The adventure continues

Justin and I have now made it to the second country of our trip, Peru. So far Peru has been good, with nice buses that actually come to a complete stop when you get on, cheaper in general than Ecuador, and the people have seemed more welcoming and outgoing overall.

During our last few days in Ecuador we did a hike close one of their big national parks. The owners of the cabañas that we were staying at also have a reserve with a lodge a day´s hike away from the cabañas. When Justin and I think lodge, we think of THE LOJ, our outdoors club´s exquisite wooden structure in the White Mountains. So we decided to pay $9 a night each (this may sound cheap but it´s not, the cabins at the hostel were $7 a night each) to hike up to this lodge and stay the night instead of bringing up our tent. The hike was very nice and the area that the lodge was in was gorgeous, set on a ridge between two rivers, but the lodge was dark, dirty, and the running water we had been promised was not functioning. So we would have been more comfortable in our tent, and the moral of the story is that South America´s lodges do not measure up to NUHOC´s.

After leaving Vilcabamba we head our first of many border crossing experiences. We took a 9-hour bus that crossed the border and it turned out to be a very lax experience. The "border" consists of a bridge with the Ecuadorian exit office on one side and the Peru entrance on the other. All the foreigners, about 7 of us backpackers total, got off the bus and took an hour or so to get our exit and entrance stamps. No one else got off the bus to do any of this, and while we were going through these formalities the fruit guys were freely walking back and forth across the bridge selling their wares.

In the town we stayed in Peru we befriended a few of the other backpaskers who had been on the bus. Since there was not a lot to do in the town, we decided to buy a couple beers at the grocery store and sit on the rooftop deck and hang out. Buying beer at the grocery store turned out to be more complicated than we had expected. They do not care how old you are when buying alcohol, but they are very protective of their bottles. In much of South and Central America they reuse the glass beer and soda bottles, so there is a large deposit. But at this grocery store it turned out to be very complicated to explain this to us. While checking out we all spoke some spanish, and usually it is enough to get by, but it was not enough to figure out this situtation entirely. When the first of us tried to buy his beer, the lady shook her head at him, said she couldn´t sell him the beer, then said it would cost more, he asked why, and a couple times during this exchange she looked at the security guard with the large gun standing at the back of the store, and he would shake his head. Finally she just rang up the beer plus an extra sol (1 sol=35 cents) to cover the deposit. This might not sound like a lot, but 3 soles buys you a decent lunch. So we tried to ask if we could come back and return the bottles in the morning, but again she looked at the security guard and he shook his head again. So we conceded defeat and left with our beers.

After the first town we ventured to a nice beach town where we again ran into our backpacker friends, before venturing to Huaraz, Peru, which is very close to one of Peru´s nicest mountain ranges. We had our first overnight bus ride last night which was amazing compared to all of the other buses we´ve been on. Reclining seats, a meal, and even a bus stewardess. We are planning a few hikes and will keep everyone posted about how they go!

Again we don´t have pictures up yet from the Galapagos but we are working on finding a fast enough connection to upload them all.

Hope everyone is well!

Jess