20 NOV 99

Fiona and I spent about ten days Lima. We stayed with Luis and hung out with him and Karem, whenever they were not too busy working.

One day I went to Luis` mother`s birthday party. It was nice to see Luis` parents again. They had lots of good food and my favorite Peruvian drink, chicha morada.

One day Fiona and I went to the Catholic University where Luis was a student and Karem is an English teacher. We were guest speakers in two of Karem`s classes. The first class was older and more advanced. They asked us questions about life in our countries and our opinions on world political events. The second class was a beginning class full of people under twenty. The guys in this class mostly asked if Fiona was a model and if they could have her phone number. I asked the students a few questions myself and learned a some interesting things about life in Peru.
I also read a few of Luis` books and explored his neighborhood. He lives in a fancy suburb and his area is full of foreign consulates and embassies.

On the 13th of November we caught a bus south. We went about four hours to Ica and then took a taxi out to Huacachina. Huacachina is a small town. They have a little lake, a few hotels and places to eat and some huge sand dunes. After dinner, I headed out into the night to explore the sand dunes. I have never seen such a large area of sand dunes. I think they went for about 30 miles to the west and probably more than one hundred miles to the north and south. I wandered off into the night and eventually it got to dark to see very far. I knew there was nothing but sand around, but I could not really make out the hills and valleys. It was fun to stroll in the moonlight and walk in the sand. After about two hours, I put my clothes back on and went back to town.

The next morning I went back out to explore some more. I went for a four hour walk in the sand dunes. I decided it would be great to return with a backpack full of food and a G.P.S. device so that the satellites could tell me how to get back after a week of wandering aimlessly. I decided I would need a gelaba, one of those middle eastern desert dresses for men, with a reinforced back and shoulders and holes in the side to attach my backpack hipbelt through. By the end of my walk, the sand was very hot and was burning my feet whenever I sunk in past the bottom of my sandals. I had to sit down and raise my feet about every five minutes to let them cool off.

After a leisurely lunch by the lake, we caught a bus. A few hours later we were in the town of Nasca. Somehow a little local kid ended up on my shoulders as we explored the town and looked for a place to eat. He tried to charge me for his guiding services and I tried to charge him a carrying fee. In the end we called it even and went our separate ways.

The next morning we got up early and went out to the airport. We took a thirty minute flight over the plateau to look at the giant geoglyphs that the ancient locals made in the desert. Besides the Nasca lines, there were many figures built on the ground. My favorite ones were the astronaut and the monkey. From the air, the entire desert appeared to be covered with figures and lines. It was impressive.

Following a late breakfast, we joined a tour to see some of the other things Nasca has to offer. Our first stop was a pottery making place. The owner is an archaeologist and figured out how the locals made pottery two thousand years ago. They showed us how the clay was prepared and shaped and how the paints were produced from local rocks and how it was fired at the end. They also taught us the ancient secret for keeping the paint bright and shiny for thousands of years. After the mineral based paints are applied and before the pots are buried and heated up for a few days, they cover the pot with nose grease. They rub a rock on their nose and then rub the pot. For the hard to reach places, they rub their nose with a narrow bone and then coat the nooks and crannies of the pottery with the nose oil. It is an interesting system and I am hard pressed to figure out not only how the ancients figured it out, but how the modern archaeologist re-discovered it.

Our next stop was the cemetery. No matter who you were, in Nasca two thousand years ago, when you died, you were entitled to a decent burial. For them, this meant that they removed your internal organs and brain. Then they scrubbed you with salt and laid you out in the hot sun for a few weeks until you were pretty well mummified. Next, you were wrapped in a bunch of cloth and carried around to all the towns and places you used to go. This way every one you knew, knew you were dead. After a month or so of this, you were buried in a small clay room, perhaps with others of your family who were already dead. To help you in the next life they also gave you some jars of food and a few hair braids for good luck.

Early this century, most of the graves were dug up and looted. The mummies were left scattered around on the ground. Five years ago they put the mummies back in the holes and that is were they are sitting now.

The final stop of our day tour was the house were they extracted gold from rocks. This was pretty interesting. We learned how they went up into the hills and carried back a bunch of rock. Next, they put the rocks in a tumbler with iron balls until they had crushed rocks. Then they put the crushed rocks in a tub with some water. They had a big round stone with a board on top of it to put in the tub also. They stood on the board and rocked the stone back and forth for about six hours. Then they had fine rock powder, which they mixed with mercury and eventually extracted the gold.

On the 16th of November I went for a walk. I have gotten into this bad habit of waking up with the chickens and the sun. I am usually awake before six in the morning. Fiona can somehow sleep for several more hours, so I have taken to going for a morning walk.

I stopped for some orange juice and bread in town and then headed east. I went through the poor end of town and through the fields in the valley. I found some ancient aqueducts and some Nasca lines that were not part of the main group that I had flown over the previous day. Then I walked along a road that had almost no traffic and headed for the hills. By about 8:30 I had gone six miles and was next to the world's largest sand dune. I was able to see it from town, but now I was next to it. I turned off the road and walked about a mile up a dry river bed and was right below the 6,000 foot pile of sand.

I had been informed that nobody took tours to the sand dune anymore because some tourist had been buried up to his neck in the sand. Apparently the sand is a bit unstable and acts like quick sand on occasion. I decided to walk around the mountain of sand, instead of climbing it. I clambered my way up a dry river bed and made my way up the neighboring mountain. After three hours, I made it to the top of the mountain behind the sand mountain. I found a dirt road and it led to a bunch of gold mines dug into the hills. I had been walking for six hours straight in the desert heat and decided to stop for a rest.

I took a twenty minute lunch break and realized that I was never going to make it all the way around the sand dune and back to town in one day. I followed the nice dirt road back in the direction of the paved road I had started the day on. After a while, the dirt road turned into a well trodden path. A little while later the well trodden path turned into a faint, but obvious trail. Eventually, the trail turned into a barely perceptible marking on the mountain side. And of course, in the end the trail disappeared and I got to make my own. I made my way down a sharply angled rock fall to the dry river that I was going to follow back to the road.

Once I got to the river bed, I headed west. It was a fairly easy descent to begin with. And, in the easy parts there was one set of footprints headed the other direction. So, I knew that I must be able to get out of the mountain in this direction. Eventually, the easy descent turned into a series of small, dry waterfalls. As I progressed, the climbs down became more challenging. I noticed that whenever it was a difficult climb down the other persons footprints would disappear, only to reappear when the going got easy again. As you would expect, I eventually came to a twenty or thirty foot cliff that was clearly impossible for me to get down. On the mountain side next to me was a path. I followed it. It was quite exposed and eventually ended about four feet from were the river bed became flat again. So, I clung to the cliff face for a little while and then jumped to a steep section of mountain nearby. I did not slip off and made my way down.

From there it was easy going again and I made it back to the road, six miles from town after six hours of walking in the mountains. I was ready for a ride home, but there was no traffic and nothing to do but walk. After three miles, a taxi came by and I gladly paid the thirty cents for a ride back the last four miles. I walked for well over eleven hours in the hot sun and was good and tired.

It was good that I was tired, because instead of a bed this night, I had a night bus to Arrequipa. We paid for the Royal Class bus and it was worth it. At more than $17 for only ten hours it was not cheap, but it was comfortable. Besides the normal hostess and movie, it had very comfortable seats. They were extra wide and reclined an incredible distance. A foot board popped out of the bottom of the seat in front of me and I was able to sleep most of the night.
Shortly after sunrise, on the 17th, we arrived in Peru's second largest city, Arrequipa. We took a taxi to the hotel and relaxed on the roof until a room opened up. We slept the rest of the morning and organized our Colca Canyon trip in the afternoon.

Wednesday morning, we got on a tour bus and drove around the huge volcanoes that tower over the city. We stopped to watch some people shaving the wool off of a few vicuna. Vicuna, along with alpacas and llamas are related to camels and live in the high dry areas. The roads were very bad and it we did not get over the 15,000 foot pass and into Chivay until well after three in the afternoon. Before dinner, we went to the local hot springs pool and soaked. After sunset, I walked into the hills and found a seat. I looked at the sky for about two hours, but the promised meteor shower never materialized.

The next day we left the hotel at 6:30 am and drove out to the Condor Cross. We waited for an hour and a half, but the condors never showed up. Still, it was nice to sit around and look down into one of the deepest canyons in the world, Colca Canyon. The rest of the day was spent returning to Arrequipa and stopping at a few small villages.

Yesterday was spent wandering the streets of Arrequipa and doing not much. Tomorrow we plan on taking the train to Cuzco and getting ready to walk the Inca trail to Machu Pichu.
I have now been in Peru for a month and have a few observations to offer.

The U.S. dollar seems to be a close second as the national currency, after the Nuevo Sol. In all the commercial districts the streets are packed with people holding a great big wad of local money and a calculator. They are there to change money. The big supermarkets, most chain stores, and many local shops also accept U.S. dollars. This seems to be a normal part of the Peruvian economy and is not related to tourism. It seems to me that locals with money are just as likely to have a few Dollars in their wallets as Soles. The bank machines even offer the options of taking out your money in Dollars or Soles.

I have enjoyed the local food. My favorite drink is now Chicha Morada. It is a purple drink, made from purple corn and is heavily spiced. I tried cuy, which is guinea pig. It is a specialty of the people living in the Andes. It has dark meat and reminded me of duck. It was okay. My favorite food is ceviche. Rather than cook their fish, octopus, conch, squid and other seafoods with heat, they cook them chemically with some very acidic lemon. I like it. I have not yet tried anticuchos, but I will soon. I have to wait until Fiona is somewhere else, because she does not want to watch me eat grilled cow heart. The local way to prevent altitude sickness is with tea made of coca leaves. I don't think it has much more taste than hot water with sugar in it, but at least it is a warm drink in the high, cold mountains.

5 NOV 99

On the 28th of October, Fiona and I woke up early and took a local mini-bus to Yungi. After waiting an hour, our next bus filled up and we headed east, over the mountains. It took over three hours on the dirt road to cross a 4500 meter pass and come a little ways down the other side.

In Vaquera, we got off the combi/colectivo/mini-bus/van. It was early afternoon. We strapped on the packs and started walking. We went down a hill, crossed the river, went over the next rise, went down to the next river and started following it up to the mountains.

Before five, we made it to the first campground. This is were I learned how they make campgrounds in the mountains of Peru. If you want nice short grass in a flat place in Peru, you let your cows do the upkeep. This, of course, meant that every night we had to kick the cow patties out of the way before we could set up camp. We made a nice dinner and called it a day.
After a nice breakfast of oatmeal and milk, we packed up and started walking some more. We passed by a really tall mountain with some glaciers and then continued up, above the tree line.

After lunch the day started to get pretty long. We climbed and climbed and eventually we got to the lakes we were supposed to camp at. Unfortunately, they were not the lakes we were supposed to camp at. It turned out that we had another hour to climb. Then, finally, we really were at the right place to camp, at a cold 4500 meters above sea level.

The stove was frustratingly unreliable, but eventually we made our pasta and went to sleep. It was a very cold night and I found out that my tent is definitely a three-season tent and that the night was bordering on the fourth season.

After a not too early start on the morning of the 30th, we quickly made it to the top of the pass, Punto Un?n at 4700 meters. It was a nice day and we had great views of glacier covered mountains in several directions. We took a few photos and then started down into the Santa Cruz valley. We were now about 1800 vertical meters and 23 walking kilometers from the end, Cashapampa.

After about ten minutes of heading down, Fiona slipped and hurt her ankle. We continued on, had lunch and then made it to the nicest camping place on the whole trail. By this time Fiona could barely walk and was in definite pain.

We set up camp in a nice flat place, near a river and I made a very nice potato curry and rice dinner. That night it rained. This meant that the clouds kept the heat in the valley and blocked the moonlight. Between the sound of rain on the tent, the lack of light, our being at a lower altitude, and the warmer night, I got my best sleep in Peru so far.

In the morning, there was no question about us moving on. We propped Fiona up against a rock, with a view of our little stream and iced her foot. My lighter had broken and my matches proved very difficult, so we spent the morning waiting for trekkers to come by so we could bum a few matches. Two groups of two passed by and we ended up with a lighter with very little gas, a lighter with a lot of gas but no flint and three matches that allegedly burn underwater.

Our next concern was water. I grabbed the water bottle and looked at our nice mountain stream. It was no longer clear and inviting. The water level had risen a couple of feet and it was muddy. About then a local boy came and pointed out that the stream was flooding and our tent was nearby. He helped me move camp to a safer place. He was a good kid and I ended up giving him a pen and half a candy bar.

The stream ended up rising from about two feet deep to perhaps six feet deep. It covered the bridge and prevented the cows from leaving our area. After lunch, it started to drizzle, so we sought shelter in the tent. The sun was still shining so it got hot in the tent as we read.

By a little after four, I had too much energy and drizzle or no drizzle, I was going for a walk. I headed up the side valley with the intention of finding out where all the water was coming from. I ignored the drizzle and headed up. It soon stopped raining and I made it up into a high valley. There was not so much water up there, but there were a lot of cows and some great glaciers and tall mountains. On the way back to camp I ran down hill. It is always so much fun to run downhill at high altitude, you go so fast.

It was Halloween night, but we were the only ones around. I did not go trick-or-treating. Instead we had a good dinner and turned in.

Fiona's foot was still pretty suspect, but she declared herself ready to start walking. We walked nine kilometers before lunch and planned to do six after lunch. After lunch we saw a sign that said we still had nine kilometers to go, it was a bit depressing.

As we got to lower altitudes, it got warmer and the black flies started attacking. My legs still itch from their bites. Somehow Fiona kept going and, after passing through a narrow canyon, we made it to Cashapampa. We had walked 18 kilometers that day. Fiona did it with a bad ankle and I managed it with all of my stuff and much of her stuff on my back. I now know that I can walk long distances, at high altitudes, with a heavy pack on my back. This is a good thing to know.

From Cashapampa, we took a colectivo to Caray. Fiona and I both agreed that this was the scariest road we have ever been on. The narrow, windy mountain road was made of sand. The driver kept the speed moderate and this was not a problem. But, you could feel the van slide a bit on the turns. Where streams crossed the road, could see where the road had washed out and timbers were placed to shore it up. In Caray, we changed combis and returned to Huaraz. There were quite a few chickens on this bus.

Fiona spent the next day resting her ankle and I poked around town. We took the Cruz del Sur Imperial class bus back to Lima and I almost won the bingo game. Yesterday, Fiona rested her ankle again and we hung out in Luis's apartment. He has a lot of great books to read. In the evening we met Luis and Karem at the fancy mall type place and ate Ben and Jerry's ice cream.
Today we are doing research for the next part of our trip and taking it easy. The plan is to continue south and visit Nazca, Arrequipa and Cuzco this month, and eventually make our way to La Paz, in Bolivia.

Believe it or not, this was only my third backpacking trip in my life. Twice before, I have headed out with a tent, a sleeping bag, a partner, food and a stove for a two night trip and returned after one. These four nights in the mountains were my longest and most difficult backpacking trip ever. I enjoyed it.