Perils in Peru

Hi all,

Ok well we have just arrived at cusco, 3 days after the start and 700km. That may not sound alot or it may but i assure you its epic!!

The mototaxi is rubbish, it has no power whatsoever and i now understand why we didnt even see hardly any in Lima´s city streets. We have climbed upto 15,000ft in these things and down again at speed of between -5 and 15mph.

in addition to being slow they are also unreliable. So far we have had 2 flats, one broken exhaust bracket, both side pannels fell off and the ´sofa´at the rear is now only held on by mine or lloyds weight after the screws fell out. We have snapped 2 chains and 10 spokes snapped in the front wheel causing the second puncture. Oh and the batttery stopped working...

All of the above has happened to a brand spanking new motorbike that even now has only done 700km.

Now all of the above may suggest we have had an absolute nightmare. Well we have in parts but equally it has opened alot of doors to getting to know the Peruvians. The night before last we stopped to ask for oil late at night and ended up having a party thrown for us in the persons house where 30 people of 3 generations all descended on us for drinks, singing , booze and dancing..oh and frisbie in the street curtesy of Lloyd.
Leaving at around 10.30 pm tyo make the next town we broke down and whilst considering sleeping by the side of the road in our sleeping bags. lloyd spotted and photograthed a red back Tranchula within 1 meter of us on the road..... at that point we both dug deep and i miraculously discovered i had a fountain of knowledge about the internal combustion engine bestowed on me by my wonderful father as a teenager which i never new i had; on account of begrudgingly standing in our cold garage watching him renovate my first car.

The worst times for us are when the bike breaks down causing us to drive at night to reach a place to sleep. Generally we will have a breakdown that means we are driving almost blind down time dirt road with several 1000M drops inches away from the wheels. This is ok but then for the past two nights we have then broken down again with no spare parts or as last night, no tool to get the front wheel off.Yesterday we drove 15 hours which is only 3 more than any day.

People here are some of the best i have come across. every single person we pass on foot or in the car waves or hoots. When we breakdown we generally have more offers of help than we need. Last night at a desperate moment when again we were contemplating sleeping by the road and freezing. A lorry pulled up and changed our tyre for us using the spanner he had that we were missing. His wife and child dutyfully watched in the freezing cold while he spent the best part of an hour helping us out.

Aside from that, the Andes are an amazing sight to behold and the comntinously changing geoghaphy is mind blowing really. on hour we are driving through what looks simular to Arizonian dessert and the next we are surrounded glacier. one hour later and we could be in the peat bogs of Derbyshire.

Final thing i wanted to mention to lamly attempt to instill symapathy and aduration is that so far the group have suffered.... one lost taxi to the river over a 7 storey drop. One broken arm, one goudged head resulting in hospitalisation, one bail out by passanger due to panic of inpending death over side of mountail road, resulting in the taxi running him over suffering cuts and bruises plus total loss of confidence to ever get back in one again.

Its really dangerous and definitely the most dangerous thing i have ever done or will ever voluntarily do again....unless your reading mum , in which case its very safe and im having a lovely time. sent you a postcard! X