Finally into Peru!

Hello all

Sorry about the lapse in blogging there, I was applying to Phyio schools and just couldn´t manage to spend another minute on a computer. In any case, that´s all done now (YAY!) and I´m ready to fill you in. We spent a fair bit of time in Cuenca as I worked on my applications but we also went to some very cool art markets (you wouldn´t believe the beautiful paintings that people are selling for ridiculously cheap), partied a bit with some other gringos, and went to a few museums. Eventually we just had to get out of Ecuador, though... Peru´s a big country (compared to Ecuador, not Canada) and we don´t have a lot of time left! We caught an overnight bus into a Peruvian city called Piura. This was a bit gong show. We´d been told in advance by another Canadian couple to just assume that there are professional theives on overnight busses, so we were very careful. We took the memory card out of the camera, wrapped the arm straps of our little packs around our legs, and kept most things of value under the bus with our big packs. However, 2 people on our bus weren´t so well informed/lucky. One Scotsman had his hiking boots stolen and a local kid (maybe 16 or 17 years old) had $80 USD stolen. The real tragedy was of course the kid who may have worked for a month for that money. He was really upset while the Scotsman played it off as though losing $300 boots was nothing... it really was an odd behaviour, he wasn´t going to claim it on his insurance or file a police report. It made it less likely that the police would help the kid and it almost justified stealing the boots. It was a pretty sad experience but interesting.

The city we entered (Piura) was TERRIBLE! If any one is travelling to Peru then do your best to avoid Piura. We´re safe and well but it was very overwhelming with swarms of cabbies telling you how dangerous it is there and you need to get in their cab because you´ll be attacked if you walk down the road to the next bus line... and you don´t know who´s more dangerous, the swarms of cabbies or the swarms of poor people. Anyways, we were lucky to have a couple friends on the bus that we met in the Galapagos so we just walked in a big group. It was a rude introduction, though! But enough bad things... we made our way to Chiclayo which is an ugly big city but it has some AWESOME ruins nearby. The ruins here are from the Moche culture which was from about 100AD to 700AD. They made big pyramids for their Lords and for the graveyards of important people in society. Each level of the pyramid was built during a different reign as they would bury the Lord when he died (along with many of his women/guards/priest which were sacrificed) and then fill up the entire pyramide with adobe and sand. They´d then build the next palace and burial chamber on top of that one. The Lord of Sipan was a lord that had been buried in an unlooted tomb with a whole bunch of very ornamental objects.. amazing bead chest plates and gold crowns, jewelery with metalwork that is pretty mind blowing... there was a necklace of these gold spider bobbles that had something like 150 weld points each. Unfortunately we couldn´t take pictures in the actual museum which was called Tumbas Reales and it´s an incredible museum... very tasteful and classy for south american tastes... you can tell there was a lot of international help. Highly recommended for any travellers. Luckily we got to go to the actual pyramid site where we had a fantastic guide. The best situation is when you´ve got a bit of spanish and the guide´s got a bit of english and you´re both trying to learn more. That way you really appreciate eachother´s efforts. Anyways, she hadn´t been very busy this particular day and we were very interested in the tombes so she let us climb down into one of the newer excavations. It was quite amazing to know that the level you were at was made maybe 1500 years ago. The pyramids themselves are pretty weather-worn but luckily the vast majority was below ground for ages. This is how these tombes were so well preserved... by sand coverage. Oh yes, nothern Peru is a desert, which was quite a change coming out of lush Ecuador.

We then travelled on to Trujillo which has some more recent ruins in the form of an ancient city called Chan Chan, occupied by the Chimu culture. This was the largest city prior to Inca conquest and really the last resort of the Chimu culture. The Incas, unlike the Spanish, allowed the Chimu to remain in this city and live according to their own traditions for quite some time as long as there was no opposition to their conquest. This was a HUGE city, I can´t remember the acreage, but it was too big for me to comprehend. We visited the best preserved sites which had some very interesting architecture but I honestly found the Moche culture more impressive, despite being a century earlier. We did visit a nearby Moche pyramid as well called the Temple of the Moon which showed some very impressive artwork on the walls... I find it amazing that paints found in the natural surroundings could last for so long.

We´re now in a small city called Caraz which is up in the Andes. The bus ride here was perhaps the most terrifying voyage I´ve ever made. I would look down out of the window and not be able to see the road (bumpy dirt by the way) but just look straight down a gigantic cliff... the fun bit was when we met another big vehicle coming the other way... we had to back up a little bit and we both nearly got off the bus, but luckily our bus was awarded the inside half of the one-lane road while the other truck inched past the cliff side. It was freaky deaky. Anyways, we´re here to do some Andean hiking. There´s a 3 day trip we want to do but I´ve unfortunately got some form of food poisoning which is making that a little impossible right now. Someone tell me why in the hell I would have a temperature of 34.5 degrees C??? It confuses me. So I´m trying to get healthy right now but our room is lacking in windows and it´s getting a bit depressing in there. The food poisoned part of me really would like to be home right now but things will get better soon. Poor Clay is bored, I know, so we´ll try and get this health thing going quickly.

After Caraz we want to go to some ruins south of Huaraz, the next big city. Then we´re going to Lima and flying to Cuzco! I´m very excited to get to southern Peru which is supposed to be very touristy but with reason. And I think a lot of people speak english there, whereas no one has in the vast majority of our trip to this point. First languages rule.

Lots of love! I promise I´ll post more regularly from now on.