Let me breath a little bit (UPDATE)

Last time I checked in with you folks, I was getting turned around by police in Tingo Maria for the illegal act of being a gringo in the jungle. I have since regretted complying so easily with the checkpoint patrol for a number of reasons. Pretty much everyone since Tingo Maria say the terrorists live in the deep jungle far away from the main roads and have only killed gringos who wander into their territory, and that was years ago. So I guess I had to climb all these mountains again for nought, when I could've been chilling in Moyobamba by now. Fortunately, I am resting by the coast in a beautiful city named Trujillo, and the sweet smell of the Pacific is filling my lungs for the first time in months. How I missed this great ocean.



I was eager to get up to Cerro de Pasco, a town separated from the city of Huancayo by a three and a half day climb that promised to be the last time I would have to make a 4600 mts ascent before heading down to the jungle lands of Huanuco, followed by the province of San Martin. From Jauja to Cerro de Pasco, my heels cracked in a hundred pieces like baked clay due to the dry climate. Temperatures along the route dropped to below freezing levels despite the fact that it's summer out here, and breathing the air this altitude was a little tough. Sleep was scarce, especially in Cerro de Pasco, where I got fleas in a hostal bed. At least the free breakfast was good (mint soup with taters).

Dead chinchilla

The descent down to Huanuco was a welcome change from all the climbing in the past couple of days and the frigid temperatures of high mountain passes. The trip down to the city was one of the longest descents I've had since dropping down into Ayacucho (four hours!), hitting what must have been an average speed of an Usain Bolt sprint. Wintery clothes were eagerly stashed away as the beast and I entered the jungle for the first time. The clothing of the locals was getting scandalous compared to the usual heavy sweater getups of the past couple of weeks, so I decided to strip down as far as human decency allows in order to blend in, but I wasn't fooling anyone in Huanuco.

  

I have come to enjoy one very special attraction that can be found in just about every Perúvian city, and that is the central market, where you can find just about everything you need when it comes to produce, clothes, basic electronics and Albert Christ memorabilia. Always a few blocks away from the central plaza, one knows they've entered mercado centro when they find themselves inside a giant warehouse wreaking of rotten meat and fruit. Don't let the smell deter you, for this place is filled with gold...I'm talking about finding ten mangos for a dollar, kilos of plantains for a mere two soles, and just about every cow innard imaginable, and if you aren't in the mood for cooking up some cow tongue fajitas, then maybe all the ceviche and fried rice will suit your fancy. I can't say enough good things about the central markets...except for the areas dedicated to overly aggressive juice vendors...putting two bananas in a blender with some honey and water doesn't make you the boss of all things nectar related. Sit down and stop screaming at me to taste your terrible swill.

More mountains :-(

I guess another recap is in order...after a day and a half in Huanuco, I drifted down to Tingo Maria, where all my freeze dried wounds on my fingers and feet were assuaged by the heavy Amazonian humidity. It was a welcome change from the weeks of mountain climbing, but all too brief as I was quickly turned around at a police checkpoint as I tried to head towards the San Martin province for a quick ride towards San Ignacio, where I would cross into the eastern edge of Ecuador. I was not about to backtrack back into the mountains for 210 km's, so I hitched a ride with another hauler (free of old fashions) and rode to La Union. At this point, it's necessary to mention that all the Perúvian homies I've met in my car rides are usually not down with my tunebox...except when it comes to Fela Kuti. When I put "Expensive Shit" or "Opposite People" on the car radio, my amigos leave the tunes on repeat pretty much until we reach our destination. They're all big fans and I think it blows their minds after spending their entire lives listening to screaching cholitas sing about how awesome it is to cook big dinners for their husbands. It's a big change.

I almost forgot...La Union was a blast. This small mountain town just so happened to be celebrating it's carnaval when I was dropped off near the center of town. However, since the cold mountain air was not the kind of environment where one would find sexy ladies shaking their booties and boobies around in string bikinis, the whole event turned out to be one giant water fight instead. The main attraction was the large gathering of evil ghosts (accompanied by a band) marching through the center of town in scary masks and ponchos, trying to scare little children and get a rouse out of the populace. For the next couple of hours, the local people took a stand against satan by pelting his minions with water balloons, flour, and checha from high balconies while the minions danced their evil jig in the streets. As I was the only gringo in 200 km's or so, I was quickly pulled into the fray by a drunk old lady, had my face and arms smeared with chalk, and thus channelled the fiendish spirit of some kind of gringo baby stealing ghost. For the next thirty minutes, I danced a hellish salsa with my ghoulish old lady around town, all the while trying the best I could to dodge water balloons and other projectiles. It was all in good fun, and I hope to see my face in the local newspaper in La Union, what with all the people wanting to take a picture with the baby eater.

Perúvian bball lockout

No need to mention the details of my climb to Huaraz...frozen to my bones, frozen water bottles, coagulating chain grease etc., not very enjoyable in general. But then came another record setting descent...a full day and half of down hill riding from Huaraz to just past Yuracmarca, and then some the next day all the way down to Chimbote, but of differing degrees of quality. Huaraz to Caraz was excellent forest drifting with potable water on the side of the road and excellent fried fish in Caraz...

...then came Mordor, or the Caraz-Chuquicara leg of the descent, where plant life shriveled into pulverized dust and the river turned an ugly shade of gray. Although I have faced dirt roads many times before in Andahuaylas and Ayacucho, road conditions here wreaked havoc on my wrists and ass. This was not loose gravel or pressed dirt...large stones were deep set into the route with absolutely no give while other sharp stones were scattered about the path to sheer away the sides of my tires if I made a sharp turn. This was two and a half days of very painful riding and very little progress, and as I crept along closer to the mountain base, the headwind became all the more potent, and I was forced to dismount several times before reaching Chuquicara. Oh, also some young punks in Yuracmarca with the lamest super saiyan haircuts that have ever graced the pates of cro-magnons thought they might dismount me by hucking perfectly ripe mangos in my direction. It turned out to be a good opportunity to collect some dinner and practice my insult spanish with some little bastards.

My arrival in Chuquicara was like a dream, for two and a half day long rock road finally came to a halt and so did the oppressive headwind. I was greeted by some mountain rescue dudes who bought me water and beer and spent the next couple of hours discussing dumb presidents and drug policies in South America, something that'd been on my mind since Tingo Maria. They gave me some good advice on my future route through Perú (and informed me the Moyobamba route was in fact safe for gringos) and told me what cities to check out. The next day, I was off to Chimbote and Santa and got my first wiff of the ocean since the Bay, and from there I was off on the great Pan American highway, which was the most desolate stretch of land I've seen since Southern California. At least I was back to 100-120km days along almost flat road. I arrived in Trujillo nursing diarhea bowels, so once again, I was out for two days with little time to see the sites. Although I wish I had more time to enjoy this town, I must keep moving. Ecuador is less than a ten days bike journey away.

Discovery Channel Discovery of the Week: Guaba (or guava)

This gigantic green bean has lined the sides of roads since Chuquicara, and I would not have paid any attention to it if I had not seen the locals carting bushels of these monsters into town and selling them for 2 soles per kilo. I was intrigued, so I got one for myself.

At first glance, this appears to be an oversized green bean, and if I know my audience, an oversized vegetable is hardly an impressive sight for all the gringos out there...

...but crack into this bad boy and you're greeted with a sweet surprise. The white pulpy goodness that surrounds each bean on the inside has the same feel and texture as a marshmellow and peels cleanly away from the bean. The folks down here eat the pulp raw, but only when it's cold, otherwise it will make you throw up apparently. I can't quite put my finger on the taste of the pulp...there's definitely a hint of green bean in there, but it mostly tastes like a wet chunk of bubble gum to me. Definitely the perfect treat after a long ride. The locals also dry roast the beans with salt in an oven for a couple of hours, which is supposed to make for another awesome snack. I'm good with the pulp for the moment. 

So much for a quick ride through the Amazon

I made it to Tingo Maria today in record time only to be told at a police checkpoint that I will be kidnapped and thoroughly double D´d by fake communist revolutionaries if I proceed any further. It seems that every nationality is welcomed by these commies of the jungle except for Americans.

I asked the police why Americans are vilified in these parts and he proceeded to give me a long list of all the shit our great nation has pulled in the San Martin, Huanuco and Loreto provinces for the past thirty years or so. It would seem that the past four administrations (Reagan, Bush, Clinton and Bush) flooded this region with DEA agents and other "advisors" who--in all their wisdom--decided that burning down coca crops and intimidating all the local coca farmers was the best way to win the War on Drugs. Nevermind the fact that the majority of coca farmers in Perú´s Amazonian basin were cultivating the plant for legal consumption...I guess our wise, all-knowing government in the states prefers summarily torching small villages in South America over vastly cheaper and effective methods of rehabilitation on the home front. Protip: "source control" policies never work and tend to piss a lot of people off.

To distance the US government´s role in the region from the state-sponsored violence that was occuring in the region, the Bush administration outsourced much of these advising roles to Haliburton employees around 2003. Well, it was only a matter of time before a few of these nosey gringos started turning up rather dead in the basin. According to the police, the angry folks in the Peruvian Amazon have basically been snatching any North Americans who decide to wander into the San Martin province. Although the Perúvian government has been rounding up the ring leaders of these abductions while taking a stronger stance in protecting the interests of local coca growers against foreign intrusion in the past year or so, tempers are still raw and it will probably be another ten years before Americans can start setting things on fire again.

Ugh...so now I got to turn around and head back towards the Andes, into the cold once more, all the way to Ecuador...god damn it. A special thanks to our fantastic government for making things so difficult for those of us that want to see the rest of the world. As always, I blame Reagan.

Thanks, shitdiot

No more cold lonely nights on the frozen pampa (I hope)

My very first (wild?) monkey sighting of the trip, a moment to remember

The coldest leg of the journey is over, or so I've been told. No more wrapping up in every single item of clothing before sacking up, and absolutely no more socks with sandles. Huánuco marks the beginning of the Amazon leg of my bike ride. Here's to fifty cent kilos of mangos, sticky weather, and close brushes with malaria. Things are about to get interesting...

Unrelated

Perú is the world's biggest waterpark

St. Hacksaw Jim Duggan

A couple of days on the road and I'm pretty much soaked to the bone. I didn't count on my top of the line North Face clothing to be as permeable as a screen door when it comes to the weather down here. Because of this, I flew into Huancayo smelling like hot piss-urine and no one wanted to talk to me until I had stripped down to my skin tight hot pants, and even then, the only folks that approached me were leacherous old farts wanting to grab my legs. Why do they think I'm so easy?

Iglesia de la Compañia de Jesus

The Perù leg started off with a little bit of cheating, and would continue with more cheating further down the road. So, my journey in this country started in Cusco, one of the oldest cities in South America and pre-dating Oakland by a good millenia, give or take. It is a city quite literally built on the bones of ancients. Before Christians came to ruin everything in South America with their rock n roll and moist towellettes, and before the Incans got everyone addicted to coke, the Killke folks were the first to lay down stones in the mountain valley. Since then, Cusco's pretty much served as a preschool lego box, with every subsequent little snot bulldozing everything down and building up a new edifice as an afront to the previous caretakers. The Incans ripped down the walls of the Killke to make their Sun Temple. The tradition was carried on my those cooky Christians who simply had to bust down every last piece of heathen stone to make way for some fancy cathedrals that are probably not nearly as cool as the blood-soaked carcass-littered courtyards that graced the landscape of the city long before.

Incan blocks in Cuzco

The Superbowl was celebrated in two English pubs in Plaza de Armas, where we few Americans were thoroughly embarassed by the spectacle of white southern trash and military jingoism that we call an opening ceremony, and the reaction amongst our fellow bar patrons not of American blood can only be described as slightly amused horror, as if they were watching Hitler's Olympics. Why are we still celebrating failed military interventionism before every game and letting all these platinum blonde aryan country hicks stand up in front of a world wide audience as if to serve as ambassadors of American culture? And people wonder why one of the greatest inventions to come out of our great nation is not catching on in the rest of the world? Get those goddamn rednecks off the TV and let Project Pat MC the whole event, with Millions of Dead Cops singing the shat spackled banner. That's my America, and that's the America that the rest of the world can appreciate.

High in the clouds

The day after that fiasco, I was finally back up on the bike and diarrhea free, but the first day of travelling in a week was not without complications. The more I ascended, the harder and heavier the rain came. And of course the temperature at every peak has to take a dramatic nosedive towards wintery levels. To top it off, and as mentioned before, my supposed waterproof clothes were soaking in everything like a sponge and I had to keep moving and grinding hard in order to keep the ol body temperature up. This turned out to be a problem when it came to the hairpin descents that would soon define the first and last legs of each of my daily rides through Southern Peru thus far. The roads have been incredibly slick with mud, oil, and water, rendering my downhill portions alot slower and alot less fun then they should be. To top it off, by the time finally hit the lush, humid rainforests at every basin, I'm pretty much a human popsicle.

Above Abancay

If that wasn't enough, I also discovered that the only safe place for all of my electronics were my air-tight panniers. Double wrapping your camera in garbage bags and stuffing it in your "water-proof" waist bag is not enough in this wet environment. Everything is going to get soaked, and if you're not carefull with your fragile electric goods, your junk is going to get ruined. Somewhere between Limatambo and Abancay, my camera was rendered somewhat useless even though it was double bagged and safely stowed beneath my saddle. It was no use. The weather gets to everything out here in time.

And while my map assured the roads between Cusco and Ayacucho were navigable and safe, the constant rain was turning everything into a dangerous mudslick that threatened to swallow the steed each and every time I descended into the low lying valleys close to the rivers. Some of these roads near the rain-swollen rivers were turning into barely rideable creeks, especially on the roads right after Ayacucho. All these obstacles once again led to some cheating on my part, as I was compelled to hitch a ride 40 km's outside Ayacucho all the way to Huancayo. It would be my first voyage in a hauler that did not require an Ol' Fashion on my behalf.

Which brings me to my next point: the great folks of this magnificent land. Not since Argentina have I come across a group of folks so consistently amiable and willing to help with whatever questions or needs I may have. In Bolivia, folks were always telling me to get lost, deliberately giving me wrong directions, or trying to sell me their baby's shit wipe for 20 bolivars. While I'm still a gringo to a lot of people in Perú, the folks down here call me "young one'" (joven) more often than not, which is a really kind way of calling out to strangers in my opinion. Folks are once again opening up their doors to me at night and letting me crash in their living rooms or balconies as long as their five and ten year olds are allowed to kick my ass well into the night. Thanks to all this hospitality, my wet cloths are more or less dry by the morning and I'm good for another day in the rain and cold. If it wasn't for all this friendleness, I'd be at a loss as to how to survive this leg of the journey.

I was dropped off in Huancayo early on Saturday, and as soon as I enquire about a place to stay at the local firestation, the firefighters drag me half way across town to a paved soccer field to play some of the most hard hitting soccer since high-school. Now, when I was staying in Córdoba, I had to play with Germans and Argentinians, an international rivalry I didn´t think anyone could top in terms of competitiveness. Oh but how wrong I was. When these friendly, happy Peruvian folks start playing soccer against each other, they enter a state of mind that can only be described as an innate desire to murder each others families. Elbows were thrown, noses were bloodied, and at least one tooth was lost during the short sixty minutes of game time in which I participated. Upon witnessing the ferocity and fire in the eyes of my teammates, I was pretty much cowed to the goalie position, which was probably for the best seeing that I had no footwear save for sandles. When our game was over, their fiery tenacity instantly dissapated over some cold beers, and everyone went back to accusing each other of being gay or screwing old cholitas or whatever, but it was all in good fun. The last game of the day was for the really old guys, and watching these guys play was like watching sixteen Moe's and Curly's play surprisingly good but nevertheless slapstick soccer. Lot's of comical sliding around and running into eachother. Good times? Amazing times.

Oh, I forgot to mention that my camera started to work perfectly again as soon as I took a picture of this billboard. Science is god.

And here's Polly the lorro. He loves everyone.

Huancayo

The dreaded Ayacucho climb is complete...the biggest ascents of the journey are finally out of the way. I am addicted to coca leaves. Nothing can stop me now.

What a grand jam.

The States....

...I see I'm not missing much. I think I'll be back just in time to observe the horrible sham we call an election, and as always, I won't be participating. Dissolve the union.

¡Dios mio!

After a week plus break, maybe grinding hard from Cuzco to Abancay wasn´t the best idea. Yesterday, I think I climbed the equivalent of 2.5 Mt. Diablos on the way to Abancay and now my head is spinning.

Bad news: my camera has taken some water damage and needs a good fixin.Who knew ¨rainforest¨ was a term meant to be taken literally?

Good news: thanks to the folks back home, I have another satellite messenger so you people will be able to see where I´m at every night again.

I´m a lazy sick piece of crap.

I took another bus...this time all the way to Cusco. La Paz is a terrible place to be sick so I thought I might give another place a try. Still...bus riding is cheating, and I will pay dearly for it during the next month when I take on the punishing terrain of central and northern Perú.

Tales of the BowelCrusher

EAT MORE STREET-FOOD

The day after I shat my pants 74 clicks outside of Oruro, I woke up in the middle of a crowded curtain-draped hospital room  flanked on both sides by folks who look liked they´ve been shot out of a meat grinder. In comparison, I was the spitting image of picture perfect health, even though I still felt like shit. I was taking up precious space for more serious cases, so I called for the nurse and asked to be checked out. In ten minutes I was out of there, and found myself roaming the steep city streets of La Paz.

Vicuñas outside of Oruro

As I looked around for some affordable lodging, I began to mentally retrace my steps for the past couple of days. It hadn´t been so long since my stay in dreery old Challapata, where the head matron of the residencia I was staying at refused to let me use any of her many faucets to filter water, and if I had asked permission to use my own toilet,  I´m pretty sure she would  have said no. Challapata was quickly turning out to be the last straw in terms of my interactions with the locals of Bolivia. Not only was the head mistress of my residencia intent on destroying me via dehydration, but I quickly found that even the smallest amount of help was hard to find in this fair town. My simple quest to find a couple of black garbage bags at the local ferreterias were met by rude requests to get the fuck out, and it took at least five tries before someone finally told me how to get back onto ruta 1. There was something about my appearance that suggested to these folks that I was some kind of drug mule or worse...a gringo.

A couple of kilometers outside the most miserable town in Bolivia, I entered Pazña, the happiest town in Bolivia, for it was here that I came across some hotsprings. I spent half the day splashing around in the spiciest water I´ve encountered since Córdoba and slamming volleyballs into the faces of heedless Bolivian children. It´s ok, they were good sports, and they restored my faith in Bolivians albeit temporarily.

After my quick reprieve in the cozy waters of Pazña, I continued towards Oruro. However, the omens were not good. Some massive storm systems were developing to the east and the west, and as the city started to take over the horizon ahead of me, so too did these dark sky bubbles of death decide to merge and create a wall of lightning and hail that threatened to stop me dead if I dared approach any further. With the storm now heading directly for me, I had no choice but to break into one of the many abandoned mud brick houses on my route and take shelter for the night. The city was less than 7 km´s away.

My arrival in Orruro was a little anti-climactic. The city was effectively shut down due to a construction workers strike and with just a handfull of the stores open, there was no use sticking around except for a small snack of two salteñas (que ominous music). I asked around to see what everyone was up in arms about and found a lot of these folks were angry because the countless construction projects sponsored by the government had been brought to a halt, and now thousands of people were out of a job. As I entered and exited Oruro, I found the outskirts of the city surrounded by hundreds of finished and half-finished buildings and houses as far as thine eyes could see...all of which appeared to be completely vacant. I can only assume all this contruction was brought to a standstill because the government couldn´t find enough folks and businesses to pay for all these new buildings. So now there are plenty of places to stay for free outside the city.

So I continued on my way, and to make a long story incredibly short, I started throwing my guts up, crapped my pants, and found myself incapicitated on the side of the road with my limbs twitching like a fresh piece of road kill. It wasn´t long before a family in a pick-up realized I needed some help and lifted me into the flatbed for a quick hour and a half ride to La Paz. I wanted to talk to these folks, to thank them for all the help they were giving me, but I was having one of those days where I was just too damn sick to be translating words in my head. I hope they somehow find my blog and realize just how much I owe them for all their assistance. For all the bad folks I´ve run into in this country, there sure are a lot of people that go above and beyond the call of duty when it comes to helping people.

Government Palace - La Paz

La Paz, like so many other Bolivian towns and cities (except Oruro) is surprising in all it´s colonial beauty and European sophistication in terms of architecture. The city-center lies at a shallow dip between two steep mountain valleys and is surrounded on all sides by what appears to be inversed limestone stalaktites exploding out of the tips of the mountains. While most of the towns and cities in Bolivia I´ve seen lie at the base of some vast mountain range, La Paz reaches a new level of ridiculouslness in terms of geography.

Great or greatest Imperial Guard?

Even though I´ve been here close to a week now, I haven´t had a lot of time to enjoy this city. With all this E. Coliciousness floating around in my guts, I tend to get winded pretty quick when I´m walking around and always have to be close to a bathroom. The only items I´ve been able to keep down in my stomach for the past couple of days have been rice, mangos, lettuce and sprite, so I haven´t had the chance to enjoy all the great goodies that line the streets every day. And like every other place in this country, the hail kicks in around three o´clock so you definitely don´t want to be caught outdoors when that happens.

It´s not a lot of fun being a gringo in La Paz either. The gringo toll is annoying, and when I refuse to pay twenty bolivianos for a bar of soap that has an eight boliviano price tag on it, these street venders will actually get pretty heated at me. Now that I think about it, this is the main reason I´m not really enjoying my stay here. I have to haggle for everything, right down to the last grain of rice, and even then I get stiffed.

One such incident got pretty bad yesterday. I got up early to snap some pictures of a few interesting sights and to avoid all the pedestrian traffic that clogs up the streets later in the day. As soon as the camera comes out, some creep sneaks up behind me and in his most seductive tone whispers into my ear "gringo, mira...hey gringo", and repeats this until I finally turn around. He has some busted up ancient trilobites that he´s trying to sell for twenty bolivianos a piece. As soon as he sees I´m not interested, he dramatically lowers the price to ten, but I still don´t want to buy that stupid shit so I tell him to leave me alone. He pretends that he doesn´t understand what I´m saying, so he continues with his sale pitch until I can´t take it anymore and head down another street. He follows me for a block before he wanders off to talk to some other dude.

I go back to taking pictures for five minutes before this cholo looking asshole rounds the corner and starts shouting at me in perfect Los Angelese, "Hey white boy, why aren´t you buying my man´s fossils?" I´m getting really pissed at this point what with all the diarrhea in my system and all these street creeps bugging me so I go right up to him and ask what´s his problem. He´s mugging me right back and saying that I disrespected his man by turning my back on him. I say to him I´m not here to buy that stupid shit. He says, "Why not? You´re rich. You can afford it". He keeps playing around with some junk in his pockets so I ask him if he´s going to do something about it if I don't buy something. He tries to get up in my face one more time but his stocky little legs can only bring him up so high before he says, "I better not see you here again, faggot", then immediately spins around and runs back to whatever troll cave he spotted me from.

Every city has assholes. It's an unavoidable reality of metroplitan life. But it's the troglodytes that make the empty threats that get on my nerves the most. I went back to the same street later that day to have some coffee and the troll was nowhere to be seen. I hate that guy. I hope one day someone spots him crying over the fact that he has no friends.

Cathedral de San Francisco - La Paz