Unto the End of the World...

Happy New Years!!!

We finally made it, sort of. Drew and I are now in Ushuaia, Argentina - the end of the world. Ushuaia considers itself to be the southern-most city in the world. It´s credentials are good. Ushuaia sits at the southwest end of Tierra Del Fuego and is nestled up against the Beagle Channel. It is tough to find a beer anywhere south of here.

There is just one small problem, Puerto Williams, Chile.

Puerto Williams is on the other side of the Beagle Channel and consequently, just a few kilometers farther south. Argentina deals with this problem just like every other great civilization deals with their sticky little issues. They ignore it. Apparently, inconvenient facts aren´t facts at all.

Ushuaia argues that Puerto Williams is not a city, it is just a small naval village. Therefore it doesn´t count. Being located in Chile doesn´t help Puerto Williams´case either. Chile and Argentina have been ignoring each other for decades. (Except when they are trying to blast each other off the continent. On this topic, I saw my first mine field the other day.)

So Drew and I will close out 2008 surrounded by penguins and beaver. Who couldn´t like that?! The only downside to being this far south is the absolute lack of college bowl games.

Where to next?? Good question. We had hoped to book passage to Antarctica, but that proved to be too expensive. The best price we found was about $5000 for a two week cruise. So the Antarctic will have to wait. The Falkland Islands are still a possibility (which the Argentinians are still pissed about) or perhaps we will wander up along the Atlantic coast of Argentina. Who knows.

Best wishes to everyone for 2009!

Torres Del Paines and the Straits of Magellan

Patigonia is cold, windy, wet, and bueautiful. I love it here.

After arriving in Puerto Natales, Chile on Christmas, Drew and I took the opportunity to visit Torres Del Paines National Park. This is a gem of wilderness and unfortunately, that means lots of tourists. The American ex-pat owner of our hostel told us that even a few years ago you could wander the park without seeing another soul, but that isn´t true anymore. We were only there for a day and only got the chance to flit around the edges, so we shared the experince with the masses.

Still it is a great park and deserves a visit. While we were there it rained several times and might have gone all the way up to the low 40´s. We were soaked, but happy. The park consists of mountain spires that are the remains of ancient volcanoes, glaciers and icebergs, and glacial rivers and lakes. Below are the Grande Salto falls and Drew and I just a bit farther up the river.


After leaving the falls, we hiked up toward the Grey Glacier. This hike straddles two lakes with just thin strip of land (a meter or two) between then. While we tried to cross this little isthmus, the wind kicked up so fiercely we were forced to bend over as the waves rolled up from one lake trying to reach the other. Needless to say we got wet. On the other side, we climbed to the top of small hill and looked to a small inlet that had two icebergs stranded within.
After returning to Peurto Natales, we prepared to leave Chile and jump across the Staits of Magellan to Tierra Del Fuego and the end of the earth. The trip was largely uneventful, but the ferry across the striats was rough. The boat lurched its way across the strait, but a pod of Commerson´s dolphins kept us entertained. These dolphins are a deep gray or black with a white belt the runs diagnally across them. Think of swimming zebra with one big strip.

Almost at the bottom.

Endoresements

The South American Shuffle endorses:

Mister Potato's Mayonnaise and Ketchup potato chips!


Really?? Mayo potato chips!? That´s just disgusting.

A $500 Rum and Coke

Merry Christmas from Patagonia!


There is nothing like a traditional Christmas, but sometimes you just want to create new traditions.

From now on I am spending Christmas on a ferry plowing small circles through choppy South Pacific Seas. After spending four days on a ferry from Puerto Montt to Puerto Natales in the Patagonia region of Chile, Drew and I were due to pull into port around noon on Christmas day. Unfortunately, we ran into a bit of traditional Christmas weather that included 80 knot winds and rain that blew up instead of down or sideways. The port closed due to waves and wind so bad that our ship couldn´t dock. Hence, seven hours of slow circles in the Pacific.

Despite the delays and the rain that actually flies up your jacket, this was a great trip. We had an uneventful Day 1 and adjusted to our new bunks. Each person was allotted about six and a halfe had an feet of bunk and a cabinet to put your stuff in. Then you made friends with the 90 people sleeping within 10 feet of you. While space was scarce, this was the most comfortable bed I´ve slept in for weeks.

Day 2 was a bit dicey. The scenery was beautiful was we sailed through small channels and alongside of soaring volcanoes. By late afternoon, we cut out of the narrow channels and out into the ocean. It takes a lot of weather to make a big cruise rock. This wasn´t a big cruise ship. The ocean greeted us with 12 foot waves and 60 knot winds and our little ferry rocked up and down. Then side to side. Then sort of an elliptical pattern. On a ship with about 250 passengers on 60 were still standing by dinner time. Less then 20 made it until 10 pm and only an intrepid few closed the pub at midnight. I closed the pub. I had no choice. There were so many people getting sick around my bunk that I couldn´t stand to be near it. After they kicked us out of the pub, I wandered down to my bunk and started to read. It is an interesting experience to have your boat rock so far to one side that you can see your feet over the top of your raised book.

On day 3 we retreated from the ocean and returned to the relative shelter of the channels. We steamed up to Pio XI glacier and spend a few hours bobbing alongside. While everyone is snapping pictures of the glacier, Drew grabs my arm and points to the side of the boat. Our bartender is getting into a little zodiac and speeding away. Imagine the Love Boat without Isaac! Now our little Chilean Isaac was abandoning ship. Nope. Our bartender fervently believed that the best drinks are only served with ice chipped from the icebergs floating by - my $500 rum and coke.

The day ended with a Christmas Eve party into the wee hours. On day 4 we all wished that we had gone to bed a little earlier. By the time I woke up for breakfast I knew we were in trouble. The ship was tilting sideways at nice little angle. At first I thought this might just be my hangover, but Drew assured me that the boat, not my head, was listing. We packed up our bags, grabbed some grub, and prepared for port. Then waited. Waited. Waited. An unforgettable Christmas going in circles.

We are finally in Puerto Natales and preparing to see Torres Del Paines National Park. After that we are heading for Tierra Del Feugo and Argentina to push on to the final chunk of this continent.

Hopefully, I will get another post out before New Years. If not, then have a great celebration and email me all the embarrassing stories.

Deck the Halls...errr decks I guess

Merry Christmas!!

I hope that all of you have a Merry Christmas and enjoy the holiday with your family and friends. Drew and I board a ferry tomorrow morning and will be spending the holiday on the sea, slowly making our way toward the bottom. We will land in Puerto Natales late on Christmas day and then will continue south via boat and bus. We are almost there. We should be on Tierra Del Fuego by New Years. From there we will try to make it out to Cape Horn, the farthest extend of South America, but the Cape is just a small group of islands that are difficult to reach.


Have a great holiday!!

Bugs on the Run

There is one great freedom that most travelers never experience - the cut and run. When you travel on a schedule you tend to stick to that itinerary. When you travel with only a vague idea of what´s coming next you occasionally get the chance to see how fast you can throw all of your junk into a bag and get out of town. Drew and I had yet another chance to bolt in Santiago. This time it was the bug´s fault.

After returning from Easter Island we caught a cab to the hotel where we had a reservation. Upon our arrival the hotel informed us that there was no room at the inn, so we got the equivalent of a night in the stable - the International Hostel. It was late, we were tired, and Drew was sick so we took it. There were no angels, no star, and no wise men at this stable. Just bugs. Bed bugs to be exact. (On a side note, I have now been bitten by just about every type of insect on this continent.)

The next morning we discovered that the bugs had been feasting upon us, and we complained to the management and to the owner. They told us that bed bugs don´t exist. Apparently, they are a figment of my imagination. Choice words were said. Questions about the hotel manager´s intelligence were raised. There might have even been some insinuations about his mother, a dog, and a bevy of circus clowns, but I don´t want to point any fingers.

So we left, stormed out is more appropriate, and hopped a bus south to Puerto Montt. This unfortunately meant we spend the night on the bus, but it was preferable to being eaten in your own bed. The next day we arrived in Puerto Montt and did what any sane person with bed bugs does. We checked into the nicest four star hotel in town. If you are going to suffer, do it in luxury.

For anyone who has not experienced the joy of bed bugs, its a real pain. The itching is annoying, but the little devils are a lot of work! All of our clothes needed to be washed. Everything we owned - backpacks, books, shoes, etc. - all need to be cleaned. So there is nothing like a Friday night in a luxury hotel, sitting on the edge of a bathtub scrubbing out a grimy backpack.

Welcome to my life. You get used to it after a while.

Hawaii´s Lost Sibling - Easter Island

Easter Island is amazing. It is the most isolated human-inhabited place in the world, but that´s not the best thing. It´s on Eastern Standard Time! The most isolated spot is in the same time zone as the second most isolated spot - Washington, DC. That boggles my little brain.

How do you describe an island like this? Very easily. It has the climate of Hawaii, the cost of New York City, the population of Mayberry, and the infrastructure of a third-world banana republic. Then add the tourists.

Everyone has seen pictures of the Moai (the stone heads), they are even more impressive in person. (I think the roar of the ocean helps a little.) The first time you see a Moai you are in awe. The second time is amazing. The tenth is pretty cool. By the two-hundredth statue your eyes roll back and you realize that if you squint just right it sort of looks like Kermit the Frog. About this time you glance at your watch and realize you have only been on the island for three hours.

Now you really understand why this is the most isolated spot in the world and why the islanders just about whipped themselves out. There is nothing here but statues and souvenir shops.

Well that´s okay, when you get tired of statues you can always just hit the beach right? Not really. The island is a series of three extinct volcanoes. Hawaii is a series of extinct and not-so-extinct volcanoes. What is the difference? God smiled on Hawaii and gave it loads of sandy beaches. He did not smile on Easter Island. There is one beach, period. Everything else is black volcanic rock. Fun to scramble around on, but bad to swim next to. The beach is slightly larger than the corner Starbucks. Then add the tourists, many of whom should not be in bathing suits. It sort of makes you appreciate Captain Ahab´s hatred of the white whale. Yes, madam, that bikini does make you look fat. No, sir, I am not insulting Germany, just your wife.

So what did we do for four days? One day climbing a volcano to see the freshwater lake the formed in its crater. One day driving around the island looking at hundreds of Moai. Then Drew and I split up. Drew decided to get sick and stay in bed. I took the jeep that we rented and hit some of the off-road trails to the more in-accessible parts of the island.

It was during this little jaunt that I had a close encounter with nature. Specifically, a pair of blood-thirsty birds. I had parked the jeep at a small pasture that had seven Moai all lined up looking out at the sea. I decided to leave the jeep and hike for a little bit, so off I went. As I walked down the trail I could hear two birds screaming at each other. They were a type of falcon or hawk, but something I didn´t immediately recognize. I have a specific name for them, but I won´t repeat that here.

So the birds were sitting in this tree making all sorts of noise. It is spring-time down here, so I though maybe this was some mating thing. I figured this was some avian ladies man making a move. You know, two birds, some Barry White, a little courvoisier... Who knows where things will go? Nope, they had already done that and now were guarding their nest. I figured this out as I looked up to see two feathery missiles coming at me with their talons out. So I ate dirt. The stupid birds buzzed me and then came around for a second attack. By this time I´d jumped up and started sprinting down the path. I can hear these birds scream and then feel the air as they whoosh by me. Each time they pass me by, they make a tight circle and do it again. I ran down the path, leaped over a stone wall, and ran through the pasture with the seven moai. By this time a few tour groups had arrived and there are about twenty people standing around. The tour guides didn´t even pause as I ran through right through tours followed by two angry raptors.

I survived, but only because the car was unlocked. Stupid birds.

We spent our last day in town shopping for knick-knacks and then caught our flight back to Santiago. I highly recommend making it out to Easter Island if you get the chance. Just don´t stay too long and bring plenty of sunscreen and books.

A Magical Place

I sat next to a hedgehog on the bus.

Well okay, not next to him. He was across the aisle, but in the same row. It was the first time I had ever seen a hedgehog use public transportation. Drew and I were on our way to Valparaiso, a port town a few hours out of Santiago. This was when I decided that Valparaiso must be a magical place. I asked the hedgehog about this, but he didn't answer. He just curled up in a little ball and went to sleep.

When we got to Valparaiso we said goodbye to the hedgehog and climbed off the bus. We walked out of the bus station, turned to the right, and was greeted by a horse wearing a hat. I had never seen a horse in a hat, but there was one now. I was so shocked that I couldn't even get a picture before he and his owner walked on down the road.

Valparaiso is often compared to San Fransisco, but I don't really see it. Admittedly, both towns have fog, hills, and highways that look perilously close to collapse, but that's about it. Valparaiso is a little closer to Oakland, just without the Raiders.


You might think that I didn't like Valparaiso, but you would be wrong. It was one of the most fun towns we have visited. Santiago is a comfortable town that works. Valparaiso works despite its best efforts. It is full of graffiti, but most of it is better than must public art I have seen. The sidewalks are broken, but somehow they keep their 150 year old funiculars operating.

It is just an odd town where everyone does their own thing. For example, while we were walking down the street a bus pulled up. A man got out and opened up the cargo hold. Inside was a small child, stretched out on a mattress and blankets. He didn't seem at all phased to be sleeping the hold of a bus.

While we were there Valparaiso was hosting a citywide performing arts festival. The entire bit was centered around shipping containers from the local port. Shakespeare in a box! Containers were turned into galleries, stages, and seating areas.


We thought it was brilliant. Anyway, this will be the last post for a few days. Drew and I are off to Easter Island and will not be back until late next week. Enjoy the holidays!

The Stars at Night...

The Stars at Night;

Are Big and Bright;

Deep in the Heart of Chile...

Texans may take offense at this, but its true. Drew and I deep into Chile by this point. We are currently in Santiago and getting ready to head for Easter Island. But, I am still well behind in my blog posts so let me catch you up to our first stop - La Serena, Chile.

After Drew and I decided to cut our time short in Peru, we hopped the first bus south. Over the next 48 hours, 34 of those were on a bus. We spend two full nights sleeping on buses and the rest of the time in bus stations, immigration offices, custom houses, and drug check lines. This sounds bad, but it infinitely better than crossing the Ecuador/Peru border.

When you get off of a bus after 34 hours there here are your priorities: find a bathroom and find food not purchased from a vending machine. Finding a hotel comes way, way down the list. We were in La Serena for two reasons. First, we just couldn´t sit on a bus any longer. Second, due to funky atmospheric conditions, La Serena has the best star gazing on the continent. There are four or five observatories within an hour of the city, including the building in the final fight scene of the new James Bond movie. The building is part of the European Space Observatory, and while the movie claims to take place in Bolivia, the desert and observatory is in Chile. Bolivia just makes a better bad guy.

So we spent our time out at the observatories. I won´t bore you with all the details, but observatories are fun places for the Cash family. We grew up close to an observatory in Ohio and spent many summer nights out there. (Mike Sigrist, my dad, and I also used to play golf through one of the antennas used for the SETI (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence) project, but that is another story.)

From the Southern Hemisphere a lot of new constellations appear and a lot of the old favorites look a little different. We spend time watching Orion, Taurus, the great bear, and the Southern Cross all move across the horizon. We trained telescopes on several nebula and two small galaxies that orbit the Milky Way like the Moon orbits Earth. The picture of the moon was taken by holding my camera up to the telescope lens.

I also picked up some worthless trivia. J.K. Rowlings named several of the Harry Potter characters after stars. Specifically, Sirius Black (named after the dog star) and his sister Bellatrix Lestrange (named after a star in Orion). Also, the symbol for Subaru cars is the Pleiades star cluster. We call them the Seven Sisters after the sisters of Greek Mythology. We see seven bright stars (there are hundred or thousands), but the Japanese only see six.

Buses or Why We Left Peru

Buses in South America are an institution like trolley cars are in San Fransisco. The vary in comfort, price, and safety. In Ecuador they are cheap, designed for people under 5 feet tall, and a socially accepted form of suicide. They are just plain scary. Riding a bus in Ecuador is the only time I have ever seen two buses, a car, and a semi pass four abreast into a blind turn going down a mountain.

In Chile the buses are much more expensive and closer to riding in the economy cabin of a trans-Atlantic flight. When the bus driver exceeds the speed limit, a little red light flashes, a buzzer sounds, and the drivers name and a phone number appears on digital screen. This allows you to call and report him.

Peru is somewhere in between. The buses are comfortable and generally not to expensive. There is a speed limit, but the drivers often don´t obey it. Peru also doesn´t have many interstates. Most of its major roads are simply one or two lane highways that cuts through dozens of small villages. Imagine taking route 50 or 29 out of DC and way into the countryside. When it becomes a one or two lane road the speed drops. When it enters a little town, say Front Royal or Winchester, the speed drops even more. When we drive down these roads we slow down because we know that every small town cop would love to pull over the city slicker.

That doesn´t happen in Peru. Consequently, these buses don´t slow down when they barrel through no-name villages. Eventually, they hit someone. In our case it was a five year old boy. As our bus rounded a relatively blind bend in the road, a small village kid ran out across the street. Our bus driver saw and him, slammed on the breaks, and jerked the bus to the right. I noticed something was wrong when the bus began leaning at a 30 degree angle as the driver was fighting to keep us out of the ditch on the side of the road. Then came the crunch and Drew yelled. He had seen the kid running.

We looked out the window and the child was lying face down, not moving a bit. He only had one shoe. Immediately, the villagers began running to the child and the mother pushed her way through the crowd toward the kid. Then she did the one thing you never do. She picked the kid up by the shoulders and shook him. The she shook him again. If that kid had a neck or back injury it just became permanent. As you can image, the screaming was unearthly.

Fortunately, on our bus was a Korean medical student. He was already leaping off the bus when the mother began shaking her child. He got her to set him down and the future doctor began to check the child out. An ambulance and the police arrived quickly. The police and some villagers had to separate the mother from the bus driver. The Korean Doc assisted the EMTs, loaded the kid into the ambulance, and the climbed in after the kid. It was a good thing he did.

At the hospital the child was rushed into the emergency room. No one knew what to do. This wasn´t a major trauma center, just a small country hospital. There was no doctor and the nurses were not really trained for this. Again, the Korean took charge. He began cleaning and bandaging the child´s wounds, hooked him up to an IV, and checked for internal bleeding and broken bones. Amazingly, there were none!!! This kid just got hit buy a bus and didn´t sustain a single broken bone. However, there was some swelling of the brain and the Korean med student ordered him to be taken to Cuzco, the nearest major hospital.

While all of this was going on, everyone on the bus was in a state of shock. As soon as the accident happened, everyone was in tears. One girl was crying so hard that she bit through her own lip. It was chaos. The police decided that they needed to impound the bus and take its driver into protective custody. They thought the villagers might seek a little revenge, especially if the child died. Where the bus goes, so do the passengers. After several hours of sitting along the side of the road waiting for news about the boy and for the police to decide where to take the bus it looked like we would relocate to a police compound a few miles away.

The police and bus driver told us that this would likely mean that everyone would have to spend the night on the bus and hopefully, the police would work things out in the morning. Drew and I decided that we were pretty finished with Peru at this point. The police agreed that we could leave if we caught another bus. Luckily, Drew and I got the last two seats on a passing bus.

The Korean med student returned just as Drew and I were catching our new bus. Drew spoke with him quickly and found out that the kid was on his way to Cuzco and there was a good chance he would live. I check the news papers for Cuzco and the surrounding area so hopefully that means he survived. However, on the same day as this accident another bus accident killed 2 tourists and injured over a dozen.

Drew and I arrived in Puno, Peru later that night. We had a tour planned for the next day on Lake Titicaca. We took the tour, grabbed our bags, and got on the first bus heading toward Chile. Peru was a wonderful country and we both expect to return, but for now we are done.

The Jewel of Peru

We finally made it to Southern Peru in late November and early December to see the gem of the Incan world - Machu Picchu. This ruin is the most famous of dozens of Incan ruins scattered within a few hours of Cuzco, Peru, the old imperial capital of the Incan Empire. For weeks, travelers heading north told us how wonderful Machu Picchu was and how it changed their life.

If you want Machu Picchu to change your life, don´t go Rome. Really steer clear of Italy altogether. Okay, just stay out of the entire Roman world. I think that means you can still visit Iceland, Canada, and part of Botswana.

Don´t get wrong, Machu Picchu is impressive. Its big, and there are a lot of rocks that slaves had to carry up a ridiculously large mountain. There are more steps at Machu Picchu than any other single place I have ever seen. It´s like living in a giant cardio workout. (If you hike up to the Temple of the Moon you literally spend hours climbing up sets of uneven stairs until you reach the peak next to Machu Pichu. Drew and I did this and spend over a half a day just climbing up and down. Drew still isn´t talking to me.) Here are some pictures of the ruins.

Even with all of Machu Picchu´s glory, I was still a little disappointed. Machu Picchu is a Pre-Colombian ruin, meaning it was built before Columbus discovered the new world. This is a nice linguistic device to suggest that Machu Picchu is old. The complex was built around 1460, so it beat Columbus by 32 years. That means that when Machu Pîcchu was in its height, Roman ruins were between 1000 and 1800 years old. That point goes to Rome.

The Incans were known as expert stone masons. There is a 12-sided Incan stone in Cuzco that the Peruvians are very proud of and hold up as an example of Incan skill. (see picture at right) I am sort of old school. If you need 12 sides to make a stone fit securely, then that just screams of shoddy construction. If you have ever seen the ruins of a 14th or 15th century European castle or church you have seen what Incan builds sort of look like. However, the Romans used architectural designs and construction feats that we still cannot duplicate. So, point Rome.

Gold. I am not going to really go into this one too far. The Incans had it in spades and pretty much dominate this category. This point belongs to the Incas.

It is well known that the Incans didn´t have the wheel. Actually, this isn´t true. They did have the wheel, but it was just a kids game. Incan children had the wheel, but there parents didn´t quite make the leap from kids toy to simple machine that makes your life loads easier. So this point goes to everyone other than the Incans.

So really, if you want to be impressed with Incan ruins make sure you visit it before you see Europe. Or Asia. Or the Middle East. Or Northern Africa. Or the Christmas village at the Tysons Corner Mall. Also, be prepared. Machu Picchu is the largest tourist trap in South American and its only rival in the entire world is Disney World. Disney is still slightly more expense, but only slightly.

Indians And Pilgrims And Termites, Oh My!

Happy Belated Thanksgiving!

I hope you all enjoyed your holiday and did your part for the economy and went shopping on Friday.

When the opportunity came to spend Thanksgiving in the rainforest, Drew and I could not turn it down. Besides I was vaccinated for everything under the sun anyway so it seemed a waste not to put modern medicine to the test. Does it live up to the hype? Yes. The spiders are bigger than your hand, the piranas eat anything, and monkeys will throw things at you if you piss them off.

I knew that it would be hot, but I wasn´t prepared for the combination of upper 90´s and over 90% humidity. Drew and I asked for an air conditioned room at the lodge we westayed at. They just stared at us. Apparently they get that joke a lot.

Periodically you will hear someone mention the law of the jungle. As far as I can tell, these are the laws:

Law 1 - It is hot. You will stink. Get over it. And don´t raise your arms too high.

Law 2 - Don´t drink anything less than Black Label. Chances are something will kill you tomorrow so don´t let your last drink be cheap.

Law 3 - Parrots bite.

Law 4 - A third of the creatures out there want you dead. The other two-thirds really don´t care either way, so watch where you step.

We were the only Americans at the lodge on Thanksgiving, but everyone was wonderful and cooked us up a great Thanksgiving dinner - turkey, stuffing, termites... Just kidding about the turkey and stuffing. However, we did eat termites for Thanksgiving. Not surprisingly they taste like wood. This picture has nothing to do with dinner. We didn´t eat the frog.

A gigantic tarantula that lived about about 10 yards from where we slept.
















Parrots eating clay. The clay contains an enzyme that parrots need to help them digest some of the plants around the Amazon.

A Saddleback Tamarin trying to figure out if I am a threat or not. I was trying to figure out if he was dinner or not. He wasn´t.

Corrida de Torros

Note: This post is about bullfighting. If you are squeamish about animals being hurt or Frenchmen peeing on innocent Peruvians, please click here. Thanks.

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The drunk Frenchman next to me summed up bull fights perfectly. "It is exactly like a ballet," he said, "except you don´t know what the bull is going to do."

We were lucky. First, we actually got to catch a bull fight in Lima, which has the best fighting in South America. We were repeatedly told that it would be impossible to get tickets, but we did. Second, it was the final and best match of the entire bull fighting season. Third, we sat next to some very drunk Frenchmen and an old Peruvian woman who explained the whole thing to us. Well the Frenchies explained things to us. The old lady scolded the French for setting a bad example. The details of the sport are complicated, and there are all sorts of traditions that determine when a matador can do what and how he is judged. However, I will give you a quick description.

This bull fight consisted of three matadors each fighting two bulls. A typical match starts when the bull enters the ring and several banderilleros (A.K.A. junior matadors with the pink capes) get out and run the bull around a bit to see how it will react.

So after the junior matadors get their chance in the ring, then the picadors come out. Picadors sit on padded horses and stab the bull with a spear or lance. As you can image, the bull really doesn´t appreciate this and tends to go a bit nuts. Generally, this means it tries to gore the horse and rider, hence the padding on the horse. One lancer was completely embarrassed when a bull managed to flip his horse and unseat the rider. Shame is a big part of bull fighting and the crowd booed the guy for being flipped and threw cans and trash at him as he left the ring.

Now the bull has been stabbed, but unfortunately for him, his troubles are just beginning. After the guys on horseback get one good stab, then comes the ugly part. The banderilleros come back out with banderillas (sharp, barbed sticks) and jam them into the bull close to where the lance wound is. This is the most interesting and vicious part of the match. Each bull receives six banderillas, which hang out the the bull´s back. To stick the banderillas, each junior matador allows the bull to charge him and then he leaps out of the way, stabbing the bull in the same motion. After all of this, then you finally get to the part of the bullfight that we all know - the matador. Actually, the matador is involved in the entire process, but now he is the only one on the field, with the traditional red cape and sword in hand. The goal is for the matador to take the bull´s charges without moving his feet. A good matador will be able to take three or four passes without adjusting his position. The cape is waving, the bull is charging left and right, the crowd is going nuts, and then... The matador will put one hand out, place it on the bulls head, and stop the charge as if he was walking out into traffic. This really sends the crowd into hysterics and the whole dance begins again.

Finally, the bull begins to tire from exertion and loss of blood. His head drops slightly and the matador begins the final steps. The matador may encourage a few more passes from the bull, but suddenly, the cape drops and the sword flashes. That is all you see. The matador has stabbed the bull directly behind the head and, if he did it well, the bull will die quickly. Occasionally, the bull wins, but this is very rare. We saw one bull just about catch a junior matador, but the guy flung himself over a wall to avoid being gored.

It was one of the most interesting, bloody, and brutal events I have ever seen.

At the end of the night the crowd was exuberant at the great matches and well fueled on beer and pisco (grape brandy). Everyone streamed out of plaza and onto the streets below where makeshift restaurants and bars are set up at the base of the stadium walls. I stood on the top row of the stadium overlooking the plaza below. People were below drinking and enjoying some dinner. To my left I saw a bit of movement and turned just in time to see one of the drunk Frenchmen belly up to the top ledge of the stadium. He looked over the edge, unzipped his pants, and proceeded to piss on all the Peruvians below. We wisely thought this was a good opportunity to leave before the police came, but I looked over to see the poor, poor people below. Several put out their hands to see if it was raining and one poor guy just pulled up the hood on his jacket.

What Morgan Freeman Didn´t Tell You...

March of the Penguins is the gripping tale of penguin survival in the frozen wastelands. What our dear friend Morgan forgot to mention was that sometimes Penguins get lost. Then they end up in the desert hanging out with pelicans. I see the plot line to a Disney movie...

These are Humbolt Penguins and apparently they belong here. Who knew? Okay, actually I did, but I didn´t want to come off as a smarty pants. They pretty much hang around on the rocks all day and frolic with pelicans and sea lions. Here is the requisite cute sea lion picture.

Well after a day of exploring the desert by boat and taxi, Drew and I needed a well deserved rest. We headed south a bit and holed up in a little oasis town. The town is surrounded by huge sand dunes on every side. Some of these dunes are hundreds of feet high. Drew had the brilliant idea to walk up the dune and watch the sun set. Walking up a giant sand dune is exactly as much fun as it sounds. We were about two-thirds of the way up when the sun set. (Okay, I was two-thirds of the way up. Drew stopped at the half-way point tried to get the sand out of his shoes, pants, etc.) It produced a few good pictures.

A quick word about night time in the desert. It comes fast. We had a lovely (unexpected) time running (rolling) down the hill in a vain attempt to make it back to the hotel before it got pitch black. We exuded grace and style as we walked back into the hotel with trails of sand pouring out behind us. (The cleaning staff declared us mortal enemies.)

The next morning we grabbed a dune buggy and tore off into the desert again to try our hand at sand boarding. If you have never had the joy of taking a dune buggy let me explain the sensation to you. Imagine your self on a bucking bronco. Now try to shave with a sand blaster. That´s pretty much it.

The sand boarding was a great sport and I am terribly disappointed I will not be able to take it up full time when I return to DC. Sand boarding is like a cross between snow boarding and water boarding. You standing on the board like would a snow board or you can lay on it like a sled. Then you hop on down the hill and let gravity do the work. It is pretty easy.

Then you fall... You are in the desert so the sand just been laying there waiting for some idiot to come by. Sand left out in the desert sun takes on a nice skin searing temperature of about 300 degrees. This is the water boarding portion of the sport. It hurts!!! Bad! After laying in the sand for a minute or two would confess to pretty much anything.

American Imperialism

American economic might is everywhere in Lima. In the smaller towns in Lima it is not hard to walk down the street and sort of forget that the United States exists. Not in Lima.

This is using our powers for good:

This is using our power for evil:

By the way, South American hooters girls are even less attractive than their North American counterparts. Who saw that coming??

The Big City

Last night Drew and I went out for beers in Lima, Peru. We had a few pints and started walking back to our hostel. It wasn´t terribly late, but the nightlife was in full swing. As we rounded a corner, a strange man walked up to us with a suitcase in his hand. He looked at us and said, ¨Hamburgers, hamburgers, hamburgers!¨

I prayed. Lord, please let ¨hamburgers¨ be slang for cocaine. Yes, maybe he is selling drugs! Or prostitutes. Anything!!! Just please don´t tell me that a small Peruvian man is selling me hamburgers from his luggage. They weren´t drugs or prostitutes. Just plain, normal hamburgers. I just couldn´t bring myself to buy a burger kept under someones tighty-whities.

Other than the weird people, Lima is a great town. All the best people are here - Bush, Hu Jin Tao, and whoever is in charge of Japan this week. Apparently, the Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation is in town this weekend. Since we didn´t really want to hang around for the protests (we can do that in DC), Drew and I are hanging out in the desert a few hours south of Lima. We have to head back by Sunday though since we have tickets to the bullfight.

Roads? Where We´re Going We Don´t Need Any Roads.

Peruvian travel is a study in contrasts. This morning I rode on a bus nicer than most trans-Atlantic flights I´ve taken. Lots of legroom, breakfast, and a rousing game of Bingo. Okay, I have never played Bingo on a plane before, but its pretty popular on buses in South America. This is one extreme. This is what you hope for when you get on a bus.

Generally, this isn´t what happens. A week ago, the bus Drew and I were on stopped because a landslide closed the mountain road we were on. It was a one lane, winding road so backing up or turning around was out of the question. I guessed we would have to wait for hours to pass by, so we watched the construction crew attempt to push the boulders (some the sizes of small trucks) off the road and down the mountain. During the ten minutes we watched, a front end loader was almost crushed and a keg-sized boulder nearly killed the head of the construction team. These setbacks forced our team of crack construction workers to develope a new strategy for dealing with the issue - cheating death.

The construction crews forced everyone off the bus, organized us into a small group, and then started shouting ¨Corra, Corra!¨ (Run!) So we did. Normally, the sight of old Peruvian women running through a landslide would be funny, but I was to busy trying not to die to really notice. Then the bus driver revved the engine, gathered some speed, and bumped along under the landslide sending rocks spinning in all directions. Safe? No. Efficient? Yes.

Since dodging rocks, the Peruvian bus system has stranded us in a town for 3 days because the only road was shut down by protesters. (Really!! Who protests all weekend. Don´t these people have reruns to watch like the rest of us?) When we were finally able to catch a bus to Lima, Drew had the distinct pleasure of sitting behind a guy who barked at every car that passed the bus. Yes, barked. It is hard to sleep on a bus when Mr. Crazy is barking.

By the time we had gotten to Lima, I was pretty tired of the bus system and we still faced a 25-hour ride from Lima to Cuzco. Twenty-five hours on a bus!! I broke down and forked out for plane tickets.

The Road Less Traveled

There is a road less traveled. Frost liked to idealize it. Trust me, there is nothing ideal about it. This road is nothing but a one lane, dirty track that winds and weaves through the jungle and then up over the Andes Mountains. Just when you think can´t take any more, it starts back through the jungle all over again.

Last Tuesday we began our push into Peru with the hope to make it all the way to Chachapoya in a single day. We didn´t think this would be too much of an issue since it is only about 400 kilometers. That is roughly the distance from DC to New York City. We even left at 5 AM to ensure that we would make it by the end of the evening; South American roads can be unpredictable so you need to allow for extra time. A bus, a flatbed truck, a four-wheel drive taxi, two military checkpoints, and several immigration offices later we finally crossed into Peru. It took us over fourteen hours to travel about 200 kilometers! Well short of our final destination.

So Tuesday night, we found ourselves (Drew, me, our friend George, and a random German tourist we picked up along the way) stuck in a small Peruvian town called San Ignacio. Daylight is long gone, there are no way to keep moving forward, and we are the only gringos in town. We were also a hundred miles from the nearest ATM and without any Soles (the Peruvian currency). This isn´t a section of Peru that receives many tourists. It sits right on the edge of the Amazon jungle and is loaded with untouched ruins for a variety of civilizations. These ruins are exactly what led us here, but there is little infrastructure to support any robust tourism. We people say ¨getting there is half the adventure,¨ this is the place they were talking about. Banks only exist in the largest towns, so we had to change dollars for Soles in an small appliance store. Luckily you can generally find someone who wants US dollars. These small towns often aren´t on any bus routes, so the only way to get around is to catch a cab to the next town. Cabs only go to the next major town, so you end up hopping in and out of cabs at every town.

Since we didn´t make it to Chachapoya on the first day, we decided not to take any chances on day two, and we left at 4 AM. We caught a small VW van to the next town and packed in with 15 of our new best friends. It is rather difficult to sleep when you are crammed in between a couple of Peruvians and a chicken. About four hours later we arrived in the next town of any note. We jumped out of one cab and into a couple of scooter pedi-cabs for the trip to the next taxi stand. It would make sense to put all the cabs together, but that would make it way too easy.

We dashed into an second taxi and pushed off for the next town. This next town was large enough to catch a bus to our final destination, Chachapoya, but we had to rush to make it in time. Two hours later we arrived at the bus station only to discover that the morning bus was gone, but there was an afternoon bus if we wanted to wait until 4 pm to catch it. Since it was now 10 AM, we decided to just hire another cabbie to take us to Chachapoya. It was only 2 hours away and if we made good time we could still see one of the ruins in the later afternoon. Foolish gringos.

The final taxi ride started uneventfully. Our driver was insane and never missed an opportunity to try to kill us, but this is normal. After about an hour and a half we rounded a bend for the final 30 kilometers of our trip. Parked in the road was a dump truck and a large sign that read ¨Road Closed! Open Daily from 4:30 pm to 8 AM.¨ This was the only road to Chachapoya and we were stuck. We got out of the car, calmed our new German friend, and assessed the situation. It turns out that this road construction had been ongoing for about a year and was well know to everyone in the region. So we yelled at our cabbie for not telling us. He decided it was a good time to take a nap and ignore us, so he got a pillow and blanket out of the car and spread out in some shade.

There was a single roadside restaurant nearby, so we decided to grab some lunch while we killed 4 and a half hours. Generally,in small restaurants there is no menu. You get whatever they cook that day. Our lunch consisted of soup, rice, and stomach. Yes, stomach. Not surprisingly, beef stomach tastes like fuzzy chicken.

So on day two of our trek we finally made it to Chachapoya. It only took 24 hours more than we anticipated. We has started this trip with rough schedule that culminated with a bullfight in Lima on Sunday afternoon. It was now Wednesday evening, so we planned to catch the ruins on Thursday, cut out some extra stuff we wanted to see, and take a 26 hours worth of bus rides on Friday and Saturday. With luck we would arrive in Lima on Saturday afternoon.

Our delays/adventures were just beginning.

Rascal the Guinea Pig

This is Rascal. He is a guinea pig. In Spanish they are called "Cuy" after the cute little sound they make. "Cuy, Cuy, Cuy" said Rascal. That means "hello" in guinea pig.

He is the cutest guinea pig we could find. He likes to nibble on lettuce and frolic with all his little guinea pig brothers and sisters.

If Rascal was a lucky guinea pig then he might have been born in the US. He could have been the mascot for some 4th grade class in a suburban elementry school. Every Christmas break the kids would fight over who got to take care of Rascal that break.

Poor Rascal. He wasn´t lucky. He was born in Ecuador. Now he is my dinner. Poor, poor guinea pig.

Tasty, tasty guinea pig.

Hey, if you thing that is bad, Drew wanted to turn all the baby guinea pigs into Cuy nuggets.