Jungle Fever

We straight away have to change our plan when we leave Cajamarca, as the farewell party the night before takes its toll and prohibits an early departure. Luckily there is a late bus that day as well. The plan is to go further inland (east) from Cajamarca towards the Amazone jungle. After spending nearly 2 months at altitudes between 2000m and 4000m (with the exception of Lima), and thus relatively cold climates, we were looking forward to a bit of heat before we head down to chilly Chile. To travel from Cajamarca to Tarapoto (our destination in the Peruvian jungle) we take the geographically most direct route which is timewise by far the longest route as it crosses some high passes and low valleys. The 1st day is a 120km stretch from Cajamarca to Celendin which only takes about 5 hours, after 40 km the roads become unpaved. The next day is a beaut of a route from Celendin to Leymebamba, the probably less then 100 km trip takes about 7.5 hours. First the bus climbs to 3200m, then descends to a river valley at 950m, to then commit to another pass at 3600m after which the road finally descends into Leymebamba at 2200m. The route may not be for the fainthearted with single lane gravel roads, cliff faces and 60´s style buses but the scenery is simply brilliant, changing from banana trees in the valley to tree less alpine country on the passes. Pictures should have demonstrated this, hadn´t it been a hazy day plus the fact that it´s not easy to shoot a nice pic from a bouncy, non stop turning bus.

Leymebamba is a village starting to be discovered by tourists but still visitor numbers are low. In 1996 some antropologists discovered some thombs nearby with 226 mummies. The thombs were situated in a cliff face, about 100m above a lagoon (i.e not easily accessible) at an altitude of about 3200m. The consistent climate kept the mummies and most of their clothes in perfect shape over the last 500 years. The Discovery Channel apparently did a documentary on the discovery and the Austrian government donated half a million something for the conservation of the mummies and the artefacts. The result is a very nice museum in Leymebamba which we visited. Nearby (4-5 hour drive) is the fortress of Kuelap, a pre Hispanic, pre Inca fortress build on top of a ridge. Again not many tourists visit this remote place which is reached by another spectacular road. Some say Kuelap can only be matched in grandeur by Machu Picchu, but my unexperienced eye thinks that´s a bit of an exaggeration. Nevertheless fortresses on ridges are always nice. After Kuelap we head to Chachapoyas, the capital of the region. Here the gravel road ends, back to asfalt. In Chacha we visit a 770m high waterfall and then we head to Tarapoto.

And Tarapoto is definetely something else, a more Caribean style place, hot weather, no car taxi´s but tuk tuks, a busy bustling town. The jungle fever makes us ambitious and we make plans to go into the Amazone a bit further by taxi, boat and canoe. As we are planning we find out that to reach our destination we need to get up at 3 in the morning, then drive for 7 hours, take a boat which would drop us of in our canoes at midnight from where it would be three days of canoeing.....okay and then the same way back. That´s 8 days we don´t have so we can the plan and in stead stay up till 3 - 4 enjoying Tarapoto´s nightlife. A good choice as we meet some Tarapotense that evening who become our drinking buddies for the next week. The pub, across the road from our hostel, becomes our local and our new friends suggest all kind of day trips for us.We have some big nights that week, undertake a two day trip to an Amazonian reserve by boat, see monkeys, visit a waterfall which involves a 4 hour muddy rainy hike and we visit a blue lagoon. The last evening we dance and drink at a local fiesta, a so called fiesta patronal, a party for one of the many saints. A great night which ends a great week in Tarapoto thanks to our Tarapotense friends.

And then it´s back to Lima, pick up our luggage, say bye to the Lima paragliding community (unfortunately due to the weather no farewell flight) and off to Chile. 10 Weeks in Peru which were as diverse as the country itself. I´d never thought that Peru was such a fantastic country to travel through but after being here for a while the wish list of places still to visit here would easily take another 10 weeks. Then we would surely do the canoe trip in the jungle, visit the high mountains around Huaraz, the ruins of Choquequirao, Paraglide in Huancayo, Nazca lines, Sipan.....

Whether you become wiser from traveling, I don´t know, but there is surely a paralel with wisdom. The more knowledge you gather, the more you realise how little you know (this is hearsay of course, how would I know) and the same is true for travel. The more you travel, the bigger becomes the number of places you still want to visit. Anyway Peru was a fantastic experience, mainly thanks to all the great people we met along the way. Chao Peru