Mummies & Potatoes
Me and Andrew finally made it out of Chachapoyas. I’d planned on going to the coast for a few days while Andrew was heading to Huaraz however it didn’t quite turn out that way.
I can't remember where I left off in my last mail. Basically I was without money - down to my last 100 soles (£25). The reason for this was that on returning from our semi-successful jaunts in the wilderness, we found the cash machine in Chachapoyas wasn't working. We weren't too worried as it was the end of the day, and just assumed that the machine had run out of money and the bank wasn't open to restock. The next morning we went back to the bank in time to see the entire cash-point being loaded onto a truck. On enquiring, we were told that it would be returning on Monday, by which time it would be full of money (the cash point, not the truck). As the two of them disappeared off into the distance, I stared at the novel new take on the ‘hole in the wall’ concept, only too aware that I had to survive the weekend on next to nothing.
Monday eventually arrived and it became obvious that the cash point wasn't going to be reinstalled any time soon. Embarrassingly I had to find someone with whom I could travel until the next source of money. Paul was heading to Lima, but Huaraz with Andrew sounded better and I’d remembered that Carol, a girl I met in Congal, had said she was going to be there at some point.
The decision taken, we set off along the back routes to Cajamarca, a town where we knew I could get money. The first leg took us to Leymebamba as we’d heard of a museum there boasting a collection of around 300 mummies. We caught a small minibus and arrived at 8.00pm. After checking into a hostel we walked around the town, which took us all of 5 minutes.
In the morning we rose early to walk to the museum. This time we actually found what we were looking for as a Peruvian was going in the same direction and kept us on the right path. He headed off on his own way after a while but as we stood at the next crossroads looking confused we heard a cry from the other side of the valley turned to see him waving and indicating that we should turn left. People are very helpful in the north of Peru. For instance, when we finally got to the museum we met the manager of our hostel in Leymebamba who pointed us towards its entrance. The museum really did have a lot of mummies. All of them were in foetal positions, and some were just draped loosely in muslin so you could see everything inside, pretty freaky. Other mummies were still wrapped in their burial sacks - little hessian bags with faces stitched into them and patterns round the side. I liked the faces.
Our quest for mummies successful, Andrew and I went back to Leymebamba and immediately started enquiring as to how to get out. The next minibus, we were told, was on Thursday. This was Tuesday. What about about cars, taxis, anything? It transpired that there might be a potato truck leaving at 1.00pm, which could get us to Celendin (half way to Cajamarca and the cash-point). We sat and waited. At 1:30pm the truck showed up and we bartered the driver down from 40 to 30 soles for passage for two to Celendin. As part of the bartering we asked, casually, how long the journey would take. Both of us heard the number ‘8’ and took this to mean an 8 hour journey, we would arrive there by 6pm.
We bundled our rucksacks into the back with the potatoes and, a second later when we realized it was expected, bundled ourselves in there as well and got comfy. The scenery was spectacular and we enjoyed the novelty of the potato truck. By 6.00pm however it was apparent that we were nowhere near Celendin. As we stopped to pick up another passenger, a Peruvian, we retranslated the bartering conversation in our heads and decided that the ‘8’ must've referred to 8.00pm. At 10.00pm we finally asked our fellow passenger when we would get to Celendin. In another 5 hours he answered. We never found out the relevance of the ‘8’. Resigned to our fate, we settled into our sleeping bags and tried to get some rest.
We eventually arrived in Celendin at 4.00am and caught a minibus straight back out. This was meant to be only a 4-hour journey but the bus had to circle the town for an hour looking for enough passengers to make the trip worthwhile. At 9.00am we finally found ourselves in Cajamarca - civilization and money!
Hugs,
Jen XXX
