As it is, I’m sat here struggling, as usual, to make my brain connect with interesting words and sentences that people might enjoy reading, oh and when was the last time I updated this blog? October 2010! Jeeez, I’m living in the wrong parallel universe that’s for sure.

Well whatever, I am where I am, and that happens to still be Iquitos in the middle of the jungle, towards the end of 2011, somewhere in this apparent infinite universe! No doubt in another parallel universe there’s a version of me wishing he was having adventures in hot and interesting places. So I’m not complaining

So, it’s been over a year since I updated this blog! What’s happened since? Quite a lot actually. It’s been a crazy, fun and ultimately enjoyable year, but with several road blocks, challenges and serious frustrations thrown in for good measure. But that’s how you grow and learn right?

Anyway, here are a few highlights that stand out in my mind from 2011. I’ll start with the good stuff!

Starting an Ayahuasca Retreat Company

About a year ago I visited my good friend Alex at his lodge in Huaraz to further discuss our ideas and come up with a concrete plan for setting up an Ayahuasca retreat company. That quickly evolved into Ayahuasca Odyssey and we hosted our first retreat just 6 months later in June 2011. It was a pretty small affair, just 3 people attended which perhaps wasn’t bad considering we only launched the website about 2 months before that retreat which didn’t give us much time to promote it!

I remember being pretty nervous about that first retreat, mainly from having doubts as to whether I could be an effective facilitator or not. An Ayahuasca experience is undoubtedly one of the most powerful, life changing and paradigm shattering experiences that most people will ever have. Almost nothing else comes close and it can also bring up a whole lot of shit (such as deep fears, painful emotions and old wounds) that people then may need help to process and heal. I don’t have any formal training in counselling or psychotherapy and I think those kind of skills might turn out of essential in certain circumstances. However, I’m pleased to report that so far things have gone pretty well and I’ve received some very positive feedback on my facilitating skills, so that’s something I feel much more confident about now.

The following retreats were also pretty small affairs, and then in September Alex met an American guy called Zach who had also just started his own retreat company called La Familiar Medicina. Alex was incredibly impressed Zach and the main shaman he was working with, a relatively young guy (35 I think) called Gumercindo, and for the sake of brevity let’s just say that we’ve now joined forces with Zach and Gumercindo and now we’ve become Ayahuasca Satsangha. Our last retreat was fully booked and the next two retreats are fully booked with 12 people, so this can undoubtedly be labelled a success!

I’ll attempt to follow-up with more thoughts about my experiences with Ayahuasca Odyssey and Ayahuasca Satsangha in a future post, but for now this experience has definitely been the highlight of 2011 and has resulted in lots of conscious growth for me.

Encounters with Brujeria

Not everything related to Ayahuasca shamanism is infused with love and light. There’s a dark side too and sadly many shamans fall into its grip, after perhaps starting out with good intentions in some cases. Here in the Amazon the bad shamans are usually refered to as brujos (pronounced bru-ho’s) and what they engage in is referred to as brujeria which is what we would call black magic or witchcraft. And whether you believe in it or not, its effects are definitely very real.

Usually they do what they do for money. Someone might get really upset or pissed off with someone, and as a form of revenge they pay a brujo to cast a spell on the person they’re unhappy with. Some spells can cause misfortune, or accidents, while others can cause serious illness and even death. You certainly have to be very careful about who you piss off in the jungle, because the wrong person can do a lot more harm than simply shout at you or punch you in the face!

So what happened to me? Well, I’m still getting to the bottom of it all to tell you the truth. What I can say is that about a year ago (Nov 2010), after a ceremomy near Cusco, I stopped getting visions or useful insights from drinking Ayahuasca. I would usually get some kind of experience, but it was always a little weird and almost never interesting or useful. In the first half of 2011 I was regularly taking tourists out to Kapitari to one of my favourite shaman Don Lucho, and as a result I would always take part in the ceremonies, but I was never getting a good experience. Among the Ayahuasca community you regularly hear the mantra “Ayahuasca doesn’t give you what you want, but it always gives you what you need!” There’s certainly a lot of truth to that, but in my case something really weird was going on – month after month after month,  and I never felt for a moment I was getting anything I needed (or wanted) from the ceremonies.

I had 3 theories as to why I was having these problems and brujeria was one of them, but it wasn’t until early August that I got confirmation that brujeria was indeed the source of my troubles, and I’ve had several more confirmations since then. I don’t know how it works exactly, but somehow the brujeria has blocked me from connecting with the spirit of Ayahuasca. And as a sidenote, this to me is further proof that Ayahuasca is almost entirely a spiritual experience. If for some reason you can’t connect with the spirit of the plant, then almost nothing is going to happen, no matter how much you drink!

In future I will write a follow-up post with the full story – or at least when the story is finally over, because I’m still not out of the woods yet. Just last weekend I did a ceremony and drank 3 cups of super-strength ayahuasca and got almost nothing out of it.

I’m supposedly clear of the brujeria now. For the last couple of weeks I’ve been working with an amazing healer who’s staying in Iquitos for awhile. This guy uses a combination of intuition, prayer and experimental kinesiology to do what he does, and he’s been getting some remarkable results around here. All the tests say I’m now clean, but as the last weekend demonstrated, there’s still some work left to be done.

It’s been baffling as well as frustrating, but many lessons have been learned.

Dealing with more rejection (the cycle continues)

In the very early days of this blog, when I was living in Cusco, I wrote some extremely personal stuff about my lack of success in love and relationships – even though I only scratched the surface to be honest. Two and a half years later I can’t say things have got a whole lot better for me, although I’ve certainly gotten much better at dealing with it emotionally so I guess progress is always being made on many levels.

It seems that one of the recurring themes of my life so far has always been rejection (at least in terms of love and relationships). Now, I’m very aware that EVERYBODY has to deal with rejection at least sometimes in their life, it’s good, it’s normal and in some ways it’s very healthy because it’s the difficult and gutwrenching experiences that help us grow and become better and more conscious human beings. But sometimes I can’t help but want to scream at the universe “COME ON NOW, ARE YOU SERIOUS? GIVE ME A FUCKING BREAK WILL YOU!?”.

It’s happened to me too many times to even remember and surely I’m now way beyond having my fair share of this type of experience. Well apparently not it seems, because they just keep on coming. Clearly I must be missing some important part of the lesson, which is odd because usually I’m a pretty fast learner!

I began 2011 being rejected by someone I really thought I connected well with, and now I’ve just ended the year being rejected by someone I know I have connected really well with over the last 12 months, so much so that many people actually thought she already was my girlfriend! But as usual I’ve gotten deeply stuck in the ‘friend zone’ and as I’ve come to realise it’s a very hard place to escape from!

Anyway, I don’t want to seem like I’m complaining about life, it is what it is, and thankfully I’m not someone who dwells on the negatives for very long. I may feel sad and perhaps even a little angry for a few days, maybe a week or so, after it happens, but if nothing else, I’ve learned to process my feelings pretty quickly and come out of the other side feeling as happy and optimistic about life as always. I seem to be incapable of feeling depression and any feelings of self-pity I may occasionally indulge in are quickly put aside. So at least I’ve got that ability to be thankful for. But I can easily understand how some people can become very bitter and angry as they get older, and if I didn’t have a strong connection with spirit sustaining me through difficult times, I think in a different parallel universe that could easily be me by now!

This seemingly continuous cycle does leave me feeling bewildered though. It surely has to end eventually (or does it?), but I’ve been saying that for over 10 years now. Finding a girlfriend has never been something I’ve obsessed over. I’ve always been happy and extremely comfortable on my own, and will continue to be, no doubt. But I do feel like I’m done with all the lessons of being single, and that I’m beginning to stagnate in this area of my life. I definitely don’t see having a relationship as being some kind of holy grail, and nor do I believe that a relationship will necessarily make me any happier, but what it undoubtedly will bring is new lessons, new experiences and hopefully a lot of conscious growth, and for those reasons more than anything, it’s something that I desire to happen in my life.

Financial Struggles

Love is not the only thing I’ve often struggled with over the course of my life, the other is money, and it seems that I’ve had more than my fair share of bad luck in this area of my life as well. But it has to be said that 2011 (or at least the first 8 months of 2011) saw me going through one of the roughest financial periods of my life. As you may know I make most of my living as a freelance web designer, and although I’ve never made a lot of money from it, I’ve almost always made enough to support myself and it seems that the universe has always sent me work when I’ve needed it. So I’ve gotten by ok, but can hardly say I’ve experienced much financial abundance.

My financial problems started about the same time as the brujeria did, and I suspect there may be a connection but it could of course just be a coincidence. I’ve always found that work has come to me when I need it, but that just didn’t happen during the first half of 2011. I’ve rarely done any self promotion and have generally relied on word of mouth or people finding me through serendipity. That failed me big time this year, and for the first time in my life I started doing  self promotion only to find that it didn’t bring me anything but more frustration (and very little money). There were a few times this year when I had to rely on my family and my business partner Alex to send me a bit of money just so that I could live and pay the rent and there’s almost nothing I hate more than having to ask for financial help from people. It makes me feel utterly powerless and useless and not in control of my life. But sometimes there are no other options, and thankfully I’m blessed with a few people who are willing (and able) to support me in tough times.

Anyway, since about August (about the same time I started working to cleanse myself of the brujeria – coincidence?), things started picking up again and I’ve finished the year doing ok for myself. And I’m also very optimistic about the year ahead (presuming major financial crashes don’t happen around the world just yet). I’m in the process of launching a new internet business venture with a couple of friends that I expect will be pretty successful next year, but more on that another time perhaps.

Let’s end this review on a slightly more positive note!

Giving up the Booze

This year I stopped drinking alcohol for almost 5 months. I realise to some, that may not seem like a great deal of time, but it’s undoubtedly the longest period of time I’ve gone without having a drink since before I started drinking when I was about 17 years old. It may even be the longest time since I was about 13 because even when I was about 14 or 15 I was allowed the occasional glass of wine or beer with my parents.

Now before I gave it up, I don’t think it would be true to say that I had a problem with drinking, but let’s just say I never needed much of an excuse to go out and drink a beer – much like most of the British population in fact! Drinking is such a huge part of our culture and for most people in Britain, the pub is like a second home. Drinking was certainly a huge part of my adult life for all the time I lived in the UK and although I’ve generally drunk a lot less while I’ve been living in Peru, it’s perhaps something I’ve still indulged in a little too often to be good for me.

I decided to stop drinking because I thought it might help with my problems I was having with Ayahuasca that I just wrote about. Initially I made a decision to quit for 3 months, but then I decided to keep on going, although I confess I did have my first beer again a couple of weeks ago (and yeah it tasted pretty good!).

The first couple of months without drinking were hard work, and I frequently found myself desiring a beer  (particularly if I was anywhere near a bar!), although I never did give in to temptation – I can be pretty strong willed when I really want to be. But then it started getting easier and easier, and after about 3 months I found, for probably the first time in my adult life, my desire to drink beer had almost vanished. Wow! What a change!!

For the first time in my adult life I now find it easy to say ‘no’ if someone suggests going out for a beer. That’s not to say I always will say no. I haven’t gone off the taste just yet, so it’s something I can, and probably will enjoy sometimes, but for the first time in my life I feel almost completely in control of it – and I’m very pleased about that.

Now I just have to remain in control. I don’t want to blow my trumpet too hard just yet because I know it probably wouldn’t take much to slip back into comfortable old habits – if I’m not careful – and these last couple of weeks have certainly been extremely testing for me. Rejection in the past has usually led me to drinking copious amount of booze for a week or two to help numb the pain, but so far I’ve avoided falling into that trap and I’m feeling pretty good about it. However, I do confess to still missing some of the all night benders I used to enjoy with some of my close friends in Iquitos. I realise they were not good for me, but boy were they sometimes crazy fun!

Looking ahead

So that was my year in a nutshell. It probably doesn’t sound like a great year overall when you consider the main ‘highlights’ were mostly pretty negative. But I’d be lying if I said I thought it was a bad year. Despite all the challenges and setbacks I enjoyed it immensely, and as they say, what doesn’t kill you, only makes you stronger. I definitely feel stronger than ever and I’m really looking forward to 2012 and everything it will bring. I think I need to write a separate post about that so hopefully I can get back into the habit of blogging once again! There’s a definitely a lot of things I can write about.

So, here’s me toasting (with a glass of water) to 2012 being an awesome year! Given the current global economic/political climate, it’s likely to be a very challenging year to be sure, but I feel the conscious growth potential is going to be immense! Have a great one everybody.

I’d been aware of the race ever since I first arrived in Iquitos last October, however I had just missed witnessing last years event by about a month. Mike was one of the first people I got to know when I arrived in Iquitos and he would tell stories about the race quite often. It sounded like a hell of an adventure that I wanted to experience for myself…

Fast forward almost a year and I was back in Iquitos after returning to the UK for 3 months in the summer. The race was about 3 weeks away from starting but because of my trip home I’d never gotten around to forming a team so I decided to just watch the race on a special spectator boat that had  space for people to sleep in hammocks over the 3 days. To me that sounded like the most sane idea anyway. I really had no idea if I was capable of paddling 112 miles and I wasn’t convinced that I wanted to find out. Why suffer on the water when you can relax for 3 days, drink a few beers, breathe in the tranquillity of the Amazon – and enjoy watching everyone else almost kill themselves from exhaustion? Yep, spectating definitely seemed like the most sensible and best thing for me to do!

Fast forward to 3 days before the race started.

It was Tuesday evening, and I was enjoying myself at the pre-race party at La Noche bar where most of the race participants had gathered to greet for the first time and party hard! I would guess over a 100 people were there in total and it was turning into a really fun night. I think I’d had about 3 or 4 beers when I started thinking to myself – why am I not taking part in this race? This is going to be awesome! But was that me talking, or the beer? I wasn’t sure but it wasn’t long before I found myself approaching Linda, one of the race organisers and said something like “Linda, perhaps I’ve gone completely crazy, but I’ve decided I really want to take part in this raft race. Do you know of any teams that are a man short?”

Suddenly my mind goes into overdrive. Jesus Christ Andy, what are you saying? That’s over 100 freakin’  miles you have to paddle – on a little dinky raft – that you have to build – and you’ll be paddling for 3 days – in burning hot sunshine. Are you out of your goddamn  mind?

About 10 minutes later Linda comes back to me and introduces me to a tough looking American guy who I guessed was probably around 50 years old. “Andy, this is George, and one his team members didn’t manage to make it down to Peru, and he’s happy for you to join his team”

Awesome! Or I had just made the most stupid decision ever? I don’t know, but bring it on!

Day 1 – Thursday – Journey to Nauta

After having Wednesday free to recover from our party hangovers, all the participants had to meet at 7.30am on Thursday morning to get on the bus to Nauta where the race would begin the next day.

It was about a 3 hour journey down the only road that leaves Iquitos (and doesn’t go any further than Nauta). When we finally arrived at Nauta there was a welcoming committee that comprised of a brass band, a speech from the mayor of Nauta, members of the local government and several of the locals who I’m sure never cease to be  bemused by the fact that around 150 gingros descend on their town every year to build a raft and paddle 112 miles down the Amazon (although having said that, there are always several Peruvian teams as well – who win it every year!). The welcoming committee was a little boring to be honest and I think most people were getting restless to start building their rafts, although first we would all eat lunch in a local restuarant.

Part of the Welcoming Committee

After a good meal we had to take a boat across to the other side of the river to a beach where we would begin constructing our rafts and later sleep the first night in tents. By the time we got to the beach I was getting to know my team a lot better and right from the beginning I had a really good feeling about them. I didn’t really know anything about raft racing or building rafts and if I’d joined a team that knew as little as I did I think the whole experience might have been absolute hell to be honest. But as usual – I was in serious luck! It turns out George had spent 25 years in the military and was ex-special forces which is the US equivalent of the SAS – in other words totally fucking badass!  I mean, can you think of a more perfect team member to have on this kind of trip than a special forces guy? Me neither… Although I have to say, as badass as he was, George was an extremely friendly and good natured guy who I enjoyed getting to know immensely.

Also along for the ride with George was his 29 year old daughter Amber (who I thought was extremely cute and great fun to be around!) and one of her best friends Aaron who is kinda one of those guys who makes being cool seem completely effortless. Aaron was also a pretty tough guy who liked to do a lot of physical activities like hiking and rock climbing so he was another great person to have the team. My only worry was that I was starting to feel like the weakest link, and I have to admit I was a little concerned I was going to become a liability for the team. I still had no idea if I was capable of paddling 112 miles in 3 days!

George, Amber & Aaron

Another good omen I should mention was that our team number was 33 – a very potent number if you’re into numerology. Amber had named the team ‘So long and thanks for the shoes‘ a nod to one of her favourite albums by American punk band NOFX.

Anyway, around 2pm in the afternoon we finally received our balsa wood logs and were able start building our rafts. There were 50 piles of 8 logs and we drew lots to see which team would get which pile of logs. That was to keep things fair because some of the logs were far from perfect, some had different thicknesses while others were slightly crooked and bent out of shape in places which can cause extra drag on the water.

We didn’t exactly get lucky with our logs and a couple were bent a little at the ends which made it harder to fasten them together, but in the end we built a pretty solid raft that we knew wasn’t ever going to sink or fall apart (which had happened to a team the previous year). George had also been a military survival instructor in the past so he had a lot of experience building rafts. Aaron, being a rock climber, was an expert with knots, and so it has to be said that Aaron and George took control of the raft building and they did a great job. In the evening we shared a couple of beers and then had a fairly early night in preparation for the big day.

The Materials we were given

George & Aaron making sure the raft is securely fastened!

The finished raft just before launching

Day 2 – Friday – The Race Begins

The race was due to start around 7.30am so everyone had to be up early. I think most people had been fairly sensible the night before and hadn’t drunk a lot. Thankfully I usually know when to be sensible these days, but a few of the younger participants had clearly left their sensibilities at home (as I might have done 5 or 10 years ago!) I saw one girl projectile vomiting behind one of the tents not long after she had woken up. Way to go girl, you’re going to have a really fun day ahead of you!

By 7.30am most teams were on the water for the first time, and it was a good feeling to be there, and our raft seemed to be floating just fine. The start of the race was delayed by around 30 minutes because several teams were late launching their rafts because of last minute modifications. Finally around 8am we were on our way. The Peruvian teams took off like a rocket and they were going so fast you would have sworn they had a hidden motor underneath their raft.

Our team, particularly myself, expended quite a bit of energy the first 20 or 30 minutes trying to get off to a good start, and I must admit it wasn’t long before I was starting to wonder (again) if I had made a terrible mistake. I remember after we’d been paddling only about 15 minutes I looked back and could still see the starting beach in the distance. I asked George “Do you reckon we’ve gone about a mile?” George looked back and said “Yeah, I’d say that’s about a mile”.

Oh great, only another 35 miles to go!

Yes, day 1 of the race was a 36 mile stretch between Nauta and the village of Porvenir where we would sleep the 2nd night. It was also a very hot day with the sun beating down on us rather unmercifully for the entire 6 hours 40 minutes we were paddling that day. Like in most places close to the equator, the sun here is pretty unforgiving and I definitely made one of my better decisions two days previously when I bought a new hat with a much wider brim to keep the sun completely off my head and face.

Me with my new hat!

Anyway, after paddling that first mile and then starting to feel pretty tired already I was definitely contemplating the fact I had probably made the worst decision of my life by joining the race, but thankfully little by little I started to get used to the none-stop paddling and really get into a good rhythm I could maintain. For some reason that I can’t explain my body became almost like a machine and I basically paddled almost none-stop for over 6 and half hours, although of course we all took the occasional break. Some times we took a team break where we would just float on the water for 15 minutes, and other times, two members of the team would take about a 10 or 15 minute break while the other two members kept paddling. We really didn’t take that many breaks though. There’s no doubt I constantly felt on the verge of exhaustion but somehow I was always able to keep on going. I always had a little something in reserve that never quite ran out. And while I certainly didn’t have the strength and stamina of George and Aaron I was holding my own well enough and never felt that I was being carried – which was a big relief.

Also, what I really appreciated was that no-one on my team (or even very few of the other teams) were treating it as a race. To the vast majority of participants, it was just a bit of fun and nobody cared what place they finished, because it was the experience that counted.  Nobody had a chance of beating the Peruvian teams anyway, who were expert paddlers and knew the currents of the river like the back of their hand. The Peruvian teams were usually distant specks on the horizon within less than 45 minutes of the race starting each morning.

When we finally reached Porvenir, a small jungle village, we were all totally exhausted and I don’t think any of us could have paddled much further that day, mostly because of the terrible heat. I think we arrived at the village around 2.30pm and I was finally ready to collapse – but first I ate lunch. Then I setup a mattress in an empty building many of us were sleeping in that night and fell soundly asleep for a few hours before an evening meal. Then it was back to bed again…

Passing team 11 as they take a break.

Day 3 – Saturday – Porvenir to Tamshiyacu

Saturday was the longest of the 3 days, we paddled for nine and a half gruelling hours and I think we covered about 50 miles in total. It should have been 42 miles, however a shortcut we were supposed to take that allowed us to bypass one of the huge bends in the Amazon river was inaccessible because of lower than usual river levels. I think the shortcut would have saved us about 8 miles. The very last thing you want to be told when you know you have to paddle for 42 miles is that you’re going to have to paddle 8 miles extra!

We set off a little earlier than scheduled due to the extra distance we had to cover and I think the race was underway by around 7am. My muscles were feeling a little stiff, but overall I felt surprisingly good after having slept really well. Although I do remember having some extremely weird dreams that night!

There’s not a lot to say about Saturday except it was a loooong day. However, it wasn’t actually the hardest day because thankfully we were given a little bit of protection. A thin layer of cloud protected us from the full intensity of the sun for most of the day so we weren’t dying in the heat for over nine hours. That made a huge difference and although we were all very tired when we arrived at Tamshiyacu I didn’t feel anywhere near as exhasted as I had the previous day. I didn’t feel like I needed to collapse on the nearest bed, in fact I had a shower and then went out and had a beer with Mike Collis.

The town of Tamshiyacu a surprisingly large Amazonian town with roads and motorcarres, and also 24 hour electricity which is extremely rare for a town that’s not directly connected to Iquitos’ electrcity grid. The only way you can get to Tamshiyacu from Iquitos is by boat so it’s a totally isolated town.

George paddling away at the back!

Day 4 – Sunday – Final day of the race

The final day was definitely the hardest day in my opinion. After two days of paddling for more than 16 hours in total we were all very tired, and to make matters worse the sun was back out at full force. No cloud protection for us today unfortunately.

The first third of the route was actually one of the easiest parts of the entire race. Just after Tamshiyacu the Amazon actually goes round two islands and creates 3 channels. The first channel that we went down was certainly the narrowest part of the race and the water was flowing faster which meant we didn’t need to exert as much effort, we could almost let the river carry us downstream.

In fact I haven’t mentioned the current yet. Perhaps you’ve been thinking there’s strong current down the Amazon and that we didn’t need to paddle so hard because the current would carry us. If only that were true. Unfortunately for most of the race the currents were actually quite slow moving and sometimes virtually none existent. Often it seemed like we were paddling hard and getting absolutely nowhere. I suppose there was almost always a current somewhere, but in many places the river is about a mile wide and because it’s so damn wide it was sometimes almost impossible to tell where the current was. Once in awhile we would get into a nice current and stop paddling for awhile and let the river carry us down stream but that’s not something we could do very often. So we really were paddling hard for most of the time and not relying on the current to carry us very often.

The last stretch of the race seemed to go on forever with no end in sight. A combination of exhaustion and the hot temperature meant that tempers were getting frayed. Amber and George were at each others throats quite a lot and even George and Aaron were having a few disagreements and I think all of just wanted to be off the boat and be done with it already. But we battled on and on and on until eventually Iquitos creeped into view.

The very last stretch of the race, perhaps the last 200 metres are known as Mad Mick’s Surprise (he told me that later) because just when you think you’re at the end of the race and just when you think you’ve expended all your energy you have, you suddenly find that you’re paddling upstream!? what the hell? The end of the race was actually a short way up the river Nanay, a few hundred metres from where the Nanay meets the Amazon. The Nanay is not a fast moving river but it was a hard battle paddling against the current and really the last thing you want to be doing right at the end of the race when all your energy is spent up. We probably spent a good 20 or 30 minutes trying to paddle only about 200 metres upstream to the finish line.

Finally after paddling like mad men we made it across the finish line and were greeted by a large crowd of locals cheering us on. I actually felt quite emotional when we hit land and were finally able to disembark the raft for the very last time.

I want to finish by saying that I’m so happy I took part in the race. It really was an amazing experience and although I had early concerns that I had made a bad decision and perhaps wouldn’t even be capable of finishing the race, it turned out those concerns were unfounded as I found strength and endurance that I never knew I had. I think paddling 120 miles down the Amazon is a pretty remarkable achievement, particularly for someone like me who is not used to physical challenges and hasn’t even been inside a gym for more than 2 years!

I also want to say a big thank you to my new friends George, Aaron and Amber for welcoming me on to their team and making the entire trip a wonderful and fun experience that I will certainly never forget. So long and thanks for the memories!

Our raft just after we had got off for the very last time

This was our team name

Here is the route we followed over 3 days

You can see more photos here

I’ve said before I’ve never been a prolific writer and can easily lose the motivation for it although I’ve been telling myself almost every week for a year “I must update my blog again soon!”. So why now? Hard to say, I guess I’ve finally become inspired to write again, and I’ve also got a much better work life balance sorted out that is affording me a lot more free time than ever before.

So where were we?

Well I finished my last post by stating:

“Now I’m starting to feel like I might be about to take another leap into the unknown. In just over a weeks time I’m going to start travelling to Iquitos, a city in the middle of the Amazon jungle in northern Peru. At this moment I don’t have any plans to stay there for more than a few weeks; however, I’m starting to get a strong intuition that I will stay there a lot longer than a few weeks. I get this weird feeling that universal cogs are turning and that my life is about to take a whole new direction.”

Prophetic words indeed!

So what’s happened since?

Well I don’t think I can accurately sum up a year in a single blog post, but needless to say that I did end up staying in Iquitos for more than a few weeks, although it’s not really a year because I returned back to the UK for 3 months over the summer to catch up with friends and family who I hadn’t seen for over 18 months.

Nothing really dramatic has happened. I started a relationship with a local girl which lasted about 6 months. Lovely girl (sometimes!) but a little too crazy for me I think, but we’re still good friends although she’s living in Lima now so I haven’t seen her for awhile.

I’ve met quite a few shaman and taken ayahuasca a bunch of times and I’ll say more about that in a future post. I’ve been into the jungle a few times and stayed at a couple of villages with the locals.

I’ve made some great new friends.

I’ve taken part in the world longest raft race down the Amazon River!

It’s been a great adventure and I’ve had a blast.

Iquitos is hot and sweaty and dirty and noisy and completely unlike anywhere else I’ve ever been. And I love it! It’s the largest city in the world that can’t be reached by road. There are only two ways to arrive in Iquitos – by river or by air, but despite that it’s somehow grown into a jungle metropolis with a population of well over 350,000 people! I will definitely write more about Iquitos in a future post with some photos.

So do I miss Cusco? Definitely! Cusco has a lot more variety than Iquitos and a lot more things to do. Cusco generally has much better restaurants, bars,clubs,  shops and more places to visit in the surrounding area. And it has mountains, oh how I miss those beautiful mountains! I’m hoping to revisit Cusco soon for a few weeks, for the first time since I left, and I’m really excited about that, I just need to get a bit more money together to afford the airfares.

Anyway, I’m so relieved I’ve finally updated you again, and I really regret letting this blog slide into the abyss for so long! Once I start writing I actually enjoy it.

Expect more blogging soon – I promise!

A little over three years ago I left the comfortable surroundings of the city I was born in and where I spent the first 31 years of my life. I moved to Devon in the south west of England, a very charming and picturesque place that many say is one of the most beautiful parts of England (and I would probably agree). Moving to Devon wasn’t something I’d been planning and I seemed to remember it all happened very quickly.

I spent about 10 very enjoyable months in Devon. I loved the tranquillity and calmness of Devon and the relaxed pace at which most people there seemed to flow through life. It was also the first time in my life I lived next to the ocean, and I still miss that ocean a lot. I never had any plans to leave Devon, but events happened, opportunities presented themselves, and bang, within a matter of weeks I suddenly found myself living in London, again something wholly unplanned.

I spent about 15 months in London and I loved just about every minute there. I loved the vastness of the place, the incredible amount of things to see and do and I was blessed to become friends with some of the most interesting, intelligent and fun, not to mention highly conscious, people you could ever hope to meet. I still miss London a lot to be honest, but I knew it wasn’t part of my path to stay there. I also lived in 3 very different parts of London during those 15 months. A couple of months in the East End, about 11 months in North London and then I spent my final two months living in a very swanky flat close to Richmond in West London.

Then, almost a year ago I moved again, and this time I moved abroad for the first time to Canada where I had some great friends I wanted to spend more time with. Canada was slightly more planned than the other moves, or at least I knew three months in advance of my move that I wanted to go there. However, I literally didn’t know until about week before I flew whether I was definitely going or not.

In Canada I was living in a small town in Nova Scotia called Wolfville, a very charming and friendly little town where very little happens. It could not have been more different from London, but I enjoy being there and I enjoyed slowing down once again after the mad pace of life in London. It was also fucking freezing!!

I’ve never experienced a freezing cold winter before. We literally didn’t see the ground for almost 4 months due to the snow. And my god was there a lot of snow. I don’t think that’s an experience I ever want to repeat but I’m mightily glad I endured it. It feels like a war scar of some kind and it’s certainly given me a whole new perspective on weather and temperature!

I also had no plans to leave Canada (are you seeing a recurring pattern here!?), and I was really looking forward to experiencing a Canadian summer after the long harsh winter. In fact I had literally just applied to renew my visa for another 6 months (and paid an administration fee) when a few days later I had a mad flash of intuition that I should move to Peru. 3 Weeks later I was jumping on a plane to South America, my most exotic and perhaps bizarre destination yet.

Each of those 4 moves (to Devon, then London, then Wolfville, then Cusco) was essentially a leap into the unknown. None of those moves were planned in advance and to be honest I never really had a clue what I would be doing when I got there. In all those cases I was essentially following my intuition and completely trusting that I was doing the right thing and that everything would work out for me.

Now I’m starting to feel like I might be about to take another leap into the unknown. In just over a weeks time I’m going to start travelling to Iquitos, a city in the middle of the Amazon jungle in northern Peru. At this moment I don’t have any plans to stay there for more than a few weeks; however, I’m starting to get a strong intuition that I will stay there a lot longer than a few weeks. I get this weird feeling that universal cogs are turning and that my life is about to take a whole new direction.

Also, as I finish this post I’m a few hours away from catching a bus to Bolivia. My visa expires in a few weeks and I want to renew it before I head to Iquitos. Tomorrow morning at 9am I should be arriving in a place called Copacabana on the Bolivian shores of Lake Titicaca where I intend to hang out for a few days before I get a bus back to Cusco on Sunday.

Hasta luego mis amigos!

If all goes well then I should have plenty to write about too. Around the 7th of October I plan to cross the border into Bolivia for several days and then come back into Peru to renew my visa. Then after Bolivia I will finally be visiting the Amazon which I’m really excited about. But more information about that soon once I have a better idea of where I’m actually going.

The most interesting thing to report about September is that it’s been a completely alcohol free month for me. I had to do it because things were getting a little crazy just before this month started, and I was drinking just a bit too often. It’s kinda ironic that I came to Peru for more spiritual and consciousness raising reasons, and instead I ended up on what was practically a four month bender! Slight exageration there perhaps, but drinking was definitely becoming too frequent, even for my liking.

Anyway, a month off alcohol (which has been far easier than I expected) has done wonders for my well being. I’m definitely a lot more clear headed and also a lot more productive in my work. I’ve also decided I’m going to stick with sobriety for at least another month. I hope to be doing some Ayahuasca ceremonies in the jungle in a few weeks time and I feel it’s important to stay completely sober until after then, so it looks like October is going to be an alcohol free month too. To be honest I’m not sure if I’ve ever gone more than 30 days without a beer in my entire adult life, so this could be a whole new experience for me! Who knows, maybe I’ll even give it up for good. Now that would really be something!!

Anyway, it’s been awhile since I regularly updated this blog and I’m sorry about that. I’m hoping to get back into a more regular routine but you just never know with me. Writing has always been something I’ve struggled with and if I can put it off I usually will! Although the truth is once I get started I usually enjoy it more than I expect!

So what have I been up to this last month that’s made the time fly even faster? Not a whole lot strangely enough but it’s been a whole lot of fun!

As stated in one of my lasts posts I went without my laptop for almost 2 weeks due to my power adapter getting fried. At first I thought I was cursed but in the end it proved to be a blessing and I really enjoyed having a chunk of time away from the computer. I must admit I went a little bit crazy during that period, having a brief affair with a Peruvian girl called Ysabel (on vacation in Cusco from Lima), I ended up going clubbing, getting fairly drunk,  and staying out very late about 7 nights out of 10, which is definitely not my usual way of being. I certainly had a lot of fun but I was grateful for the rest when Ysabel returned home to Lima (she’s actually just returned to Cusco a few days ago but that’s perhaps a story for another post!).

Right now I’m busier with work than I’ve been in a long time with about 5 projects on the go, so definitely no late nights and parties for me at the moment! Hopefully this will mean I’ll be able to afford to take a trip into the Amazon in the next month or so which is something I really have my heart set on.

About a month ago I also did my fourth Ayahuasca ceremony while here in Peru. I’ve been meaning to write about that for quite sometime because I haven’t really talked about my Ayahuasca experiences so far on this blog and I really felt I received some lessons I want to write about any explore further. I will get round to that soon, and please give me a nudge if nothing appears soon.

Another positive development over the last month or so is that I’ve made quite a few friends with people who are either living permanently in Peru, or who are like me, staying here indefinitely. During my first 2 months here most of the people I developed friendships with were mostly just passing through on their travels, so I had to keep saying goodbye to a lot of people I really liked which was difficult at times. It feels really great to finally have some solid friendships with people who won’t be leaving anytime soon!

I’ve now been learning Spanish for about 3 months and I have to say I’m still really struggling with it, although perhaps I was expecting too much too soon. One thing is for sure though, it’s a very frustrating language to learn and I’m probably going to dedicate a whole post soon to my struggles with Spanish.

Anyway, it’s getting late and I have an early morning Spanish class, so it’s adios from me for a little while.

“I have an idea that some men are born out of their due place. Accident has cast them amid certain surroundings, but they have always a nostalgia for a home they know not. They are strangers in their birthplace, and the leafy lanes they have known from childhood or the populous streets in which they have played, remain but a place of passage. They may spend their whole lives aliens among their kindred and remain aloof among the only scenes they have ever known. Perhaps it is this sense of strangeness that sends men far and wide in the search for something permanent, to which they may attach themselves. Perhaps some deeprooted atavism urges the wanderer back to lands which his ancestors left in the dim beginnings of history. Sometimes a man hits upon a place to which he mysteriously feels that he belongs. Here is the home he sought, and he will settle amid scenes that he has never seen before, among men he has never known, as though they were familiar to him from his birth. Here at last he finds rest.”

- – The Moon and Sixpence, W. Somerset Maugham

I’m sort of still able to work from internet cafes and the computer in my Spanish school, but it’s not ideal and so I’ve essentially taken a holiday away from my computer which is why I’ve been quiet of late.

Anyway, I’m starting to feel like I have quite a few things to write about again, so hopefully posting will resume next week.

First of all, Carissa just added a new comment and seeing as though most people don’t often go back and read comments from old threads I thought it deserved greater prominence. She wrote:

“Was re-reading this entry and I thought of some additional things that are now seen as “normal” in our society but which aren’t.

It’s now normal to root for people to fail and fall on their butts, and to see people as competition, versus cheering for people to succeed and being happy for them.  There are several reasons for this I think – so many people’s lives are unhappy and unfulfilling (which in itself is a point that I’ll get back to) that they can’t stand to see people achieving something good and being happy when they aren’t.  They want to tear them down to their own level.  So watching somebody fail or screw up or fall on their butt (figuratively speaking) becomes fun in an evil gleeful way.  (hence, the *tabloid culture,* which specializes in that.  Tear people down for the paparazzi pics capturing them with celulite on their thighs, no makeup, wrinkles, or an outfit that’s not deemed “haute couture” enough.  Look on in giddy glee when their relationships fall apart, look for the drugs, sex and cheating scandals after they’ve died so even in death they can be raked over the coals.)  This is now considered normal.  Which leads to how celeb-obsessed entertainment is now considered normal.  Following the minutae of celebs’ lives because people’s own lives are boring and pointless.

The jealousy/competition thing is an extreme manifestation of separation.  Instead of viewing ourselves as related pieces of a greater whole, they mistakenly think we’re all cut off from each other and completely separate…and thus, competition to be jealous of.   So it’s now considered normal to be separate, competitive, jealous, gossipy and mean spirited.  Not everybody is like that, but in certain regions (urban centers in particular) that attitude is prevailant.   We have movies and TV shows that celebrate this attitude, with backbiting and cat fights and scheming and plotting and jealousies galore, trying to tell people, “This is how you should be.  This is the new normal.  Strive for this.  Emulate this.”

And as just mentioned, it’s now considered normal to have an unfulfilling, mundane and possibly unhappy life.  You mentioned how it’s considered normal to hang with one’s friends being superficial and mundane (I definitely agree!) and this extends to one’s entire life in general.  I look around at people and I can’t believe the lives and jobs that most people have locked themselves into!  o_0   Like, who would WANT to do that……for years on end?!?!?!  Is that what they imagined for themselves as a kid??!  Who grows up saying “I want to be an accounting clerk who’s always irritated and frustrated obsessing over getting the numbers to balance!”  Nobody.  Or, “I want to be a stressed out executive assistant to a boss I don’t like, being run ragged every day!”  Nobody.  Or, “I want to become a corporate guy working for donor relations and attend endless mindless meetings where it’s all about ‘How can I get more money for the university?’ !”  Nobody.   Jobs with no life to them, no variety, no real point, *working for that which is illusory,* so that one can insure that they can keep paying the bills every month.  To me it’s a life not worth having.  Work should ideally be about producing something tangible……….not working for illusory concepts.  (I once wrote in one of my articles: “Banks, loans, credit cards, debt counseling and consolidation, taxes, personal investment, mortgages, car/home/boat/personal insurance, law firms, home owners associations — what I’ve found is that the number of useless, illusory industries is skyrocketing, while jobs that create an actual tangible product and serve a useful purpose are on the decline. [...] What good is it going to do anybody to be a financial investor, lawyer, paralegal, mortgage underwriter, IRS agent, insurance salesperson, credit card telemarketer or property manager enforcing rules for the Association about mowing your lawn and power washing your driveway when/if things finally really hit the fan? These people will kind of be up the creek, to put it lightly. Their jobs and industries are completely useless in every sense of the word. So since illusion is what now dominates your job market choices, it’s all the more reason to find a way out, ASAP.”

Illusory concepts is now considered the norm, instead of making or doing something tangible and meaningful.

I work with people who’ve been doing the same lifeless, pointless job for 20, 25, 30 years.  I can’t even IMAGINE.  The worse part is when I encounter coworkers who hate their jobs and complain and gripe and moan and groan….and then what happens when I nonchalantly suggest to them that they quit.  Their faces get a wide eyed, surprised look, like, “huh?!”   You can see them running into a wall with the idea.  It never occurrred to them to leave.  They think I’m weird for suggesting such a thing.  You don’t…..quit your job!  They think it’s normal that you hate your job and complain and be miserable for years and years on end!

I can think of many more so-called normal ways of being in the modern western world that are anything but normal, but I’ll stop here!  :D  ’Cause
I could go on all day, seriously…..”

Great stuff Carissa, I agree entirely!

Also, about a week after I made the original post, I discovered Paulo Coelho also looked at the subject of normality on his blog. Given that I’m connected with him through Facebook and that he might have seen my blog post in his newsfeed I wondered if he was influenced by my post, but then I noticed he posted it in January so he was first.

You can see Paulo’s blog post here: Inventory of normality

I will write more about Machu Picchu in my next post, but this post is about how I got there. The first time I visited Peru we travelled to Machu Picchu by train. This time I wanted to walk there!

There are a few treks in this region that enable you to finish at Machu Picchu. The most well known is the Inca Trail, a stone pathway built by the Incas to connect Cusco (their capital) with Machu Picchu. However, at this time of year you need to book over 3 months in advance if you want to hike the Inca Trail due to laws enacted several years ago to help preserve the trail, which allow only 200 people a day to begin the trek – and only with a licensed tour company.

The second most popular trek to Machu Picchu is known as the Salkantay Trek. This is because it passes right by the regions second highest mountain – Mount Salkantay. You’re free to hike this trek alone if you want to, but as I’m not an experienced hiker (and always looking for ways to meet more people) I decided it would be better to do an organised trek with one of the trekking companies that operate in Cusco.

The Salkantay trek would be a 4 day trek arriving at Aguas Calientes (the village below Machu Picchu) at the end of the 4th day. The 5th day would be spent exploring Machu Picchu and then finally getting the train back to Cusco.

Each of the 4 trekking days would be split into 2 hiking sections of about 4 hours each (with lunch in the middle). The first 3 nights we would be camping in tents and the 4th and final night would be spent at a hotel in Aguas Calientes.

Day 1 – Mollepata to Soraypampa

The first day of the trek began at 4.30am when everyone was picked up at their hotels, or residencies, by a taxi driver. We were then driven to a waiting bus that took us on a 3 hour drive out of Cusco to the town of Mollepata where the trek would begin around 9.30am.

Mollepata is 2,900masl (metres above sealevel) and is a small village only accessible from an incredibly long and winding dirt track that seemed to go on forever. After arriving in Mollepata we were taken to a local cafe for breakfast which was the first real chance to meet the rest of the group and our guides. The impressive group consisted of 14 people (5 Brits, 2 Americans, 2 Australians, 2 Germans, 2 Polish and a Belgian). There were also 2 tour guides to lead the way, 1 cook to keep us well fed, and 3 horsemen to ensure the horses ended up in the same place as we did (the camping equipment and some of our bags would be carried by horses).

The trek began after breakfast around 9.30am after we’d all introduced ourselves and taken a few group photos. The first morning was mostly uphill but not usually on a steep incline so it wasn’t too difficult. But still, after 3 or 4 hours trekking you become rather tired and hungry and incredibly grateful for a hearty lunch. All our meals were excellent I’m thankful to say. Both lunch and dinner usually consisted of a soup for starter and then a main course and a hot drink. Rice and/or potatoes were a common feature of the main course along with beef or chicken in the form of traditional Peruvian cuisine such as Lomo Saltado.

According to my infosheet we hiked 19km on the first day in about 8 hours. Our destination was the campsite at Soraypampa, at 3900masl, so we went about 1km uphill in total. Soraypampa, which is just a campsite (there’s no village or anybody living there), would be our highest campsite of the trip and also by far the coldest. I think we arrived there about 6pm and it was already starting to get really cool. Once the sun sets in this region of Peru, it can get very cold.

Most people were in bed by around 9pm as it was just too cold to be anywhere else but your sleeping bag! And thankfully I had a warm sleeping bag, you needed one, because night time temperatures in this area would drop below freezing. Some guy whose watch could read the temperature said it was about -5 Celsius inside the tents! A few people experienced an uncomfortably cold night because not everyone had great sleeping bags. You were expected to bring your own unless the booking agency provided you with one (which was the case for me). Not all sleeping bags are designed to be used in sub-zero temperatures!

Views like this were all around us for much of day 1

The snow-capped mountain in the distance is Mount Umantay. Our first night camp was at the base of this mountain.

Getting closer to Mount Umantay

Our first view of Salkantay would come as we almost reached the campsite towards the end of Day 1

Day 2 – Soraypampa to Chaullay

Day 2 was by far the most difficult day of the entire trek with about 10 hours of hiking in total. We were woken about 5.30am for a 6am breakfast and I think a 6.30am start. The first 4 hours of day 2 would be spent hiking entirely uphill and it was pretty steep in places and quite gruelling. After about 4 hours of hiking uphill we would finally reach the highest point of the trek at 4650m, right in front of Mount Salkantay. Mount Salkantay is probably one of the most impressive peaks I’ve ever been close to and I’m sure it would be a challenge to any mountaineer planning on reaching its peak.

After 4 hours of hiking uphill we were all pretty hungry; however, we wouldn’t be having lunch here unfortunately, that was another 2 hours away. But thankfully after the highest point it was pretty much all downhill the rest of the way.

Not long after a much needed lunch we then entered into a long and very lush valley where we would hike for about another 3 hours in a downward direction. It was amazing how quickly the landscape changed. Some of these valleys appear to have their own micro-climates and get a lot more rain than other much drier regions at a similar altitude. In about a 10 minute period of walking we dropped down from a fairly dry and barren landscape to being surround by incredibly lush and beautiful vegetation.

The second campsite was a place called Chaullay which is 2900masl, so we dropped down about 1750m in the space of an afternoon. This campsite was on a small isolated farm so there were a few people living there but I think it’s about half a days walk from here to the nearest road so they’re pretty cut off from the outside world, although that’s definitely not unusual in Peru.

I think we hiked 21km on day 2 and even though the campsite was a lot warmer most people still had a very early night!

This photo was taken about 3 hours into the steep accent of Day 2. The first campsite is down in the valley about as far as you can see.

This was taken fairly close to the highest point of the trek where we get up close and personal with Mount Salkantay, the 2nd largest mountain in the Cusco area.

After reaching the highest point of the trek we begin our descent downwards and we spend over 5 hours walking downhill. The 2nd campsite was further than the eye can see in the above photo.

After a few hours of walking down through a fairly dry and baron landscape the scenery quickly changes as we enter a lush green valley.

We finally reach the 2nd campsite at the bottom of a beautiful valley.

Day 3 -Chaullay to Santa Teresa

Day 3 was certainly the easiest day of the trek, although it’s fair to say we cheated a bit because after about a 3 or 4 hours morning hike through another beautiful, green valley, we then met up with a bus that took us to our third and final campsite at a small town called Santa Teresa. The reason they took us part of the way by bus was so that we would have time to experience the amazing hot springs at Santa Teresa, and I think everyone was glad for this. The hot springs were incredibly beautiful and a very welcome relief for 14 tired and sore bodies!

The morning of Day 3 is spent walking through the lower regions of the valley you can see in this photo

This nice waterfall is one of the many pretty sights on day 3.

A shopping center in the middle of nowhere!? Or just a place for hikers to buy drinks and snacks!

This is the bus that took us to the final campsite at Santa Teresa so that we could have a few hours at the beautiful hot springs before dinner.

Day 4 – Santa Teresa to Aguas Calientes

The morning of Day 4 would be spent walking to the Santa Teresa train station (about a 3 hour walk) where for those who who were feeling worse for wear could travel the final part of the trek to Aguas Caliente by train – except that wasn’t an option today. Over the last few months there’s been a series of transport strikes in Peru and today was such a day, so the trains weren’t running. I think everyone would have walked anyway, except their was a slight problem. Usually all our bags would be put on the train (we said goodbye to the horses when we got on the bus in the middle of day 3) and then everyone would walk up the tracks. But with no trains running everyone had to carry their own bags for this last part of the hike (I’m sure the horses would find that funny but we certainly didn’t).

After 3 long hours of walking with a much heavier loads than we were used to, we finally made it to our final destination of Aguas Calientes where we checked in to a rather nice hotel for our 4th and final night. Our 4th morning would be an early start of around 4.30am to get to the bus stop for 5am to get the first bus up the mountain to Machu Picchu (write up coming in my next post).

The final stretch of the hike, walking up the train tracks to the town of Aguas Calientes

For the full slideshow of this trek go here