Treasures of Peru: Part Three-The Amazon

Flying to the Amazon Basin from Lima took us over the Andes and then, suddenly, I could see the river and the endless-seeming jungle from my plane window. It looked just like a photo in the Time-Life book I read during a snowstorm last winter in Silverton! The trees and the river with all its tributaries stretched on and on and on and on...............
We flew to Iquitos, a Peruvian city of 600,000 on the Amazon. One can get there only by air or water. It was the heart of the South American rubber industry at one time until some enterprising Englishman smuggled a few thousand rubber seeds out of the country and the British began their rubber colonies in India. That finished the rubber business in SA.

A popular mode of travel is this motorcycle-powered sort of rickshaw. Our guide told us Iquitos has 22,000 of them! (We actually rode in them later in the week on a trip through the jungle from the Amazon to another river---a sort of short cut to save us several hours by boat.)

Street scene in Iquitos---lots of rickshaws, a few busses, but virtually no normal cars.

Arriving by river boat at the pier for our resort. Yes, the Amazon is very muddy. It is constantly erroding the banks so there are always trees floating downriver which is a constant hazard for the river boats.

One of the lodging bungalows at our resort. We were happy to have air conditioning which kept most of the critters out of our room (most---not all!). There was a beautiful screened in lodge where we found the bar and dining room. The bar had great local beer and we also had learned to enjoy Pisco Sours, the national cocktail of Peru, made with grape brandy and eggwhites. Come to Silverton and I'll make you one; there was room in my luggage for a bottle of Pisco!

Meanwhile, we were busy doing things like this picture: here I am playing Jane, looking for Tarzan while I swing on the philodendron vines in the jungle. I am sorry you cannot see the depths I was swinging across! (I was so busy hanging on I forgot to emit the jungle cry!)

We were priviledged to visit a village of Yagua indians down the river from our lodge. They live in thatched huts, such as you can see in the picture below. This lady is using her machete to peel a manioc root, one of their staple foods. She put on her grass bib just for us. Normally she would not wear it, as the heat is too intense. Part way through our visit she gave up, took it off, and hung it on a floor joist of the house. (Believe me, I would have loved to shed my clothes, too!)

The villagers did a demonstration dance for us in their ceremonial house, out in the jungle. They did a portion of the dances they do twice a year---what an amazing experience it was for us. Our guide had grown up on the river and was able to arrange the visit for us.

The chief is demonstrating a blowgun which launches poison-tipped darts we had previously seen. The poison comes from plants and tiny little frogs which emit a poisonous secretion. It is nasty stuff---we were very careful when looking at the darts and the poison jug as it will kill a person (or animal) in fifteen minutes or less. They were very accurate with their shooting and could hit a target dead on at about twenty-five feet.

The next adventure was pirhana fishing! You will need to enlarge this photo to see my catch, which I caught on a one-inch cube of raw beef. Now, I ask you, how many people do you know who have been pirhana fishing? We learned that it is perfectly safe to swim in the same water with them. They only attack when blood is involved---the movies are wrong

Sunrise on the Amazon River...this river is amazing. The river system carries 2/3 of all the fresh water on Earth.

A view of the village of Mazon, deep in the jungle, where we were taken in the rickshaws to

board a boat on the Napo River. Note the concrete electrical pole on the extreme left of the picture. A local lady was sharpening her machete (the kitchen knife of choice in the jungle) on this pole. There are no rocks in the river basin so having a concrete pole within walking distance of her "kitchen" is a big help to her.

Traveling down the Napo, after the rather wild rickshaw ride through the jungle, we arrived at another lodge where we had breakfast and then hiked through the jungle to a canopy walk. At the lodge their pets are two of the world's largest rodents, the capybara. This one was named Charlie and he was especially friendly; it seemed someone was always tripping over him!

The canopy walk took us up to 120 feet above the ground, through all the different levels of the rain forest. You may need to enlarge this picture to verify that is actually me coming along the swinging walkway. The various flowering epiphytes (ahem...plants that just grow on a tree up in the canopy...many are bromiliads) were beautiful.

From this platform high above the Amazon rainforest, beside a lovely pink flower, I shall bid you farewell from Peru! (Come to Colorado for Pisco Sour!) Cheers.........Penny

Treasures of Peru--Part Two

Leaving Machu Picchu, we traveled by train through the Sacred Valley to Cuzco, where we enjoyed the city and surrounding countryside. In the Cuzco area it was not unusual to see street signs such as this: We were at the city square on Sunday morning when the weekly parade took place. It seemed that nearly everyone that lived in Cuzco was in the parade or on the square to watch!

This street vendor was especially amusing!

Our tour had arranged for us to have lunch at a private home. Our host was a prosecuting attorney at the local courts. We "enjoyed" grilled guinea pig for an appetizer--I still can't believe I ate it!

The high altitude (10,900 feet) in Cuzco makes for good business. Lots of remedies for high altitude sickness (in tourists) were available for a price---including a large can of pressurized oxygen that one would just sort of squirt into your mouth and quickly inhale!

Girls on parade! The people in Cuzco seem to love to parade around their city.

Indigenous ladies weaving at a co-op in Cuzco. All were using back-strap looms, sitting on the floor and wearing their village hats.

Couple plowing in the country. The lady led the animals and the man wangled the wooden plow.

This lady sold me a nifty little Inca-style jug that you can pour water into the bottom, turn it over, and then pour it out of the mouth of the puma on the jug! (Come see me and I'll give you a demonstration!). The women often seemed to wear hats that would usually be for men in the USA---this style as well as bowler hats. The men usually wore knitted hats or baseball caps.

I was surprised with a beautiful and delicious cake at lunch on my birthday!

We drove over the Abra La Raya Pass-the highest point of our trip at 14,014 feet on our way to Lake Titticaca, the largest lake in South America and the largest navigable lake in the world.

Our beautiful and elegant hotel at the lake was on an island, which came equipped with llamas and alpacas that loved to come to the hotel grounds and feast on the grass and flowers. The doorman would rush out waving a white cloth at them and shouting. They would just calmly move to another patch of green munchies!

We visited the people of Los Uros, a group of floating islands made of totora, the reed that grows abundantly around the lake. They make boats out of the reeds that looked suitable for Cleopatra. After having a bit of a cruise around the lake, I decided the reeds make better boats than islands, for walking on the islands had a sort of mushy feel.

One of the islands with houses, bundles of green reeds drying on the right, and a resident carrying a bundle of green reeds. The Los Uros people built the islands to get away from the Spanish and have continued living on them ever since.

We also visited Isle Taquile, a real dirt island, which is famous for its weavings. Some of the men entertained us after lunch with a dance. The little lady in the above picture is over 100 years old. They were very colorful people.

The local market in Puno, on the shore of Lake Titticaca, was a treasure-trove of vegetables. Peru has hundreds of varieties of potatoes, and in spite of the altitude, grows endless types of grains, squash, and other veggies. I would love to shop here every week! We could not take pictures of the people as they fear having a photo taken takes away part of their soul.

A final view of the beautiful lake...

We visited this small farm near the lake. Note that the buildings are thatched and built of mud bricks or local stones. It was very neat and well-cared for, though primitive.

The farm owner with her trusty wooden hoe. Other than the machetes we saw in the jungle, all the tools in rural Peru still seem to be made of wood.

Freeze-dried potatoes on the farm. The people of the Andes learned long ago how to preserve potatoes for use during their harsh winters. They lay them out on the ground to freeze, and then stomp on them to flatten them a bit and allow them to continue to freeze night after night until they are dry. They can be re-hydrated by cooking. The US military learned to make our potato flakes from the Peruvians during World War II.

Thanks for dropping by---Part Three: The Amazon will show up in a few days!

Treasures of Peru: Part One

Greetings to those of you faithful enough to check this blog for my rather sporadic posts. I have just returned from two interesting weeks in Peru, my first foray into South American travel. My long-time friend, Marie, from Minneapolis (originally from North Dakota) and I joined a tour group for time in the high Andes as well as the in the Amazon Basin. We flew to Lima for our introduction to Peru... This is the Plaza de Armes (town square) of the city of Lima, which was founded by Francisco Pizzarro, the Spaniard who captured the leader of the Incas in 1537. It is a crowded, noisy city with some traces of the Colonial Period and is plagued by a daily fog for much of the year, which acts like a temperature inversion, holding in all the grit and pollution from the city.

Traffic was heavy. Crossing a street on foot was close to impossible; one often had to walk for blocks to find a traffic light to assist with crossing and then I felt ill at ease---cars and busses do not make way for pedestrians!

(Well, I have now learned that the photos I rotate on my computer do not stay that way when transferred into this blog! Hmmm...shall have to work on that! Maggie's coming soon and will help me!) Meanwhile, we visited a market in Lima our first morning and decided our food would contain a lot of lime and tomato!

Leaving Lima, we flew to Cuzco, the ancient Inca capital which is 10,900 feet high! Here is my friend, Marie, feeding an alpaca at a farm we visited. They have utterly amazing coats! The alpaca is a huge contributing factor to the Peruvian economy---they eat them as well as using their wool for spinning and weaving the broad array of textiles sold.

This lady, at the alpaca farm, was using a backstrap loom to weave the yarn made at the farm. She is dressed in typical dress for the country women. The shape of their hat usually indicates what village they call home.

Here is the elaborate hair dressing the women wear---please crank your neck to the left to accomodate my photo problem...thanks!

We spent time visiting the Sacred Valley, which is the route to Machu Picchu. It is a long, beautiful, glacial valley with farming terraces dating back to the Incas on all the mountainsides surrounding it

This pale photo shows you a hang-glinder enjoying the rugged mountains and spectacular views of the Sacred Valley. (You may wish to click on this to see the mountains more clearly.)

These terraces, dating back to the Incas pre-1500, show an area used for agricultural research by the Incas. They planted crops at various levels on the mountain to simulate different growing seasons within their lands; they had even masterd the skills of creating hybrids. Amazing!

Nearly all the buildings in the country and the villages are built of sun-dried bricks which are hand-made by the people needing them. The same sort of bricks are used to build walls along property lines as well as to create enclosures for animals. It appeared that after a time the mud brick buildings sort of "melt" and need to be replaced.

This was taken at Ollentaytambo, an Inca structure which shows their amazing stone masonry skills. It was not possible to slip a credit card between these huge stone blocks.
Machu Picchu was an amazing place. It was much larger than I had imagined from my reading and included such advanced features as a sun dial, a water system, various temples, and plenty of housing that would have had thatched roofs.
The Incas had fabulous views through every window!
This was taken from a vantage point beside the "guardhouse", after a climb up the ruins.
Another example of their masonry---this doorway and wall were also fashioned of well-fitted rocks. How they cut them and moved them continues to be a mystery to archeologists.

To be continued, in "Treasures of Peru, Part Two." Thanks for joining me!