From Anchorage to Ushuaia by Bike

After two false starts, we finally left Lima Monday morning. It took a little time to get out of the hostel where we’d been staying for so long. The staff watched us load up the bikes, impressed by all our gear. They gave us lots of advice about what to eat in the mountains, since lots of travelers get sick going through there. They also gave us a bag of coca plant leaves – it had been left by some Germans who wanted to take it home with them, but customs there would have confiscated it for sure! Here, they either chew the leaves like tobacco or brew it in a tea, called “mate.” The tea is an appetite suppressant and also gives you energy, and it is used to stay awake and help with altitude sickness. And of course, the staff wanted to take lots of pictures with the “loco” (crazy) French couple who are biking from Alaska to the Tierra del Fuego! With any luck they’ll put our pictures up on the hostel’s website!

On our way out of Lima we stopped at a bike store. Our bikes are holding up pretty well, but they do seem a little tired. One of our tires totally gave up the ghost, even though it had been in perfect condition. It’s hard on the bikes to be carrying all the extra weight. The manager saw us arrive and came out to shake our hands. We were impressed with his formal greeting – we’re not celebs, just regular people. We needed a chain and two spokes, just in case, since we were headed out of civilization. He gave us lots of good advice in terms of what to buy, and then gave us the spokes for free! Before we left, he wanted to take our picture with all the employees, and said he’d put it up by the cash!

Leaving Lima was dreadful. The collectivos – those mini buses – drive like they own the road and regularly squeezed us over to the side. We zigzagged all over the place, buffeted by the noise and the crush of other cars. We practically suffocated in all the exhaust fumes, and our throats were raw. We nearly wiped out a whole bunch of times when the drivers forced us off the road, yelling out “rapido, rapido!” It was only slightly uphill, but enough that we struggled, and made slow and painful progress.

10 km outside of Chosica we finally got out of the “garua”, the foggy cloud that blankets Lima and the surrounding area for 9 months of the year. We pulled up to a gas station and two police officers came out to talk to us and warn us about Peruvian muggers. We asked them about Chosica, where we were planning to spend the night. They drew us a map on a scrap of paper with the two best hostels that we should go to. We thanked them, and surprise, surprise, they wanted to take a picture with the “gringos”! It seems to be the pattern of Peruvian police to take pictures with all the cyclo-tourists that they meet. (Remember the border police who wanted their pictures taken with all the cyclists that went through!) We tried to get their email address to send them the picture, but they didn’t have one. Oh well, they said, at least we would have a reminder of them.

We continued on our way. The last 10 km weren’t really difficult, but we were feeling pretty tired. We figure that we were still feeling the after-effects of being sick.

Just as we were getting into Chosica (820 m high), we saw a biker pass us going the other direction, then turn around and pull up alongside us. His name was Fernando, and he told us that he had seen us earlier in the day when he was on the bus, just as Sara was being attacked by a dog and had to slam on the brakes to avoid getting bitten. Fernando is a national class cyclist, and is famous in Peru. He told us that he meets lots of cyclo-tourists, and that he invites them to stay with him at his parent’s house. He invited us there too, and after a bit of hesitation, we agreed.  They gave us a very warm welcome. It was a beautiful colonial style house, and he gave us a large room and our own bathroom. Fernando had plans that night, and so asked one of his parents’ employees to take us into town to eat. We were a little suspicious at first of the locally prepared dishes, but the employee ate with us. We ate well, although felt a little strange about the whole arrangement. The next morning we slept through the alarm, and so saw Fernando only briefly before he headed off for work. We thanked him for his hospitality, and he told us his Mom had made us breakfast. What a luxury! Thanks again, Fernando, and thanks to your parents!

We continued our climb. This is day two, and we’ve covered 44 km and 1600 m in altitude. Not a single downhill, either today or yesterday, only stretches of false flats that we count as a “break.” The kilometres tick by to the sounds of the trucks, cars and minibuses that pass us, not beholden to the road as we are. We had two serious scares: one when a truck nearly ran us off the road, and another when an oncoming car decided to pass a truck right in front of us. The problem is that there’s no shoulder by the side of the road, so we hug the cliffs on the right.

The landscape is changing as we climb higher and higher. The dusty mountains of Lima are giving way to more greenery. The surrounding peaks seem to tower further and further above us, and the valley sinks deeper into the earth. We feel so small and insignificant. There are water jets along the “Carretera Central”. The road runs alongside a river that has been very cleverly exploited by the locals. There are water jets that spring up and offer “salon services” to the cars coming in and leaving Lima. They also cool the overheated engines or breaks of the cars going up and down the mountain.

We planned to spend the night in Matucana (2400 m high) and we arrived there just after dark. It was a bit of a struggle to get there, although the road really wasn’t all that steep. But really, after going uphill all day, there comes a time when your legs have had enough! We crammed ourselves and our bikes into a tiny room, with no room left to move. It’s gotten colder, and what we really wanted was a hot shower, but alas, no such luck. And there’s no heating up here, so after a cold shower we climbed into bed, huddled under two blankets.

San Mateo: We’ve been dreaming of this little town, 3200 m above sea level. We’re planning to rest there a day to get used to the altitude. But there’s still 20km to go, and 800m up! We climb, and climb, and climb. We’re a familiar sight now for the truck drivers, and they encourage us, like old friends, and we really appreciate the support. We finally made it to San Mateo around 3 in the afternoon, and after a quick tour of the town, we decided on a little hostel, noisy despite being off the main road. We waited while the manager made sure the room is cleaned – so far so good. The sign outside said that there was hot water, but we didn’t want to get our hopes up… And yes, the electric water heating system crapped out and it was a cold shower again! This time there were four blankets on the bed. We put on our fleeces and headed out into the town – strangely quiet in the middle of the afternoon, but a busy place in the evening. The internet connection is slow, maybe it’s a little frozen too. It was a typical little mountain town, not a lot of other “gringos”.

We have finally understood that in Peru the word “gringo” isn’t as insulting as in some of the other countries we’ve been through. Here it means foreigner more generally, not just the unwelcome Americans. So we’re getting a little more used to the moniker… well, we’re trying anyway.

Sara

Our departure from Lima was again delayed! This time, I (Sébastien) got progressively sicker all week. Since Monday, I had been having really bad diarrhea, the worst since Alaska, over a year ago. It was pretty bad Friday night and by Saturday morning I had a high fever. Nothing seemed to work – I’ve never shivered so hard in all my life.

We went to the government-run health centre right beside the hostel where we were staying. We didn’t discover until the night after we went to the Anglo-American clinic. It was an entirely different experience. It was also clean, but it was clear that they were seriously lacking in funds. The security guard led us to a small sort of cupboard, and 10 minutes later the doctor came in to examine me, tapping at my stomach. She told us that we should be more careful about what we eat – she thought it was food poisoning. As she was writing out the prescription, she asked us if we could afford to pay, and adjusted the script for rehydration salts accordingly. In the end, we paid 5 soles (US $1.65) for the 10 minute consultation and another 8.50 soles (US $2.80) for the prescription. 

The day before, we had paid a lot more! 245 soles (US $85) for the doctor and another 100 soles (US $33) for the medication. The difference in price between these two clinics was pretty astounding, and they are only a few streets apart.

We think we have figured out why we’ve been sick: we are pretty tired of eating chicken and rice at every meal, but it’s usually the only (relatively) and safe thing on the menu. In the past month or so, we’ve been branching out and eating more and more what the locals eat. Here, the local specialty is “ceviche”, a kind of raw fish marinade. I really love it, and probably ate too much of it, and I had eaten some salad too. I guess this serves as a lesson to us: we’re not invincible, and need to be careful to choose food that has been well cooked.

We’ve been following some travelers’ blogs, and they all got sick in the Andes too, in either Peru or Bolivia.  Apparently, according to the doctors, the bacteria are different in this region and travelers need to be extra careful.

By Saturday the antibiotics had started to kick in, and I was feeling a little better. Sara and the hostel manager cooked up a meal that the doctor had recommended: rice, potatoes and carrots, all cooked in boiling water, with a little bread thrown in. Then they mashed it all together and I drank only the broth. Sara also made a drink from the juice of the “membrillo,” a local fruit. I was still a little shaky, but starting to feel a lot better. But then, at around 9 pm, I had really bad stomach cramps. I was huddled up on the bed in pain. I dragged myself to the bathroom, and the happily a hot shower seemed to cure everything – I got out feeling as though nothing was the matter!

And after a good night’s sleep, I was as good as new. Yesterday was Sunday, and since we were both feeling better, we updated the blog and worked on our microfinance projects. Today, we both nearly fully recovered, and getting ready to ride!

Sébastien

We were supposed to leave yesterday to start tackling the 4800 m mountain, and we had postponed our departure until today.

But then, this morning when I got up, I was not feeling well at all. I felt feverish and had the chills, and also had a sore throat – worse than the little cold that we had been battling earlier and that we were treating with aspirin. So we decided to go to the doctor – but we didn’t know where. The French Consulate website for Peru suggested two or three places, and we ended up at the Anglo-American clinic in the Miraflores Quarter, thinking that at least if they needed to order extra tests, it wouldn’t be far to go.

When we arrived, the receptionist told us that the first available appointment wasn’t until 6pm that night. She recommended that we go to the emergency room if we wanted to be seen earlier. There, they set me up in an examination room. Sébastien came with me and translated a few sentences here and there when I had trouble understanding the doctor. The GP came in with a med student, and after a quick consultation, the verdict was throat infection. But we’d already figured that out!

After they left, a nurse came in to check my blood pressure and take my temperature. No fever apparently, although I had been sweating buckets earlier and now I was freezing. A third doctor arrived to get us to fill out an anonymous questionnaire about where we were going and what we were doing. He was impressed by our trip! Then the first doctor came back and gave me a prescription for antibiotics. We went back to the reception to pay: 215 soles (US $72) for the consultation and another 30 soles (US$10) as a “location fee.” We made a face, thinking (fondly) of the $30 (22€) all-!!include!!d doctor’s fee in France.

We decided to get the prescription filled somewhere else, so as not to be overcharged. We paid 70 soles ($24) for three tablets (one per day), and that didn’t !!include!! the cough syrup or the pain killers. We thought (again, fondly) of how social security in France usually covers the costs of prescriptions up front.

I guess the French system really isn’t so bad, huh?

PS. DON’T WORRY! I will be back on my bike again soon. I was “lucky” to get sick in Lima where health care and access to medication was relatively easy to find and where our hostel is clean, warm and dry. So we’ve pushed back our departure until Sunday morning, when it’s quieter in Lima. We arrived last Sunday, and since the traffic was so light and the drivers so relaxed, we joked about how nice it would be to leave again on a Sunday!

Sara

Since arriving in Lima we have rediscovered city life! We have wandered through enormous grocery stores, with many more options (and much higher prices) than the little corner stores. We’ve looked, although without much success, to find some good quality biking gear. We have explored different areas of Lima in the Combis, those doctored minivans with room for 20. But there are no route maps or numbers and no way of knowing where the buses go – so it’s an adventure each time!

We have two meetings with MFIs, and then we will head off towards Cusco and Machu Picchu. Between Lima and the next big city, La Oroya, there are 180 km and a mountain 4800 m high! And Lima is right at sea level!!

Sara

After horseback riding in the mountains around Vilcabamba valley, called the valley of longevity since its inhabitants can live to be 120 years old, we got back on the bikes for the final push through Ecuador. Slightly smaller mountains than we had come through, but just as hard. We loved Ecuador and so stayed an extra day in Catacocha. Then, just a few hills to get over in the heat and one night camping in the brush beside a river in the middle of a tropical forest, and we arrived at the border town of Macara.

Good-bye Ecuador…

The country where:

• Everyone eats rice morning, noon, and night (Peru does too, actually)
• You choose your cut of meat at the grocery store by testing each one with your fingers
• There are two prices: one for the locals and one for the tourists – entirely legal for the hotels
• You can find chicken feet in your soup – all the better to dip with!
• There are no manhole covers, only gaping holes in the roads and sidewalks

As we were leaving Ecuador, we had to stop for a medical exam and a strict reminder of how to prevent swine flu. It took almost an hour, and while we waited we watched the locals (mostly Ecuadorians) cross the border between the countries carrying goods on their bikes or in their trucks. They didn’t have to stop for a medical check-up, or even show a single piece of ID!

Hello Peru!

At the Peruvian border there was no police check, but the customs officer was not very friendly. And then, not 50 m from the border, we heard the familiar calls of “gringo, gringa” – yikes! If it’s going to be like this the whole way, we thought, we’re not going to like Peru very much. Sara got whistled at again, and really the only defence is to keep her head down and totally ignore the attention.

5 km from the border we ran into the police blockade –while we were coasting downhill! Stuck in the middle of nowhere, we were most unimpressed when the first question that the three police officers asked was whether we had a camera. We both wondered if they were after a bribe, but we really didn’t know what to make of it. We had been warned a lot about robberies in Peru, and so we were pretty nervous. So at first we pretended like we didn’t understand the question, but then after we answered other questions about where we were from and where we were going, the police officers explained that they just wanted to have their pictures taken with all the bikers that passed by! So we took a bunch of pictures with them, with the help of passing motorists who helpfully stopped by the side of the road to get out and take photos of us all. In the end, the police officers were really nice. They told us to watch out for Peruvian muggers, offered us some pastries, and warned us seriously against going through Sullana (where we were planning to spend the next night). A number of other people also said that staying in Sullana was a bad idea, including the owner of the hotel where we stayed that night, and who we had a long talk with about Peru. As soon as we told him that we were French, he wanted to talk about the nude Carla Bruni pictures that were recently put up for auction and the Air France plane that crashed into the Pacific. Actually, since Alaska, every time we tell anyone that we’re from France, they mention Carla Bruni or Zinédine Zidane…

The next day,  thanks to our training in the Andes and our high red blood cell count, we made it all the way across 114 km of flat, polluted desert in the Northern part of the country, and avoided stopping in Sullana. We averaged 19 km/h, our fastest since Central America. It’s tough to be much faster than 10km/h when you’re biking through the Andes!

Lima

And now we are in Lima – that was quick, wasn’t it? There will be those who say that we cheated, and others that say we made the right call. After much hemming and hawing, and considering that we are a little behind schedule, we decided to bus the 1000 km between Piura and Lima. It was 1000km of flat desert, not very clean and definitely monotonous. Two days in that environment was enough for us.

So we decided to take the bus, leaving at 6 pm, and arriving at 9 am the next day, roughly 15 hours of travel time. We were surprised by the tight security along the route. First they checked everyone’s IDs and scanned their signatures, and then the passengers were filmed getting on the bus and finding their seats. The bags were also searched, and scanned with a metal detector. Interestingly, the security measures seemed a little more optional for foreigners (maybe just cyclists?) and we didn’t have to undergo much.

Our great leap forward means that we can spend more time climbing the Andes in between Lima and Lake Titicaca, and visit all the microfinance institutions in the region.

Sara & Sébastien