Anyways.... I dont have many photos of mancora but i assure you it was nice.
The town itself is just a bunch of hostels built along the pan american highway and directly on a stretch of white sand beach with palm trees and decent surfing waves. we spent four days there, surfing and hanging out with two english couples we had met on our travels in ecuador. it was a kind of holiday from our holiday! : )
Or at least it was supposed to be- turns out dermot has been offered a phd post in Manchester! So we spent most of it trying to work out how to change flights and whether we could get him to buenos aires in time. To say nothing of the whole "manchester" thing. Talk about first world problems in a third world country!
Anyway, we managed to fit in a couple of surfing lessons in between all that. They have a great system here where you go out on an extra long board. you lie on the board and your instructor hangs of the back helping you to paddle out - then he chooses the wave sets you up and keeps you balanced while you stand up. On the first lesson we had great conditions and caught about 10 waves! its definately cheating but soooo much more fun then what i believe can be quite a frustrating skill to pick up.
My teacher was hilarious- when we got to the school he was dancing on the sand, shaking his ample booty with his shirt off and his two silver teeth glinting in the sun. When i asked his name i thought he said Jafij or something - so he just sighed and pointed to the tattoo on his arm - DAVID. oh. I couldn't understand a word he said when he spoke english so we had to do the lessons in spanish - which probably wasnt the best way to learn but we managed!
After Mancorra we had to embark on our most gruelling bus journey yet - 19hours - one night in Lima - then another 22 hours to arrive in Cusco in time for our Inca trek.
the first bit was fine and we arrived in Lima on time. What we hadn't expected was that the whole journey was going to be through red sand deserts. It felt like we were on mars and our first glimpse of Lima looked like we were somewhere in the middle east. We didn't see much of Lima when we got there, but as we entered by bus we drove through miles of dusty "squatter" communities. They are like shanty towns built out of wood that surround the city. Many developing countries have this phenomenon as the population move to the City, but I don't know why this is referred to as " squatting" in Lima. Apparently some of these communities are as big as 350,000 people and have won awards for there organisations. Definitely worth looking into I think.
Back to the buses - They are always quite an expereince on this continent however we have both been quite impreessed at how smoothly it has gone so far.
In colombia and ecuador the coaches were pretty basic - but not bad - we only had one bone rattling experience. In both countries they have quite a blazé approach to the term ´direct ' and would stop in all kinds of places, with people running to jump onto the coach while it was still moving. You would also get vendors regularly coming onto the bus to sell their wares. i quite liked that as you got to meet some real characters. The majority just sold fruit or crisps with their bird-like calls, though we've had people coming on with freshly cooked kebabs and curry. But my favourites were the 'delboys of south america' who come on with a box of chocolate bars or whatever, put one in your hand, and then wax lyrical at the front of the bus about latin american spirit or whatever before come back round to see if you'll buy the thing.
The most bizarre guy so far, was a middle aged gentleman who got on our bus from baños; the way he was talking and holding himself I thought he was a preacher, then suddenly he opened his book to reveal various pictures of people with dental hygiene problems! We still don't quite understand what he was trying to sell.
Then the next guy got on and insisted on reading aloud the entire cook book that he was trying to flog!
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| One of our more surreal coffee stops while travelling through ecuador... |
In Peru 'direct' does seem to mean 'direct' - and the buses are more like planes, with seats that go back nearly all the way, tvs, wifi (thought that hasnt worked yet) and a hostess who serves you dinner and breakfast!
So we were feeling pretty confident about the mega journey ahead of us...
Unfortunately we were much mistaken. On the second 22 hour journey we were seated directly in front of the tv and deafening speakers. I dont know why, but they feel the need to play you movies constantly throughout you journey with only a break between midnight and 7:30 am. You never see any locals reading a book even on the longest journeys. Normally this is cool because i just see it as an opportunity to practice my spanish - but they dont seem to have any problem with showing the most GRAPHICLY violent films at 7am. Followed by various lads comedies with embarrasingly explicit sex scenes. Bearing in mind this is latin america, there are always young children watching it with you. The whole thing made me feel very British.
This was all nicely topped off by the fact that we had at least three people throwing up more or less constantly through the whole night. I really hope it was travel sickness and not some horrible bug. So I am now at the stage in my trip where i can no longer count on my hands how many people have thrown up near me on a bus. mmmm.
Well, i think its probably just good training for bolivia...
So anyhoo, we are now in cusco, in a nice hostel getting ready to celebrate Peru´s independence day. Struggling a bit with the altitude but that should pass by tomorrow.
So next stop - the Inca trail and Machu Pichu!
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