I haven´t written in a while because I have been travelling and the distances in South America are much larger than when I was in Central America. Last time, I wrote to you from the Equator. That evening, when I returned from Mitad del Mundo, I was so terribly bored for the first time on my trip, that I began playing fake pool (billiards) with a guy from California named Oliver. We talked about Ecuador and Quito in general but called it a night by 11P.M. The next morning, I woke up early, had breakfast and went back in to Quito to see a few things I hadn´t seen. After that, I met an Irish girl named Jen and met up with Oliver again. The three of us went to the
nice area of Quito to have coffee and talk about the world, the environment, first world politics and third world mayhem (if you choose to see it that way). I emptied the memory on my camera´s memory card and went to have Mongolian Barbeque for dinner. That was amazing!! Mongolian BBQ in Quito, Ecuador. I thought it was great! Anyway, after dinner we went for a few beers and ended up in this cool club/bar in the Mariscal area of Quito (full of cafe´s, bars, travel agencies, hotels, disco´s, fashion stores, etc) that played top 40 and TONS of reggaeton.. I haven´t told you but Reggaeton reigns supreme in Latin America. I have heard it
non stop and it´s the only thing people here know about Puerto Rico. They have asked me numerous times if I know Daddy Yankee personally.. That story is for another day. Anyhow, I had a blast that night with Jen and Oliver and ended up taking a cab back to the hostel at around midnight since I had a long day the next day. The following morning, I took a bus to a town called Baños about 4 hours south of Quito. It´s a beautiful little town FULL of tourists that seek adventure. It is overshadowed by a giant active volcano that decided to wake up after hundreds of years of being dormant only last summer. Now everyone wants to climb up
and get burned with lava. Just kidding. This place is the place for rafting, hiking, volcanos, etc. It has a bunch of irish pubs and tons of reggaeton. At night after I had settled myself into the Blancas y Plantas hostel, I went to this pub to have a beer before I headed back to sleep for the next day. Well, as usual, plans change. I met this chick called Ale who was trying to get into my pants every 2 seconds. It got annoying after my 2 mojitos (not beers) that she kept forcing me to drink (no arm twisting). Thank God, a cool french guy walked into the bar and she jumped from my pants to his pants. She took his hat, put it on her head and began to dance salsa. Then she asked a lesbian from Key West if she thought she was hot. Ale was a flirt who was drunk and horny. The night got good though. She did get the party started and everyone began to dance salsa, reggaeton, and have their drinks. Then 2 Argentineans came in (Lucho and Tintín) who were incredibly cool! They were attacked by Ale as well but after that, they invited me to the Amazon to meet the indigenous people that live away from
civilization. I was sold! I had to wake up at 2:45A.M. too met them at their hostel and then leave for a town called Puerto Napo. Again, I left at around midnight with them and set to meet in 3 hours. MY ALARM WENT OFF AT 3:45A.M.!!! I was so pissed off when I realized I missed this opportunity. You can´t really do this alone because it´s dangerous and there are many diseases. They tell you to go with a buddy so someone can help you back into civilization if something were to happen. My Argentinean friends had left Baños and I had no idea what to do. By the way, I realized my alarm went off an hour late when I had arrived at the bus station. I was dressed, with my backpack and all waiting for them when I get concerned and ask for the time. My alarm was on my Ipod and it had Central America time on it. An hour behind Ecuador. Anyway, that being said, I decided to take a bus to a town called Riobamba. This is the town where you take the train down the Nariz del Diablo or Devil´s Nose. I left at 5A.M. and arrived at about 9A.M. there. People, once I got there, I wanted out. I had not felt this way EVER on
this whole trip. My hostel was the dirtiest thing ever. The room was not cleaned, the sheets were not new, there was a rat (no kidding) in it and the guy who took me in the room told me the neighbors shower had been running for 2 days straight but he had no extra key to open the room. WHAT IF THIS GUY WAS DEAD? This was seriously fucked up. I left my bag and walked out to look for something to eat. I was hungry and pissed that I had missed my Amazon adventure and I was in the middle of this shithole. I found a decent cafe after a 20 minute search throughout the dilapidated town and sat to eat disgusting coffee, hard bread and yellow
water called orange juice. There I met the guy sitting next to me that looked as disgusted as I was with the town. I asked his name and where he was from. His name is Jere and he is from Croatia. Immediately we got along and decided after 10 minutes of conversation that we would head to Cuenca and leave Riobamba. That´s exactly what we did. Jere is 25 years old and had been working as an architecture assistant professor in Ibagué, Colombia for the last 3 months. Now he was travelling around before heading back to Croatia in February. Anyway, he walked with me to my hostel so I could grab my bags and then we took a cab to the bus station. I
didn´t even sleep in Riobamba (spent a whole 2 hours there). We went to Cuenca soon after and spent a whole day there. It was very colonial and pretty quiet. The interesting thing about this town was that there was a lady who set up a Puertorican bar there. It was insane! She had flags, paintings and the tackiest shit you would ever see. She was Ecuadorian from Cuenca but lived in a Puertorican neighborhood in Chicago when she was younger and said they had been nice to her. As a tribute to Puerto Rico, she set up the Puertorican bar in Cuenca! Hilarious! Anyway, after dinner, we went back to the hostel and went to sleep. The next morning,
we took the first bus to Guayaquil (a coastal city in Ecuador about 5 hours away) so that we could transfer to a bus that would head south to Peru. Remember, I´ve been travelling since 5A.M. and I´m on this crazy journey with a Croatian dude I´ve never met into Peru. That´s what makes travelling worthwhile! The changes in plans are what keep you on your feet waiting to see what´s around the corner. Anyway, we got to Guayaquil and literally had 10 minutes to board the bus for Tumbes on the Peruvian side of the border. It took us another 5 hours to get to Tumbes so you must have an idea how growchy I was by the end of the day. To top it all off, once I was at the
immigration line in the dusty little border town of Huanquillas in Ecuador I realize I had lost my Andean Immigration Permit Card I received at the airport in Quito. Luckily, the peple down here don´t care about anything and I overstressed. If you ever come down here, don´t lose it just in case. Anyway, once in Tumbes, Peru we hustled fora cheap minibus to the town of Máncora. There were about 13 people going in that direction so we got a good price. We payed 8 soles each (3.20 soles = $1.00) for an hour ride to the doorstep of our individual hostels/hotels. I was tired, I payed it. Once in Máncora, I thought of Boquerón (a beach town on the western coast
of Puerto Rico). Máncora was loud with tons of bars and clubs lining the main one lane road that slices through it (that road also happens to be the Panamerican Highway which is funny that it´s that small). My hostel was the Hostal Sol Y Mar. It was basically a resort on the beach with a pool and a bar but no fans in the rooms. I payed 15 soles a night so about $4.50 per night which you could not beat. Máncora was fun! I enjoyed the nightlife which was typical for a beach town and tried my first Pisco Sour (a traditional drink in Perú that will KILL YOU). Beers are also cheap here. We get the big beers, normally Brahma (a Brazilian beer) at 3 for 10 soles. You can´t beat
that either. Perú up to now had been a chill / relaxing place to recharge my batteries. I sat at the beach and watched surfers, enjoyed the AMAZING sunsets and then listened to music and drank beer at night. I wasn´t worried or planning anything. Máncora had been the perfect choice. There, Jere and a Peruvian couple (Melissa and Luis) slept in my same room. Luis and Melissa where the ones that introduced me to the Pisco drink and told me about Huaraz (which I will be going to next), the ruins of Chan Chan in Huanchaco near Trujillo and about the town of Pisco. They were great help and lots of fun to spend time with. As the saying goes
though, all good things must come to an end, I had to leave Máncora for the town of Huanchaco 10 hours away. Jere is still travelling with me and we bought a bus ticket for the following evening at 10P.M. so that we would arrive in Huanchaco early in the morning. The last day in Máncora, was spent at the beach. We basically just sat around, walked around, had a huge wooden sort of billboard fall on our breakfast table and spill every single liquid that was on it, and I bought flip flops. Mine had been robbed on the flight from Panama to Ecuador. Basically it was an incredibly relaxing day. The only thing was that the WHOLE town had lost electricity
and water so there was no internet, no bathrooms, no ANYTHING. Beach, beach, beach, warm beers and a pool full of Inca Kola. Inca Kola is a really good soda they sell here but it´s yellow like concentrated urine and tastes like Materva (they sell it in Puerto Rico made of plants, my grandmother loves it!). Anyway, I thought that what a better way to describe the pee in the pool than by saying it was filled with Inca Kola. You had to be there. Anyway, at one point I had to poop before I left for Huanchaco and couldn´t find a toilet anywhere that would flush because there was no water. I found this vegetarian place (they love the world so they had to have working
toilets) that had a huge tank filled with water with a scooper to fill with water and manually flush your own toilet. It was better than digging a hole in the desert and using a stone as toilet paper. Finally, the day came to an end and Jere and I went to the bus station (a street corner) to wait for the bus. OH JESUS! If you would have seen the bus! It was not bad but it was filled with DRUNK MEN WITH NO SHIRTS AND HUGE BELLIES. The women on it, continually yelled as if they had been raised by wolves and the only quiet people on it were Jere, a boy that sat next to me that was telling me about a movie called ¨The Last Marine¨ and myself. Eventually, I fell
asleep and slept through the night. Unfortunately, during the EARLY morning hours, a man begging for us to contribute to his product (strawberry yogurt filled candies), yelling at the top of his lungs about how he is the head of his household and needs to support his family by selling strawberry yogurt was annoying the shit out of me. I don´t know why but he bothered me immensely. Once he finally shut up, I got back to sleep until we arrived in Huanchaco. I did notice though, that we were in the middle of the DESERT! Once we arrived in Huanchaco, we had a nice lunch/breakfast (where the two waiters got into a fist fight and gave eachother busted lips and black eyes) and walked to a pier where I fished. I don´t know what type of fish I caught but I caught a fish with small clams on hooks. It was pretty cool. After that, Jere and I went to the ruins of Chan Chan which predate the Incan civilization. They are from approximately the
12th century and it is the largest mud/sand/dust city in the world. It really was pretty cool and gave the feel of being in Babylon or Sumer or something. After we returned, we walked to the pier again to see one of the most amazing sunsets ever. It was incredible to see the sun falling into the sea with traditional reed boats in the foreground. You´ll see the photos but you had to be there. I´m sure you´ll enjoy the pictures and at least, in a minor way, see what I saw. You are all with me here. I´ll see some of you soon!!! Seeno, Meghan, Jamie and Yoel are all coming to Peru next week!! I can´t wait!! Until la próxima vez!!
I haven´t written in a while because I have been travelling and the distances in South America are much larger than when I was in Central America. Last time, I wrote to you from the Equator. That evening, when I returned from Mitad del Mundo, I was so terribly bored for the first time on my trip, that I began playing fake pool (billiards) with a guy from California named Oliver. We talked about Ecuador and Quito in general but called it a night by 11P.M. The next morning, I woke up early, had breakfast and went back in to Quito to see a few things I hadn´t seen. After that, I met an Irish girl named Jen and met up with Oliver again. The three of us went to the 
nice area of Quito to have coffee and talk about the world, the environment, first world politics and third world mayhem (if you choose to see it that way). I emptied the memory on my camera´s memory card and went to have Mongolian Barbeque for dinner. That was amazing!! Mongolian BBQ in Quito, Ecuador. I thought it was great! Anyway, after dinner we went for a few beers and ended up in this cool club/bar in the Mariscal area of Quito (full of cafe´s, bars, travel agencies, hotels, disco´s, fashion stores, etc) that played top 40 and TONS of reggaeton.. I haven´t told you but Reggaeton reigns supreme in Latin America. I have heard it 
non stop and it´s the only thing people here know about Puerto Rico. They have asked me numerous times if I know Daddy Yankee personally.. That story is for another day. Anyhow, I had a blast that night with Jen and Oliver and ended up taking a cab back to the hostel at around midnight since I had a long day the next day. The following morning, I took a bus to a town called Baños about 4 hours south of Quito. It´s a beautiful little town FULL of tourists that seek adventure. It is overshadowed by a giant active volcano that decided to wake up after hundreds of years of being dormant only last summer. Now everyone wants to climb up 
and get burned with lava. Just kidding. This place is the place for rafting, hiking, volcanos, etc. It has a bunch of irish pubs and tons of reggaeton. At night after I had settled myself into the Blancas y Plantas hostel, I went to this pub to have a beer before I headed back to sleep for the next day. Well, as usual, plans change. I met this chick called Ale who was trying to get into my pants every 2 seconds. It got annoying after my 2 mojitos (not beers) that she kept forcing me to drink (no arm twisting). Thank God, a cool french guy walked into the bar and she jumped from my pants to his pants. She took his hat, put it on her head and began to dance salsa. Then she asked a lesbian from Key West if she thought she was hot. Ale was a flirt who was drunk and horny. The night got good though. She did get the party started and everyone began to dance salsa, reggaeton, and have their drinks. Then 2 Argentineans came in (Lucho and Tintín) who were incredibly cool! They were attacked by Ale as well but after that, they invited me to the Amazon to meet the indigenous people that live away from 
civilization. I was sold! I had to wake up at 2:45A.M. too met them at their hostel and then leave for a town called Puerto Napo. Again, I left at around midnight with them and set to meet in 3 hours. MY ALARM WENT OFF AT 3:45A.M.!!! I was so pissed off when I realized I missed this opportunity. You can´t really do this alone because it´s dangerous and there are many diseases. They tell you to go with a buddy so someone can help you back into civilization if something were to happen. My Argentinean friends had left Baños and I had no idea what to do. By the way, I realized my alarm went off an hour late when I had arrived at the bus station. I was dressed, with my backpack and all waiting for them when I get concerned and ask for the time. My alarm was on my Ipod and it had Central America time on it. An hour behind Ecuador. Anyway, that being said, I decided to take a bus to a town called Riobamba. This is the town where you take the train down the Nariz del Diablo or Devil´s Nose. I left at 5A.M. and arrived at about 9A.M. there. People, once I got there, I wanted out. I had not felt this way EVER on 
this whole trip. My hostel was the dirtiest thing ever. The room was not cleaned, the sheets were not new, there was a rat (no kidding) in it and the guy who took me in the room told me the neighbors shower had been running for 2 days straight but he had no extra key to open the room. WHAT IF THIS GUY WAS DEAD? This was seriously fucked up. I left my bag and walked out to look for something to eat. I was hungry and pissed that I had missed my Amazon adventure and I was in the middle of this shithole. I found a decent cafe after a 20 minute search throughout the dilapidated town and sat to eat disgusting coffee, hard bread and yellow 
water called orange juice. There I met the guy sitting next to me that looked as disgusted as I was with the town. I asked his name and where he was from. His name is Jere and he is from Croatia. Immediately we got along and decided after 10 minutes of conversation that we would head to Cuenca and leave Riobamba. That´s exactly what we did. Jere is 25 years old and had been working as an architecture assistant professor in Ibagué, Colombia for the last 3 months. Now he was travelling around before heading back to Croatia in February. Anyway, he walked with me to my hostel so I could grab my bags and then we took a cab to the bus station. I 
didn´t even sleep in Riobamba (spent a whole 2 hours there). We went to Cuenca soon after and spent a whole day there. It was very colonial and pretty quiet. The interesting thing about this town was that there was a lady who set up a Puertorican bar there. It was insane! She had flags, paintings and the tackiest shit you would ever see. She was Ecuadorian from Cuenca but lived in a Puertorican neighborhood in Chicago when she was younger and said they had been nice to her. As a tribute to Puerto Rico, she set up the Puertorican bar in Cuenca! Hilarious! Anyway, after dinner, we went back to the hostel and went to sleep. The next morning, 
we took the first bus to Guayaquil (a coastal city in Ecuador about 5 hours away) so that we could transfer to a bus that would head south to Peru. Remember, I´ve been travelling since 5A.M. and I´m on this crazy journey with a Croatian dude I´ve never met into Peru. That´s what makes travelling worthwhile! The changes in plans are what keep you on your feet waiting to see what´s around the corner. Anyway, we got to Guayaquil and literally had 10 minutes to board the bus for Tumbes on the Peruvian side of the border. It took us another 5 hours to get to Tumbes so you must have an idea how growchy I was by the end of the day. To top it all off, once I was at the 
immigration line in the dusty little border town of Huanquillas in Ecuador I realize I had lost my Andean Immigration Permit Card I received at the airport in Quito. Luckily, the peple down here don´t care about anything and I overstressed. If you ever come down here, don´t lose it just in case. Anyway, once in Tumbes, Peru we hustled fora cheap minibus to the town of Máncora. There were about 13 people going in that direction so we got a good price. We payed 8 soles each (3.20 soles = $1.00) for an hour ride to the doorstep of our individual hostels/hotels. I was tired, I payed it. Once in Máncora, I thought of Boquerón (a beach town on the western coast 
of Puerto Rico). Máncora was loud with tons of bars and clubs lining the main one lane road that slices through it (that road also happens to be the Panamerican Highway which is funny that it´s that small). My hostel was the Hostal Sol Y Mar. It was basically a resort on the beach with a pool and a bar but no fans in the rooms. I payed 15 soles a night so about $4.50 per night which you could not beat. Máncora was fun! I enjoyed the nightlife which was typical for a beach town and tried my first Pisco Sour (a traditional drink in Perú that will KILL YOU). Beers are also cheap here. We get the big beers, normally Brahma (a Brazilian beer) at 3 for 10 soles. You can´t beat 
that either. Perú up to now had been a chill / relaxing place to recharge my batteries. I sat at the beach and watched surfers, enjoyed the AMAZING sunsets and then listened to music and drank beer at night. I wasn´t worried or planning anything. Máncora had been the perfect choice. There, Jere and a Peruvian couple (Melissa and Luis) slept in my same room. Luis and Melissa where the ones that introduced me to the Pisco drink and told me about Huaraz (which I will be going to next), the ruins of Chan Chan in Huanchaco near Trujillo and about the town of Pisco. They were great help and lots of fun to spend time with. As the saying goes 
though, all good things must come to an end, I had to leave Máncora for the town of Huanchaco 10 hours away. Jere is still travelling with me and we bought a bus ticket for the following evening at 10P.M. so that we would arrive in Huanchaco early in the morning. The last day in Máncora, was spent at the beach. We basically just sat around, walked around, had a huge wooden sort of billboard fall on our breakfast table and spill every single liquid that was on it, and I bought flip flops. Mine had been robbed on the flight from Panama to Ecuador. Basically it was an incredibly relaxing day. The only thing was that the WHOLE town had lost electricity 
and water so there was no internet, no bathrooms, no ANYTHING. Beach, beach, beach, warm beers and a pool full of Inca Kola. Inca Kola is a really good soda they sell here but it´s yellow like concentrated urine and tastes like Materva (they sell it in Puerto Rico made of plants, my grandmother loves it!). Anyway, I thought that what a better way to describe the pee in the pool than by saying it was filled with Inca Kola. You had to be there. Anyway, at one point I had to poop before I left for Huanchaco and couldn´t find a toilet anywhere that would flush because there was no water. I found this vegetarian place (they love the world so they had to have working 
toilets) that had a huge tank filled with water with a scooper to fill with water and manually flush your own toilet. It was better than digging a hole in the desert and using a stone as toilet paper. Finally, the day came to an end and Jere and I went to the bus station (a street corner) to wait for the bus. OH JESUS! If you would have seen the bus! It was not bad but it was filled with DRUNK MEN WITH NO SHIRTS AND HUGE BELLIES. The women on it, continually yelled as if they had been raised by wolves and the only quiet people on it were Jere, a boy that sat next to me that was telling me about a movie called ¨The Last Marine¨ and myself. Eventually, I fell 
asleep and slept through the night. Unfortunately, during the EARLY morning hours, a man begging for us to contribute to his product (strawberry yogurt filled candies), yelling at the top of his lungs about how he is the head of his household and needs to support his family by selling strawberry yogurt was annoying the shit out of me. I don´t know why but he bothered me immensely. Once he finally shut up, I got back to sleep until we arrived in Huanchaco. I did notice though, that we were in the middle of the DESERT! Once we arrived in Huanchaco, we had a nice lunch/breakfast (where the two waiters got into a fist fight and gave eachother busted lips and black eyes) and walked to a pier where I fished. I don´t know what type of fish I caught but I caught a fish with small clams on hooks. It was pretty cool. After that, Jere and I went to the ruins of Chan Chan which predate the Incan civilization. They are from approximately the 
12th century and it is the largest mud/sand/dust city in the world. It really was pretty cool and gave the feel of being in Babylon or Sumer or something. After we returned, we walked to the pier again to see one of the most amazing sunsets ever. It was incredible to see the sun falling into the sea with traditional reed boats in the foreground. You´ll see the photos but you had to be there. I´m sure you´ll enjoy the pictures and at least, in a minor way, see what I saw. You are all with me here. I´ll see some of you soon!!! Seeno, Meghan, Jamie and Yoel are all coming to Peru next week!! I can´t wait!! Until la próxima vez!!
3 comments:
boy you need to eat something :) have some ceviche or lomo soltado jesus.
i'm just jeolous.
1 more week!!!!!!!!
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