Ecuador. More than bananas.

If ever there is a guidebook published on the street vendor marketing pitch, written in bold on page 1 would be the phrase "where you from?". After which there need not be anything else in the South American edition because as a merchant here you commit those three words to memory, close the book and settle back into your hammock.

A typical morning on Bondi Beach

I still don't fully understand the power in these three words. It doesn't really matter what the answer is because my being from New Zealand has little to do with the price of fish; or some crudely made handicraft. After 4 months of this line of questioning sometimes I mix it up. Timbuktu, before they're halfway finished. But I may as well say New Zealand for the recognition on their faces. And still they've won because I've been sucked in and now obligated through my own courtesy - and this simple phrase - to trawl through stuff I will never need. I just don't seem able to walk away from this question.

The main street of Montanita is lined with dozens of stalls similar to this. All sell huge fruit bowls, smoothies and cocktails. Nothing will cost you more than $2. 

Sometimes you meet entrepreneurs who have studied beyond the first page. They have a batch of pre-fab responses stored away for the most common nationalities. The response won't make sense - just a list of colloquialisms rolled out in a meaningless string. Sweet as, kiwi, All Blacks, kia ora, yeah bro, sheep, haka, Lord of the Rings. Is this really NZ's contribution to the World?

Praia de los Frailes

But the grounds for feeling aggrieved at such a trite global image of NZ are shaky (we have great wine and lamb also; did I mention we're intermittently great at sports no-one else is too interested in?). Because as we board a bus bound for Ecuador it dawns on me that my collective knowledge of the country can be obtained from a small blue and yellow sticker. Bonita, Premium Bananas.

There's no shortage of study time. It's a 30 hour trip from Lima to Guayaquil and I do my best to learn about a country that ashamedly never made it onto my top-10 list. 

Pelicans 

We are in and out of Guayaquil quickly, heading straight for the beachside towns of Montanita and Ayampe. We spend a few nights in each place (I tried to recall exactly but it blurs into a sandy, sugary wash); Montanita, a bustling party town and Ayampe, where there's nothing more than a few bungalows and some shops. 

After 6 busy weeks spent in the highlands of Bolivia and Peru it's great to do nothing but lie on the beach. SPF 30, of course.

Ayampe

Washed up on the shores of Ecuador, the remnants of the Bolivian navy

No time for more at the moment, but will continue our travels in Ecuador soon.

Hope everyone had a fantastic Christmas. We had a great time celebrating in the Colombian countryside. Off to the Caribbean coast tomorrow for New Years!

xN&G

Arequipa, Huacachina & Lima

Huacachina, Peru 

Although arriving in a new city at 5 am is never ideal, it gives us time to wander the streets of Arequipa before the city had truly woken up. It felt like the kind of place where the skies were always blue and this proved to be true for our time there. 

Near empty streets alongside our favourite plaza in South America so far

The second biggest city in Peru, Arequipa's colonial centre is built almost singularly from sillar - a white volcanic rock found in the area. With a few days to take in the sights we potter through the endless courtyards tucked away all over the city. 

George became quite besotted with the architecture of Arequipa. I had to agree, it was a truly beautiful city. Above left is part of a university, to the right, another cafe-lined laneway.

First signs that Christmas is sometime soon

More courtyard goodness

A great spot to spend the evening - Mt Chachani in the background

At the end of our third day we arrive at the bus station in Arequipa to find it packed with people, but very few buses to be seen. It transpires there are protests near Lima and none of the buses have been able to make the trip down the coast. This is slightly problematic, only for the reason that we have booked a bus out of Lima for a few days time and had planned to stop along the way up there. We manage to secure a spot on the bus for the following night and decide there are far worse places you could be stranded.

Arches. Arches and taxis.

The delay allows us to see more of the city - George has read there is an iron bridge designed by Eiffel in town and a walk along the river and through some plush suburbs brings us there.

10,000km from Paris, Eiffel's contribution to Arequipa. Not so much the icon as the tower.

The following day our bus has made the trip from Lima and we depart for Ica on time. We had planned to spend a night in Huacachina, an oasis town about 15 minutes from Ica, but the delays have ruined that idea. Our hostel with whom we had our reservation invites us to come and spend the day by their pool and we make the most. Four o'clock rolls around all to quickly and we are off in dune buggies to see the surrounding area and give sand boarding a try.

Dune buggy

Endless sand

George makes his way down

Lima is only a few hours up the road from Huachachina so it's back on the bus for a quick stopover. With about 6 hours to explore Lima, we keep it to a minimum.

A walk along the coast (El Parque de Amor)

And eating

Having heard that Lima is the has the best food in the world (from an Argentinian, no less) we decide a meal of Peruvian-Japanese fusion will be our last before the 28 hour bus journey that lies ahead of us...

More from Ecuador!

It had to happen sometime... (Cusco & Machu Picchu)

It's no secret we're happy to be out of Puno, having spent less than a full day in the place. Thankfully we seem to have survived the Puno challenge - eat-out and hope you can sleep the night, poo-no. Which is a blessing because we sleep this night on a bus, sin bano. At this stage in our travels we're less concerned about the potential for stomach upsets than we used to be, confident in our hardiness. Before we left Australia our travel doctor gave us a shot of cholera vaccine, mentioning that it also protects against a number of other food nasties and we credit this for an unscathed run. And we've just spent a month in Bolivia without any huge problems so it doesn't occur to us to tread cautiously 2 days out from a 5 day hike to Machu Picchu. Our luck was always going to run out...

Delicious breakfast and coffee

But our first meal in Cusco is a delight. Our guide book had told us good things about Jack's cafe and further recommendation from our hostel owner is all we need to head straight there after an early morning arrival in the city. Maybe we've been away from the cafe a scene too long but the food and coffee is as good as anything we've eaten in Melbourne. A huge meal fuels us for a day of exploring around the city and we don't eat again until dinner. Cusco itself is beautiful; the streets and buildings evidence of its title as the oldest city in the continent and the capital of the Incan empire, but the main plazas are plagued somewhat by relentless hawkers and touts. We wander off onto side streets and set about finding a tour company to trek with. 

Cusco central plaza

It's easy to see how people spend longer in Cusco than they anticipated, but we plan to see more of the city after our trek and so with a tour company chosen the 4am departure on day 1 rolls around quickly. We settle on the Salkantay trail, which is one of a number of alternative options to the Inca trail. As much as we would have liked to have walked the original Machu Picchu trek, bookings for the Inca trail sell out months in advance and our travel itinerary never extends further than the day after tomorrow. The Salkantay trail has a good reputation as a challenging walk across spectacular landscape, winds up at Machu Picchu and only needs to be booked a couple of days in advance, which ticks all the boxes for us.

But by lunch on day 1, we're ready to pull the pin and stump up for a $50+ cab back to Cusco. It's always difficult to pinpoint the exact culprit but it at this early stage it occurs to us that the bargain chifa the day before (Chinese food) could have been a false economy. We've been climbing for 4 hours and Nic and I have been languishing at the back of the group, taking turns to dash into bushes at the whim of our cramping bowels and stomachs. The initial onset cues exactly with our arrival at Mollepata, 2 hours from Cusco, where we take breakfast and make introductions to our group of 16. Neither of us manage to eat much and I survive a clammy and horrifying moment on the bus ride to the starting point of the track only to make a mess of my meagre breakfast on the roadside. 

Our guide does his best to reassure us that it's just altitude sickness but we know better: this is the lowest we've been in 5 weeks, aside from 4 days in the jungle. The climb is steep in parts and we're not particularly fit and we have little energy as a result of our IBE (Involuntary Bimodal Evacuation). Other than a few sips of coke we can't bring ourselves to eat lunch but the time sitting down and catching our breath helps settle things a bit. The thought of forfeiting $400 for the trek in addition to the cost of the taxi encourages us to persist until the first camp and we decide we'll make the call the next morning if things are still bad.

Fetch me my brown pants

It turns out to be a very good decision because things pass quickly, so to speak, and by nightfall we're able to force some dinner down. The following morning is another 4am start as it's the longest day up and over the Salkantay pass at 4600m. We realise to skip another breakfast will be a mistake and do our best to stock up. We're lucky that the sun rises into a clear and windless morning, providing views of the mountains and down the valley. As we get closer to the top of the pass it's apparent that some of the group are struggling with the thin air, which is thankfully not a problem of ours. Three of the group pay to get carried over the pass on horseback. We're already feeling much better and able to laugh at the horrors of the day before, and it's a consolation to restore some credibility after being the group stragglers. The views of Salkantay Mountain rising above us as we rest at the pass are spectacular.

The track zig-zags up the bottom of the picture. Our guide calls it The Gringo Killer.

Resting afterwards. All gringos still alive.

Mount Salkantay

With the sickness and longest day behind us we end up having a great time over the remaining 3 days. The weather stays clear and sunny, with no more than a few minutes of rain (and it's meant to be the rainy season) and our group is a mix of great people from all over the world. On one of the evenings the guides wager a few beers over a game of football: South America vs The World. My inclusion in the World side is mostly a numbers thing and I try not to disgrace NZ's proud football heritage. The plucky prematch statement that the All Whites were the only unbeaten team at the last World Cup falls on the deaf ears of my French & Italian teammates. We lose, partly because our team can't match the sprinting locals at 3000m but mostly because I am truly shit at soccer. Anyone for cricket?

Happy to have Eeyore carrying our gear

The best is saved for the last day, when we make the climb to Machu Picchu. Another early start, this time 3.30am, but it's all worth it when we find ourselves the first at the entrance gates for the 6am opening. I'd seen the postcard photos of Machu Picchu plenty of times before, with the ruins sitting beneath the sugarloaf-esque peak of Huayna Picchu, but in context with the surrounding mountains it's even more special. When the Incans were kindly sharing their empire with the Spanish, only for the Spanish to ransack and destroy most of it, somehow this spot was kept secret. Good thing it was because it's an amazing place to visit. We buy the additional ticket to climb to the top of Huayna Picchu, a steep and challenging haul up ropes and rock faces for a birds eye view of the site. Definitely recommend this option (though don't bother with the Grand Cavern at the foot of the mountain - not worth the effort).

We're the very first to arrive here in the morning and see this view. No-one else around. A few hours later and the place is crawling with people and cameras. Overlooking is Huayna Picchu, which we climbed also, the track up hidden somewhere in the shadows on the left face.

Evolution has missed a beat here. Nowhere to hide for this caterpillar.

Sunny skies in Cusco 

From Machu Picchu it's a train and bus combo back to Cusco for a few days to relax, wash-up and see more of the city. And a few more visits to Jack's cafe...

It's an impossible task to get this up-to-date, but we're getting closer momentarily. From Cusco to Arequipa to Ecuador and we'll have finally clawed our way back from the lapses in Brazil!

xN&G

The Amazon

It wouldn't be a South American adventure without a visit to the Amazon. We decide that Bolivia is the best country to see it - it's reasonably accessible and the Madidi National Park is supposed to be a vast untouched tract. But probably more significant for us is that the Boliviano makes it much cheaper than the options in Peru, Brazil and Ecuador. From La Paz, there are two ways to get to Rurrenabaque, the gateway to the Madidi Jungle; a 35 minute flight in a pencil plane or a 20 hour bus trip along stretches of road that could stake a claim for the World's Most Dangerous if only the traffic volumes were higher.

Our guide pushing through the shallows 

We've heard horrific accounts from other people in our hostel about the bus and we splash out on the flight. After the obligatory delays, engine problems etc. we're noisily bumping our way past snow capped mountains at 6000m before plunging down into the jungle.

After nearly a month at altitude, we're priming ourselves to be athletes back near to sea level but the heat and humidity quickly sap this idea. Not that we need too much energy because our guide for the next 4 days, Obi, lets us know that we're the only people staying at the lodge and the program each day is entirely up to us.

Fishing spot

Bolivia, up until this point, has felt more of a tourist destination than any other place on our trip. In the 10 days preceding, we've toured the salt flats, biked down death road and crawled through the silver mines. All of which was great fun, but all part of a well beaten track. But the 3 hour canoe ride up the Madidi river to our camp, with just a spluttering 2-stroke motor and our camera to hint at an outside world, is wonderfully remote and untouched.

Arriving at the camp there are no distinguishing features that draw attention to it from the river; the canoe pulls up to the bank and we scramble up an overgrown track to a clearing. Clustered around the clearing are a few simple timber huts with thatched roofs, an open walled dining area and a vege garden. Obi repeats the schedule for us - that there is no schedule, other than dinner at seven - and we opt for reading in the hammocks strung up outside our room.

Nic spots this guy on a night walk in the jungle

When Obi wakes us in fading light and urges us to follow him, we shrug off the grogginess and wade into the jungle in our jandals. He's heard the call of monkeys from the camp and we crash our way through the bush behind his careful steps. We only catch glimpses of the monkeys through the leaves, but still it's more satisfying than through the bars of Santa Cruz zoo. Arriving back at the camp (by some mystery of navigation to us) dinner is served and it is a banquet. 

Nic does not spot this guy in her hammock before climbing in. The screams defied a farm upbringing. Above left, we stumble on a herd of wild boars during a walk. Above right, a fat wad of Australian cash.

The next four days pass in a similar relaxed way. Walks in the jungle in the morning and hammock time in the afternoon, all interspersed with great meals. We catch fish in the river (well, Nic does) and help prepare it for dinner. We hike to a farm plot a few hours from camp and pull up veges for lunch. Nic can't overcome the fear of muddy water - piranhas lurking, we're told, though perfectly safe if you're not bleeding or peeing - so I make the return trip from the farm by myself floating in a tube.

Hard at work digging up yucca. Above, Nic catches a piranha for dinner and gets shown how to make delicious banana leaf parcels with it. 

Relief from the sticky jungle heat

The dining room

Leaving the jungle we return briefly to La Paz on our way out of Bolivia and into Peru. En route we stop off on the Bolivian side of Lake Titicaca, at a place called Copacabana. There is water and something resembling a beach and that's where the resemblence to its Brazilian namesake ends. But it's a nice enough spot to spend the night and we're happy to break up the bus trip. Reaching the alternative layover spot on the Peruvian side of the lake, bleak and ugly Puno, we realise we made a good choice stopping where we did. It's not a first impression that Peru should be proud of, but Puno does have one minor redeeming attraction, the floating islands. 

Only photo evidence of Copacabana

Touristy beyond comparison the Islas de Flotantes are a collection of about 50 manmade reed islands floating on Lake Titicaca. We hop on a boat for a tour and chug out to one. As we approach you can see the families living on the islands rush about in preparation for the incoming dollars: mothers frantically pull traditional clothes over their children's heads while the dads set-up knick-knack stalls. Historically these islands were a refuge from war-faring Incan tribes but now it's a sham for tourists. They still use the traditional techniques to build the islands (labour intensive, reeds are restocked every 2 weeks) and for me, this is the interesting part about the tour. The sensation of walking on them is unnerving; it moves under your feet like a bowl of jelly and you're never really certain that you won't fall through.

Model of the floating island on the floating island. Compacted earth cubes with reeds layered on top.

As we cast off from the island a huge storm passes overhead and the back of the boat is covered by a sheet of hail. It's at this point we realise our competent captain, Henry, hasn't successfully started the engine. Something smelt funny leaving Puno and it's apparent that the electrics are buggered. An irritating Canadian aboard, old and with a know-it-all looking beard, painstakingly crafted to disguise multiple chins, informs us that it was most definitely burning copper wires we smelt earlier. The boat drifts out into the lake and the deluge continues on deck.

Storm approaching

Henry organizes to be towed back to Puno by a boat we happen to bump into but the added weight is too much for our saviour tug and its engine gives up also. A third boat is strung on the chain and it's a slow and ungainly haul back to the harbour. We have time for a dubious meal at the bus terminal before boarding for Cusco (which we get duped on by the boat operator. We're sold a combo boat/bus ticket but the promised bus company won't accept the chit and we're stuck traveling with some dodgy outfit). Ah Peru. You've got some work to do.

And striking

For my sister and all the underwhelming moments we suffered at corner stores in Brazil. The sugary colours of South America at last.

A rather negative finish. And things get worse before they get better, I'm afraid. But we're now happily ensconced beachside in Ecuador and I'm writing from a hammock. Don't feel too bad for us.

xN&G