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ENTRIES FROM THIS CATEGORY
- Adventures in Border Crossing
- On the Road Again - Tomb Raider - Eastward Ho! - A Fresh Young Boy - A New Shipmate - Tally Me Banana - Houses On Stilts - Urban Jungle - Welcome to the Jungle - Monkey Business - In Deeper With A Really Big Knife - Slimy Yet Satisfying - Survivor: The Amazon - Amazon Dot Com - Looking for Christmas in Lima - Across Lima and into Mordor - The Taxis of Miraflores - A Pair of Turtles - Sweet, Sour and Sandy - NAZCAR - Where They Drew The Line - On the Trail of Lara Croft - Horses for Hangovers - Christmas in Cusco - Catch Him If You Can - Two Women, A Llama and The Bird - The (Andean) Village People - The Redemption Cookie - New Friend For New Year's - Decisions - New Year, New Adventure - My First Stolen Item - Bargain Hunter: Puno - School Days On The Titty Side - The Orange Hat - Saved By A Twelve-Year-Old |
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December 02, 2003
Adventures in Border CrossingDAY 43: Navid and I were out of the hostel in the Guayaquil suburbs before eight and caught a city bus to the main bus terminal. A fake Christmas tree stood in the center of the main hall and for...Read this entry December 03, 2003
On the Road AgainDAY 44: I bid a fond farewell to Navid when we left the hostel before eight in the morning. He hopped on a mototaxi which brought him to the airport for his flights to Cuzco. For the first time since...Read this entry December 08, 2003
Tomb RaiderDAY 45: In 1987, when most people were discovering the idea of boiling rabbits in Fatal Attraction, a group of archaeologists discovered new ruins just 30 km southeast of Chiclayo, Peru. This find contained the tombs of Sipan, an ancient...Read this entry Eastward Ho!DAY 46: Since no roads go to the Amazonian jungle city of Iquitos, there are only two ways to get there: by plane or -- if you have time to kill like me -- via a cargo boat up the...Read this entry A Fresh Young BoyDAY 47: The sun came up over Tarapoto and broke through the morning mist, revealing a pretty town surrounded by mountains. I got dressed and sorted out and went looking for a place for breakfast -- there was one on...Read this entry A New ShipmateDAY 48: The sun broke through the river fog to reveal what I didn't want to see: through my "first class" "window," I saw that we still hadn't left the port in Yurimaguas....Read this entry December 09, 2003
Tally Me BananaDAY 49: The sun was already up when our cargo ship stopped in Maripoto, a tiny village on the riverbank where the Rio Huallaga meets the Rio Marañon. It was the first of many stops along the way where we...Read this entry Houses On StiltsDAY 50: You would think that Amazonian city of Iquitos, the largest city in the world without any connecting roads, would be reminiscent of a lost Shangri-La or an ancient city out of a Tarzan set. The fact is, Iquitos,...Read this entry Urban JungleDAY 51: Like Tarzan swinging from vine to vine in the jungle, I swung from person-I-could-possibly-trust to person-I-could-possibly-trust. With the girls off on a flight back to Lima, I only had Richard to turn to for advice -- which was...Read this entry December 15, 2003
Welcome to the JungleDAY 52: I bid farewell to the hostel desk attendant -- who, hearing that I was from New York, assumed I was Puerto Rican -- and rode with Andres to the docks. He put me in a motorboat taxi for...Read this entry Monkey BusinessDAY 53: My lip had swollen down about half way from the night before, and sensation was coming back, which was a good thing being mistletoe season -- not that there was any mistletoe around. In the steamy jungle, it...Read this entry In Deeper With A Really Big KnifeDAY 54: Alone in my hut in my mosquito net tent, I heard rustling outside, followed by the sounds of small footsteps of monkeys. Suddenly one of them landed on the roof of my mosquito net and so I grabbed...Read this entry Slimy Yet SatisfyingDAY 55: Juan and I woke at dawn and left our things in camp to go on a morning hike. We walked along a trail, on logs, through creeks, looking at the different medicinal plants. Juan showed me a coconut...Read this entry Survivor: The AmazonDAY 56: I woke up around three in the morning to the sound of a distant static. Gradually the white noise got closer and closer until it started pouring rain in camp. The wind blew out all the mosquito candles,...Read this entry December 16, 2003
Amazon Dot ComDAY 57: I was off to drop my laundry off in Iquitos to wash out the stench of vinegar-flavored yogurt and bug spray, when I ran into Richard on the street again. It was weird, because the run-in didn't feel...Read this entry December 17, 2003
Looking for Christmas in LimaDAY 58: Call me old-fashioned, but during the holiday season, I like it to feel a little bit like Christmas -- you know, with the trees and decorations and people following shoppers leaving the mall to snatch their parking space,...Read this entry December 18, 2003
Across Lima and into MordorDAY 59: The Lord of the Rings trilogy is a phenomenon in many countries around the globe, Peru included. Tolkien's world is very much a part of Peruvian pop culture as it is in the States, and with the worldwide...Read this entry December 19, 2003
The Taxis of MirafloresDAY 60: Just south of Lima is the affluent oceanside suburb of Miraflores, a place that despite its fancy retaurants and hotels, is suggested as "the better place to stay for budget travelers" according to Lonely Planet. Perhaps this is...Read this entry December 21, 2003
A Pair of TurtlesDAY 61: I was writing a rough draft in the rooftop cafe of the Lima hostel early in the morning when two new pet animals, a pair of turtles, wandered in and walked under the tables and chairs. It took...Read this entry Sweet, Sour and SandyDAY 62: Ica, capital city of the department of the same name, is known for two things: its massive and dramatic surrounding sand dunes (picture below), and its pisco brandy and wine-producing vineyards. The easiest way to see them both...Read this entry December 22, 2003
NAZCARDAY 63: Nights in pisco country are great, but the mornings after aren't so much. With the absence of my usual greasy Hangover Helpers in New York -- Union Square's McDonald's, Flatiron District's Eisenberg's Sandwich Shop or Chinatown's Wo...Read this entry December 24, 2003
Where They Drew The LineDAY 64: I was lying in bed in the darkness of my room with no windows when there was a knock on the door. It was my driver for my transport to the airport -- an hour and a half...Read this entry December 25, 2003
On the Trail of Lara CroftDAY 65: In 1996, the adventure video game Tomb Raider was born, starring the full-lipped, big-breasted virtual heroine Lara Croft. The gun-toting Lara adventured around the world in search of artifacts like a modern, female Indiana Jones. The popularity of...Read this entry December 26, 2003
Horses for HangoversDAY 66: It's one thing to be hungover after a night of boozing, but it's another to be hungover when you haven't yet acclimatized to the thin oxygen 11,000 ft. above sea level. I woke up feeling just awful (but...Read this entry Christmas in CuscoDAY 67: I woke up to the sound of firecrackers in the streets early in the morning -- the kids had been setting them off all night. For me, the sounds of Christmas morning sounded more like the sounds of...Read this entry December 27, 2003
Catch Him If You CanDAY 68: Some people would say that the best invention since sliced bread is the "snooze" button. You know it and its contribution to Mankind -- why wake up and face reality when all you have to do is simply...Read this entry December 28, 2003
Two Women, A Llama and The BirdDAY 69: I was having breakfast at the cafe across the street from the hostel when I noticed the same two women I had noticed at various places in town almost everyday. They were two local women who dressed in...Read this entry December 29, 2003
The (Andean) Village PeopleDAY 70: "Guess what," I asked Lara at an early morning breakfast before our day trip to the Sacred Valley. "I got a traditional Andean band to play 'Y.M.C.A.' tonight at 8:30." "Excellent," she said. We were both looking forward...Read this entry December 30, 2003
The Redemption CookieDAY 71: I was up by seven o'clock in the morning to see Lara off before she left with her transport to her 4-day/3-night trek to Machu Picchu -- a trek I had already done in 2001. It was her...Read this entry January 02, 2004
New Friend For New Year'sDAY 72: Arequipa, Peru's second largest city, is nestled in the valley of three volcanoes. The lava of these volcanoes have hardened over geological history to form the white-colored rock known as sillar, which many of the buildings were made...Read this entry January 03, 2004
DecisionsDAY 73: MY LAST DAY OF 2003 started at one o'clock in the morning. My alarm woke me up twenty minutes before my 1:20 pick up from my guide who would take me and Heidi down Colca Canyon, the deepest...Read this entry New Year, New AdventureDAY 74: Usually I wake up on New Year's Day hungover, with a feeling like I am at the bottom of the deepest canyon in the world. When I woke up at 4 a.m. feeling that same way, I realized,...Read this entry My First Stolen ItemDAY 75: Being in a No Internet Zone (aka N.I.Z.) for two days or more often forces me to take an entire day to sit in front of a computer to catch up on The Blog. On my last day...Read this entry January 06, 2004
Bargain Hunter: PunoDAY 76: Dave the Australian was up and out of our room by 7:15 in the morning, less than four hours since we checked in, for his day tour of Lake Titicaca. He left me a ten soles note on...Read this entry School Days On The Titty SideDAY 77: Lake Titicaca, the lake that Simpsons' creator Matt Groening once called a place whose name is guaranteed to make kids snicker, lies on the border of Peru and Bolivia at an elevation of over 12,500 ft above sea...Read this entry The Orange HatDAY 78: I woke up on a rainy morning on Isla Amantani feeling a little bit better from the night before. Basilia came to our room with a breakfast of bread, eggs and muņa tea, and then bid us an...Read this entry January 07, 2004
Saved By A Twelve-Year-OldDAY 79: I was awake by 6 a.m. feeling a little bit better from my illness. I ate a mango for the extra vitamins and gathered all my belongings. As always, I was amazed when I looked around the room...Read this entry |