[Above: A llama-crossing sign along the Bolivian highway.]

Journal by Justin Mounts

One thing I’ve learned on this expedition is that I wish I had studied Spanish in high school.

Seriously.

Each day on the expedition, I’m given an opportunity to practice my Spanish-speaking skills. Now, these opportunities often come with a great of pain inflicted on the ears of whomever I am speaking to and it usually involves a considerable investment of their time to figure out what I am talking about. Regardless, most of the time communication does occur. Let’s review how far I’ve come with my Spanish skills on the expedition.

When we left, I knew enough Spanish to say hello, goodbye, how are you, and where’s the bathroom. I could also order a drink and say things that would most likely get me involved in a fight or make my mother blush. So, suffice to say my knowledge of the Spanish language was roughly equivalent to a high school freshman.

Now, however, I can order food, get set up at an internet café, shop and bargain almost like a pro, and carry on a relatively civil conversation with someone I meet on the street. Not too bad. Plus, I can still stay hello, goodbye, how are you, where’s the bathroom, and all that other stuff that still has my mother blushing. One of the problems I run into now is that the little bit of Spanish that I do know, I can now deliver with such confidence, I frequently trick people into thinking I know a heck of a lot more Spanish than I do know. Which is fun, and often leads to a learning experience for me. But the other problem I run into is that often times I will deliver the entire 20-30 minutes of Spanish I know in about 2 minutes. The conversation goes like this:

Me: “Buenos! Como estas?”

Them: “Bien, gracias. Que paiz?”

Me: “Los Estados Unidos. Mi en es groupo manahara todo del mundo….blablablabla blablablablablablablablablablablablablabla volunterio lablablablablablablablalbablabla blablab dinero lablablablablablablablablablablablablablablablablablablabla se llama Parkinson’s blablablablablablablablablablab El Papa y Mohammad Ali lablabl abla lbablablabla cinco dias lablablablablablablablablablablab lablablablabl ablab labl ablablablablablablbalablbabl Si! M me gusta Sur America blablablablablabl ablabla

Them: Ay! (Insert incredibly complex conversation-piece in Spanish here at a pace so fast that even native Spanish speakers couldn’t understand what they were saying).

Me: Uh….Lo siento. Una veces mas, por favor. Me habla poco espaniol.

(Repeat the same exchange with no further success)

Them: Ay, bien. (Then they stand there nodding for a second pondering what to do next, then…) Ciao!

So, you can see how premature delivery of my Spanish vocabulary can lead to a shortened conversation and quite honestly an unsatisfactory encounter with a local from the country I’m in. Not to mention it leaves me feeling very frustrated because quite honestly, I should know more Spanish than this. Don’t get me wrong, my guerilla, phrase-book tactics for learning Spanish are quite respected among my team members. In fact, I’ve been told that I’m fearless and that my Spanish has improved the most of anyone so far. That’s quite a complement in my eyes, but I don’t want to kid you. I am still barely a half-step above caveman Spanish.

This week, I had a great opportunity to practice in the company of a new friend. Our 5th Take Me With You! guest, Mairo Moya was very friendly and helpful when it came to practicing my Spanish. It also helped that he was bilingual, so anytime I couldn’t continue in Spanish, I could talk to him in English. As a native Peruvian, Mairo is very proud of the Incan traditions, and we spent a great deal of time not only talking about Peruvian history, but we also talked about different goals and aspirations. Mairo is a 28-year-old tour guide for Isla de los Uros, the famous reed island communities of Lake Titikaka (always with a “k”, never with a “c” he insists). However, he is also in the process of building a new house for his family (first son is due in about 2 weeks) and in the process of trying to start a charitable organization that will provide alternative housing for orphans in local communities.

Mairo met us at 6:30 am for our departure for La Paz, Bolivia. Given the supposed risk of riots in Bolivia during our stay there, we both agreed having him along as a cultural expert could benefit us. The drive to La Paz was relatively uneventful, however I had my head buried in my laptop most of the day preparing information for an article that will run in the Feburary 8th edition of the Orlando Sentinel. I did look up long enough to see the sparkling blue waters of Lake Titikaka before we crossed into Bolivia. It was absolutely breathtaking. Several miles in the distance, a small range of mountains skirted the edge of the water, gently reflecting their beauty off the water as if it was just for us to see. Immediately in our front was a cliff that dropped off about 300 feet to the water’s edge. A few dozen meters out into the water you could make out the silhouettes of 6 different fishing nets and cages, clearly set up to pull in the freshest fish and shell fish to be taken to a nearby market.

We continued into Desaguadero, a bustling little border town on the very southernmost point of the lake. We were pleasantly surprised when it only took us about an hour and a half to complete the full process of exiting Peru, canceling the temporary import paperwork for each vehicle, then registering our Land Rovers for driving in Bolivia, and completing the individual paperwork necessary. We were very lucky, and the border personnel were very friendly. Although they yelled at me as someone was filming me standing in line to have my passport stamp, when I returned to the cars to work security detail, one of the other officers called me over and we had a good conversation in Spanish.

But the best part of my conversation with the border guard was that it lasted more than 5 minutes.

Logbook for January 17th, Day 78
Start: Puno, Peru
N: 15* 50.480'
W: 70* 01.706'
Finish: La Paz, Bolivia
N: 16* 30.162'
W: 68* 08.133'
Mileage: 153
Notes: We departed Puno at around 9 in the morning to head to the Bolivian border. With us is Puno resident and native, Mairo. He was our tour guide during our visit to Uros, and he came with us to find the latitude/longitude intersection last night. He had so much fun, and we had so much fun with him, that he agreed to join us for the drive to La Paz in Bolivia. The border crossing from Peru into Bolivia was less than an hour-and-a-half, and it was the easiest yet. No car search, no VIN verification. Bolivia is pretty laid-back. We arrived at the border at noon, left at about 1:30, and arrived in La Paz at about 4 p.m. A wonderful local woman named Catalina helped us find a nice hotel with good parking, and we settled in. Catalina had studied for two years in the U.S., and she easily recognized gringos in need of assistance. Driving in this city is NUTS! Tomorrow, more fun in Bolivia.(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.

[Above: The floating village of Uros on Lake Titicaca.]

Journal by Colin McAuliffe

Today I have the fortunate pleasure of being the person to write the blog for what was probably our most action packed day of adventure yet. We started our morning at 9am, when a minibus picked us up at our hotel in Puno Peru for a tour of the reed islands of Lake Titicaca. We all piled in the van and prepared for our three hour journey. We had no idea how interesting it would be.

When we got to the dock it was overcast and cold, really cold -- I mean 4 layers cold. We had a few minutes to buy snacks and then we were herded onto our boat by our tour-guide Mairo. He began to explain the history of the floating islands.

The people of the islands were originally land dwellers, but when the Inca came to the Titicaca region, the people were forced to hide on the lake. The lake, being filled with reeds offered great materials for building, so the people decided to build their own islands. They created these floating homelands by carefully weaving layers upon layers of reeds together on top of a base of floating reed roots. The islands only last ten or twelve years and then the people must start building a new one. They test the stability of the islands by digging down through the layers of reeds and sniffing for the smell of decomposition. Of course, the islands immediately begin to decompose as soon as they are built so there is always a smell of sulfur when they dig down (when we smelled it, the stink smelled vaguely of farts and rotten eggs) however when it is time to build a new island apparently the small is horrendous.

There are over twenty islands with up to ten families that live on each. Certain islands have schools and there is a hospital too. Only ten of the islands actually allow tourists to visit them and the people that live there make their living though the money that tourists spend to go there and from the typical stuff the tourists buy. These islands are more technologically advanced than those that don't allow tourists. They have solar power and I was amused to find a television in one of the huts.

Anyway, Mairo was a great guide. We started off on one island where he explained all about the lifestyle and showed us the inside of one of the huts, which I might add was quite small, closet-sized even, and slept up to six. The weather then cleared, sun and all and we then took a cool little reed, little man-powered boat over to another island which was pretty much the same as the first, except that an ingenious old lady had thrown together a small potato patch in a corner of the island on a pile of decomposing reed roots. Mairo had answers to all our many questions such as, where do these people go to the bathroom? The answer was that they built little island off the main ones where they could poop in shallow latrines and then dry the waste so that it wouldn't pollute the water.

So, we finished up our tour of the island and returned to our hotel to prepare for another exciting journey, our first confluence. Now, confluences are a little weird, and actually upon first hearing about them I thought them to be ridiculously stupid, however I eventually grew to love the idea. A confluence is the spot where lines of latitude and longitude meet. There is a website called www.confluence.org that lists every confluence in the world and whether or not it has been "bagged". Bagging a confluence is when you take your GPS and go to the exact spot of the confluence and take a picture of you and your GPS reading all zeros. The lines we were trying to reach were longitude 70 and
latitude 16.

So, Mairo, our guide from the reed islands met us at about 4pm, not having a clue what he was getting into. I think he actually thought that he was taking us on a tour of some old funerary tower ruins. When he finally did realize what we were doing he said that it was "completely crazy" but that he liked it.

So we all piled into the Land Rovers an drove about twenty five kilometers out of Puno. It was pouring rain and Nick, GPS in hand, was carefully monitoring the spot at which we would have to turn off the road, and when the time came he called the cars to a halt over our new radios. We all pulled over and went to check out where we would be going, which was basically swampland. At first Nick was insistent on us walking almost a mile out into the swampy field, but with a little encouragement, the team convinced him that we could drive it.

Nancy went ahead on foot as our scout, to tell us when ponds and whatnot were in front of us. Eventually we came to a point that Nancy said we could not cross, Adam was disbelieving of this, so he took off his shoes and waded across the stream that was our obstacle. We all agreed that the creek was shallow enough to cross and from there on was complete off-road mayhem.

The two cars we had packed full of people began to race across the swamp towards the confluence, blasting through ponds and ravines like we had nothing better to do. Our car had a great advantage, Nancy had taken a spot on the rear ladder where she could see over the top of the car and yell directions at us so we could avoid the pitfalls of the swamp. The other car did not think to do this and within twenty minutes they were stuck in an irrigation ditch.

We spent a good half an hour in the rain digging the car out and then thanks to our Extreme Outback Recovery Kits we yanked the car to safety. Another twenty minutes ripping through the swamp and we bagged our first confluence. The team all got back out of our cars in the rain and Neil took some pictures of us with the GPS to prove what we had done.

I had a blast on our little excursion and I look forward to doing it again. After all was said and done, we piled back in the cars and headed back to Puno for dinner, which would turn out to be our third adventure of the day.

So, when we got back to Puno we originally had planned to go to the restaurant that we had eaten lunch at, but Mairo said he knew a better place, so we let him lead. We arrived at our restaurant and sat down to receive our menus at this point Todd, Neil, Adam, and myself decided to do something we had been talking about since we first got to Peru and that was to eat cuy. Now, cuy is considered a major delicacy in Peru, but in the States we consider cuy a pet -- a guinea pig in fact. So myself and the aforementioned guys ordered up our little guinea pigs and waited to see what happened.

When they arrived I was a little taken aback. The Cuy looked like one of the rats from the Muppets. It was deep fried with its head still on, and mine was looking at me very suspiciously, kind of like it was about to get up and say, "Hey buddy, what the heck do you think your doing?" Anyway, I paid five bucks for the thing so I had to eat it. At first bite it wasn't that bad, it kind of reminded me of rabbit but a little more greasy, however after a while, when I had exposed the skeleton and everyone kept talking about how cute guinea pigs are, it started to get harder to eat the thing. Not to mention the fact that there was barely any meat on it, mainly just skin and bones. By the end I was thoroughly grossed out, and had to give up. Mairo gladly accepted the head, which he tore the meat of with gusto. That was the end of it, I'll never eat cuy again.

This was, I'm pretty sure the most active day on the entire Longitude expedition, I'm hoping we have more of them, only without the eating of household pets, because that was seriously gross.

Colin
colin@drivearoundtheworld.com

Logbook for January 16th, Day 77
Start: Puno, Peru, 1600
N: 15* 50.480'
W: 70* 01.706'
Finish: Puno, Peru, 2000
N: 15* 50.480'
W: 70* 01.706'
Mileage: 028
Notes: Today was epic. From 0930 to about 1230, we toured Puno's biggest tourist attraction, the floating islands of Uros. There is an indigenous people who have lived on floating reed islands on Lake Titikaka since the days of the Inca. We were amazed to visit these people on their islands and had a hard time imagining what it would be like to spend your whole life on an island that is smaller than a high school infield. You can't run on the reeds that make up the ground, and you have no hope of biking. You'd spend most of your days fishing and tending to the islands if you are a man, and women would spend most of their time watching the children, cooking, and making handicrafts to sell to tourists. After the Uros visit, we searched for and found, with the help of our Garmin GPS, a point where lines of longitude and lines of latitude crossed. It was in the middle of a farmer's field on the outskirts of Puno. More on the significance of this later in Colin's journal. The day was good. Tomorrow we leave for Bolivia.(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.

[Above: The scenic road to Puno, Peru.]

Journal by Nancy Olson

Today is a traveling day. Finally. We’ve been in Cusco for what seems like forever. It’s been more than a week, and as great as it is here, we’re ready to move on.

We got up early today, intending to hit the road at 0730. I got up, got ready, and carried all my bags downstairs to the lobby. Then I made two more trips to the room to carry down our precious Santa Cruz mountain bikes. I actually got to ride quite a bit in Cusco, and the bikes, like the team, were treated to the comfort and safety of the Royal Inka’s plush rooms each night.

The nice Senora at the hotel’s front desk watched my stuff while I ran off to the Playa del Estacionamiento (Parking “Beach”) to retrieve Vehicle D3. I was back, loaded, and ready to go before 0730. Unfortunately, things happened, as they tend to do, and we didn’t leave at our specified time.

First, we had to spend an hour talking to the parking lot owner about the obscene rate they charged us for parking. She was kind enough to finally decide not to overcharge us after learning that we are all volunteers and are trying to raise money for Parkinson’s Disease research.

Secondly, we had to allow time for Todd to make his scheduled 0930 phone call to the Royal Geographical Society research sites coordinator. He had a conference call to them to arrange for assistance with our visits and our education program.

Finally, since it was 1100 by the time everybody finished up with the phone calls and the Internet café, we had to delay our departure a bit longer for lunch. I had snagged a ham-and-egg sandwich from the hotel’s free breakfast, so I decided to shop instead of eat. I was on the hunt for a traditional Cusquena hat, which basically looks like a ski hat with ears, except that it is brightly colored and layered with intricate beadwork around the sides and ornate pom-poms on the top and on the side strings. They are antiques and take more than a month to knit. The colors are natural dyes, and the fabric is hand woven from alpaca wool. I’m in love with them. I didn’t have enough money with me to buy the one I found at Aguas Caliente during our trip to Machu Picchu, so I am still sadly in search of the perfect one. I found several, but none will fit my huge melon. I guess I’ll keep looking. It’d be a fun item to have to remind me of my Around-the-World expedition, my teammates, and Peru.

We finally pulled out of Cusco at about 1200 and headed toward Puno, a city on the banks of Lake Titicaca. The drive brought us past the snowcapped mountains of the Cordillera Real and the green farmland of the Altiplano. As we drove, the altitude increased, and the temperature dropped. Fresh snow was falling in the mountains around us.

By the time we drove through Puno and did a couple of circles in search of a nice hostel and secure parking, it was raining cats and dogs. And it was COLD!!! We moved in to the Hostel San Antonio and then headed to the plaza to find dinner. Because the whole city is on a hill overlooking Lake Titicaca, the rain forms huge rivers down every street. We had to ford several “streams” at each crosswalk heading toward the main plaza, and our shoes were soaked in no time. Thanks to our GoreTex North Face jackets, though, our bodies remained perfectly dry.

Puno lacks the beautiful Spanish architecture of Cusco, but it has a charm of its own, and the people are spectacular in their traditional dress and bowler hats. The native women begin wearing men’s bowler hats at about the age of 13 to signify that they are ready to settle down with a husband and to take on the responsibilities of a household, marriage, and children. The English brought these hats over about 80-90 years ago. Thousands of years prior, the Incas would put boards on their foreheads to deform their skulls into a more elongated cranial shape, much like the conical shape of the Englishman’s bowler hat. Once introduced to Peru, these hats became a sort of extension of, or update to, the tradition of actually deforming the skull. Now you will see women wearing men’s bowler hats or fedoras all over Ecuador and Peru.

We found a great restaurant that had a huge Native Indian band onstage singing and playing the drums, pan flutes, and tiny little guitars. They were an excellent accompaniment to our traditional meals. Justin had alpaca, and I tried a bite of it. It wasn’t bad at all. It tasted pretty similar to beef, with a hint of lamb.

After the restaurant, we headed back to the San Antonio and our comfy beds. We have a tour of the floating reed islands of Uros tomorrow, so it’ll be an early morning. I think Colin’s got Friday’s journal, so ya’ll stand by for some interesting reading. I’m certain Lake Titicaca will give him lots to talk about.

Until next week…

Nancy
nancy@drivearoundtheworld.com

Logbook for January 15th, Day 76
Start: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Finish: Puno, Peru
N: 15* 50.480'
W: 70* 01.706'
Mileage: coming soon...
Notes: We left Cusco for Puno, near Lake Titicaca, at about noon. The drive was a beautiful one that took us past snowcapped mountains and through the endless green fields of the altiplano. We arrived in Puno in time to see the shopkeepers closing up their kiosks. We also arrived in time to experience the effects of a pouring rain on a city whose streets run downhill into the world's highest lake. We were nearly washed away as we walked down the street toward the plaza for dinner. We enjoyed a traditional meal with traditional entertainment (singing, pan flutes, drums, tiny guitars) before returning to the Hostel San Antonio to hit the sack. Tomorrow we have a guided tour of the floating reed islands of Uros.(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.

[Above: The famous and breath-takingly beautiful ruins of Machu Picchu in Peru.]

Journal by Todd Borgie

We are headed to Machu Picchu today! Unfortunately we did not have time to stay in Agua Calientes the night before so we could see the sunrise upon Machu Picchu, but whenever you go the site is truly amazing! Despite the early hour the team was ready. In fact I was the last one down to the taxis that were waiting patiently to take us to the train station. We arrived at the station in good time and even had to wait a bit before we boarded.

Cuzco is located in a valley so the train had to work its way up the hill using a series of switchbacks. The train would climb for about 10-15 minutes and then we would stop, the track would be switched and would descend a bit before climbing for another spell. We did this about 5 times before we clear of the valley.

As the train lumbered along some of us slept, others chatted, and others just looked out of the window. I pretty much just looked and slept. It was interesting looking out upon the landscape seeing the corn, potatoes, llamas, pigs, cows, and other animals. What was really amazing was to see the terraced hillsides. These terraces are a series of step that are carved in the side of the mountain. They vary in width, but most seem to be about 6 to 8 ft wide and can be any distance in length. These steps serve two purposes first they prevent soil erosion by reducing the speed of the rain water as it travels down the side of the hillside, and they spread the water flow to a greater area. Apparently these steps are not as simple as the first appear. In every step, although you can’t see them, there are three layers. The bottom layer is made up of clay, the second layer is made up of rocks and the top layer is made up of good topsoil.

As the water comes down the mountain it moisturizes the top layer were the crop is grown. The second layer, of rocks, allows the topsoil to drain off excess water preventing root rot and mildew problems. The third layer, of clay, prevents drainage, dumping the excess water down to the next level. Pretty amazing!

In the course of journey we dropped form about 12,000ft to a mere 7,500ft. This would have been great if we had level ground to walk on, but Machu Picchu is not known for it’s flat ground.

Three and half-hours after leaving Cuzco we arrived in Aguas Calientes, the town just beneath Machu Picchu. The train dumped us off and we had to find our way down the gauntlet of street venders to where the bus would takes us the 8km to the top of the hill and Machu Picchu.

Our time was limited at Machu Picchu, so we paid the price for quickness and convenience. The team was soon to the top of the mountain and Machu Picchu was in sight! There is something about this place, it is like a mantle piece situated upon the earth’s hearth. As you stand on the ledges of this mountain you can see and hear the river rushing down below, and I mean rushing. I have never seen such a river with that strong of flow, we all speculated how long someone would survive if they fell in, and none of the estimates were very long.

Anyway, back to the peaks. Machu Picchu is an Incan outpost/village that was abandoned long ago. No records mention it. Although many farmers in the area knew about some of the structures it was not excavated until 1911 by an American Professor from Yale named Hiram Bingham. You may think it is strange that the farmers didn’t mention it or someone didn’t excavate it earlier. You have to realize that there are stones everywhere and it would be really easy to confuse ancient ruins for just another rocky landscape. Also, the jungle grows at an amazing rate, very quickly covering anything that is not maintained. This is one of the reasons the Mayan ruins were preserved so well. The jungle covered them so the Spanish didn’t realize they were there. It was standard operating procedure when the Spanish conquered to tear down structures of whom they conquered and build their own upon them. This is especially true for holy or religious places.

Machu Picchu since it was so remote managed to escape human destruction. Much of the city has been rebuilt be archeologists, but all the old stones were there so it was not that difficult to rebuild. Machu Picchu was a community for scientists and artisans, or it has been so speculated. Without any kind of records most all information about Machu Picchu is based upon speculation.

I was most impressed with the series of baths and several of the temples. There were a series of shallow trenches connecting open bath chambers. A constant trickle of water would flow from the top of the mountain through the series of chambers. It was quite an effective source of constant water flow. The temples were impressive due to the amazing stonework that was used to construct them. The large stones fit so tightly together it was difficult to see the seam between rocks. No mortar was use in any of this construction. Truly amazing!

Milling around amongst these structures was neat, but I really enjoyed just sitting amongst them. There is a herd of llamas that serve as lawn mowers at Machu Picchu; I had the opportunity to see how llamas spit at annoying people, that was pretty funny.

Unfortunately our time was soon up and we had to catch the bus in order to catch the train. I recommend to travels to go to Aguas Calientes and stay so you really will have a full day at Machu Picchu, the place is wonderful, although pricey. If you get there early you will avoid the crowds, you can’t do that if you take the train.

Another thing that was amazing at Machu Picchu was the fact that there were all kind of steep slopes, and no guardrails. I noticed the sundial was cordoned off, and a couple of other things, but everything was mostly wide open. I thought about potential lawsuits, and the possible destruction of this relic due to reckless people. I know that this is a problem here and Peru is being encouraged to make stronger policies to protect Machu Picchu. I thought about the DATW lawyers, Gibson, Dunn, & Krutcher, it would be great to have Michael Levy with us here, but I wonder if he would pull his hair out trying to see through the cloud of liability. Hopefully he can join us later, as Gibson, Dunn & Kructher is another reason why we are where we are. They offered their services to us as we were first incorporating ourselves as a non-profit organization. They have continued to support us answering our many questions as we traveled towards our departure day and beyond.

We made our way back to the train and eventually to Cuzco. We have another early day tomorrow as we make our way to Puno.

Todd
todd@drivearoundtheworld.com

Logbook for January 14th, Day 75
Start: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Finish: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Mileage: train to Machu Picchu
Notes: Our visit to Machu-Picchu today was incredible. Until you see it in person, you have no idea just how amazing it is. The ruins are one thing, built by hand out of immense rocks by the Incas, but the view is the real attraction. It's built on top of a mountain, and next to it is another mountain with another set of ruins, called Huayna Picchu. When you look at a typical photo of Machu-Picchu, it's the mountain in the background. Justin and I hiked to the top of it, and it was incredible. The hike to the top was about 43 minutes, and I can chock it all up to good training. It felt great to be active again, especially at altitude. I'm real proud of Justin for hiking up with me. Between that hike and the mountain biking I did the other day, I'm feeling pretty happy. See, what I miss most about home is clean bathrooms and adventure racing...we're actually doing pretty well in the bathroom department here in Cusco, and I'll keep training when I can for the adventure racing. Everyone is doing well, and we're leaving for Puno and Bolivia tomorrow morning. (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.

Logbook for January 13th, Day 74
Start: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Finish: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Mileage: 000
Notes: This day was a great day for just relaxing. The weather is overcast, and we even heard some thunder late in the afternoon. Last night, we were hit with a few rain showers, and it gave the city a nice clean feeling. Many of us slept in late today because of sparse sleep last night. The clubs were hopping, and the crew who went to see the shaman didn't sleep enough. Colin, Nick, Chanda, and I went to the hotel's sauna, and then I had my hair trimmed and got a pedicure. It was nice to pamper myself for a change. I feel like a girl! Tonight will be an early-to-bed night, because we have to rise at 0500 to meet our train to Machu Pichu. (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.

[Above: An example of the classic Incan stonework in Cusco (read on for details!).]

Journal by Neil Dana

Cusco!!!!.................... I really need you to realize how amazing Cusco is, so take a moment and say ............................."Cusco" ........................... Alright, now I know you probably didn't really clear your mind yet and say Cusco, so try it one more time and say................................."Cusco".....................................!!! Okay, now you have to make a promise to yourself that you will come a visit Cusco, Peru sometime in your life.

Cusco is the most beautiful city I have visited on our trip. Cusco is a town completely blanketed with Spanish red tile roofs and sits on top of ancient Incan ruins. The buildings in the Plaza de Armas have the old Incan foundations still intact. In fact, when you walk a block out of the plaza into San Blas, a subsection of Cusco, you see some of the most amazing Incan walls in Peru. The stones are cut to fit each other so perfectly that there was no mold required to hold the buildings in tact. On one specific street I saw, one side of the street has an Incan infrastructure, and on the other, Spanish infrastructure. The difference is quite remarkable. The corners of the buildings have stones that were smoothed out to make the round corner of the building. These are immense stones too, I cant' imagine how long it must have taken to build such magnificence.

Another interesting structural fact that Incans knew about were earthquakes. When you look at these walls of huge stones, you realize that the very bottom of the building, the first two rows, are made up of much smaller stones and are not fit perfectly. This was to allow for movement in the building during an earthquake. They also build doorways out of stone that were shaped like a trapezoid, and this was for strength as well. It is no wonder why the foundations are still used today. I wish you could be here to experience Cusco, it is truly amazing. But I know you are already making plans.

Another wonderful thing about Cusco is the people. The people of Peru, especially out here in the mountains are so friendly. It is really nice to see. You really see it when you step outside of Cusco into the surrounding smaller towns. It is much more serene. However, within Cusco, all you need to do is walk a few blocks up the hill into San Blas and you will enter the most tranquil setting. There are houses and little shops and restaurants, which all move at a very slow pace and you feel very relaxed. It is quite different then the Plaza de Armas in the center of Cusco.

The Plaza de Armas is beautiful and has two cathedrals and is lined with all kinds of shops and moneychangers and restaurants. However, it is also filled with too many little kids running around trying to sell you something every minute of the day. That really is the only aspect of Cusco that is annoying. At night, it changes to little kids trying to drag you into all the bars. Cusco has an amazing nightlife, which roars until sunrise every night of the week. There is something for everyone in Cusco.

Today, we walked up through the town of San Blas, which truthfully is as powerful and breathtaking as going to see Incan ruins in the parks. The structures are the same, and seeing those stones just mesmerizes me. Anyway, we walked all the way up the hill towards the Christo Blanco, which is a statue of the White Christ, and sits atop the hill on the outskirts of Cusco. From the top you can see all of Cusco and it is an unreal view. To see all the red roofs surrounding the Plaza de Armas is spectacular.

Also, right behind J.C. are the ruins of Sacsahuayaman, almost pronounced, "sexy woman." These are very impressive ruins and you can just walk there from Cusco. Some of the stones, or boulders, used here are HUMUNGOUS!!! They are literally 20 feet high and 10 feet wide. It is difficult to fathom how they moved these stones into place. It is amazing and sad at the same time. In order to build such magnificent cities, there had to be an equally immense slave, or peasant force at work.

These ruins are one of the many other ruins you can visit near Cusco. Of course there is Machu Picchu, which you must do as well. And hiking the Inca Trail to get to Machu Picchu is one of the greatest things I have ever done, so make sure when you do come here, you do that also. You could spend many months or years even around Cusco and visit lesser-known ruins and go on incredible hikes and adventures.

Another reason you could stay here so long is the food is delicious and inexpensive. We ate at our favorite place again today, which has a great deal. For less than 2 dollars, you get your choice of cream of spinach, or asparagus, or pumpkin, etc. etc. etc. And before you get your soup, you get some juice or tea, and also some garlic bread. Now for the main course, you can choose either pizza, pasta, Peruvian style chicken or beef dishes, or fish, or many other great tasting dishes. My favorite is the Peruvian olive pizza, wow, those olives are delectable. After you have eaten all this food, you also get a dessert, usually some fresh bananas with honey, mmmn, mmmn. And all this for less than 2 dollars. It is awesome.

Well, Cusco has a million things to offer, and there are too many small details to spend all my time writing about, I rather go outside and experience them, so I will leave you with this........Come to Cusco. You will never regret it.

Neil Dana
neil@drivearoundtheworld.com

Logbook for January 12th, Day 73
Start: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Finish: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Mileage: 000
Notes: Today we had day off after having worked hard on sponsorship materials for the past few days. Most of us just puttered about town doing our own thing. Justin and I experienced som Thai cuisine at a local restaurant in town. It was actually pretty good. Later, most of the gang went out on the town and hit a few of the favorite local clubs. Nick, Chanda, and Todd paid a visit to a Shaman and had an overnighter at the Shaman's facility. I think maybe you'll get to hear about their experiences in a future journal entry. On Wednesday, we're getting up at 0500 to take a train to Machu Picchu. Woohoo! Tomorrow is basically another day off. (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.

[Above: Todd "Chipper" Borgie works on removing a boulder from a mountain road not far from Cusco.]

Journal by Chanda Baggarly

Boulders blocking Indian village access roads are no match for the Drive Around the World recovery vehicles.

The LONGITUDE Expedition makes use of four Certified Land Rover Discovery Series II vehicles with each vehicle playing a distinct role. Vehicle D1 ('D' being short for Discovery) serves a technological purpose. It's a base for technology items such as, satellite phones, HAM radios, and laptops (provided by Seagate). The laptops are running a fascinating piece of navigation software made by Keyhole software, called EarthViewer Pro. D1 also includes a wireless router that allows team laptops to communicate in camp and even while the convoy is moving. D1 is also responsible for charging batteries for computers, cameras, and radios. All of the technology is powered by three Optima batteries, separated with Sure Power battery separators and a 1000-watt inverter provides 110 watts of power for hours.

Vehicle D2 is manned by the documentary crew of Flip Flop Productions -- Adam Burgess, Neil Dana, and Colin McAuliffe -- and holds the film crew's cameras, lenses, filters, lights, and tape stock. Vehicle D3, piloted by Nancy Olson and Todd Borgie, is the chuck wagon. It holds food and water provisions for two weeks as well as everything needed to make and break camp. Finally, vehicle D4, driven by Justin Mounts and Rolf Potts, holds spare parts, tools, and the main medical kit provided by Adventure Medical Kits (the other vehicles have smaller med kits). While all vehicles are equipped with ARB bumpers and Warn winches, D3 & D4 also server as recovery vehicles. They are equipped with extra gear such as Extreme Outback recovery equipment, compressors, shovels and other tools to dig the team out of stuck situations. Whenever we split up, the rule is one recovery vehicle must remain with each group. Today we needed our recovery vehicle.

Nick and Nancy recc’ed some trails earlier today and came back to fetch the rest of the team, wearing ear-to-ear grins. They had found a good trail to take sponsor pictures so we all piled into our vehicles and drove thirty minutes southeast of Cusco into a nearby canyon. On the way we drove through two Indian villages and through some pretty deep mud bogs too. All vehicles made it through, as always, without a hitch.

Passing through one village, we looked down from the hillside and spotted a football game going on. As we passed the field, people waved and yelled "buenas dias," reinforcing the notion I already had; people in Peru are very friendly.

The road quickly turned to dirt and we continued to snake back into the canyon, taking great care as we drove along the ridge. To our left was a steep drop down the canyon to a rushing creek below. At times, the road narrowed and was barely passable. I call these roads, 'two-handers' because you're wise to keep two hands on the wheel at all times with priorities being to watch the road first and scenery, second. The scenery was indeed breathtaking. Small mountains with neatly kept crops growing on the hillsides, distant views and a sporadic bright red-orange poppy to break up the greenery. Some of our best sights and experiences with nature and local people occur while driving on these back roads. I kept thinking, I know we'll make it back here again some day.

Eventually vehicle D3, came around a bend and discovered a large boulder blocking the road. The boulder was the result of a small landslide and there was no easy way around the obstacle. I suppose one of these small to mid-size road vehicles could make it around but one false move to the left and it's creek-city, bent metal, and certain death. Being members of Tread Lightly! we figured we could use the opportunity to clear the road for these people and get in a bit of winching practice to boot. We're light on this sort of training and Nick says the roads in Indonesia and Russia will demand that we have these techniques down. Nick and Nancy took turns spotting one of the vehicles around the boulder with some excellent shovel work by Todd, 'Chipper' Borgie to reduce the size of the big rock. Once around we placed an Extreme Outback recovery strap around the rock, and connected the Warn winch using a heavy-duty snatch block. Our team and friends retreated to higher ground while Nick took the wheel of D3 and Nancy operated the winch remote. After some movement it became apparent that the boulder's center of gravity wouldn't accept a straight pull in the desired direction. In fact, if we continued the tug the boulder would fall smack dab in the middle of the road, trapping our vehicle. A plan B was necessary so we snapped some great pictures for our sponsors and hung up the winch; The solution was a great one. It used the team's might and the intellect of our new friends. Noticing that we were re-evaluating the object, the Indians headed up the road and returned with several long logs. Using smaller rocks as fulcrums, the logs were used to lever the boulder up a bit, allowing us to place a rock underneath. This technique was repeated over and over until the boulder was tilted up on it's side. Finally, our team and the Indians leaned in together and moved the big rock off to the side. The road had been cleared but, more importantly perhaps was the lesson this little exercise had brought. Tomorrow we will visit Machu Picchu, home of the ancient Incan civilization over 500 years ago. I can't help but think that we will have a new appreciation for its construction after our little rock-moving incident.

Chanda
chanda@drivearoundtheworld.com

Logbook for January 11th, Day 72
Start: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Finish: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Mileage: 035
Notes: Today we had an evening photo shoot in the hills of Peru. Nick and I went out in the morning with a shoddy map of the area. Our plan was to find a dirt road, explore it, and decide if it would provide the sort of landscape we'd need to take some photos for our sponsors. Nick and I had a blast driving through a quaint and happy little village, past pigs and goats and sheep, past a town soccer game, past the farmers working in their fields, and past giant mud pits and children playing. We ended up on a bunch of switchbacks leading up a mountain along a fast-flowing stream. It was perfect for a photo shoot. We returned with the whole team, our four Certified, Pre-Owned Land Rovers causing quite a stir in the tiny little village. We found a road which had been blocked by a huge boulder, and we used our WARN winch, our Extreme Outback recovery equipment, and a lot of elbow grease to help a few of the local men remove the boulder from the road. It felt great being able to clear a road and help the village, and we got our sponsorship photos, too. I even got to ride my Santa Cruz most of the way home along the winding switchbacks. We're having a great time here in Cusco, and we get to go to Machu Pichu, Titicaca, and Bolivia in the next few days. (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.

[Above: Statues in the old colonial city wall of Cusco, where we were based while taking sponsor photos in the surrounding countrside.]

Journal by Justin Mounts

Do you ever spend time wondering about how you are perceived by others around you? If you’re like me, chances are you do. First impressions can often swing the balance of an encounter from being a good experience or a bad one. There are many times and situations on the expedition that make me sit back and wonder how the people we interact with feel about our presence in their country. While it is true that we are traveling the world for 9 months with a balance of altruism and exploration, at the end of the day we always have an equal potential to be perceived as an ugly 9-headed American monster rolling into town as we do a friendly group of volunteers that are trying to broaden our horizons and make new friends. It is a fulltime job balancing curiosity and exploration with intrusion and perceived mayhem.

Who are we in the eyes of the people we meet? This is always a good question, but one that doesn’t always have a good answer…

The last few days of the expedition have been spent in Cusco, Peru tending to our business responsibilities, including maintaining our sponsor relationships. Today we are loading up the team to scout out a photo shoot location to take advantage of the incredible scenery around Cusco and Machu Picchu. Our goals are simple—find a location and shoot as many photos as we can. As we drove out of Cusco, we came back to a long valley full of small buildings, farms, and lush green pastures. Quite simply, one of the most breathtaking sights we’ve seen so far. We found a small road leading toward a cluster of buildings on a local farm, and we pulled up to the main building to ask the farmer if it was all right for us to use a small section of his land for our photos. As he approached the lead car, he had an expression of curiosity mixed with confusion. By the time he walked far enough to see all four Land Rovers lined up, his expression changed to complete and utter bewilderment. Neil, our best Spanish speaker, leaned out of the rear window of his vehicle, introduced himself, and began to explain the situation to the man. The man, very polite and friendly, said he was pleased to meet us, but apologized that he didn’t feel his land would work for our purposes. Apparently, the short stretch of land we drove across to talk to him was about the only area accessible for photos. He recommended that we continue to the northeast to a road that would lead us further into the valley and to an area that he assured us was much more beautiful than his patch of land.

Excited by this suggestion, we headed back out to the road and continued on our way. While we never found the exact road the farmer mentioned, we did find another road that took us off toward a small village and a tiny plateau that was perfect for our needs. As we completed setting up the vehicles and gear for the photos, a few people approached us from the village, including a diminutive old man, who was very friendly and greeted us each with a hug and kind words. Our understanding was that this was his land, and he was happy to let us use it for photo purposes. As all this was going on, a small crowd of people from the village walked over and sat down on a ridge to witness the gringos locos (crazy gringos) who rolled into town. For the record, none of us really knew what the old man said or even what language he was speaking. We know it wasn’t Spanish or Quechan, and the other villagers laughed to themselves as he made the rounds hugging us. I think he was drunk. Regardless, as a village elder, we paid him the utmost respect. And I don’t want to give you the wrong impression—he was a hell of a nice man. He probably had no idea what we were saying to him and probably not much of an idea as to what we were doing on his land, but he welcomed us with open arms—literally.

As we began to take our photos, the crowd continued to grow, now including approximately a dozen adults and nearly twice as many kids—all sitting on the ridge, quietly observing us in their natural habitat. I noticed that there was one woman and a child who stood separate from the group of villagers. At no time did they approach us or the other group of people and at no time did the other group of people approach them. Given how friendly this group of villagers was, it seemed very odd to me that there was absolutely no interaction with this lone woman and her son. When we asked why she was more or less being avoided, the villages responded simply, “She’s from another village.” In not so many words, there is a clan mentality that exists among many villages in Latin America. So, while people from many clans or villages may be near each other, they do not interact with each other. Period.

As dusk rapidly closed in around us and the temperature began to drop, the villagers began to disperse. However, in exchange for coming into their village for our photos, we had supplied all, both young and old, with Red Bull drinks and miniature Hella keychain lights. Normally, I am not completely comfortable with brief interactions like this with the indiguenas (indigenous people) simply because it seems inappropriate under any context to roll into town, take photos of people, hand them a small gift, then load up and leave. Interactions like this bring me back to my original question, “Who are we?” As global travelers, “How audacious we are?” Do our interactions with people alienate them from future travelers with as much ease as this group of Peruvians alienate a woman and child from another village?

Living in the San Francisco area, I have interacted with more than my share of tourists. Some are good. Some are bad. On the flip side, when you are the visitor, you will always encounter people who hate tourists or who are begging for money, or who just do things that annoy you. These experiences can sour the overall joy you get from traveling if you let it get to you. But being conscious of how that first interaction goes is key. Most people that we meet are friendly and care about who we are and what we are doing. The same way we care about not intruding too much in their lives. The same way that we have no desire to cause problems anywhere we go, and that we are driven largely by curiosity. Not only are we curious about the towns we visit, but also we are genuinely interested in the people who live there. Through each interaction, I continue to make new friends.

So, where does that leave me—still searching for the answer to my question, I guess. I am finding that sometimes the more we ask a question, the less we have a chance to actually find the answer. But I do know when I watched the children of the village walk home arm in arm lighting the way with their key chain lights, they looked like fireflies disappearing into the night, and it was probably an encounter they will remember for the rest of their lives. Just like I will.

Logbook for January 10th, Day 71
Start: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Finish: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Mileage: 040
Notes: Today we had an evening photo shoot to get some good shots of our team for the companies who provided us with equipment, services, or monetary support. We drove out of town and found a nice grassy area near the dilapidated foundation of an old farmhouse. We set up the Hannibal Tents and pulled out all our equipment to simulate what it looks like when we are in camp. All the villagers came out to see what the crazy gringos were up to. Pretty soon, the entire village was there, including old men and very small children. We had a blast talking to them and showing them our stuff, and we even got several photos with them for sponsors such as Red Bull and Hella. Tomorrow we'll have one more photo shoot and then we'll take a trip to Machu Pichu! (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.

[Above: Central Cusco at night.]

Journal by Colin McAuliffe

Well, we're still here in Cuzco, and I must say I love this city. There's a strange spark to it that really gets me going. I've definitely seen my share of the nightlife here, but truthfully, I haven't really been out of six-block radius of our hotel and haven't done a tourisitic thing during the day because we've been working so hard on sponsorship stuff, but I look forward to my "dia libre" or freedom day when I can spend some time exploring the place. And of course, there's the famous Machu Picchu ruins which I have to visit. Looking forward to it, but also not, only because I know it will be mobbed with tourists and even I am sort of a tourist myself, seeing others of the sort at archeological places kind of ruins it for me. I'd like to feel like I just stumbled on these places in the jungle, but that just isn't going to happen on this trip. Anyway, we have to make a decision weather or not to go to Bolivia soon, and I'm kind of pushing against it because the country goes on strike and riots very soon and if we got caught in the middle of that it could be a bit peligroso (dangerous) although, it would make for great film. Personally, I'd rather head up to the Amazon and check it out. I love the jungle, moist air, never a silent moment, birds, bugs, cats, sloths, you name it.

Anyhow, back to the nightlife. I'm slowly learning to become a slightly better dancer, enjoying meringue, but not quite at the salsa level yet. Dancing here is so much more important than in America. Every Latin American person dances, twirls, spins, dips. Gringos are easy to spot on the dance floor goofily bouncing and shuffling around. I imagine myself being included in the group. Occasionally one or two will blend in properly, but the majority don't have it. Must be the Latin soul, born of rhythm and passion, or something like that. Before this journey I never really cared for dancing too much, the problem oftentimes being that I can't dance to music I don't like, now I really want to improve, not necessarily my bouncing around hip-hop bumpin' and grinding type stuff, but the graceful spinning and whatnot of the Latin dances. I think it comes from watching this one couple dance, I mean, they had a whole dance club mesmerized. spinning, twirling, flipping, you name it. The girl, tossed about like so many rag-dolls, continuously spinning, no awkward shuffling. That couple really danced. Now, I'm not saying I'm devoting my life to dancing, nor am I going to take classes or any of that, I'm just going to try a little harder. There's plenty of Latin America left and that means that I'll get plenty of practice. Not to mention the fact that dancing is a great way to meet girls. Anyway, time to head over for some work.

Colin
colin@drivearoundtheworld.com

Logbook for January 9th, Day 70
Start: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Finish: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Mileage: 000
Notes: Today we finished writing sponsorship testimonials and washed vehicles. Tomorrow we will shoot more than 480 photos to send to our various sponsors. It will be a busy day. When we are finished with the sponsorship tasks, we'll figure out our next adventure. While here in Cusco, we want to see Machu Pichu, and I'd like to do a bike tour. You can do anything here, from canopy tours, to river rafting, to city tours, to horseback riding. Cusco has it all. What a wonderful city. (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.

[Above: A bird's-eye view of the lovely city of Cusco]

Journal by Nancy Olson

We spent all day today diligently writing testimonials for each of our sponsors. We’re here in the beautiful city of Cusco, an oasis of sorts in my mind, surrounded by the mud of the tail end of Peru’s rainy season.

We drove in yesterday from Hostel Zuchara in Samborja, seemingly so remote and simple as to be completely disassociated from anything as modern as public transportation, HBO, and indoor plumbing. But as we were driving through this indescribably beautiful countryside, earthen dwellings suddenly shot up all around us, the mud houses becoming increasingly close together and the streets more and more well-groomed until we found ourselves in the middle of a town square sequestered amongst brilliant Spanish architecture in the form of a Cathedral, a government building, shops, and the Plaza de las Armas. It looks like a classical European scene, straight out of the glossy pages of the “Our World” resource book I cherished so much as a kid.

I cannot believe the size and beauty of this Peruvian gem. I would love to explore it, but there’s the task of preparing sponsorship deliverables looming, and that takes precedence. To say we’re holed up would be a bit misleading, for we’re actually reclining in the luxury of one of Cusco’s finest hotels, the Royal Inka. For the first time during the expedition, we have treated ourselves to fancy accommodations. The Hotel Royal Inka has given us a generously discounted rate of $40 per night, and we are three to a room. The staff is all smiles and hellos, and the rooms, including the bathrooms, are sparklingly clean. What I was missing most about home was toilet seats, warm water, and sanitary bathrooms, and we have been blessed with each here in Cusco. With the amount of work we have to do for our sponsorship project, and considering the importance of this task, it is only logical that we be comfortable. The room money, as always, comes out of the $10K we have each contributed to Drive Around the World and the LONGITUDE Expedition.

We are each divided into three teams of three, and each team is responsible for 20 sponsors. Team Two, consisting of Chanda, Justin, and Adam, nicknamed themselves the Flat Puppies; Team One of Rolf, Todd, and Colin, named themselves the Condors; and Team Three of Neil, Nick, and me are called the Pumas. Something about having a team name makes our work a little more fun. I spent all day writing three testimonials each for WARN, Rover Accessories, Extreme Outback, Bauer Vehicle Gear, Red Bull, Santa Cruz Mountain Bikes, and Sport Kilt, while the rest of the team worked on their respective sponsors. By dinnertime, most of the team had completed their writing assignments. Of course, being long-winded, I was one of the few who still hadn’t finished. I went to dinner anyway knowing that tomorrow will be another writing day.

Cusco is chock-full of inexpensive places to eat, and, like I said, the city is beautiful, but there is one detractor from its “enjoyability.” Cusco, and Peru in general, really, is home to tens of thousands of little kids, women, and teenagers selling everything from postcards, to shoe shines, to finger puppets, to silver jewelry. As soon as a tourist steps foot outside of his or her hotel, restaurant, or favorite club, he or she is swarmed by these relentless entrepreneurs. If I were the president of a company who employed salespeople, I would fly to Peru to hire these kids. They’re closers. They follow you around using every trick in the book to sell you one of their trinkets until you either give in, promise to buy later, or rudely ignore them.

“Mees, mees, where you from?”

“Los Estados Unidos.”

“Capitol Washington, President, Boosh. You want to buy a postcard? I have very good price for you.”

“I already have ten postcards.”

“You don’t have these. These very deeferent.”

“No, thanks.”

“Ok, maybe you want one of my puppets.”

“I have 38 of those. Seriously. All your friends have all of my money.”

“Buy one more from me. These are very deferent. You don’t have these one. You need pig.”

“I have the pig. I have ALL of them. You want to buy one? I’ll give you a very good price.”

Silence, and then, “You want me shine you shoes?”

“I’m wearing flip-flops.”

“Come on, mees, for my lunch.”

“We’re through. Bye-bye.”

“Mees! Please!”

Ugh! It is heartbreaking, but these kids will break you if you keep buying from them. And when you don’t buy from them or give them money, they call you and your mother every dirty word in the book. I have to continually remind myself that they are just kids, that this is the only life they know, and they are just trying to make a living. I’m so tired of denying little kids that I can hardly stand it. The street hustling is a huge problem and a huge detriment to Cusco and Peru in general. But Peru is still my favorite country so far. The people are friendly and interesting, warm and embracing. The countryside is endless green fields, livestock, mud-brick farmhouses, and mountains. I could live here for a year, no problem, but then I’d have to come home to my beloved U.S. of A.

Catch ya’ll later. I’m spent.

Nancy
Nancy@drivearoundtheworld.com

Logbook for January 8th, Day 69
Start: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Finish: Cusco, Peru
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Mileage: 000
Notes: The whole team is busy producing sponsorship deliverables. It's a daunting task, because it is ultra-important. We are preparing testimonials to send back to our 60 sponsors in order to update them on our status and to thank them for the use of their products and services. Bootsnall, who publishes this blog, is just one of the many great organizations that makes our expedition possible, and we want to pay back a little. If you like reading our journals, then let's hear it for Bootsnall! The weather here is beautiful. Cool and beautiful. This is a rare occassion in which we are actually staying in a swank hotel. We're very comfortably holed up in the Royal Inka, one of Cusco's finest hotels. They cut us a sweet deal on rooms. (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.

[Above: An Andean llama!]

Journal by Todd Borgie

It wasn’t an early wakeup call this morning. Although we had 660km to go before reaching Cuzco we had a number of team members that were quite sick. Nancy, in her competitive way had broken the fever record producing a new record of 102°F the day before. She woke only to drink some broth and fall back asleep. Chanda was part of the competition as well only peaking out just short of the record, and for the most part the rest of the team was either recovering or trying to come down with something, I sure hope my healthy streak holds out.

Anyway we got up as early as we thought was necessary, but as late as we could get away with, we finally had breakfast, packed up and were rolling out about 9:30 or 10:00am.

I loved the town of Nazca and it was a nice respite from the hard driving we had been doing for the past 3 days. It seemed to be a friendly town that hadn’t been jaded by its famous monuments nearby. The desert was amazing. I asked a couple of people along the way, what this Peruvian desert was called and most people looked at me strange. I thought it was my Spanish until I tried to look up this Peruvian desert in Encarta. I found one small article referencing the Sechura desert. The article had less to with the desert than with securing oil rights around it, hmmm. Everything I looked at described the boundaries of this place, but never really told me much about it. I was confused. I looked up the definition of a desert and found the following: Desert, term applied to regions of the earth that are characterized by less than 254 mm (10 in) of annual rainfall, an evaporation rate that exceeds precipitation, and, in most cases, a high average temperature. When I looked up Peru I found reference to a coastal plain that extended the length of the country varying in width from 40 to 100 miles. I also found that this region was an extension of the Atacama Desert in Chile, however, when is a desert a desert and when is it an extension? I guess I will have to do more work to solve this riddle, but it is kind of fun being confused like this. When I return I think I will look at geographical programs, as I am tremendously interested in this subject.

Anyway, as I mentioned earlier we hit the road. The roads snaked around through the dry canyons, rocks and sandy dirt, but not much plant life. We installed our new radios yesterday, so this canyon was a perfect place to try them. We had been used to our little hand held mobile radios, which were adequate for convoying, but very little else. They didn’t work over long distances, and it was sometimes very hard to hear what was being said. We were excited to see the range of the new ones, Nick said they would transmit over 5 miles, but I was the Doubting Thomas. Nancy and I pulled over to truly test the distance these radios would cover; we waited as the rest of the team went on ahead. As the minutes rolled by we talked to Nick and Chanda. Soon, two minutes turned into 6 minutes and the radios were perfectly clear. After 10 minutes of waiting, and still a perfectly clear signal, we decided to roll rather than check the maximum distance, besides we were in a canyon so our results would have been skewed anyway. These were cool radios, thanks to Day Wireless in San Jose.

We continued to snake our way up through the front of the Andes, up, up we traveled winding through more canyons. We climbed over 13,000ft; we drove into some precipitation and experienced a major vegetation change. We drove by a river, which is something we hadn’t seen in couple of days as well. Apparently on the west side of Peru there are 52 rivers heading west from the Andes mountains, however, due to the dryness of these mountains only 10 of these reach the Pacific ocean without drying up. Now over the summit we saw a lot of short grass, small brush, and an occasional tree. However, this leads me to another question. The trees I saw were mostly Eucalyptus trees, which are exotics, and I saw a few conifers as well. All of these trees seemed like they were introduced, so I wondered what the native tree life was like here. Was this area massively deforested, or did very few trees grow here? At what elevation is tree line? Another question of mine that remains unanswered, I will get to the bottom of it soon.

We pulled into the small town of Puquio for gas; at this point we were about 13,500ft. I was concerned at the altitude and the fact the people were not feeling well. If we continued on would we have to stay at a higher altitude? People can climb the 10,000ft in a day without too much problem, just headaches and shortness of breathe, but anything beyond that was a gamble. We had a lot of bronchial problems that would complicate any altitude adjustment. Cuzco was about 11,500ft but the Andes stood in our way and they were known for their height.

We tried to gain some insight from maps, but didn’t find very good information. We knew there were towns between here and Cuzco, but would they be at a lower elevation?
Local knowledge suggested the next town 200km away along windy roads was lower in elevation. We like to trust local knowledge, but often times these people had never been out their communities, and besides elevation would not be an issue to them, so why would they know about it?

The decision was made to get lunch in the town and drive on. We arrived at a restaurant just as a downpour commenced. After eating our fish, chicken, or soup we headed out in the rain. The drive continued to be beautiful as we drove at about 14,000 ft. With our new radios Nick, Chanda, Nancy and I played 20 questions and joked and talked as we rolled down the road. It was almost like we were all in the same car. It reminded us of being back at the office where we would banter back in forth. That reminds me to send a special thank you to Minitool, who provided us with the office. Without their help we would not have made it this far. As we travel we do think about the many people that have helped us along the way!

As we drove in and out of the clouds we actually saw flamingos fishing in a pond. Apparently flamingos color changes based on their diet, as these flamingos are white and the ones on the coast are pink, apparently form eating shrimp.

Darkness set in as we hit the peak and began to descend. I was relieved to see our altimeter slowly ticking down. It reached 9500 ft just before we pulled into our stopping point of Chaluanca. Only a couple of us made it up for dinner, as tomorrow was going to be an early day and many people had to rest.

Logbook for January 7th, Day 68
Start: Chalhuanca, Peru, 0800
N: 14* 17.704'
W: 73* 14.860''
Finish: Cusco, Peru, 1700
N: 13* 31.017'
W: 71* 58.835''
Mileage: 179
Notes: The whole team is coughing, but nobody has a fever, for now. The team continued across the Altoplano and completed their first crossing of the Andes. We are looking forward to exploring Cusco and exploring Machu Pichu. Before we can play, though, we have several days of work ahead of us here in Cusco. We are taking photos and writing testimonials for each of our sponsors. When we are finished with this critical task, we will play. The city of Cusco is the most beautiful we have visited. At an altitude of more than 11,000 feet, it's also the highest. The people with virus-affected lungs are finding it difficult to breath. That will get better with time as we acclimatize. (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.

[Above: A llama-like vicuna in the pampas wilderness as we drove into the Andes.]

Journal by Adam Burgess

We came into Peru on New Years Day, which offered a surprisingly easy border crossing. The roads and streets were rather quiet and the border was tranquilo. I was pretty damaged that night so going out to party wasn’t really an option. After taking a dose of CIPRO, the wonder drug of all drugs, it cleared up my guts by the next day. Now it seems that the rest of the crew has been attacked by some form of heavy flu; Neil was barely audible, shivering like a wet rat and going numb in the hands yesterday, apparently I’ve been immune because of the CIPRO. He seems better today, so its not typhoid or some other crazy jungle disease. Northern Peru is desert spotted with little cube houses of handmade sand colored bricks sometimes covered with a roof of either woven reed, adobe mud or -- sometimes -- no roof at all. It seems incredibly poor here, and people have little more than the occasional chicken, few goats and a pleasant demeanor. The sand dunes rise to the left and right of the highway with mountains of sand in the distance. It reminds me of images of the moon, or the Sahara. Our destination is Cusco, to see Macchu Picchu, and we decided to take this bleak road instead of the beautiful mountain roads to the east in order to make up time.

Yesterday was one of those days where very little happened but we accomplished a lot. The day before we spent in Nazca to see the Nazca Lines. Over a thousand years ago, someone drew massive images of monkeys, trapezoids, spiders and an alien. Massive is an understatement, as some figures are hundreds of meters in size. It’s a big mystery as to why and how they drew these images only visible from the sky in the desert soil. I’d try to explain them, but you really have to see for yourself. Before I knew it Neil and I were off to investigate for ourselves. The 1952 motor sputtered a few times and then warmed up a little, crammed shoulder to shoulder like a British sports car, four of us were motoring down the runway in the classic Cessna. I was determined to get some aerial footage of the images combined with the Land Rovers in convoy, so we hired a pilot to take us up. I had the pilot remove the passenger window so I’d be able to shove the camera out at 70mph but as I leaned out the hole as we buzzed down the runway I realized that the consequence would come from the two black oversized kazoos attached to the side of the plane just in front of the window. Exhaust pipes, loud. I was so busy filming Neil squashed in the back seat introducing the camera to what we were doing that I failed to notice we were already 90 feet off the ground. I’m so used to the minute-long rocket launch of jumbo jets that floating up in 10 seconds felt effortless. We buzzed up pretty high and there they were all across the desert for as far as the eye could see, the Nazca Lines. Archeologist Maria Raiche spent her entire life analyzing them, caring for them and offering theories of origin. For decades she swept them with a broom, she went through hundreds of brooms in her lifetime before she recently died of Parkinson’s in her 80’s. It was no surprise then when the pilot appeared confused that I showed little interest in flying circles around the images and insisted that he follow the three white Land Rovers driving in convoy on the nearby Pan-American Highway. As I leaned out the window the rush of wind sucked my contacts out, filled my eye sockets with air and my left cheek inflated. This carried on for a while as we crisscrossed the highway for 15 minutes. I managed to get a few good shots of the crew driving down below and then we headed back.

A sense of guilt sometimes smothers me as we travel. I wonder what I did to deserve the position behind the wheel of a $40,000 car instead of that of the man farming small cactus plants on a rocky plot next to the highway or the woman weaving sheets of thatch in the desert outskirts of Lima. We just pop out anywhere in this world and make the best of it; I suppose that’s what I did to get myself behind the wheel, and that’s what they are doing in the dunes where it never rains. But the eyes continue to stare as 4 identical cars barrel through their little village or homestead. Some wave with excitement; others are stopped in their tracks; but one smile and a thumbs-up gets the crowd going. Almost immediately the children are jumping around and the woman weaving thatch breaks out into a sun-damaged smile. Their smiles only add to my guilt and I begin to wonder why so many people are obsessed with repeated participation in driving expeditions. I’ve come up with one possibility. We are addicted to the immediate celebrity status it appears to offer. Instant fans line the road calling out in excitement, yelling “Ingleterra!” or “Camel Trophy!” often confusing us with Brits or Germans. Months of this special treatment is something we've never experienced at home.

So we kept driving east towards Cuzco. In 2 hours we climbed from an altitude of 1500 feet to 15,000. The cars pushed rather effortlessly up into the Andes, offering a drastic change in climate. As we crested the range, the GPS dithered between 14,900 and 15,000 feet. There was little up there but shrubs and funky little llama-like creatures, called vicunas. We filmed them for a bit and they shrieked out and scrambled off into the chaparral.

The altitude has definitely had an effect on us. Breathing is a new challenge; you feel it up here, climb a few steps or run to set up a tripod and your panting like a smoker. To make it worse. I have a blocked nose that at times makes me feel like I’ll suffocate at any given moment.

As I’ve told everyone a hundred times, losing my sense of smell in a car accident 10 years ago has changed my life for the better, and driving to Cuzco proved this once again. Altitude and other ailments left Colin with a case of sulfurous burps. In our vehicle, Colin belched constantly, and Neil would scream out in disgust. Apparently they carried the stench of rotten eggs and could be smelled outside from 12 feet away. Other than that not a lot happened -- just long hours of driving through beautiful highlands.

Logbook for January 6th, Day 67
Start: Nazca, Peru, 1000
N: 14* 49.752'
W: 74* 56.542''
Finish: Chalhuanca, Peru, 2000
N: 14* 17.704'
W: 73* 14.860''
Mileage: 195
Notes: Nancy and Chanda are still fairly out of commission, but without fever. The team traveled along mountainous switchbacks to inland Peru and crossed the Altiplano. Peak elevation for the day was just over 15,000 feet. The team saw local wildlife, including vicuñas and flamingos. The temperature at that altitude dropped to a low of 38 degrees F. Driving was slow and winding, but really, really fun. (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.

[Above: Adam Burgess films as Todd Borgie prepares to enter the Cessna airplane that took them over the lines of Nazca; below, an aerial view of the DATW Land Rovers near the Nazca Lines.]

Journal by Neil Dana

It's not everyday you get to feel your cheeks swish from side to side and open your eyes wide as your stomach tries to escape, up and out of your body! Well, maybe if you are a crab on Isla Grande. But for us humans, riding in a 1952, 4-seater, 170 Cessna airplane, zooming around tight turns looking at figures etched into the earth while you are completely sideways in a plane, is quite a feeling!!

We are in Nazca, a town in Peru, which got its name from the Nazcan culture, which pre-existed the Incas by a thousand years or so. The Nazcans were around from 300 BC to about 700 AD. What they left behind is still a mystery to everyone around. They are called the Nazca Lines. And these are no ordinary lines! These are lines that were etched into the desert floor here a couple thousand years ago and still remain in tact to this day. These lines are spread throughout the area, and comprise different figures, some of which are a mile in radius.

The Nazcans dug about 60cm deep into the ground, to form these designs. Some of the designs, which can only be recognized from air, are a monkey, a condor, an alien etched in a mountainside, a snake, a spider, and many other interesting and significant drawings. Imagine seeing a monkey etched into the ground from thousands of feet in the air, and it still looks huge from there! It is truly mind-boggling.

And what makes it really mind boggling about the phenomenon that everyday, these strange winds come into the valley, and in a circular, almost tornado like fashion, they swoop up into the air and away, any debris or dust that would cover up the designs. For thousands of years, thousands......these figures have remained etched into the Peruvian landscape. Why?

Well, the answer to that has many different theories, but no concrete solution. It is still a mystery. In fact it is still a mystery as to how they did it, and why they did it, or if they did it, maybe aliens did it? How could they figure out the correct angles and lengths and dimensions if they couldn't see the figures from the sky? Maybe they could see it from the sky -- there are some theories that they were able to create some sort of hot air balloon to see them! They have found evidence that supported that argument as well. But why? To say hi to aliens, to pray to their gods, or because they were bored, or what? Many scientists have tackled this one, yet no one knows.

Todd Borgie, our team member seemed to come up with the most reasonable solution to the beginning of the mystery.......how did they figure out the lines etched into the ground would last forever? Hmmm. Well, of course, any normal person would understand that it was due to a woman! Some heartbroken guy must have been devastated and etched his ex-girlfriend's name or face in the ground, and of course, when he was cruising around 50 years later with his wife and kids, and stumbled across a perfect image of his ex-girlfriend, he must have been horrified! But at the same time, bewildered, he must have shared this information with the King -- and hence, the immense project of developing the Nazca Lines. There can be no other solution. Thank you Mr. Borgie.

So anyway, enough of mysteries and histories, how about our day! Adam, Todd, and I ended up in a small plane, the Cessna described earlier, piloted by Stephen, also a surfer and avid motorcycle rider, so riding around in his plane was a blast.

Nick, Chanda, and Colin came with us as well in our vehicles. We had a mission to accomplish this morning. Not only were we going to see the Nazca Lines, we were also going to get some aerial footage on video and camera of our expedition vehicles. So those three needed to drive the vehicles out onto a road and coordinate timing with us as we zoomed in from above and filmed them out in the desert.

It was quite a ride. With the side window taken off the plane, our cheeks never held the same shape the entire voyage, especially when trying to poke our heads out with a camera! We looked like dogs cruising around in the passenger window of cars, and as wide-eyed and happy too! We ended up flying for 35 minutes and seeing some of the Nazca Lines and filming our vehicles. Our communication with the vehicles from the air was a bit of a mess, with all the static and interference: "psshshshshsshpshsh… HERE WE COME… spspsshspspshshpshs… FASTER… pshddsfsfsfh… sfshfhshhhsssshd… hfhdhfshdhfshhfdf… TURN AROUND… pshshsspshs… phphsshshhssp… shspshpshshs..." -- that was about all that was understood! Fortunately, it was all that was needed, and we accomplished our goals. It was a sunny and beautiful morning, and we were done by around 9:15 a.m.

I remember the time well because our team is very sick right now and we needed to get back to the hotel and rest. I just got finished with a 102 degree fever, and a left hand that literally was in extreme pain and couldn't be used for a day, however now I am feeling better, just a nasty cough won't go away. And now Chanda and Nancy are sick too, in fact, Nancy has a higher fever than me, so she is really feeling awful right now, poor thing. Todd is the only one on our team who did not get sick in the last week. Hmmmm. Maybe that is why he knows the mystery of the Nazcans, and doesn't get sick? Yep, I thought so, Todd is an alien.

So here I am, sitting in a small restaurant in Nazca, with the occasional child staring at my computer in amazement, writing this journal, drinking tea. I just woke up from sleeping a few hours, and figured, since we have designated this day to rest, I might as well get this log online today! Now how is that for live updates. You have to thank Rolf for that, he is the man!!! [Editor's note: No, Neil, you the man for writing this so fast!]

Tomorrow, we head towards Cusco, and wow, that is going to be fantastic! The Incan ruins are the most spiritual and amazing sights and places I have ever visited in my life. Yes, I have been here before, in fact I have flown to see the Nazca Lines before, not like today though. But I am excited to go back to Machu Picchu and many of the other amazing historical wonders that await our eager souls.

Neil Dana
neil@drivearoundtheworld.com

Logbook for January 4th, Day 65
Start: South of Huarmey, Peru, 0800
N: 10* 20.036'
W: 78* 03.265''
Finish: Nazca, Peru, 2130
N: 14* 49.752'
W: 74* 56.542''
Mileage: 407
Notes: Team continued through Peru toward Nazca. Along the way, we visited Pisca to sample Peru´s National Drink, a tequila-like brew made from fermented grapes and named after the town. Nancy is sick with fever and headache. (N.O.)

Logbook for January 5th, Day 66
Start: Nazca, Peru, 0645
N: 14* 49.752'
W: 74* 56.542''
Finish: Nazca, Peru, 1800
N: 14* 49.752'
W: 74* 56.542''
Mileage: 050
Notes: Nancy has a headache and a fever of 102.3, and Chanda, too, is very sick. The team has decided to remain at the comfortable hostel to encourage them to get well. Healthy teammembers chartered plane rides to get an areal view of the mysterious Nazca Lines, and other teammembers drove the vehicles near them for a photo shoot. So far, this vicious virus has attacked 8 team members. Nancy is the winner for the highest temperature. (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.

[Above: Four Drive Around the World Land Rovers are parked for the night along the desert landscape of the Peruvian coast south of Huarmey.]

Journal by Justin Mounts

Sometimes when you’re traveling, you find yourself stuck in the middle of nowhere. Today is the 64th day of the Longitude Expedition. Our route today takes us from Puerto Chicama on the western coast down near Lima, the capital city. We are in the middle of a long series of driving days through Peru in order to explore the town of Cuzco and then proceed over to the majestic pyramids in Machu Picchu. Peru is an interesting country for a number of reasons. First, it is the 3rd largest country in South America, and it is roughly twice the size of the state of Texas. Second, it is contained entirely within the tropics. Third, I’ve seen sights here that were absent in other countries. And the last reason is that Peru is nothing like I had imagined.

We are driving through the desert. That’s right, the desert. Never mind the fact that as I just mentioned Peru is located entirely in the tropics, and every mental image you have of the tropics makes you think of thick rain forests filled with vines and sweat and wild animals that you can only see in the zoo or on TV. There’s no doubt about it, we’re in the middle of the desert. This barren, parched stretch of earth is smashed down right in between the Andes Mountains and some of the most beautiful coastline in the world. And it feels like the middle of nowhere. This stretch of desert is so barren and yet visually captivating; Rolf compared to both the Gobi Desert in Mongolia and the Libyan Desert in western Egypt.

We started this morning with a film excursion through part of the desert down to a beautiful little beach tucked into a cove. The morning air was salty and the sky was a hazy blue. Two tanned fishermen were wading into the water with nets trying to make their catch for the day. In the distance, there were two-dozen boats jockeying for the best fishing position in the bay. We were tempted to remain here for a while, but as we watched the men loading up their fish into nets they had attached to a pole for carrying the fish into town, we were reminded that we had a long day ahead of us, too.

We stopped for a quick breakfast right inside the town of Puerto Chicama. It was the usual fare for this part of the country: runny fried eggs, plain white rice, a smattering of grayish-brown beans, and a piece or two from a yucca tree. While desayuno (breakfast) was being prepared, I went for a walk around the block. The town itself is a dirty, reportedly high-crime area visited by both native and foreign tourists alike to experience the beach and what is reported as the world’s longest left-break for surfing fanatics. However, my impression is that it is primarily a fishing town and that more tourists visit the centro turista of Mancora to the north. It could also be that the waves were only about 4 inches high today.

For the most part, I found Puerto Chicama very representative of most of the small towns in Peru. The houses are small and very modest. They are built with cinderblock or thatch walls, even mud occasionally, and they have tin or reed-like roofs. While there are beaches fairly near these towns, most of the inhabitants don’t have transportation available to them, except for bicycles, taxis, or buses. From what I can tell, most buses don’t go to the beach, a taxi to the beach would probably be too expensive, and it’s just not very feasible to put the whole family on a bicycle to go to the beach, although I believe many Peruvians may try on a nice enough day.

We are without a doubt in the middle of nowhere. So I think.

But over one half of Peru’s 27 million inhabitants live in this narrow stretch of desert in the middle of nowhere. That’s roughly equal to the population of California or Canada. This band of sand dunes and rocky hills that I perceived as uninhabitable also contains Peru’s three major cities. I suppose it’s no different than living in parts of Arizona, Nevada, or New Mexico, but when your mental image of a country is so different from what you encounter, it takes the brain a while to adjust.

While I waiting for breakfast to be served, I sat down on the side of the road and I began to ponder the concept of “the middle of nowhere” For many of these people in most of these towns, this is all they have ever known. They may or may not have dreams of travel or a different life, but the reality is for most of these people, this is not “nowhere,” this is home. Generations of Peruvians will be born, grow up, work, live, love, marry, grow old, and die here. From the cheerful woman selling fresh bread; to the dark-skinned, leathery-faced, wrinkled old woman walking along-side the road carrying a bundle of sticks that must weigh 4 times her body weight; to the myriad of young and old men who drive three-wheeled motorcycle taxis like kamikaze pilots -- this place that I would call the middle of nowhere is their entire world.

And you know what? They all seem pretty happy about it, too. As we pull through towns, Peruvians whistle and wave at us, genuinely pleased to see us driving by. As we stop to get gas or eat a meal, everyone asks questions and gives us a thumbs-up to our expedition. I finished my breakfast and decided to spend more time thinking about this.

We continued with the day’s drive and the sights of Peru constantly whizzed by me: first, the small wooden crosses along the side of the road marking memories of loved ones. Then, old trucks loaded to three times their height with branches -- the beds of all of them looking ready to burst at the seams as they slowly moved along their daily routine of climbing hills and belching exhaust fumes. Then, a unique sight along the road interrupted my thoughts. I had read in one of our Lonely Planet guidebooks that it is a common sight in Peru to see men urinating in public. In fact, it’s not that strange for women to urinate in public. To be perfectly frank, along the highways, we have even found it necessary at times to pull over on the side of the road to let nature take its course. However, we were driving behind one of the three-wheeled motorcycle taxis when we noticed that its passenger needed to relieve himself -- while it continued on its way down the road. I guess when you have to go, you have to go.

Our day ended on a beach south of the coastal town of Huarmey. As I hiked around searching for sea urchins, starfish, shells, and investigating the bones of dead animals, my thoughts returned to my morning musings. Perhaps it’s just our lack of perspective or first-hand experience that prevents us from seeing past what’s right in front of our faces. “This isn’t the middle of nowhere,” I thought as the sun slipped beyond the horizon. This is the middle of everywhere. So, the next time you find yourself thinking, “Man, I am really in the middle of nowhere,” take a minute to ask yourself, “Is that really the case?”

Justin
Justin@drivearoundtheworld.com

Logbook for January 2nd, Day 63
Start: Mancora, Peru, 0700
N: 04* 06.543'
W: 81* 03.571''
Finish: Puerto Chicama, Peru, 2015
N: 07* 42.276'
W: 79* 26.627''
Mileage: 327
Notes: The team continued south through Peru, crossing the Desierto de Sechura. The scenery is amazing. Just when I thought we were running out of sand, Peru pulled through with the mother-load! The team continues to battle cold-flu symptoms. Neil is pretty bad off, with a fever of 101.9 F. He can hardly move, poor guy. We made a pit stop in a random town today to witness the random site of lions in a cage. They were on their way to a circus. (N.O.)

Logbook for January 3rd, Day 64
Start: Puerto Chicama, Peru, 0815
N: 07* 42.276'
W: 79* 26.627''
Finish: South of Huarmey, Peru, 1700
N: 10* 20.036'
W: 78* 03.265''
Mileage: 220
Notes: The team did a photo shoot with the desert as a backdrop and then explored down a dirt road to some awesome beach areas near their hostel in Puerto Chicama. Nancy had time for a run AND a bike ride. The views of the ocean with the desert cliffs in the backfground were amazing. We continued south through the huge country of Peru, past the historic city of Chan Chan and past the Moche Pyramids. At about 4:30, Nick surprised us by knocking off early to find a suitable place to camp on the beach. This was the best campsite of the trip, and this was the best bike riding area of the entire expedition. I rode my Santa Cruz up and down super-steep dunes with my hair on fire. I'm feeling sick with a headache and stomachache (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.

[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.