Canyoning, Coups and Costa del Peru!

From the lovely if not a little dreary Lima we headed up the coast for a few hours before cutting inland to Huraz, back up to altitude. We lost 4 members in Lima and gained just one, Christy from Birmingham. Huaraz is a medium sized town and we stayed in a hostel called Joes place, with a nice white dog called Whitey. There was a whole load of hikes and climbing experiences available here but as funds were running low for all of us we opted for the cheapest experince which was 25USD for a morning rock climbing. It was brilliant, a really challenging face whihc we did a few different routes on before chilling out in some thermal pools afterwards. We were really tired from lima still and chilled out the rest of our time in Huraz eating mainly cakes from the best bakery I have found in South America.......mmmmmmm cake!

After Huraz we headed towards Mancora via a bush camp at Huanchaco. Eddie had spoken a lot to us about Mancora, and in particular the Loki Hostel we stay at there, however nothing had quite prepared us for the next few days. We had by far and away the best room the the hostel right above the beach with a huge balcony. I think it is fair to nickname Mancora as the Costa Del Peru as we could have been at a beach resort in Spain or Portugal. The next few days were a blur of partying, the beach, attempting to surf, and hanging out by the pool. We have so many funny stories from Macora such as spending a whole night dressed up in a full sized adult nappy and lots of dancing on the bar. We met some great people here too as this was one of the first places we'd stayed with so many other backpackers! Needless to say our bodies were 100% ready to leave mancora after 5 days there and we headed on towards Ecuador!!

Our first destination in Ecuador was Cuenca where Panama hats were originally made and then exported through Panama, hence the name! We went on a tour of one of the hat factories and i got myself a custom trilby made for a resonable price, however it was really cool to see something made in fromt of you there and then! We stayed 2 nights in cuenca letting our bodies recover from Mancora and enjoying the bakeries and ice cream parlours! Cuenca also has the largest church in South America which is pretty huge....tick.

From Cuenca we headed to Banos for more adventure sports! Here we had a whole host of options for us to do. We were staying at a lovely campsite in a deep valley called Pequeno Paraiso (little paradise) owned by a scottish guy, RIch and his business partner Franco who is a driver for Oasis another tour company. We stayed here 4 nights and in that time met up with Miguel and his tour group (Miguel trained with us from Puno to Lima) and two other tour groups from Oasis. So there was loads of people here maybe 20-30 tents! Within 20 minutes of arriving we were off down the road again with 6 girls from one of the oasis trucks to do a 25m bridge swing. This was great fun and us 3 boys and 3 of the girls took the jump, it was a similar feeling to doing a bungy, however we jumped backwards which for one was weird and the second part was for a man, the harness is uncomfortable! The next day i went rafting in grade 4plus rapids with Kat (US) and Paige (Canada). It was great fun as i have never done it before and I lost the bet and fell out first and had to buy beers. Our guide thought it would be funny to tip us all out in the middle of a big rapid and I ended up under the boat whihc in theory is fine on flat water however in a rapid there was really no air to breathe there so after a few mouthfulls of half air half water I had to try and dive round....fun if not a little frantic! We went to see a really cool waterfall that afternoon where you could clamber round a crack in the rock like Gollum to get up really high right behind the main flow, we all got soaked and then stopped off for a beer on the way back. This was the last night for the girls from Oasis as they were heading to the jumgle next so we played a lot of cards and drunk a lot of red wine! We all enjoyed meeting up with this group, they were a lot of fun and we all wished we had met up sooner! The next day the three of us boys and three more from Miguels group went to do the canyoning, this was great if a little tircky at times, with a 6m rock jump into a very, very small pool being my main obstacle, especially after the events of last October.

We spent the next day and half chilling out in Banos, the campsite is really nice with volleyball and a much needed ice cold plunge pool. We got to know Rich the owner a bit more, a really funny guy with a typically sick Scottish sense of humour! The most significant even of the last day and a bit was me nearly cutting the end of my finger off, worse that I have done before, needless to say while Princess (Oasis tour leader) and Nat were sorting it out I...well....fainted! doh!

From Banos we headed to the our Amazon Rainforest experience. A quick stop in the morning let me ring Dad to say Happy Birthday and then we headed to a beautiful lodge set high on a ridge above a bend in the River. We went straight out for a walk/canyoning experience crawling through a bat cave and looking at walking trees etc. I didnt enjoy this much as it was so insanely hot, I think a man with sweat patterns like me should not enter in a climate so humid, there is no way I can drink quickly enough to replace what I lose! We had a dip in the river after which was much needed and floated around in circles in a cool eddy.

The next day we went to a monkey sanctuary with confiscated pets and mascots, it was sad to see some of them could never be released. We floated back down the river in our life jackets from here for a while which was really cool, swapping animal noises with our guide, Alex. There were also insanely bright and large butterflies here which are impossible to photograph but amazing to see! In the afternoon we went tubing down the river and stopped halfway to go see a village. Thsi was really cool, all the little toddlers had pet butterflies on thread that they would throw and then catch the end of the string. We met the chief and sampled some local drinks before eating a big grub, bush tukka style. Dane as we discovered, prefers his bugs uncooked, I nearly chucked, it all blobbed down his face and over his shorts....sick! After this we played an epic game of football with a load of 10 year olds before leaving late as it was getting dark. We didnt realise but we had another hour or so to get down river. We made crowns out of grass and painted our faces red with berries on the way. Twenty minutes or so in it was dark and we had the amazing experience of floating down part of the amazon with the sky full of stars! Pinch Pinch! Needless to say we got back to people searching for us from the bank with torches, and then had to walk up the impossible path in the pitch black getting destroyed by mosquitos!

The next day we did another arduous yet fun jungle walk climbing up waterfalls and spotting insects etc. The stand out insect was the fly that lays eggs in your skin which hatch 3 days later into a worm which has to be very carefully removed! We all got bitten by these so you never know!! After this we went to a really cool set of rock pools that you could dive in, and I managed to hurt my back going head first, will I ever learn?!? Our amazon experience was really cool but the temperature and schedule meant we all were shattered every night and slept a hell of a lot!

After the Amazon we headed for a place called Otovaldo, crossing the Ecuator on the way, took the standard pictures and went to the markets in Otovaldo. We decided however not to stay in Otovaldo but to head straight for Quito which was 2 hours down the road. What a wise move that turned out to be!! We arrived in Quito and met up with the Oasis group from Banos again. We went to an amazing Mongolian restaurant where you picked your own meals and had all the drinks you wanted for three hours for just 12USD! This led to the inevitable 'big night out'. The next morning we were all having breakfast when nat came over to let us know the Police had gone on strike and the whole country was in shut down and it would be safest for us to retreat to the hotel. We did so and spent a day chilling out playing cards watching movies and flicking over to the news to see what was going on. Those who dont know the Police attacked the president and held him under seige in a hospital before a big gun fight broke out while the army recued him. In the mean time there was a lot of pro government demonstrations all happening a few blocks down from us! All very exciting but it had blown over mostly the next day and we managed to get some snaps of the army baracade in the main square. I said bye to Dane and Rowan here which was really really odd, 70 days 24-7 and they're like family to me now. That night I went to an Egyptian restaurant with Kat, Christy and Paige (the sole survivors from both tour groups) and we had a lot of fun swapping stories and ended up going out again as I was leaving early the next day.

From here I was heading on what potentially could be my final leg as I had a flight booked out of Lima on the 10th.

More to follow....

The Owl