tried to find a main intersection where Julio could find us. Pat pulled over the car. While everyone honked and yelled at him, I ran out and called Julio again. He was coincidentally just passing by. We jumped into the car and followed him to our hostel. When all was said and done, it was not past 7pm and we had missed our mountain biking tour. We unpacked, showered, and went out for a quick bite to eat. Our first bite to eat actually. Then we hit the sack. Hard!

The next morning we woke with some discontent in our heart but still eager to take this country on. We packed up our bikes and Julio took us out to the top of the Cordillera Blanca just below the snow line. There, we met up with a friend of ours that we made the night before, Matt from Philadelphia, and started our descent. The mountain biking in this portion of Peru was absolutely beautiful. The vegetation was sparse and the trails were sometimes hard to see but the views were breathtaking. Steep ridges lined both sides of the trail as we descended into the valley. Once at the bottom we biked along an old genuine Inca trail that lead us right through a town, where stray dogs and pigs chased us, and back onto the mountains. The trails were fairly easy and downward slopping cross-country single tracks. Speed was what we came for and that is what we got.

Upon returning to our hostel, we simply showered, packed up, grabbed a banana from the front desk and went on our way. We drove all night through the desert towards the town of Nazca. We did stop to refuel and munch on some crackers we bought from the gas station. They washed down well with some local Inka Cola! But we had to get back on the road. We had plans in the morning.

When we arrived in Nazca it was about 2:30am. The town was, again, a ghost town and our hostel was closed. What to do? Well we just stood outside our hostel and called and called and called until someone answered. Finally our host came down and welcomed us with open arms. We drove to another property and woke that owner so he could let use into his garage to park our car. Once the car was parked, we went back to our hostel and fell asleep immediately, only to be woken up 45 minutes later for our big hike.

A 20 minute drive through the dark at 4am to our starting point was painful. The car stopped and we got out and started to hike. Up and over some boulders and rocks we went. Eventually the sun broke over the horizon and the heat hit us. 4 hours and 7 kilometers later we made it to the top of the world's tallest sand dune. Cerro Blanco was the beast we had just conquered. It absolutely dwarfed the other surrounding mountains. This is where we were able to enjoy or reward for this climb. We waxed our boards and sand boarded down the dune. Contrary to popular belief it was actually quite difficult. Because of the coarse nature of the sand, the boards had to be waxed every hundred meters or so. This was good because carving was impossible, so it gave us an opportunity to realign ourselves. It was fun, but hot and tiresome. Eventually after a few hours, we got to the bottom and had to hike for another hour to the road. With little more than one nights sleep and two full meals since we left Buffalo, the biking and sand boarding was about to do us in. Pat had heat stroke and was parched. I was exhausted. We were both burnt from the sun and we were out of water. Our ride was an hour late. We found shelter from the blazing sun in about one foot of shade cast by the remaining foundation of an old desert shack. Death felt immanent as tumbleweeds rolled by and the theme to "The Good, The Bad and The Ugly" repeated through our heads. We had our local guide flag down a police officer and we convinced him to setup a road check. These are very common in Peru so he had little problem with this. Then the officer pulled over a pickup truck and told them that the law required them to drive us back to our hostel! Amazing!

We got back to our hostel and packed up our gear and had a quick piece of toast with our hosts and hit the road again. This was getting tough. Our destination was Arequipa and our plan was to be there for 11pm so that we could climb to the top of El Misti volcano, almost 6,000 meters above sea level, through the night. As we drove south along the coast, we went through some fabulous fishing villages and managed to get some fantastic photos next to the Pacific. As the sun started to set Pat made the decision that he was in no condition to climb the volcano. This was understandable giving his physical breakdown in the desert. I needed to do it though. I handed the steering wheel over to Pat and started to pack up my gear for the mountaineering expedition. We were running late but we called and convinced the guide to wait until 12am for me.

As we entered Arequipa, the one-way roads got incredibly confusing and we had to pull a few u-turns. This is where the police caught Pat again. No u-turns in Peru. This time they asked Pat to get out of the car and really gave him the business. Eventually after a long time we had paid off the officers again for slightly more than the first time and went on our way. Unfortunately it was too late. Our guide had left and we missed our El Misti climb. It was a sad moment but on the plus side, we were able to finally sleep!

In the morning we woke up rested and rejuvenated. First thing on our minds was food and beer. We rushed off to a local restaurant in Arequipa where we ate alpaca meat and guzzled beer. Boy was it even fantastic. We took a walk around the city, which was beautiful, some local cathedrals, and even a convent, and then jumped right back into the next restaurant. We ordered the largest and most expensive gourmet meal they had on their menu. It was only $8 USD! We feasted on seafood all day and then went back to our hostel and hung out with some other travelers from Australia and Europe, while sharing bottles and bottles of wine!

In the morning we started our drive to Puno. We stopped off in Juliaca simply by accident. This city was a mess. There was traffic and pedestrians and trains and everything else you can imagine all over the place. It was definitely not a place for motorists so we used our Blackberry GPS, got out, and kept going. We arrived in Puno late that evening and once again, couldn't find the typical "two blocks north of the main square" hostel. But eventually we found it and moved our stuff in. We had a quick bite to eat and walked through the downtown and then went to sleep. The next upcoming few days were going to be tough!

We were picked up early in the morning by a bus that took us to the edge of Lake Titicaca. We boarded a speed boat with some fellow Canadians and zipped off to the Uros. These are floating islands made completely of reeds. Each island houses a few aboriginal families and there are over 40 of these islands. We hung out at the islands and learned about their way of life and how they survive. These Peruvian people were extremely dark skinned. The reason being is that Lake Titicaca is the tallest lake in the world at over 12,000 feet above sea level. The sun really burns you to a crisp. In fact, my nose got burnt so badly that day that I had a huge scab on my face for the rest of the trip. But that's okay; I really wanted to look like Rudolph in all my photos. Don't let this fool you though, because it was still really cold at that height despite the intense sun. When we were done at the Uros, our boat peeled off to Taquile Island where the rest of the group went for a hike. Pat and I, of course, did it high octane style and rented some sea kayaks and kayaked around this mother of an island. It was a blast but it was also hard work. There was a small hut on a bluff overlooking the lake. We pulled our kayaks up and had a fresh fish meal with the locals before meeting up with the rest of the crew to head back to Puno.

As soon as we made it back to Puno, you guessed it; we showered, packed and got on the road again! This time our destination was to pass safely through Juliaca again and arrive in Cusco. It was nighttime, and our friends back home were celebrating Canada's biggest Bavarian festival, Oktoberfest. We never miss it. But this year we were on our way to Machu Picchu.

Upon arriving in Cusco, it was now customary to assume that we wouldn't be able to find our hostel as predicted. Ding Ding Ding! We were correct. As soon as we pulled into the downtown we just pulled up next to a local and asked him if we could follow him to our hostel. We arrived safely, parked the car, woke the attendant to check us in and were in bed by 2am.

That morning at 4am, Jimmy, our guide picked us up for the 4-day Inca Trail to Machu Picchu. We picked up 4 other hikers and then drove to the base town where we had breakfast, loaded up on coca leaves and started our hike. As the law requires, we had to go with a licensed tour provider. We chose a company called United Mice. They were fantastic. The guide was amazing and the porters were very helpful and polite. They carried all of our food and sleeping arrangements. All we carried on our own was our clothing, which there was very little of, and water.

We started our hike super early so that we could get a head start on the other tour groups. This was a fantastic idea because that way our trek was staggered from the other trail traffic and we were able to take care of half of the second day's difficult hike on the first day.

Our first day of trekking was fairly straight forward. It was cold and rainy and we basically just walked. We socialized with the others in our trekking group and then did a bit of uphill difficult trekking towards the end. We camped out and woke early to continue. The second day was much more grueling. I was all straight uphill. So steep that it even got to the point of having steps instead of just a slope. We reached the highest point of our trek at "Dead Woman's Pass". It was cold and windy at this pinnacle so we put on some warmer gear and enjoyed some rum while watching all of the other trekkers suffer through what we had just done.

Onward and upward, we descended and then ascended again to our first full Inca ruin. It was a really cool thing to walk through this ancient building and see how and where the people of long ago used to live. We heard some ghost stories that would soon keep us awake all night, and then we moved forward to our second campsite. This campsite was absolutely fantastic. It was perched right on a cliff side with the entire mountain range outside of our door for us to see in the morning.

On the third day we only trekked for half a day. The first part of the day was fairly standard trekking downhill over more than 7,000 ancient Inca steps. This portion of the trail was now at a lower altitude and so the desolate mountains became a lush jungle that was filled with babbling brooks and littered with vibrant wildlife. For the latter half of the trek we stopped at a rest camp that had been built for the tourist. There were showers, and even a bar to have a few beers. This ended early for us because tomorrow was going to be the big day!

We woke early in the morning to beat the rush and started our climb to the Sun Gate. This was a tough climb and it was almost directly vertical. When we got to the Sun Gate, which is a break in the mountains, we waited patiently for the sunrise. As the rest of the groups arrived, the sun cracked through the clouds, over the Sun Gate and onto what would be Machu Picchu. However, the morning fog made it impossible for us to see this ancient Inca city. Most of the groups gave up and continued to walk down towards Machu Picchu, but we knew patience was a virtue. We waited and waited and eventually the sun cracked down and over the mountains and lighted up the holy grail of Peru.

With awestricken eyes we watched and then descended into the city snapping photos everywhere. When we got into the city, just like any other tourist, our guide gave us a very informative tour and bid his farewells leaving us with 9 hours to explore on our own. The history and the architecture of this city was benevolent beyond words.

We caught a bus down from Machu Picchu to Gringo City and had some dinner with our fellow trekkers and perused the internet for a bit before catching a train back to Cusco. The train actually stopped in the middle of nowhere and we had to find cabs back to town, which would have normally been fairly difficult, but we managed to get through with some fluent Spanish speaking friends we had made.

The next morning we enjoyed the day with some sightseeing in Cusco. But, we ran into some problems. We had some massive issues with our rental car and had to get rid of it. So by the time we had called the rental company and worked things out and had the car picked and had our flights from Cusco to Lima purchased, it was dinner time. We had an awesome adventure for dinner. Generally we found a local that took us into a restaurant off the beaten path where we enjoyed some Cuy and Chicha. We shared the rest of the evening with some fantastic British friends we made on the Inca trail and then turned in for the night.

For most people this is where the trip would have ended. Not for us. The next morning we began our trek into the Amazon. This was a long one. We got into a cargo van with some other tourists (none of which spoke a common language so communication was difficult) and began an 8 hour drive into the Manu Amazon rainforest. Along the way into the Amazon we stopped at a local village to pick up some freshly baked jungle bread. We also stopped at the coca plantation and a pineapple plantation where our guide told us about the value of these resources to the local jungle people.

Our next two days in the jungle remain somewhat of a blur to me as I was getting extremely tied by this point of the trip. I recall doing some whitewater rafting on the jungle rivers. We started rafting down a very clean river which eventually merged with a very muddy river. The rapids with roughly class 2 rapids so it was hardly adrenaline pumping, but it was a good opportunity for us to see the jungle for the water. We spent a night at a jungle lodge that was completely open concept. This means that our beds were covered in bug nets and in the morning we awoke to the sound of our neighbors snoring to such an extent that I thought Pat was getting mauled by a puma. Don't ask why. There we always some interesting bugs on our nets in the morning as well.

We took a speed boat deeper into the Amazon to another lodge where we were based out of. Here we did some great jungle hikes at night to see some venomous spiders and bats and other night crawlers as well as did some fairly cool zip lining and rappelling. We finished the day with a fabulous jug of freshly squeezed star fruit juice. What a treat from the humidity and heat in the jungle. In the morning we took a boat out to a macaw clay lick to see the beautiful feathered fury licking away before heading back 8 hours to Cusco.

Upon our arrival back at Cusco, we went out on the town to toast away a great trip. In the morning we headed to the airport to catch a domestic flight from Cusco to Lima. Our flight, as well as the subsequent 3 flights was never called to board. Eventually we got onto a plane 1 hour before the airport closed. However, as the taxi was pulling the plane out onto the runway, it ripped off the front wheel. Great! Maybe we would have been better off with the car we had returned. Nevertheless, they kept the airport open for us while they sent another plane from Lima to pick us up and fly us back to Lima.

We landed in Lima late in the evening and just sat and waited for our flight back to Canada. To our dismay, we saw the news and realized we'd be flying back to Canada through yet another Hurricane! I love this stuff!

Robert Bruski,

Adrenaline Junkie,

[http://www.ChooseYourThrill.com]

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