[Above: Justin Mounts and Chanda Baggarly waiting with the Land Rovers to enter Peru.]

Journal by Nancy Olson

The Peru I visited in August of 1999 seemed somehow different than the Peru than I am seeing now, and the circumstances, too, were as different as night and day. In August of ’99, I was wrapping up 5 years of active duty time with the U.S. Marine Corps, and I was taking a little trip before starting a civilian job. I was dating a boy who liked to climb mountains, and he and I and his two brothers and a roommate decided try to tackle a mountain called Huascaran in the Cordilleras Blancas in the Peruvian Andes. We flew into Lima and hired a sketchy little station wagon with frighteningly bald tires to drive us to Huaraz, which is the access town for the mountain range we wanted to climb. Well, we never reached the top of that mountain because of terribly dangerous avalanche conditions -- and my relationship (or whatever) with the boy went the way of the avalanches -- but my memories of the beautiful countryside and the even more beautiful people made that expedition a great memory. Lima wasn’t much to write home about, but the small mountain villages sure were. I’ve been wanting to return ever since.

The thinking and analyzing that was required to write that first paragraph have caused me to realize that the circumstances of that first trip weren’t quite as different as I let on, I suppose. I mean, I’m on another expedition with friends, after all, and I just wrapped up another active duty stint with the USMC, but there are some stark contrasts. For starters, I am a lot older and a little wiser than I was the first time I saw Peru at the age of 25/26. In addition, thanks to Land Rover, we don’t have to hire sketchy taxis, and our BF Goodrich tires are as knobby, safe, and trustworthy as they come. I don’t have a stitch of climbing gear with me, which is pretty torturous to withstand, but I do have a Santa Cruz Blur mountain bike along to help fill the void. I don’t have a hankering to date any of my traveling companions, although I do feel right kindly toward each one. It feels kind of weird being in South America, home of Mt. Cotopaxi, Mt. Huascaran, Mt. Aconcagua, and Patagonia, without any possibility of a climb, but I’m coping well enough. I can always treat this as a recon for when I return with climbing gear. So, I guess it’s the mission itself that makes this expedition so different from the last. It’s that, and it’s my experience base. That first visit to Peru was really my first adventure travel, other than what I’d experienced with the Marine Corps. I have since traveled around the world once with the Land Rover G4 Challenge and throughout the wilderness of Canada, Alaska, and Virginia for some expedition-length adventure races. I guess I just feel more seasoned, less naïve, and more in-charge.

We spent New Year’s Eve in Guayaquil, where the heat and humidity made it impossible to sleep well at night. In Guayaquil, they have a tradition of making “viejos” (Viejo, in Spanish, means “old.”), or giant paper-mache figures which are bombed and torched to represent bidding farewell to the old and welcoming the new. We had built a big pink monster to represent Parkinson’s Disease, and we blew it to kingdom-come. Much of my crew was feeling pretty groggy after staying up too late celebrating the New Year, but we managed to hit the road by 9:00 a.m. Today is Border Day.

We entered Peru through the border city of Tumbas at about 5:00 p.m. and bee-lined it across deserty plains and along the coast toward the beach where we’d spend the night. We had driven through flat, flat, flat country, and I wondered where the mountains were. Way off to my left, I guess. I had never conceived of visiting Peru’s beaches, since I only think of mountains when Peru’s name is mentioned, but there we were. It’s in such stark contrast with the steep cliffs and snow-capped peaks of my memory bank.

It was an easy 4-hour drive from Guayaquil to the Ecuador/Peru border, and then it was another 2.5 hours to cross into Peru. We reached the border at 2:30. It was the easiest border crossing on our record. Peru’s aduana, or customs office, consisted of one small building, three medium-sized desks, and one little customs man. Our border-helper-kid suggested we give the man a Coke or some money to speed up the process, so we gave him a cold Red Bull from our ARB car fridge. He was pretty stoked, though he tried to hide it. These guys like to be all official and in-charge, so they try to look stern and authoritative. Anyhow, we got all the Land Rovers registered, stamped, and tagged, and I even got a smile out of the stern little aduana before we got on the road again.

As we headed toward the beach city of Mancora, we passed a jailhouse, and Colin came on the radio to announce that the film guys were listening to Johnny Cash’s "Folsom Prison" album. Rolf and Justin said that they were already listening to the Johnny Cash "Sun Years" album in D4. That inspired Nick and Chanda to put in a Johnny Cash album, and then of course, I popped in his "San Quintin" cassette, so Todd and I could enjoy ole’ Johnny, too. So, as the sun set, every single vehicle in this Drive Around the World convoy was rocking out to Johnny Cash. We discussed the super-coolness of that over a chicken-house dinner and then resumed the Johnnyfest caravan to Mancora. That was one of our little tributes to a great man who, by the way, suffered from Parkinson’s Disease.

We pulled into the thriving tourist hot-spot of Mancora at about 8:30, talked to a few beachgoers visiting from Mexico, observed a dozen or more gringo tourists, and found the last room in the whole city still available during the busy holiday season. It had three bunk beds, so three people were without racks. I popped the Hannibal expedition tent on D3 to revel in the privacy of my comfy rooftop bedroom, and Nick and Chanda slept above D1. It would have been a perfect night sleep except for the loud party music and the fact that I had a nightmare about forgetting to hand in a final exam, one other nightmare that I can’t quite remember, and my wicked imagination convincing me that I was being eaten alive by bugs. It’s the third night in a row that I’ve thought bugs were crawling on me…

Well, tomorrow we drive. We’re heading toward Cuzco, which means mountains, so I’m pleased. Talk to you next Thursday. I hope the imaginary bugs go away…

Nancy
nancy@drivearoundtheworld.com

Logbook for January 1st, Day 62
Start: Guayaquil, Ecuador, 0945
N: 02* 08.171'
W: 79* 54.397''
Finish: Mancora, Peru, 2030
N: 04* 06.543'
W: 81* 03.571''
Mileage: 228
Notes: The team left the sauna-like temperatures of Ecuador for the drier heat of Peru. It is about 5 degrees cooler here. The border crossing at Huaquillas took only 2.5 hours, a record-fast crossing for the expedition. The team is experiencing its first illnesses, with 5 members battling a cold. (N.O.)

Help support our cause: The LONGITUDE Expedition is the longest journey ever attempted with a focus on Parkinson's Disease. The Drive Around the World team aims to raise money for Parkinson’s Disease research by driving four certified pre-owned Land Rover Discoverys around the globe following lines of longitude. Readers are encouraged to pledge small amounts of money per expedition-kilometer via a pledge form that can be found on our Parkinson’s page by clicking here. 100% of donations received go directly to Parkinson's research and all who donate $10 or more will be entered into a raffle to win an expedition-equipped Land Rover Discovery.