Huanchaco and Trujillo

There wasn´t much to see/do in Huanchaco - we just used it as a base to visit Lambayeque, where we visited the Tumbes Reales Museum, which showcases the Royal Tombs of Sipan. These are Peru´s version of Tuntakhamun´s Tomb, as they were found untouched by grave robbers, and yielded some very impressive gold artifacts.

We also visited the nearby ruins of Chan Chan, the largest adobe city in the world, built by the Chimu Empre in AD1300. We also visited the Moche temples of the Sun and Moon. The temple of the Sun is the largest pyramid in the Americas, and was constructed of 140,000,000 adobe bricks. The Spanish, in their quest for treasure (which was successful), diverted the Rio Moche to the Pyramid and washed away two thirds of it. The temple of the moon has some nice polychrome reliefs.

We spent the night in Trujillo. Not much here either, besides the unusual reed boats used by fisherman (available for hire) and some very nice ceviche, a traditional South American dish of fish cooked only in lime juice, and served with onion and chilli.

Mancora

Christmas was spent making our way from Cuenca in Ecuador, across the border to Mancora in Peru. The change in scenery from the green leafiness of Ecuador to the barren coast along Peru was quite dramatic.

Not all Peruvians had embraced the spirit of Christmas either: we were ripped of at the border by taxi drivers who initially agreed to transport us across the border town (which should've been called Banos - it stank!) for US$7 per taxi, then pulled over in the middle of nowhere and demanded US$7 per person instead. Even the normally reserved Andreas said at the end of that trip that he felt like spitting on someone.

We managed to catch the only bus to Mancora, and arrived earlier than anticipated at about 3pm. Our hotel was right on the beach, and we had a ground floor room at the front which gave us a fantastic view of the ocean. I've decided that I love hammocks and that we'll be getting one for our balcony : )

We went for an early morning walk along the beach the next day, and were adopted by a dog who impressed us with its ability to dig crabs out of their holes. He kept us company for the duration of our long walk, and even waited patiently while we had a long conversation with a Swiss expat. He then slept quietly at our feet while we had a huge breakfast (we each had a stack of 5 pancakes, hash browns and juice for AUD$3). Warren rewarded him with some pancake. Pity we couldn't take him with us.

That night, we went to a local bar and danced some lambada to reggaeton which is commonly played here. After a couple of dances with Warren, one of the locals asked me to dance. His version of lambada was quite different to what we're used to, and put my following skills to the test. I had pinched a nerve in my neck previously (a combo of poor sleeping posture on buses and strange pillows) and he did so many cambres my fingers were numb at the end of two dances. I had to beg Warren to take me home so I wouldn't have to dance with him again!

Cuenca

We were lucky enough to be in Cuenca for their Christmas Parade - the largest one in Ecuador.

The parade began at 10am, and went on for about five hours. Children, vehicles, donkeys, horses, sheep even, all dressed up. It was marvellous to see the whole community participate so wholeheartedly in this event, even though it must have cost many more than they could afford.

The parade went past our hotel, so we were able to watch the procession from its balconeys. Children tossed sweets and biscuits to the crowds. Towards the end of the parade, they distributed the fruit used to decorate their vehicles and things got a little violent then as the poor rushed forward to rip these off the trucks.

Cuenca's supposed to have a large number of poor, but most people were pretty well dressed here. Clothes are so cheap, I couldn't resist buying yet another pair of jeans for US$20. This was the fourth pair I'd bought in Ecuador, and I reckon that by the time we get to Brazil, I'll be restricted to buying bikinis only as they'll be the only things small enough to fit in my bag by that stage.

Banos

Banos means ´toilet´in Spanish, so I´m not sure why they chose to name this town so - it really didn´t smell that bad.

We did a half day white water rafting trip which would be more accurately described as brown water rafting since the Rio Negro (Chocolate River) looked exactly like its Willy Wonka counterpart, but tasted like mud. : ( We quickly became experts at paddling with our eyes shut to keep the silt out.

Our half day of canyoning was much more exhilirating, and our Swiss guid, Franco, was excellent. We followed a river down the mountain, abseiled down three waterfalls, jumped off another, and sailed across a pool via a flying fox across a pool.

Sadly, after less than a fortnight in Ecuador, I´m kinda tired of the food here. Buns, jam and juice for breakfast and everything else served for lunch and dinner seems to be loaded with salt and oil. No wonder my tummy is protesting. Fortunately, meds are cheap here, and Warren has stocked up on what he calls ´the good stuff´.

The Amazon

Fiona was robbed on our way to the Amazon.

My favourite parts of our foray into the jungle were riding the rapids in a tyre tube, and just listening to the jungle as we floated down river in our long boat. The sounds of the river, birds, insects and frogs were overpowering, yet peaceful, so of course Warren fell asleep : )

But you probably want to hear about the bus trip which ended with Fiona being robbed.

Bus trips in South America are almost as interesting as the desintations. Vendors selling everything from supplements to sunglasses board the bus while it´s moving. These include children laden with heavy baskets of fruit or food. They hop off later, presumably to catch a bus headed back towards their village.

Despite the commotion caused by the vendors, latin music which is played and the ocassional B-grade movie (we saw Desparado with Antonio Banderas!) most of our group slept during this particular trip.

Fiona woke up three hours into it, and discovered that her bag - which she had stored in the overhead luggage compartment above her seat - was no longer there. She moved through the bus checking all seats, ¨in case someone might have taken it by accident¨, and found it at the back of the bus. Her passport, cash, credit cards, camera, and a gold pendent blessed by Pope John Paul II were gone.

This discovery made Warren and I wrap our legs more tightly around our day packs. We had placed them between our feet because overhead storage didn´t seem like a safe option. The rest of our group had used the overhead compartments, and quickly took their bags down.

Living conditions are in Misahualli and the Amazon are very basic. People sleep in huts only large enough to accommodate their mattresses, and do their cooking etc. outdoors under a thatched roof with no walls. Unless they have the luxury of a river raft (i.e. crudely tied bamboo stakes), villagers would have to walk into town. The walk from our lodge took us four hours, and we saw children as young as six or seven hack their way through with machetes (although they took half the time we did). One could understand why some might resort to thieving to improve their lives.

On a happier note, some locals in Misahualli showed us how to dance Cumbia. From what I have experienced so far, it seems to be a cross between meringue and salsa, but I could be wrong. Have decided that, as TTC says, it doésn´t matter how you dance as long as you´re having fun!

Otavalo

We were in Otavalo over the weekend – when the animal, produce and merchandise markets were on – and the streets were busy with locals as well as tourists.

We visited the animal markets shortly after sunrise, and were able to witness hundreds of cattle, pigs and some goats brought there to be sold or bartered. The pigs were the only ones which resisted this, and many had to be pulled along by their leashes, ears or tails. Andreas, whose brother-in-law works in an abattoir, later told us that pigs were highly stressed, and often died of heart failure minutes before they were meant to be slaughtered.

The merchandise markets had the usual array of jewellery, scarves, ponchos, hats and hammocks. What made them unusual was the fact that the stallholders did not hassle us to buy these. They occasionally invited us to browse through what they had, and were more than happy to pull from storage anything they thought we might be interested in, but were equally gracious when we left empty handed.

Indeed, we had been pleasantly surprised thus far, by how helpful Ecuadorians had been since our arrival. Those who spoke no English did their best to communicate with hand gestures (while rapidly speaking Spanish) and those who spoke English seemed to welcome the opportunity to practice it with us. Warren and I met the latter with suspicious stares and clutched our bags. We would then feel guilty after they left us with our belongings still intact. On hindsight, it was better to be cautious. As we discovered shortly after leaving Otavalo, not all Ecuadorians act honarably.

Quito

We bumped into Joao Da Silva from Rio Rythmics (the friendly face at the door on party nights) in Auckland International Airport, and found we were on the same flight to Santiago, Chile. Joao was on his way to Brazil with his son.

That flight – one of four which took a total of 20 hours – though long, was uneventful. I had an adorable two year old girl who lay across the two seats next to me and kicked me in her sleep for all 11 hours of that leg (not so adorable, but fortunately she was an amateur, and her kicks were not as deadly as those one might experience at RR on a crowded Saturday night.)

Our time in Quito has been much more exciting. We tried to catch a trolley bus to the Old City the day after we arrived, only to have them stop all buses as we arrived at the bus-stop. We discovered this was due to a strike over rising bus fares (from 25 cents to 35 cents), and witnessed the protests when we walked to Old City. Police armed with tear gas and shield restricted protesters to specific streets which were then closed to public access. I thought at the time that their riot gear was a little OTT, but realised the next day that I had misjudged: as we tried to catch yet another bus, the bus-stop we were headed for was abruptly closed by police, as youth in balaclavas disrupted traffic and threatened pedestrians. (If you´re reading this mom and dad, don´t worry, South America is perfectly safe ; )

We did eventually get to our destination – one of Quito´s star attractions, Mitad del Mundo (the Equator line). A cute museum allows you to experiment with balancing an egg on a nail, watch water swirling counter/clockwise on either side of the Equator. It also had some displays showing how the natives used to live, complete with instructions on how to shrink the heads of one´s enemies.

The Iglesia de La Compania de Jesus (Company of Jesus Church ), another highlight, truly deserves it´s reputation as one of the most beautiful churches in South America (I´m sure this is true even though I haven´t yet seen what the rest of South America has to offer). We weren´t allowed to take photos inside, but click on the link above where someone´s been more sneaky than I dared to have a look at a picture of the interior: the Arabic inspired plasterwork, 10 side altars, high alter, pulpits, walls and ceilings had one and a half tons of gold poured into them during its 170 years of construction between 1605 – 1775, and it´s simply spectacular.

Our tour guide, Andreas, is lovely, highly organised, and very direct. His one and a half hour briefing on the first day of our tour included such comforting words as, “You will all get diarrhoea”. Yay : (

Our group comprises:

Tarsh (32) and Scott (38) from Melbourne who now live in England;

Fiona (38) from England

Andrew (22) from Sydney, Australia

Andreas (27) our German tour leader who´s also 6ft 4¨(just thought I´d throw this in because it seems incredibly tall to me)

We haven´t had a chance to do any dancing as yet, but Latin music is played just about everywhere, and makes me feel like we are back at a Latin Mix Party (minus the kicking ; )

We haven´t suffered any altitude sickness yet either (Quito sits at 2820m), but get puffed climbing more than three flights of stairs. Warren has also made some rather strange suggestions, but these could be due to carbon monoxide poisoning from the traffic rather than the lack of oxygen. Given the fatigue we feel now whenever some exertion is required, I think the Inca Trail is going to be rather interesting. I wonder if one of our porters could be persuaded to carry me …