Ica, Huacachina: Gringoland now playing everywhere

We wondered where all the gringos were when we were in North Peru, and again when we were in Ecuador, now we know.. they are all in Southern Peru.

Our bus from Lima to Ica had more gringos than locals. (Could have just been a Cruz del Sur thing because it is more pricey). But nonetheless, the movies now are all of a sudden in english with subtitles. Boom, people speak english, or about as much english as we speak spanish.

We offloaded in Ica and made for Huacachina, a small oasis a couple of km into the desert. Boom, we walk into our hotel and there are GRINGOS EVERYWHERE. It is like we walked into the set of some fabulous movie. Our hostal had a central pool with a bar beside it. Gringos are sitting around sipping drinks, swimming, eating, laughing, listening to music and talking about a days hard travel sandboarding and swimming.

Music thumped until late in the night. We were pooped so we pretty much went to bed. We were awaken at about 3am to the bed shaking...and no, not like that. We were hit by a minor earthquake that lasted for about 40 seconds.

The next morning we too sunned ourselves by the pool. Then to add to the movie flavour, we decided to go dune buggy touring and sandboarding. Within minutes we were Mission Impossible stars flying around dunes, being driven full speed up dunes to hit the top and go hurtling, all wheels in the air down cliff sides. It was like some kind of motion simulator of a movie at Canada´s Wonderland, except this was real. And the more the ladies screamed the crazier our driver got (Trotter, we know you can relate). It was wild.

Follow that up by some sandboarding down progressively steeper dunes. The boards are nothing more than planks of wood with lamination and some greese. They strap them on with velcro and away you go. Pretty fun and a lot less painful than snow, surprisingly. Sand gets everywhere, and we mean everywhere.

At night we decided to be somewhat social and join the rat race at the bar. As it turned out it must have been a few groups converging on the hostal by chance the night before. But regardless there were many people eager to swap stories about great BLT´s or fish and chips they found at gringo restaurants in Cusco or wherever.

Reverse Culture Shock. We could say we didn´t feel like we had that much culture shock when we first got here in Casma and headed north (although I think everyone goes through it in some form or another). But it was definitely Culture Shock having to be surrounded by english voices. Definitely a completely different circuit.

Welcome to the Gringo Trail.

We moved today to Ica which is definitely less gringo populated. It is busy and a little less safe feeling (no gringos but us around, they are all in Huacachina). We spent the day touring a few pisco-wine vineyards, enjoying a few free tastings and taking in the hot dry surroundings.

Tomorrow we want to get out of here ASAP. Now in the south a lot of locals know a bit more english and coupled with more gringos means it feels sketchier because people want to take advantage as well. We will head to Nazca tomorrow.

Piura, Lima: What did you just eat?

Journey survived, barely.

The overnight ride on Cruz del Sur was by far cushier. Food was served and even movies. Bingo was played. Yes bingo.... And guess who won... Chris.

Well we should clarify, first he had a false bingo.. missed the last number on his card, 74. But then they called it two numbers later. He won a trip from Lima back to Piura.... Yeah.. thanks, but no thanks.

Other than that we had another six or so hour layover in Lima.. wohoo..

We dined upon cow tongue potatoes and rice, and another yummy soup with hearty meats, including what could only be described as a sack of some sort, Justine thinks it was a ball sack... Luckily we will never know because we don´t know how to ask that in Spanish, and don´t really want to.

Ecuador to Peru: Crossing the Border and No Virgin Insight

Our plan was to leave Cuenca on Monday morning, head to Loja (a hub near the border) spend the night there, catch a bus on Tuesday to Piura(in Peru) and from there a night bus to Lima and then onto Ica in the south. Our plan would have us in Ica on Wednesday or Thursday. Well, Monday morning Justine woke up with a bit of a stomach problem...we figure a small case of food poisioning. Chris with his cast iron stomach worked on his journal and let Justine have a few more hours of sleep. This worked out in our favor as the bus that we were told left at 9am did not exist.

Arriving in Loja at around 4pm Justine soon discovered that there were only two buses a day that crossed the border (not what the LP says), and they were at 10:30pm and 11 pm. So after some discussion the decision to take the 10:30 bus was made. This meant no sleep or relaxation, and an EARLY morning border crossing. We whiled away the hours waiting for the 1030pm bus getting something to eat and then people watching and listening to Douglas Adams´"Life the Universe and Everything" on the Ipod.

10:30 arrived and we boarded the bus. The seats reclined slightly, and we were none to eager for the bus ride as it was scheduled to arrived in Piura at 7am. With a border crossing in about 5 hours, we quickly tried to get comfortable and get some sleep.

Cheesy Interlude:
AT this point, Chris´memory flashed to a CNN World presentation that we had watched earlier this week. It was a segment where travellers send in their questions and a reporter researches the information. The question was looking for which airline had the most leg room for passengers. It was reported that they would only look at coach class, as all first class had ample leg room. The results were that Virgin Airlines has the best leg room with 72cm. GAWD do we wish we had that!!

We were awakened at 2:30 in the morning to go through the proceedures of crossing the border. The process was relatively quick at that time of night, and we were back in the bus and on the road by just after 3am. With fewer passengers onboard, we chose to try sitting in different seats and sprawl across two seats each. This lasted until about 5am, when we began to stop for numerous locals on the side of the road heading off to work and kids heading off to school. Of course we spent the whole night rocked and lulled to sleep to the blaring tunes of yet another Spanish Rock-pop CD.

Now in Piura, we are killing time until our bus leaves at 6:15pm. The bus trip to Lima is 12 to 16 hours, but luckily for us, this is on a "plush" bus with Cruz Del Sur (with semi-cama seats, and dinner and breakfast supplied). Still, we are not really looking forward to more time on the bus. Especially considering that our plan is to immediatly turn around and get on a bus in Lima to Ica, another 4 hours!!.... Hopefully, hopefully only 52 hours of travelling in total and we will get there... hopefully.

Ecuador: Things to Remember

Helados: homemade ice cream, frozen in a cup and with a stick.. soo good, so refreshing, and Ecuadorians love them.

Brightly coloured shawls, dresses and clothing.

Hats: pork pie or pananma, could Justine pull one off in Canada?

Voicanoes: brooding silently and not so silently... a different way of life.

Markets: Fabric colours, yarn, people, smells, food, bag of oranges for 50cents..

Bus stations: so easy to get on and off.

Bus Food Vendors: Why leave the bus when vendors will board the bus, sell you what you need (chicken on a stick, icecream, chips, gum, water, beans in a bag etc) and hop off at the next stop, or even when the bus isn´t stopped.

Pigs: Always squeeling, always ornery, so funny and so fat.

Menu del Dia: aka Almuerzos... when you can find it, always a different soup, always filling, sometimes making you sick... the chance you have to take for some good eats

Panderias: The bread always smells and looks to good.. and never really is.

Touts: Always in your face, not always telling the truth about their bus... but if you aren´t going with them, they will tell you correctly who can take you there...

The kids: as babies, we have seen hardly any cry. They entertain themselves with next to nothing. Those that are in school wear uniforms, and are out by 1:30pm. Those that can´t afford to go to school work...and work hard whether in the fields, at the markets, or selling whatever they can.

The Mighty American Dollar: can you ever get away from it. It makes a developing country seem quite expensive.

Cell phones: They are everywhere...you see a person in what looks like traditional dress and suddenly their pockets begin a Bethoven melody.

Phone Cabanas: if you can´t afford the cell phone, there are phone stores on every block. Kind of like Starbucks in Canada.

Music: nothing like flying down the road in your bus with pop Ecuadorian music blarring!

Cuenca: Helados a plenty

After Riobamba, we hopped a five hour bus through the highlands to Cuenca. What a bus ride. Another rainy day (this is really the only time other than in Huaraz that it has rained at all so far) with the bus snaking through high mountain tops, shrouded in mist and cloud with occasional sunny breaks. Cliffs turned to farmland and lush valleys as we left the high snowcapped Andes behind...

Cuenca is both modern and colonial. Paved roads only reached this area in the 60´s so there is still a lot of traditional dress and people and the downtown core is a beautiful mix of colonial flat topped buildings and red tiled houses. The downtown runs along a river which is well cared for, and is still used to wash and dry clothes. Brightly coloured dresses lie on the banks drying in the sun. Beautiful bridges cross over the river which is free of garbage, although is still pretty dirty (not too common in SA). Streets are straight but filled with beautiful colonial buildings and churches, it is a real treat for the eyes.

Not too much else to say. Today is election day. We opted not to go to Sigsig (nearby town that makes Panama Hats) as the owner of our hostal tells us that things will shut down today as most people will be watching the elections.

Things have been really heating up in that category lately. Parades galore fill the streets, and these aren´t really parades... just anyone with a working vehicle, some tape and whatever political propaganda they can find adherred to their vehicle. Whole buses and big rig trucks go by with a few posters and no one but the driver. Loud speakers seem to be the draw and the louder the speaker the better, even if it isn´t political tunes, just music is great.

As we said there are a lot of political parties down here with a lot of voting numbers. Our spanish, unfortunately, isn´t great enough to really understand the situation, but from what we can understand from the hostal owner it is between two parties, number 35 and we think 12-29. Not sure if that is just from advanced poles or surveys. We also wonder how everyone must vote as there are a lot of remote houses far from towns with obvious politcial feelings, so perhaps poles have been open longer. We haven´t noticed polls before, but we saw a few today and turnout seems to be good. There is a police presence, but things are calm. People aren´t afraid to tell you who they are voting for, we had lunch at a market stall and the lady was busy showing us her ID and political party. Should be interesting, apparently we should know by around 9pm tonight.

Tomorrow we are taking a bus to Loja (about six hours south of here). From there we are going to get a bus to Piuria, Peru, and then on to Lima and Ica, Peru. Should be about a day and a half process or more.. but we are realising there is a lot to do in Peru still and even more in Chile and Argentina.... so we must bid Ecuador farewell.

Riobamba: The Sultan of the Andes and the Devils Nose

Through darkening skies and the ever-present ash cloud of the Volcano Tinguahura, we left Baños on the two hour or so bus ride to Riobamba.

Riobamba is very much a city, it has a some interesting churches and architecture but most people pass through its way soley for the train ride: Nariz del Diablo (Devil´s Nose) which starts in Riobamba and ends in Sibambe. Thinking we would hotel shop we got let off at the train station and bought our tickets for the next day. We were soon stopped by one of the hotel owners in our book (the one that was far away and we weren´t going to go to) offering us a ride to his hostal and back to the train the next morning. We ended up accepting, and it was great. The nicest, well kept, hostal rooms we have been in yet (all newly renovated) with a kitchen, tv and no one else staying there.

A wet evening was passed scrambling around town as one thing after another went wrong with our camera card. For some reason we have duplicat images on a full card, not sure how that works, but we ended up having to buy another one. The images are still on the card, it is just going to be interesting trying to get them off. We spent a couple of hours in the upstairs of a camera shop with the owner trying to get the images off the camera and burned. We got most of them, but gave up a while after he was already closed. I guess as a highlight, he sold us a 1GB camera card, two cd´s, his time and a card reader for 50$ (which was all we had in our pocket). We then spent the next hour trying to find an ATM that would accept our bank card b-c we had no money left... arg.

The next morning our hostal owner drove ous to the train station at six am... and we soon found out why.... Gone are the days when this train ride must have been really something. The train, dubbed the Narix del Diablo, because of the switchbacked track that it takes down a mountain face of the same name was also thought to be the most difficult train in the world to build. It initially starts in Riobamba and passes through farmland and soon into dry mountain valleys and crevasses. It stops in small towns along the way and its final stop is in Alausi before it begins its descent down the near vertical face of the Nariz Del Diablo. In its day it must have been something, as it serviced all the way to Cuenca, and was pretty much the only transportation method for local farmers and people. It served as a transport train of goods and such, but along with that people ended up needing lifts too. The roof riding of the train cars was permitted and is encouraged today.

The train no longer really seems to have a purpose as it was 100% gringos riding the roofs and the roof was packed full by the time we stopped in Alausi. At Riobamba you can rent cushions for your butt and back as the tin roof and metal railings can be quite tough after 7 hours. Locals climb to the top and hawk hats, gloves, coffee, banana chips etc. As far as we could tell there is no purpose to the train as we stopped a few times to unload a few railway ties, and other than that the only cargo was gringo backpacks. Nevertheless, it is an unreal experience with the wind blowing through your hair sitting atop the train as it screeches and chugs through the country side. You pass many locals farming, washing clothes, or coming out in hopes of getting a candy tossed down.

The seperation between the haves and the have nots is really apparent as you sit high above the locals, and watch little kids running back and forth fighting over candy. It is hard to tell whether the locals really enjoy this train, it must be a quite a sight, passing through three times a week with roofs packed full of gringos snaping photos... but nearly all waved and smiled, so you have to think that they must enjoy it.

The scenery is beautiful, and as it was raining and overcast, we can only imagine what it must have looked like if Chimborazo (Ecuador´s highest peak and volcanoe) and the other mountains were in view. Regardless the switchbacked descent down the Nariz del Diablo was amazing to take in, especially from the roof. We could only wish that they would extend the route.