I Abhora Mancora

Dear family and friends,


My overnight bus bounced off the highway and came to a dusty halt in front of the police station in Casma, Peru. It was 6:15AM. There were a half dozen men lolling around in the early morning half-light, none in uniform. The driver and I got off the bus and he approached the most senior looking man and started talking to him in Spanish, explaining my predicament.


"Habla usted Ingles, senor?” I said, not wanting to be excluded from the conversation. ("Do you speak English?")


"Poco", he answered ("A little"), but I never did hear him use any.


Then in a torrent of Spanish, little of which I understood, but from which I did gather, I should wait a moment and he would get me to the bus terminal. And within minutes, almost as though it had all been scheduled in advance, I was in a car with three policemen and another young couple and we were off, headed back up the Panamerican Highway in the direction from which I had just come. The car was a 1975 Chevrolet Biscayne, faded, pealing paint, re-upholstered at least 15 years ago and in desperate need of another one. The muffler leaked, the shock absorbers were shot, but we rocketed off down the highway at 130 kph, just as it was getting gray light. The old Chevvy floated and weaved, the massive hood rippled and bounced as though it was about to fly off. No one spoke - the roar of the motor would have drowned it out anyway - the young woman in the back was weeping and wiping away tears. I have no idea what the problem was.

The landscape was a true moonscape, just endless hills of sand, not a blade of grass or any other sign of life could be seen unless you considered the plastic trash thrown from vehicles and lining both sides of the highway; or the blown truck tires, round black hulks laying up the side hills. It was so bleak it almost looked like all life forms had been eradicated by a toxic or nuclear attack. This area is an extension of the great desert that runs from northern Chile, along the entire coast of Peru and into Ecuador. In parts of this desert, notably at San Carlos de Atacama, in Chile, rainfall has never ever been recorded.


"Christ", I thought, "this was the second time I've been in a police station within 16 hours". And I really had no idea where my policeman was taking me.


As I mentioned in my last letter, I had joined a GAP Tour group in Quito, nine of us, plus our leader Alex and Chris a trainee. We crossed from Huaquillas in Ecuador to Aguas Verdes in Peru about noon on Easter Friday, all shops were closed on both sides of the border. They were also closed in the four-kilometer stretch of no man's land between the two immigration offices. As most buses, including ours, do not cross the border one must get off the Ecuadorian bus and travel the four kilometers by taxi, or 'colectivo' (small bus), or walk to the Peruvian side to pick up another bus for the onward journey. The four-kilometer stretch is normally a dicey piece to cross. There is apparently no formal policing in the area and if something does happen in the area between the immigration offices, officials from neither side are interested in getting involved. Crossing always requires bribes, cajoling and tips to the various taxi drivers and baggage handlers who willingly exploit the situation. Being a holiday we actually crossed with little difficulty.


We were headed to Mancora, a beach resort some five or six hours away. I had a bit of a bad feeling about our prospects as Alex had mentioned several times that he often had problems with his hotel reservations in Mancora, rooms were often not available as booked.


Mancora is a dreadful little strip of shabby restaurants, shops, and lodgings strung out along a small bay where the Pacific Ocean rolls in with big breakers attracting surfers from all over South America. The backdrop to the town is the same treeless wasteland I described above, utterly without appeal. It’s the kind of beach resort that encourages people to go to the mountains. Alex dropped us off at a restaurant of such questionable merit that it was just clinging to life (and, based on its menu, it has an unhappy prognosis) while he went out to check on our accommodation. We sat around in our sweat for more than one hour before he came back to tell us, yup, sure enough we didn't have rooms but he was searching for alternate spaces. Easter is a particularly busy time for Mancora, so none of us were too optimistic. Another one hour later, just as I was about to strike out and find my own room (I only needed to find room for one person, Alex had to find rooms for eleven) Alex returned and told us he was able to rent a beach house that should accommodate our group.


When we arrived at the house the people who owned it were still moving out and trying to make beds for the eleven of us. The house was of two levels, it had walls of woven reeds and consisted of a living room, kitchen, and one bedroom on the main floor, two bedrooms and a dorm for five were on the upper floor. The single bathroom was attached to the back. All terms used here, including walls, beds, bathrooms, etc. are used loosely. On the way to the house the eleven of us discussed how we should ration ourselves for time in the one shower. We needn't have worried; the water was turned off. We only had hand ladled cold water available. I was sharing a room with Chris, the trainee. Our two beds were created simply by pulling the box spring off the bed and flopping it on the floor. There was no room between the 'beds'. Chris had the floor, I had the bed. He had the better deal. My bed was a very thin mattress lying over seven wooden slats, the mattress sagging between each slat. But there was nothing to do but settle in.


Peruvians, like all others in South American, are very religious. Easter, one of the holiest of occasions, is celebrated in Mancora as it is in many other places, by having a great drunken party. Music, a pounding beat so loud it truly made me hurt, started at about 11:00PM in a nearby club and continued absolutely ceaselessly until 6:00AM. I slept at most two hours.


We were scheduled to stay two nights in Mancora, but by morning I had long since decided I would head out regardless of what other arrangements Alex could make. Our group met at noon in a restaurant to discuss the day’s plans. The restaurant was small and quite full with our group plus another group of six or seven people. As soon as I sat down a goddamn dog, a frisky puppy, started darting in and out between my legs. At the same time, a local man, the owner of the dog, asked the time. In the few seconds of those distractions, the guy's accomplice had snatched my shoulder bag, which I had hung on the back of my chair, and was gone. I noticed it missing within moments. I actually didn't see him take the bag or see them go, but another patron did see the two men leave, one with two bags over his shoulder. She thought it odd that he had two bags, but she had noticed the men in the restaurant for such a long time, she thought they worked there.


Ever since I started traveling many years ago, I have heard all the warnings about being careful. Watch out for the dips in London, the purse-snatchers in Paris, the smash-and-grab thieves in San Jose, the muggers in Asia, the luggage crooks everywhere. I really do think of myself as a seasoned traveler. But there I was, cleaned out just as slick as a Bre-X investor. I lost some money, my camera (again), airplane ticket, my gortex jacket and wonderful Tilley hat, a bunch of miscellaneous stuff, but most frustrating, all the notes I keep on my travels including the description of every photo I have taken. I am angry, but mostly surprised, even shocked, at how easily they got my bag. And of course, I am quite embarrassed. When I think about it, I suppose I shouldn't be, I have been traveling for nearly twelve months of the last 28, mostly in third world countries, and it is probably just a case of going to the well too often. It was bound to happen.


So, if I had any doubts before about staying in Mancora, it was now definitely settled, I was leaving.


After visit number one to the police station to file a complaint, I was on an overnight bus headed south on the Panamerican Highway to Trujillo. The bus left at 7:30PM and was scheduled to arrive in Trujillo at 4:30AM from where I would then catch a taxi to the nearby resort city of Huanchaco, the group's next scheduled stop. After a sleepless night, I hardly need tell you I didn't wake up when the bus stopped in Trujillo. It was after six when I did come around. I went up front to talk to the driver, me in English, he in Spanish. When he understood, he clapped his hand on his forehead, had a few harsh words with the 'conductor' (after all, it is their job to get you off at your destination) and let me know, with a few words of Spanish and English, we were now some 200 kilometers past my stop and just arriving in Casma.


And so it was I found myself at a second police station in less than 24 hours and then zooming back down the highway. After about one hour we roared into Chimbote, a totally forgettable city, and screeched to a halt in front of the bus station. My policeman, and new best friend, jumped out, I followed, and within mere moments I had a ticket, the policeman led me to my bus, shook my hand, gave me a hug, and I was on my way to Trujillo. Again, it happened so seamlessly it was as though it had all been scheduled in advance. I checked into my hotel about noon, very glad to have the past 2 days behind me. Huanchaco has a setting no better than Mancora, but it is a prettier little city, the hotel was fine, and I spent the next day waiting for the group to catch up just relaxing and watching the final round of the U.S. Masters golf tournament.


The area around Trujillo is very rich in archaeological sites with five major sites in the immediate area. The earliest peoples, hunters and gatherers, date back to 3500 BC but those sites are really just middens (garbage dumps), so we visited Chan Chan, the huge ruined capital of the Chimu people built around 1300 AD. Before being conquered by the Inca, the Chimu created the largest pre-Columbian city in the Americas, and the largest adobe (mud) city in the world. Once one of the richest cities, replete with gold, silver, and ceramics, it was quickly looted by the Spanish after the conquest. The site covers 28 square km and today it looks like a giant sand castle competition. After the tide has come in. Archaeologists are trying to restore parts of the ruins but you can easily imagine how massive a job this is. While it does not rain often in this area, over the centuries El Nino has regularly caused torrential rainfalls and floods and most of the decorative relief and designs have long since washed away.


An overnight bus then took us to Lima, Capital City of Peru. I don't think I have ever heard anyone say anything positive about Lima. Some 8 million Peruvians live here making it noisy, overcrowded, and polluted. The outer suburbs of the city, where most people live, are squalid shantytowns, un-serviced by water, sewer, or electricity. Its location on the coastal desert gives it a climate and environment that are generally described as dismal. From April to December it is shrouded in gloomy fog called 'garua'. The rest of the year, although the sun may be out, smog takes over. With that said, I very much enjoyed my three days in Lima. Our hotel was in Barranco, very close to Miraflores, the cities toniest area. The weather was generally quite nice, warm and sunny. Although much of my time was taken up getting my stolen plane ticket re-issued, always have a photocopy (I didn't), I also visited a number of historical churches and the Palacio de Gobierno, the Presidential Palace.


The Franciscan church and monastery are famous for their catacombs (originally built in 1545 but rebuilt after an earthquake in 1656). Some 40,000 bodies were buried there before a cemetery was finally established in the late 1800's. Archaeologists have sifted through all the bones and skulls and they are now on display in neat orderly layouts, all the femurs together, hip bones next, then skulls etc. One deep, round pit about 20 feet across had the bones neatly arranged around it, so that it looked like a decorated birthday cake. It was hard to resist singing Happy Birthday.


I and four others of the group booked a visit to the Presidential Palace and had a very extensive tour of the various reception halls etc. The President was in residence while we were there and we did get a chance to see him, not meet him, just see him. At the end of the tour we were able to watch the 20-minute changing of the guard from within the Palace, a ceremony every bit as colourful as the one at Buckingham. The guards, brightly dressed in blue trousers and red hats and jackets with either blue or gold braids, goose step around the courtyard accompanied by a brass band and bugles and trumpets. All very festive. Across the road outside the Palace fence, tourists gather to view the ceremony, apparently unaware that Palace visits, and inside viewing of the changing of the guard, is permitted if one registers to visit the day before.


From Lima our group traveled to Pisco, the city that shares its name with the white grape brandy ubiquitous throughout Ecuador, Peru, and Chile and the base for a pisco sour, a concoction of pisco, egg white, lemon juice, sugar, syrup, crushed ice, and bitters. I have enjoyed a few pisco sours, but I have enjoyed straight pisco more (I have seldom been found without a small bottle handy for a nightcap). While in the area we did visit one pisco producer at nearby Ica, Bodega Catador, surely the most primitive wine production/brandy distillation facility I have ever seen. Grapes are foot-stomp crushed in concrete pits of questionable cleanliness, the must is then fermented in very large clay vats, and then the wine distilled in a wood-fired concrete tank. But they do produce a crystal clear pisco that I thought not bad. On the other hand, they did offer up the most horrid range of sweet and semi-sweet wines imaginable.


Then it was on to Nazca. I first heard of the Nazca lines when I saw the documentary, Mondo Cane (a Dog's Life) in 1962. The movie featured many of the most inexplicable phenomena of the world, and I have been curious about the Nazca lines ever since. The Nazca culture dates from 200 AD to 900 AD. While considerable is known about the Nazca people due to the extensive amount of ceramic relics which have been found, no one is certain about who made these strange lines or why they were made. The lines are believed to date from 900 BC. They consist of a number of geometric shapes, several giant animals (some almost 200m high), and lines which strike off to the horizon many kilometers long. One very intriguing figure is a human shape, called the astronaught, with his right arm up as if waving to say welcome, Even more puzzling is how those early artists knew what they were doing, given the figures can only be seen from the air.


It would certainly be pointless to try and view the lines other than from an airplane; consequently many small planes are available for hire. Flights take about one half hour to swing past all the figures, a dizzying ride, swooping past first on the right, then on the left. There were four others from my group with me on my flight, one of whom had to use the handy bag in front of her seat, and another who had a panic attack and was pretty much screaming to be let out by the time we landed, but for me it was an unforgettable sight. These lines must surely be the most amazing pre-historic relics in the world. As to why they were made? Astrological calendar, ritual walkways, mountain worship, have all been suggested. I'm pretty much ready to accept the extraterrestrial landing site one.


As I have traveled I have kept a small note pad in my pocket to make notes on the things I have seen and heard, the pictures I have taken etc. Then more or less daily I have transcribed these notes to a journal. I then have used my journal to pen these letters. After that refining process I am sure you will understand why each of my letters so far has been near Shakespearean in craft, each word a pearl, each sentence lyrical, every thought profound. When I got up after my sleepless night in Mancora I was so cranky and in such a rush to get out, I stuffed my note pad into my bag along with my journal. So of course all was lost and I must now rely on my memory much more than before, and worse, these letters will not reflect those careful rewriting steps. Maybe they will get better.


So here I will end for now. I hope you are all well.




Merv.