On the 6th of April 2005, cousins Jamie Mackenzie and Ben Wylson set off on their bikes on a journey which will take them to over 50 countries and to every one of the worlds great continents, all without the use of an aeroplane.
Sunday, March 25, 2007: Crashing Mountain Rabbit Sails
From La Paz we journeyed to the great lake Titicaca, sailed onto it, saw some floating islands made of Papyrus reeds; the boat broke down, we changed boats, went to a normal island -not floating- and made it back to our accommodation late. The next day we took a bus to Cuzco.
"It´s an Andean Mountain Rabbit!" exclaimed Jamie as a little grey furry animal looked back at us from a crack in the white granite of the misty heights of Machu Picchu. We advanced upon the timid creature until we were almost within touching distance. As we looked upon the Mountain Rabbit it seemed to tremble, its nose twitched, its eyes wide. Suddenly it took fright and bounded off down a steep slope. Some Peruvians who had been watching our advance on the rabbit from a rocky outcrop not far behind began to laugh. We turned around and smiled at them. They grinned back. We said in perfect, slow, comprehensible English whilst pointing in the direction of the grey fluffy creature "AN-DE-AN MOUN-TAIN RAB-BIT". Their expressions did not change; they smiled broadly and said softly to us, "Chinchilla."
A little later we found ourselves sitting on a wall sipping at spring water from 1.5 litre plastic bottles and eating morsels of stale white bread we´d bought at the bottom of the mountain. In front of us was the Temple of the Condor against an awe- inspiring, plummeting backdrop of green mountains. For some time we admired the scenery and marvelled at the fine stonework piled up around us. As we drank our water peacefully, a small bird flew over to us and perched itself upon the wall we were sitting on; its head twitched from side to side as it regarded us with beady eyes. It had a bluish cap of feathers on its head. Jamie looked over at the bird; the bird looked at Jamie. "It´s a Temple Tit" said Jamie, decisively identifying the bird´s species. As he spoke a few bread crumbs rolled from his mouth on to the stone. He went on, "Best not to feed it," as the bird pecked up another fallen crumb.
In Cuzco we bought ´baby Alpaca wool´ pillow cases which we will pack with clothes and use to make tent-nights-with-rocks-under-the-head more comfortable. The pillows are Inca-redibly soft. (Apologies, this Inca pun has been a feature of our Andean journey. We used it in many other circumstances, most memorably after a small bout of food poisoning which I suffered in La Paz when I became -according to Jamie- Inca-contenant.) We made another investment in Cuzco where we purchased two versatile squares of colourful Incan material which -although usually used for wrapping babies- has no less than four other purposes; they can be used as hold-alls for day trips away from the bikes, as ponchos, as picnic rugs or as blankets on cold nights.
With heads on Alpaca pillows another bus bore us from Cuzco back towards the bikes which were waiting for us at the Tres Soles Hostel, not far from the bus terminal in Arica, Chile. The 17-hour bus ride was beginning to drive us crazy. By 3 o'clock am our behinds ached interminably. Regardless of the un-holy hour, the driver had pressed play on a pirate DVD. It played badly at top volume and was of such poor quality that it would only play in 10 second jerky, unintelligible, distorted spurts. When motion did come to the screen, it was usually preceeded by 1 minute of silence, just enough time to nearly drop off to sleep... It was in this semi-conscious-bad-quality-DVD-state in-between dreams that we co-incidentally both found ourselves staring out of the front windscreen into the pitch black of the night; it was then, sitting just behind the front seat, that we had a high speed, head on collision.
First we saw two specks of white light, that looked like head-lights. The driver must have been wondering what they were too because he flicked on his full beams to get a better look. To our absolute terror we saw a car coming straight for us out of the darkness. The driver´s breaks slammed on and we could hear the screeching of tyres. The car driver by now must have noticed the bus because he was trying to steer out of the way at 45 degrees, but both vehicles were going too fast. The car was coming straight for us, sideways now. There was that sickening moment of silence before impact, we were all waiting for it, ready for it, braced: was this the end? Screams filled the air! BANG! BOOOM! tthhhhhhhhh plshhhhh. We had hit. Surely the driver was dead. Were we all right? We seemed to be. Yup, we were fine. But what about the others? They all seemed fine. But what about the driver?
Everyone emptied off the bus with the desperate desire to know who was injured, who was dead? How were the people in the car? In the middle of the road there was quite a scene. The car had glanced off the bus and had a stove-in side to show for it. The bus´s windscreen had imploded. It must have showered the driver with glass, the bumper was dangling, but that was it, phenomenally little damage for such a smash. The crash became more of an Inca-convenience than anything. Nobody was hurt! After a few hours the driver started the engine and we limped off in the broken bus to the nearest town to get a replacement. The pirate DVD continued to play in its jerky unintelligible way as if nothing had ever happened.
The new bus was a real downgrade in quality, but at lease the DVD player worked!
Total time on the two buses: 22 hours. Total loss of life: Zero. Death: Cheated. Total delay: 5 hours. The main part of the journey: Over.
We were in Tacna, Peru at a bus depot not far from the Chilean border. We -and a few others who needed to go south to Arica- commissioned a Chevrolet complete with driver and began the very last few kilometres back to base.
As we crossed back into Chile, national flags fluttered showing the wind to be South Westerly, a constant blow of some force from almost exactly the right direction for us to pick up a tail wind when we start cycling. The winds here on the West coast of South America follow the direction of the Humboldt current, a cold body of water that has origins in the Southern Ocean. Then the idea came to me: Let´s make some sails for the bikes! Sails to harness the power of the trade winds and make the physical requirements of this South American leg of the expedition vastly less arduous. On the back sofa-seat of the Chevy we designed -using our fingers to draw imaginary blueprints- all sorts of complicated designs for a bike sail.
In the end we submitted to the fact that we are no engineers and settled for the easy option, a large bed sheet draped over our backs and stretched out as far as the grips on our handle bars. This simple idea of bed sheet sails will take full advantage of that void between the underarms and body. As caped super heroes we will fairly fly northward. Our new method of wind cycling is yet to be tested and could well not work. Whether it succeeds or fails, we will be sure to report back on the effectiveness of the bed sheet revolution.
Finally we arrived in Arica at midday, paid off the Chevy driver and re-joined the bikes at Tres Soles, still babbling to each other about sails.
Sleep that night was deep and blissful.
Inca-contrast to the cold flow of the Humboldt current, the land here in northern Chile is desert, a seemingly limitless expanse of sand, dotted with mountains. There is absolutely no green to be seen and not a drop of water. Service stations are few and far between and there is almost no traffic; only vultures, mirages and scorpions. The coastal desert continues to the north all the way to Ecuador, almost 3000 kms away. If all goes to plan we expect to have crossed the desert by early May. We are poised to set out and in the small hours of tomorrow morning we will be in amongst the dunes with as much water as we can carry, our bed sheet sails billowing.
Saturday, March 17, 2007: Altitude sickness
It was somewhat of a consolation prize, but in the end seeing a Great White shark and numerous Boobies seemed to make up for mother nature's lack of imagination during our crossing of the Pacific Blue. Vast, menacing, hungry, razor-sharp teeth gnashing, tail swishing, cold eyes of steel glaring, a belly in need of some juicy British cyclists. It was a treat from the deep that was appreciated from the safety of our cabin. The very next afternoon as we took tea on the Poop Deck, we were treated to a flock of sparkling white boobies. They seemed to fly from the very sun above, swooping low beside us, keeping pace and effortlessly pacing about on the thermals that tickled their wing tips. Land must surely be approaching, we thought.
Several days passed, the water seemed to grow thicker, colder, the impossible blue that we'd become so accustomed to seeing finally relenting its identity to the brown, almost black waters of the Peruvian coast. We gazed down into the depths, mesmerized by the darkness, acknowledging the symbol of change that it brought. Gone were the creature comforts, logical living and safety of familiarity; here in the bleak waters below we were now confronted with the realisation of a return to life on the road.
Salaverry, Peru - or was it the moon? Mountains, rocks and sand, dry, dry, dry. Wind-swept vistas charging willy-nilly in all directions. Moody pelicans had long ago conquered the land, driving the humans away and claiming all the spoils for themselves. They numbered in their thousands, arrogantly strutting about their kingdom, dropping their pungent white guano as a sign of their defiance. It was our return to the world and what a strange world it had now become. Perhaps the Apocalypse had occurred, or maybe thirsty aliens had landed and sucked up all moisture from the land, or possibly all things 'green' had been outlawed by the powers that be. Yes indeed, it was parched!
They were largely quiet days as our thoughts struggled to escape the prison of silent contemplation that constantly reminded us of the coming thrust back into action...back to bikes. 'Were we mentally ready?...were we fit enough?...' questions, questions circling over us like vultures in the sky. The ship, like a camel's hump, took on 380 tons of Bunker fuel, a sufficient quantity for a further 20 days plodding, then continued south down the coasts of Peru and Chile, all the time pushing stubbornly against the current and head winds. Slowly we trawled on, all the while within agonizing view of the very road that we would soon return to cycle on. The Andean foothills peeled back from the sea, smashing into a layer of haze that tumbled off the peaks like a roughly-laid table cloth. Browns, yellows, oranges and grays - not a hue of each was neglected. The road bobbed and weaved along the coast, gently rising, gently falling, occasional trucks like dinky toys passing slowly along on their way to who knows where. Dolphins twisting in the bow wave, sea lions porpoising and whales spouting.
Three days on and the Pilot came along side. Under his guidance we motored to a standstill at our final resting place. Ropes secured, the engines at last silenced and so finished our 38-day Pacific Voyage. It had been at times exhilarating, occasionally enlightening, often frustrating, frequently boring but always necessary. Several hundred books were read and passed on to eager Polish crew members and an entire collection of DVDs was waged war against. Our captain, with his outrageously outrageous laugh and Cookie Franco with his equally amusing daily murder of edibles, had provided entertainment from the Bridge and the Galley and all the other officers, crew and deck hands, can be thanked for providing smiles and broken words of English pleasantries. Saying good-byes has become par for the course over these years and yet even to such good people as belonged to the BBC Ecuador roll call, who had only touched our travels for such a comparatively short time, it was none too easy.
Iquique; a city of remote quality which sits at the foot of surrounding mountains like a faithful dog at its master's feet. As grey as the peaks around it, the air hangs heavy with the reek of putrefying fish. Sea Lions prowl in the silky, oil- stained waters of the port, hunting for cast-offs and easy prey from the fishermen's nets. We had no intention of staying here for long.
Today we find ourselves in the arms of La Paz. The defacto Bolivian capitol; a hugely impressive sprawl of red brick houses glued confidently to the steep surrounding mountain sides. Ponchos, perched hats and peaceful people, fill the rambling streets with colourful markets and good cheer. The journey by bus from Arica to the highest capital city in the world, was an awe-inspiring spectacle of splendid sights, smells and sounds. Snow-capped mountains towered over icy lakes, chilled villages, herds of alpaca, lama, sheep and cattle. Craggy crevices disappeared from view as we clawed a path over the Andes and from my dusty window I could clearly see the tangled remains of fallen trucks and buses, hundreds of feet below splayed on jagged rocks, belly up, splintered red crates, contorted blue containers and hideously stricken yellow cabs. 'Fingers crossed' I thought as the gears ground and the brakes squealed.
At 4,450 metres ASL we crossed from Chile to Bolivia. A shower of thin snow flakes began falling the moment we got off the bus to have our passports inspected. Head aches, weak knees and dizziness...how had we ever cycled at such heights in the eastern Himalaya, we wondered...how indeed.
South America! We have arrived.
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