But I am not alone. He loves it here.
Mati and Sammy left early this morning while Layne and I were sleeping off our border crossing stress from yesterday and our Brazilian neighbors are nowhere to be seen while their Transit van is closed up. Layne is aboard GANNET2 making herself some cereal while I am out here supposedly writing a blog entry.
Mati described the sea air in liquid terms after weeks of living at high altitude in the rarefied air above ten thousand feet and she’s not wrong. Layne’s persistent cough and hoarse voice have disappeared and lassitude is the order of the day.
I think I’ll save the story of our last drive through Ecuador and our border crossing for tomorrow as today looks to be a swimming day, a lounging day and a day to figure out European style 220 volt shorepower. We are no longer in the familiar.
The drive from the border was dusty and messy and filled with motorcycles adapted to three wheelers as taxis and pickups and general purpose transport all at 35 miles per hour.
We sashayed among them like Cleopatra’s barge among minnows bouncing over speed bumps and trying to find a traffic lane on a road with markings but full of potholes. Layne started laughing as I started swearing.
She said something about me losing my shit after twenty miles when the country is only 1600 miles long. Supportive to a fault
We pulled up at the gate to Swiss Wassi (“Wassi” means home in Quechua) and the manager game to the door and asked us if we wanted come in. As though we had stopped our campervan there just to admire the view. We had no idea how good it was going to be once we got to the inside of the forbidding gates.
It’s eleven dollars a night plus a couple of bucks to use the kitchen and a couple more if you want to use the pool. The fridge is full of cold beer and Rusty is taking no guff from the campground’s barky hairless Peruvian dog who is I think quite sweet but looks like a black shiny nightmare on legs poor thing.
Mati and Sammy showing us how you do Peru:
The English overlanders are gone now to an Irish pub in Lima to see England kill Spain in the cup final on Sunday afternoon. I don’t envy them two days to drive 800 miles but their journey is ending and they have sold their van (online - Oh brave new world) to a Dutch couple who will use it with its Chilean plates to tour South America in turn. Now we have to ship GANNET2 to Europe as we have people to see in Cornwall.
Dinner was falafel and conversation while watching the sun go down and then bed and sleep for dessert.
Layne is working out our route across Peru, a mixture of coast and mountain with cities and sacred valleys and a visit to Machu Picchu perforce in the mix. Bolivia may not be on our route depending on how they are behaving when we get there but if not the reward is Chile, a country of decent roads, order and high prices. So much to anticipate.
For now we swim. Our happy place.
