Link to PHOTOS and VIDEOS Album
Just copies of my facebook posts since my last update. If you see my FB posts, you have seen these.
I was cruising down the highway in 100° weather, heading towards Nazca, and I saw a tower that allows you to look down on the Nazca lines. If you don't know what these are, they are pictures in the desert floor that have been here seemingly forever. All kinds of people have all kinds of mysterious theories about these. I think some kids just found peyote, and had to burn off some energy.
And just for the record, this part of the desert is kind of pretty, but most of today's ride was ugly and hot, through desert, and shore, where I was able to smell lots of chicken farms. Ick.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazca_Lines
I decided to take the airplane ride over the Nazca Lines. I thought I'd seen enough from the tower but thought that since I was here, I really should see all of them.
A whale.
A Monkey
Space Man
Scenery
Hummingbird
The Tower viewing area from the air
I think This lady had just too much eye makeup on. What do you think.
A new personal record I think.
I've got too many photos to edit from today, and way too much frustration from dealing with Latin American airlines. How do you explain to somebody over the phone that a flight from New York to Boston should not be 25 hours?
Anyway, I bring you a condor.... With a cell phone.
A condor with a cell phone.
Here is Paul Pelland's Comment:
According to Google, your flight from New York to Boston on that Condor will indeed take ay least 25 hours.
"Condors can reach speeds of 55mph and altitudes of 15,000 ft. They can travel 150 miles per day in search of dead animals to scavenge, which include large mammals like cattle, deer, and sheep as well as smaller mammals like rodents and rabbits."
I can only imagine how a texting Condor might be even slower.
So this was an interesting day. If you're reading this on Facebook, this was a few of days ago.
Anyway, I started on a route that I planned. It was supposed to be a bit remote. The road was wash board with gravel. So the gravel made it impossible to keep a high enough speed across the top of the washboard. I was alone, desert. High desert. That means no water, and it will get very cold at night. My feelings were already getting shaken out by the washboard.
After almost an hour, and just over 20 km, I had not seen another vehicle, And I had another hundred miles to go. Even this dumbass was smart enough to turn around. It took me most of an hour to get back to major roads. I did see one other vehicle. The road ahead looked like it would be amazing scenery. But I don't want to become condor food.
All alone
The major roads were mostly paved, mostly decent condition. There were a lot of trucks and buses. Those of you in the US, when you get behind a truck, you might think it's going slow. Well on these hills, it's not unusual to get behind a truck that you could literally run behind. Sometimes even walk behind.
So the road to my destination for the day, was in some places awesome in some places terrible, the view was in some places ugly as hell, and other places quite beautiful, I ended up going through a decent chunk of the outskirts of Aeriquipa. Aeriquipa is supposed to have a beautiful city center, but I don't like cities, and by mistake I ended up off the main highway. Where I went was not beautiful. But they are trying to improve it. Lots of construction. This is a good thing, but it really sucks if you're riding through it.
Any normal person would have gone in to see the city center. And stayed there. Lots of good hotels. I'm not normal.
I continued on. The scenery was probably not quite as good as that remote road, but the chance of dying was much less. Well, the chance of dying alone. The chance of a crash here was a little higher.
Anyway.... I got to my destination, which had not been my destination to begin with, fairly early. I wanted to see the Colca Canyon and the Condors at Mirador Cruz del Cóndor. This would have been the destination for after that. There was a hotel in this town, Chivay, that looked pretty good. But I had found one that was hanging on the side of the canyon. It was supposed to be awesome, with awesome views of the condors, and the canyon. I had contacted the hotel. Was told the restaurant was open, and it was not a problem..... We will get to that later.
So at Chivay I talked to an English speaking tourist police officer about the road ahead. I had to make a choice to stay in this town, and get up super early to go see the condors, or continue on to my hotel near the Condors.
The officer said that the road ahead was mostly good pavement. Except for where it was not. This is a Peruvian staple. He said they had just started letting vehicles through. He said that he did not recommend people go, but on a moto it would be okay. The reason he did not recommend people goe was because the earth was still shaking.
Uhhhh, shaking? It turns out there had been an earthquakes that had not necessarily stopped, and a bunch of landslides on this section of road. I don't know if you've ever seen a landslide, but it is a natural wonder. There is so much power, boulders, mud, dirt, vegetation, and everything else just suddenly deciding that it wants to be at a lower elevation. And the earth was still shaking?
So, I still had a bit over an hour before it started getting dark. But there was lightning in the hills, and an unknown road ahead, I had a hotel 40 minutes ahead that was expecting me. The officer had helped me call the hotel. All was good.
So I went. There were huge sections of the road that were missing, but the big machinery had made a path. It was actually a beautiful ride, except it had started to rain. It was not a lot of rain, but when I got to the hotel, it was a long twisty steep dirt driveway. I'm sorry, mud driveway. I got to the end, found the reception area. It was a beautiful view. This hotel was literally on the side of the canyon. I could have pissed from my room onto the canyon floor many thousands of feet below. Well I could have, had anyone actually been there.
Reception, and the bar
It turns out that there are three hotels that are run by the same company. I had contacted the email address of the person for this hotel, but they wisely close this hotel during rainy season. Probably because that's when it's most likely to slide down into the bottom of the canyon. I'm not sure I could have slept here anyway. Any noise and I would have thought that the whole place was sliding down the canyon walls.
One of the hotels was hours away in Aeriquipa, The other one, which I did not find out until much later, was 8 miles ahead in the little town called Cabanaconde.
My default mode, when somebody doesn't make a decision for me, is to put more miles on. This means sometimes I pass up really nice hotels, and end up staying in shit holes just to make a few extra hours.
Well, I had the name of a hotel in Cabanaconde. Well, it was listed as a homestay. Homestay PachaMama. Pacha Mama basically means Mother Earth. It took a few tries to find it, asking a few people. Mainly because I did not believe Google maps. The building Google maps said it was in was under construction.
Well that was the place, fortunately my phone worked, and I was able to call the owner. He said he would be right there. He opened the big doors And it looked like,,, well,,, a construction area. There was a toilet, plants, and all kinds of construction materials in the courtyard. I was really thinking about running, but it was raining hard, and I had nowhere to run to. As it turns out, he was improving the kitchen, and the common courtyard area. The rooms were actually very nice, nice warm blankets, very clean, very nice place. Well a Peruvian nice place, which means no heat. It was not needed with the warm blankets. I was actually very happy here. Plenty of hot water, always unusual. Oh, did I mention the power was out in town. It was out until long after I went to bed. They are used to it. I found some chicken, and a couple of beers, and life was good..
At breakfast the next morning I met the man's mother, his kid, and had a great breakfast. Plus at breakfast, there were two American men that were trekking around Peru. I really can't imagine trekking at 15,000 ft, but to each his own. One was from Connecticut. It was good to talk English for change.
I've been told that sometimes my judgment is bad. I can't say I disagree, when it's not quite the end of the day in my mind, I just want to put on more miles. Sometimes it works out. Sometimes I end up sleeping kind on park bench. The park bench always makes a better story. .
They deserve to go bankrupt.
So I need to change my flight. For some reason it cannot be done on the phone app. So I call, I called the Miami office, They ask for my member number. Give it. And then after a few more steps they tell me they cannot find my trip information, so do I want to talk to a agent. Yes. And then the sound becomes shit. Music is shit the menu items spoken are shit. It went from perfectly clear to shit. On hold forever, lost connections, finally get somebody, and they were so broken up sound wise that I can't even tell if it's a human. After numerous tries and hours, Yes hours, I finally get somebody clear enough to understand. We work our way through the menu, I spoke with him for about 35 40 minutes. His first statement, is that there are no flights. I'd already been on the app, there were flights on the days I was looking for. I told him the times of the flights, now he can find them. I tell him which flight I want to take.
So he reads back my flights. I leave Cusco at 8:45 p.m. on Wednesday perfect. arrive Lima, then leave Lima just after midnight on Thursday. That's good. I arrived New York Thursday afternoon. That's good. I arrived Boston, Friday afternoon. Wait... What... FRIDAY. I spoke with man for quite some time, barely being able to communicate because of the poor connection. I had him read back the dates of the flights. And he repeated leave New York on Thursday, arrive Boston on Friday. I said that would be a 25-hour flight. He asked if I wanted the flight. I finally just assumed he was a moron, and said yes. And then it went silent, and 15 minutes later the call was dropped. Or he hung up.
So he did not seem to think that there was a problem with 25 hours to get from New York to Boston. I had called the Miami number, but because of the fact that the automated system could not pull up my information, they must have switched me to some other office. An office where the people have no ability for critical thinking.
Now I'm in a weird dilemma. I can cancel the flight. And I think, and I quote think, that I would get half of my total flights from Peru back. And then book a flight from Peru back to Boston. But that flight back to Boston will cost me as much as my two-way flight. Now if I could be sure that would happen, I would eat the cost as it would be less than staying in Peru. But actually getting any worthwhile information, is pretty much useless. I have dealt with many airlines through the years, but this is by far the worst. This airline should just go bankrupt. I will do the world a favor.
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So after my time talking with LATAM Airlines, and dealing with the usual non-functioning shower and everything else that usually get when you stop at a place here, I chose to go to the least Peruvian place there is. An Irish bar.
So it's an Irish bar restaurant and pizzeria.
I walk in, and ask for a menu. Of course he thinks I'm thinking of the daily menu, which is usually just lunch. But then he explains to me that there's no food. Oh, and no drinks. No nothing. Nada.
So I find the second least Peruvian place. And they have Jameson. Explain I want it in a glass of solo. No ice, no anything. Solo.
I didn't order food, because I was afraid that the drink would come with the food, which is typical. Appetizers come with the meal. If you order a beer you often don't get it until the meal comes. She started work on my drink quite some time after I ordered it. It was taking her, a long time. since it was taking her too long to make it, I got nervous. So I go to the bar, and she's putting little tiny ice cubes in it. I explain solo Jameson again, So she filtered the ice out.
Of course she had a very large glass, and filled it halfway up. I was going to get a glass of wine, but I think I'm good for the night.
Two huge glasses of Jameson, a small pizza like thing, all for 66 sol, which is about $17. I like Peru again. Not latam, but Peru is cool.
I keep stopping at gas stations, but I have still not met this attendant.