Where 20 - Quito, Ecuador --OR-- Does it Really Rain in Rainforests?

Hi Guys, For maybe the last time......

Since Cusco, Peru it has been none stop overnight bus journeys (mainly uncomfortable). First went to Arequipa home to the 2 deepest canyons in the world, then up the Peruvian coast to Nasca, Lima and Trujillo and then into Ecuador to Guayaquil, Banos, into the jungle in the NE of the country and then to Quito, the capital, virtually on the Equator and the end of this six month trip.

Highs First for a change....

- The Nasca lines are a massive mess of lines drawn in the desert containing huge pictures of animals and other shapes. The lines were drawn about 1,500 years ago and are only visible from the air so we had to take a flight over them. The largest animal is a bird 285m long although some of the smaller ones (around 50m long) are better drawings. Why they were drawn is still a matter of great debate ranging from a map of where to find water, a map of the stars, solstice lines to pictures to appease the gods. How they did it is another matter. The lines themselves were made simply by removing dark stones to reveal the lighter desert stone beneath. How they achieved the accuracy of patterns is not so easy to explain. Some people claim they must have been able to see them from the air by using a primative hot air balloon, or perhaps they were geometrically advanced and had inveted a method of enlarging small pictures. Unfortunately even if they were advanced they (like all other Andean tribes prior to arrival of the Spanish in 1532) had no system of writing and so we know little about them.

- In Trujillo, Chan Chan is the largest mud city in the world and the largest pre Spanish city in the Americas was built around 1300AD and housed 55,000 people. They simply moulded mud into brick shapes without baking them and built a city. The advantage they had was that it can go for decades without raining here although even in those days the odd El Nino did a lot of damage. There are still many walls left although the water damage is obvious. Amazing that something so basic could last so long and that a civilisation advanced and organised enough to organise 55,000 people did not want (or maybe didnt need) to use more advanced methods of building.


- The 5 day trip into Ecuadors rainforest was a great experience - well at least it was when it wasnt raining.
Two things should ye know about the rainforest before ye enter. Firstly, it is a FOREST.
Secondly, it RAINS.
This may seem rather obvious but I have met people on trips into Rainforest who express surprise that it rains. That is rather like going to London and being surprised that the River Thames is a river! I know there are exceptions - like Panama hats being made in Ecuador and the Hundred Years war lasting 126 years , BUT some things are obvious and rain in a Rainforest
is surely one of them.

When it wasnt raining we say loadsa monkeys, birds, butterflys and a few mammals. We slept in mossie nets on a covered wooden platform in the middle of nowhere - there is nothing like going to sleep and waking up to the sounds of the jungle. No electrity or showers but we had candles and a river to swim in and it was just perfect. Perfect except for the mossies that is, they took a liking to my feet for some reason and my insteps did a fair impression of a relief map of the Andes.


A few LOWS

- Lima in Peru. A large costal city not far from the Equator. Rio is further from the equator and has fantastic water and beaches so I was hoping for something similar here. But.... to start with the sky was the most dowdy shade of grey imaginable as if it was just off to a particularly large
and important funeral. The sea was pretty much the same colour, as was the beach (just pebbles) and not only was it cold but there was a cold wind blowing. Just to top it off there was a small pier and a single mad local swimming. Yes I was actually in Brighton on a summer weekend ....... and the water temperature ... I didnt get close enough to find out !

- Rice, Rice, Rice. Dry, Dry, Dry. At every meal in this part of the world they serve rice .... with everything! Even ordering a portion of chips guarantees an accompanying mountain of rice sufficient to keep a large Asian family for a week. Whoever first introduced it here didnt actually tell the locals how to serve it properly ..... Dry chicken, dry chips and dry rice.
Of course hardly anyone actually eats the rice ... even the locals who you would of thought must be used to it by now are adept at pushing it towards the edge of the plate as if saving it for last .. and then just as they are about to start the arduous and painful process of consumption, they declare they are already full.

- Endless overnight bus journeys. Compared to most of SAm Peru does not look that big .... but it is enormous and many of the roads are not the best, and neither are the buses. Plus the people here are fairly short and so they design buses without legroom. Apart from that its great - what I mean is - they are cheap !


The Rest

- The Equator - The thing itself is hardly a highlight - I mean it is just a line (about 6cm wide in this case) and its yellow - Amazing that on all maps its always black but in reality its yellow ! How did the cartographers get that wrong?
But getting there (and having the usual crap picture taken) means the end of this journey. In the past 20 months I have been to 31 countries including almost every meaningful country in the southern hemisphere, across 6 continents (Antartica will have to wait for next time or when I have some money). I have spent far too long on buses but even though I never got travel sick , maybe now I am sick of travelling and want to sit in the same place for more than a couple of days.

Of course the trip would not be complete without a few Awards so here are a few random samples ........

Hottest place - Yangon and Bangkok just before the monsoons. Nobody did anything cos it was very hot and 100% humidity.

Coldest Place - My parents house near London

Most expensive place - London

Cheapest Place - Sumatra, Indonesia (For what a pint of beer costs in London you could live here for a day including accomodation, decent food and a beer !)

Cheapest Beer - Hanoi, Vietnam (Beer Hoi on the street cost 10 US cents (7p) a glass and it was pretty good. We still haggled over the price though!!!!)

Worst Food - Lao and Easter Island

Best Food - Argentina

Highest (Legal) Adrenalin sport - Skydiving, NZ

Highest (Legal) Adrenalin sport that I would actually do again - White water rafting down the Zambezi, Zimbabwe.

Best Man made wonder - Cities and temples at Angkor, Cambodia (Absolutely stunning)

Best Natural wonder - View of Southen Ice Field and glaciers, Torres del Paine, Chile
Although notable runners up include
- Mount Bromo at Sunrise, Java, Indonesia
- Iguassu Falls, Argentina/Brasil
- Moreno Glacier, Argentina

Favorite country - Myanmar (Burma)

Most played record worldwide - YMCA by Village People. That just proves it is a really sad world we live in!

I will be back in England on 19 July and will be staying at my parents as I cant afford to get my house back until I have a job ......

Several people have asked me what I intend to do when I get back - as if after 20 months I havent thought about it. I know exactly what I will do..... I will sit on my sofa at my parents house and think What the hell am I going to do now!

Thanks to all the people I have travelled with for making this such a great experience - if youre still on my email list then it cant have been that bad !

See you soon
Love
Pete

The End (?)