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After a horrendous 13 hour drive, we finally arrived in the beach 'resort' of Huanchaco via the smelliest place on this planet - Chimbote, which is Peru's largest fishing port. It was 100 times worse than the smell that emanates from the dried fish shops in Honkers. Anyway, basically Huanchaco used to be a fishing village and has now tried to transform itself into somewhere that people might like to spend their holidays. Unfortunately the beach isn't that clean and the sand is dark and gravelly. Seems like it's a great place for surfers but that's about it.
We were supposed to be camping but there were upgrades available so Vee and I got ourselves a little hut-type thing. Anyway, we speedily sat down for dinner as the kitchen was closing (it was only 8.30pm!) and half the group decided to go to a nearby bar. I went to bed. And then the fun started (or not)! Sorry Verity but the truth must come out, embarrassment or not! I woke up at 1am to find the door swinging wide open (the rooms opened out onto a communal garden type thing) but nobody there. I got up to shut it and still nobody there (bit spooked by this point). Then at 1.20 the door swung open again, Verity came staggering in (as though she was almost a comedy drunk) and puked all over the floor next to my bed. I yelled at her to get in the bathroom, at which point she slipped on it and fell. Nice. Now I'm not good with my own bodily fluids, let alone anyone else's so had to go outside as I thought I was going to throw up. I came back in to find her clearing it up with her hands so I went to get some paper towels from reception. She then got into bed and 5 minutes later got up again and puked all over the bathroom floor. I lost it at this point yelling at her to at least do it in the toilet and not round the outside! A bit pointless really as I don't think she even realised who she was let alone was capable of anything requiring a sane and logical mind. I went back to reception to find some cleaning stuff and bless him, the night guard came and cleared it all up - poor bloke - it took him 20 minutes and he had rubber gloves and everything. Thank God he did it though as I was starting to wonder what I was going to do. In the meantime, I had 'ordered' Vee to get outside and sit down at which point she sat in a big heap like a rag doll on a wooden chair (which she then fell off and knocked over the table!) making random moaning noises and swaying around. But his point it was close to 2am (I was in a charming mood as you can imagine) and Jen and Anita appeared. Anita had retrieved Vee's handbag but couldn't find the flip flop that Vee had allegedly lost (which she was wearing the next day so not quite sure what happened there!). Anita used to be a children's nurse so I left her to it to sort the situation out and put Vee to bed. I couldn't stay in the room as the smell was so bad (and I was scared Vee would throw up again which I didn't think 'd be able to cope with!) so Jen kindly offered to help me sort out a bed in one of the tents but it seemed like too much hassle at that time of night so I ended up taking my bedding outside and trying to sleep in a hammock. There was a lot of to-ing and fro-ing for a while and the night guard kept wandering around to check everything was ok. The last time I looked at my clock it was 4am - ugh! I got up at 6.30am and ventured back into the room to have a shower to find Anita cramped on my bed under a blanket with my big rucksack (and everything else) in her way. It was then that we started to try and to the pieces together. Somehow, despite not drinking as much as anyone else (and even moving onto water), Vee managed to get into a far worse state than the others and, at some point (probably while trying to get out of the bar and get back to the hotel), she must have fallen over and ended up with a huge gash on the side of her face. It's actually a hole that luckily avoided her eye (which has since turned into a nasty wound, accompanied by an impressive black and swollen eye!). Anita had followed her out of the bar and found her wandering aimlessly around so brought her back to the hotel. She propped her up next to tree where she then fell over and then while Anita's back was turned, she disappeared. At one point, the night guard carried her to bed (I was oblivious at this point - my ear plugs must be super strong but I suspect this is the point that I first woke up when the door was wide open)! Anyway, after I had settled in my hammock, Anita had decided to stay with Vee, partly because of the gash on her face as she was complaining about a horrendous headache, but also because Vee kept trying to wander off and was insisting that she was going to go to the ocean.
Anyway, that was that. As I'm sure you can imagine, I was not a happy bunny the next morning. Vee was very sheepish and kept asking me not to be angry with her (as she had kept saying the night before) but I just wanted to be left alone while she sobered up and I got back to normal! I wasn't so much angry as just upset. All was fine later in the day when she started to feel more human again. So, sorry Vee to bring all this up again (pardon the awful pun!) but I needed to tell the tale!
Right, so back to the touristy stuff. On Tuesday morning we visited Chan Chan which was built in AD1,300 and was once the largest pre-Columbian city in the Americas and the largest adobe city in the world. It was the capital city of the Chimu empire. What's weird about a lot of these ruins is that they are still being excavated and every year more is discovered that nobody knew about. There are just piles of sand or mud all over the place that hide temples and tombs and, if they haven't already been looted by grave-robbers, lots of valuable jewels and offerings. I also think it's pretty sad that most of the findings are done by the Americans who come in from the rich universities with their money. Yes, things will no doubt get done quicker, with better equipment, resource and perhaps knowledge but it would be nice if the locals could lead some of these excavation projects. Anyway, the city of Chan Chan is huge and had 10m high walls, several fresh water reservoirs inside and also contained the tomb/mausoleum of a king.
After Chan Chan we went to the sun and the moon temple which belong to the Moche era and are 700 years older than Chan Chan. You can't visit the sun temple as it's still being excavated so currently just looks like a giant sand pile (and pit!) but the moon temple was pretty impressive. It contains a load of colourful friezes and murals which were amazing, considering their age. It was customary in Moche times to build new temples on top of old temples so this structure contains layers of different sites and more are being uncovered even now.
In the evening my group was on cook duty so we had a trusty dinner of bangers and mash (and I had a dry night for once!) and then I think I was in bed by about 9pm! Wednesday was a lazy day. Some of the group went off to have surfing lessons (not my thing after my disastrous attempts at wake boarding a few years ago when I almost clobbered the instructor and then got severe stung by a vicious jellyfish - in Singapore where there isn't anything dangerous!!!). Vee (sporting her beautiful purple/back eye and still apologetic) and I went for a wander into the village, if you can call it that and then got into a collectivo van to have a look around the nearby colonial town of Trujillo. We crammed into the van with a load of locals and a whacky driver and just as we hit what seemed to be the suburbs of the town, we jerked forward and rammed into a taxi in front. Vee bashed her already bruised knee and I lurched forward, chin first, and hurtled into the man sitting opposite me, whacking me knee and then bashing my chi on something very hard (still not sure what) - ow! The police were there within seconds and everyone had to pile out. The man I had landed on checked we were ok and then said we should make sure we got our money back so we stood in line to get our 20p back from the 'conductor'! We then had no idea where we were but with so many police around it didn't long to be on our way (safely on foot!) to the centre of town. Trujillo is quite a nice little town with a beautiful main square and, different to the other towns, the buildings are all coloured in lovely pastels shades and seem to be better looked after/restored than in most places. We spent an hour or so there before heading back to the metropolis of Huanchaco in another van that had a crazy driver with severe road rage
Another early night (spurred on by a power cut!) as we had another long drive day to prepare for!
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