Awaking in Celendin at the Hostel Reymi Wasi, we peered out of our window knowing that the next leg of journey would be a true venture into the sticks of Peru, as the few who had travelled this way had written. There were busses that ventured towards Leymebamba and Kuelap on Thursday and Sunday, and we had arrived into Celendin on a Monday with no intention of waiting here in this two horse town. So before breakfast or even brushing teeth, we loaded up our packs and headed to the one roundabout in town where anything and everything that came into or out of Celendin stopped. It was here that we learned that a few trucks sometimes stopped here in the morning on their way towards Leymebamba (a stop along the way to Chachapoyas and our objective of the Kuelap ruins that is about as far as you can get in a day).
Stewart and I spent about two hours asking every single truck that rolled into town where it was headed. With no luck, the sun rising higher in the sky, and an increasing sense of disillusionment, it looked like we might be there another day. And then... a 12 foot tall, wooden slatted, 20 year old farm truck rolled into town on its way to Las Balsas. Our map showed that Las Balsas was a city on the way to Leymebamba, and we said: We’ll take it. For 5 soles (1.50 USD) a 5 hour ride, we climbed up the metal ladder on the side of this giant onto a perch on the front of the bed. There with about 5 other Peruvians we held on for dear life as the truck rambled on down the road. I was holding onto the 3 inch wide bamboo pole running the length of the bed supporting a thick tarp, and Stewart was sitting on top of it. Looking down into the dark recesses of the truck bed, we realized that we were not the primary passengers on this journey, but more important was a 3000 pound pregnant cow... with Horns!
Celendin as we climbed out of the canyon
Guy from Celendin who rode on top of farm truck with us to Balsas, he was 21 and studying to be a police officer. Here he was telling a story.
The sharp lines carved out of the mountain and through the road are ruts scarred into mountain by weekly torrential downpours that often put this road out of service.
Notice nice fall off to left...
For the next 3 hours we descended from our briefly held perch down into the valley, and it passed like 30 minutes, because this was some of the most amazing scenery I had ever seen. Sitting on top of the truck, we truly had a 360 degree view of everything that we passed around us. We were looking at giant valleys that might be 10 miles wide and slowly rising up and up to the mountains forming them. It was like someone had a giant ice cream scoop and carved giant swaths between the mountain ranges. Shorter spires of rock rose all around us, some 1,000 to 1,500 feet high, and all along their side you could make out the now vertical twisting layers of time. The road was rough, but just as rough as the one we took from Cajamarca to Celendin, however this road often had 2,000 foot drops next to it as it was notched into the side of the stone, which made it interesting from top of the truck. Stewart and I figured that if the truck started to roll off the side of the mountain, we would have time to jump from the top to avoiding rolling with the truck down the hill.
Notice nice fall to the left, no trees to catch you like they did for the girls driving up 41 last year...
The valley finally widened out some, this gives you an idea of how they just built a road where there should be no road.The further we came down, the hotter and drier the air became that rushed against our faces, and the land around us began to change in time. We had descended from a semi lush alpine valley into a dry, red, and sparse desert. Cactuses spired next to the green remnants of vegetation from above, and the hills around us were now brown and dusty. At the bottom of this savage scene we saw the river Maranon and the small town of new Las Balsas and old Las Balsas.
Theme from the bottom: down at the bottom of this canyon we had descened again from lush cloud forests to desert heat and rivers. The town of Las Balsas is actually a reference to the boats they used to use to cross the river, made out of? Balsa wood.Interesting Side Note: Many of the river towns in the Andes along Ecuador, Peru, and Chile have a “new town” and an “Old” town. The new town is almost always perched on a hill several hundred feet higher than the old town, which is usually right on the river. When El Nino was at its peek in the early to mid nineties, it caused massive flooding of most of the major rivers in the Andes on a scale never ever recorded. So all of the towns were forced to relocate to higher ground, but they still use their old town now, so they all have two ¨towns¨
If Celendin was a two horse town, Las Balsas is a no horse town. Total population under 200, it was here where the bus let us off. We were assured by the driver that cars came all the time, and it would be no time before one came along to pick us up to go to Leymebamba. This was at 12 o’clock. So there at the bottom of a desert canyon in a dry and dusty town, where the only visible means of employment was to sell fruit to passing tour busses, we waited. We walked to the corner store (or just the store because there was only one store) and bought a cola, and we waited. We talked to two basuco or pasta (cocaine sulphate) addicts who were waiting too, and we waited. We chewed some coca leaves, and we waited. With an hour of sunlight and faced with the reality of spending a night in this outpost of humanity, Stewart and I ponyed up the 200 Soles (65 USD) and found the one man in town with a car for hire to take us up over the mountain and down into the more populated Leymebamba.
View from the road climbing out of Las Blasas, the mountain we were climing was not that different from the ones you see.
Let me just say first that we had no idea what we were getting into, for the dangerous part that often shuts this road down in the rainy season was the part we were fixing to climb. Leaving Las Balsas in another one of these 1990´s throwback sedans with not more than a foot of ground clearance, and more give in the power steering than a friend of mines Jeep Grand Cherokee I wrecked graduation morning (another story...). Coming out of Las Balsas for extra cash we picked up a man who needed to go to the doctor (broken jaw), and a father and his daughter, both needing a ride. The first hour of the journey was absolutely spectacular with views trumping those over the entire trip, and the warm orange glow of the setting sun drawing retreating lines of light on the mountains.
And then... the sun set... It is one thing to be on a junky ill kept road in the middle of nowhere Peru, when the edge of literally thousands of feet is 2 feet away, in the daylight. But at night, suddenly the vast emptiness of black that occupies the entirety of your window becomes something more. The black represents you careening around a curve and over the edge, it represents the car blowing a tire and the driver loosing control to go off the edge, it represents an unseen rock hitting the tire and sending the car flying to edge. One thing I forgot to mention: our driver was the 16 year old son of the owner asleep in the back. As if the darkness was not enough, as we approached the top it began to get wetter and wetter (the town at the pass is actually called the ¨city of black mud¨). As if the darkness, rain, and mud were not enough: then a thick soupy fog enveloped the car, as thick as the thickest one I have ever seen at Sewanee. Oh yeah, and mudslides every half mile would force the car to drive over giant piles of dirt at a severe angle towards the abyss on our right.
So let me retrace: Stewart and I with 4 strangers in a junky old car headed up the side of a mountain, at night, in the fog, in the rain, with mudslides every half mile, several thousands of feet to fall on our right, along a narrow road, with a 16 year old driver. (I found out later that 16 year olds are actually not allowed to drive here).
In honest sincerity Stewart and I had our doors unlocked, seatbelts off, and hand on the door handles the entire time. For 3 hours we sat like this, on the edge of our seats, completely ready for our world to end. Our fears were confirmed when we crested the mountain and headed down the other side out of the fog, and our driver gives out a big sigh and says: Its a good thing we have passed the most dangerous part, right! This, this from a person that lives on this road, in a culture where they tend not to value their own lives as much. You rarely here a Peruvian call something dangerous, so we were both relieved we were not the only ones scared, and at the same time terrified that he had been scared as well!
Sleep came easy in Leymebama that night after a 4 hour adrenaline binge.
Blog Point:
1.) If a South American tells you to wait 10 minutes, assume he means one hour. If he tells you that the hike will take 1 hour, assume he means 2. If he tells you the bus ride will take 4, it will most likely take 5. If he tells you that it will be un ratito (a little bit) it could take all day.
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