A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving. ~Lao Tzu

WE MADE IT!!! The Dolphin has chugged and sputtered and heaved its way up the Andes to 12,000 feet. We have conquered our most difficult goal – it’s literally all downhill from here.

In Arequipa, the halfway point where the roads reportedly become much steeper and the real mountains begin, we stopped for a night to rest in a parking lot near the center of town. We awoke to the sight of great mountains looming behind the walls of the tiny parking area. We knew the next day would be the real test – from 3000 to 13,000 feet. As we were heading out of town, we stopped outside a little open air market. We bought fresh pineapple juice from a grinning Incan woman, who laughed through her gold teeth and kept refilling our cups and told us she had one niece who was married to a Japanese man and another one in Brazil. Everyone from Mexico on has called Yoshi “Chino,” which irritates him no end. It appears to be the only word people in Latin America know for Asian. When we tell them he is Japanese however, they inevitably begin to smile and bring up some story about a relative in Japan or someone they know of Japanese descent. The Japanese seem to have left only good impressions in Latin America, both through the charitable works done by the Japanese governments (bridges, disaster relief, public buildings, etc) and by the Japanese immigrants and tourists themselves. People in both Central and South America always say, “Ah! Japanese! They are good people, the Japanese. And very intelligent! Look at their cars and their cameras!” Yoshi will, I’m sure, only add to the positive image the Japanese have down here – hopefully he will also aid to educate people on the differences between Asian nations and those around him will stop calling him Chino. Worth it to try at least!

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On our way to Lima, we stopped in a small town whose market included the largest witch doctor market in Peru. Yoshi and I were still ill and markets are generally not Yoshi’s favorite place anyway, so he stayed behind in the dolphin while Jonas and I wandered through the bazaar. The market was crammed with every possible ware. We moved slowly through tiny pathways, squeezing past cages of chickens, rabbits and guinea pigs, fruit stands, tables of fly-covered meat, baskets of bread, sleeping children and men hacking up piles of coal to sell. When we arrived at the section of herbal medicines, the foreign smells of freshly cut plants made my head spin. Hanging from the tiny stalls were all assortments of dried and fresh herbs, voodoo dolls, seeds, skulls, knives, dried lizards, snake skins, hides, gourds, beads and teeth. Old women haggled over bags of plants, leaning on displays of boxes of powdered cures from the Amazon and China. Jonas asked a vendor about a hanging item resembling an animal bladder and the man asked him where he was from. “Brazil! You guys have stronger stuff than we do!” He attempted to marry Jonas off with one of the women in his stall and laughed when Jonas said he already had one. “Well, have two!” The vendor at the next stall tried to sell us Hayahuasca powder in a small baggie behind the counter and another tried to entice us with his shamanic services. I bought a small bottle containing floating herbs, seeds and a weird worm like figure and we headed back through the aisles to find the dolphin.

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In 1969, three young people, a couple and their single friend, set off in a truck for an overland voyage from Texas to Brazil. The single ... [Continue reading this entry]

Saturday, May 6 : Peru [Continue reading this entry]