El Gran Viaje

If it looks like we must have spent a lot of time in buses, we did. 

Tacna - We started in our hometown of Tacna, in the far south of the country. From there it was an easy six hour bus ride to...

Arequipa - The beautiful White City (so named for the white stones the Spanish used to construct the original Cathedral, churches, and buildings in the city center). We spent only an afternoon here with some friends before the 12 hour bus ride to...

Andahuaylillas - This is a small Andean village of only a few thousand people. It lies about an hour west of Cusco. There is a community of Jesuit Volunteers here who welcomed us for a few days (which we spent hiking and enjoying the mountain scenery and the thin air - Anda lies at over 10,200 feet). We popped into Cusco to catch a ten hour bus to...

Puerto Maldonado - After a grueling bus ride (they never turned off the heat inside the bus even though it was sweltering outside with nearly 100% humidity) we arrived to this bustling jungle city and took an hour long boat ride to a beautiful and simple jungle lodge. We spent three days in the jungle hiking in deep mud, kayaking (and swimming!) in Amazon River tributaries, spotting monkeys and tarantulas, and zip lining. We took a boat back into the city to enjoy a true jungle downpour (unrelenting rain for hours and hours) before catching the ten hour bus back to...

Cusco - Being the snooty semi-locals that we were, we nearly couldn´t stand how touristy Cusco is. It is beautiful and has a wealth of amazing churches, ruins, and museums, but it is also overrun with people hawking cheap goods and trying to sell tours and foot massages. After a long afternoon of being spoken to in broken English, we took a traumatic (there was no bathroom on the bus, there were live animals brought on the bus, and there was a four hour stop for a landslide) 20 hour bus ride to...

Ayacucho - Some awesome nuns and priests, who are part of the Jesuit network in Peru, were our guides in this mountain city, which is unfortunately best known as being the ground zero of the Shining Path terrorism movement of the late 80´s and early 90´s. We saw Huari ruins, visited the battlefield where Peruvian independence was declared, and went to an amazing little museum run by the mothers of people who were kidnapped and killed by Shining Path and the military. With our local guides, we learned more about the work the Jesuits do in Ayacucho. From there it was a winding bus ride to...

Lima - In Lima we hung out with friends, did laundry, enjoyed the outdoors, rented bikes, and ate delicious food. It was hard to drag ourselves away from a city that is home to so many people we love, but it was time to take an eight hour bus to...

Trujillo - We stayed with some members of Allie´s host family, raced around the city for a day in order to see what we could, and headed on an overnight bus to...

Chachapoyas - This little city is an absolute gem. It is surrounded by so much natural beauty - waterfalls, rivers, and canyons - and mysterious pre-Incan ruins. The people were wonderful and welcoming and we all wanted to stay longer. Sadly, on the bus ride to Chachapoyas, I slammed my chin into the armrest while sleeping and severely injured my jaw and knocked my four bottom teeth loose. After a few days of excruciating pain and no conclusive diagnosis, we decided to seek better medical help and borded a bus for...

Chiclayo - We spent a day racing around the city to visit doctors and get x-rays of my jaw. Although the final verdict was that I needed serious professional help (i.e. it was probably better to fly back home so that I could use insurance for my medical care), we did have a great reunion that day with one of our favorite Tacna Jesuits who was visiting his parents in Chiclayo and we had a delicious ceviche lunch. I bid goodbye to my travel companions (and thanked them profusely for taking such good care of me) and flew back to Houston. Meanwhile, they went on to visit Cajamarca, the site of the fall of the Incan Empire, and the beaches of northern Peru.

It pains me to know that I still missed visiting so much of the country. 

I got back to Houston and immediately went to a specialist who informed me that my jaw was not broken (so I, thankfully, wouldn´t need to get it wired shut) but that it was badly traumatized (he likened to a sprained ankle that actually takes longer to heal than a broken ankle). I rested for the week, on a liquid diet and trying not to talk, (and my parents wonderfully doted on me) and then had a root canal (the impact of hitting my chin gave me a hematoma in my jaw that killed my front bottom tooth). Twenty-four hours later I was on a plane to Ecuador. After arriving in Quito, my first stop was a four hour bus ride to....

Latacunga - An ugly, bustling town that mostly serves as a portal to the surrounding areas, I wandered around for hours, and passed the same cross-dressing prostitute about seven times, until I took a very bumpy bus ride to...

Quilotoa - Quilotoa and the surrounding small towns are charming and serene. The stunning crater lake that lies just meters from the wind-battered homes of Quilotoa provided some of the best hiking I had done in South America. I spent two days battling the wind and altitude to hike along steep paths, passing little kids taking their sheep and llama out to graze. I headed back into Latacunga to get a bus to...

Cuenca - I finally got to reunite with Allie and Pedro in the beautiful city of Cuenca. It was spotlessly clean, covered in amazing graffiti, packed with interesting restaurants and museums, and really close to great national parks. We visited El Cajas for the day, but many trails were closed due to heavy fog - which just means that I need to go back soon! I said a final goodbye to Allie and Pedro (they left for Guayaquil, Nicaragua, and El Salvador) and I took a long bus ride to...

Quito - This city is awesome - it´s everything that Lima wants to be and isn´t (sorry, Lima). There´s a beautifully renovated center of town full of unique churches and colorful houses hung with planter boxes. There are giant parks and the whole center is so walkable. It might not have the coast, but the air is crisp and the sky is bright. I spent two long days here visiting museums, churches, and the monument at the equator. The sister and brother-in-law of my parents´ neighbor in Houston welcomed me into their home and drove me around town to see the mountains and volcanoes that ring Quito. It was way too short of a visit and I really want to go back! But, alas, it was time to board a plane and fly to...

Distances are deceptive - that short little arrow to the west of Bogotá was a ten hour bus ride!

Bogotá - This was, not secretly, the part of the trip I most wanted to do, because I got to travel with my brother, Chris, and my soon-to-be-sister-in-law, Holly. We met in Bogotá and spent just a day here - which was more than enough! Perhaps on a sunny day the city would be nice, but we were quickly bored with the few museums and the unimpressive historic center. In order to escape the rain in the evening before our bus left, we went to a movie theater and saw The Imitation Game. To be fair, no Colombian I know actually claims to like Bogotá. We took an overnight bus to...

Salento - A vividly colorful village in the middle of coffee country. We hiked to a coffee plantation for a thorough and interesting tour and, the next day, hiked for hours in the Cocora Valley. When we weren´t dodging rain drops we were eating delicious lake trout and fried bananas. All too soon we had to take a bus back to Bogotá to get on our flight to...

Cartagena - Cartagena is the kind of place that you´d like to imagine has no crime because everyone is just so darn happy all the time - the sky is bright blue, the sunsets look like Impressionist paintings, the buildings look like Lisa Frank decorated them, the people are outgoing, and life is simply vibrant. It seems too good to be true! We spent hours enjoying the city, the street performances, the popsicles, the old Spanish fort, the preserved walled city, and the creative street art. But the beach was calling, so we took a shuttle but to...

Parque Tayrona - Once we arrived at the national park, we had to hike over two hours to our campsite. Although there were a number of tourists there, we still found nearly deserted white sand beaches to enjoy. There was no electricity, no cell service, and no internet - it was wonderful! We spent one night in a tent and the following night in hammocks. Paradise can´t last forever, sadly, so we took a bus back to...

Cartagena - One more Caribbean dinner with live music and too many mojitos, before flying back to...

Bogotá - For a trip up to Cerro de Monserrate and a surprise engagement!

Overlooking the lights of Bogotá.