I haven’t written a blog post in some time. I’ve been on the road without my laptop for the first time. Now I’m back at my desk.
I don’t have a reputation as an avid traveler, nor have I ever been a travel writer, but I just returned from Peru with Harriet and Owen, and I’m processing my impressions.
One thousand years ago, Peru was the center of Incan culture, specifically the city of Cusco, situated at 11,000 feet above sea level, and the corridor along the Sacred Valley. The Inca were highly skilled engineers and built sturdy structures and extensive road networks. They quarried and moved 70-ton sections of rock, assembled them Lego-style without mortar, and constructed walls on a slight pitch and archways in a trapezoidal fashion to withstand frequent earthquakes. Much of their work still survives.
The Incas worshipped the sun and the earth. They performed religious rituals and were into mummification. They deployed terrace agriculture and created an experimental site of concentric terraces with varying air temperatures and soil conditions. We visited the ruins of the Temple of the Sun, which was never finished because invading Spaniards diverted the Incan’s attention and wiped out their culture.
Machu Picchu is the famed Incan citadel built around 1400. Every tourist visits there, but not all of us take a challenging climb to the top of Huayna Picchu, an extremely steep hike of Incan rock stairs and trails that sucked the breath out of me at its 8,000-foot elevation.
I experienced an unexpected affinity for Incan culture and its people. Not being a spiritual person, I was surprised to imagine I was feeling something across time, that I was embracing the nature of their lives—and even living one of those lives, a thousand years ago, in a hierarchical, superstitious and mystic society, where mummies were special, labor did all that stone and agricultural work, and the state was in charge of distribution, ensuring food and living conditions for the population. I had this sense I had been a part of this Incan world where there was no written language, I started imagining I had been here, lived this, and by coming to Peru I’ve awakened some kind of past life in me that is going to now play a role moving forward.
I know, you could say this is hallucinatory stuff. True, I had been drinking coca tea to help with altitude adjustment and energy, and it’s derived from the same plant that gives us cocaine, and Owen did hear that every five cups of coca tea equals one line, although I can’t confirm that rumor because the most I’d consumed was two cups at a time. But I think my lip was numb.
The last part of our trip was a couple of days at a lodge accessible only by boat on a tributary feeding the Amazon River, where the heat, humidity, and wildlife dominated: we saw exotic birds, spiders, monkeys, snakes, insects, and the world’s largest rodent—the capybara, as big as a Great Dane. Plus a hike to the Ceiba tree, a magnificent, towering specimen with undulating waves of trunk at its base, and every bit as impressive as California’s Redwood trees and Giant Sequoias.
Some Peru oddities: many houses are not fully built, because tax on owned land is only about one hundred dollars a year; but on completed structures, taxes increase to several thousand dollars per year. Many homes have finished first floors and partially built second floors so they qualify as not being a completed structure and therefore not subject to the higher tax in a region where the average wage is less than $400/month. The partially constructed look gives communities a ragged, unfinished vibe. You don’t marvel at the architecture. You don’t drink the tap water anywhere. You don’t flush toilet paper. In some areas, a vague aroma of sewage or grease drifts in the air. In places along the side of the road, garbage piled up due to a lack of services. Still, the natural beauty of the region prevailed. The people are friendly, not tall. Owen and I stood well above any locals we encountered.
The best part of the trip is that most of it was curated. We had guides and drivers—it would have been awful trying to navigate and drive on the primitive, steep, narrow, curving roads. And except for a couple of unstructured days when we wandered the city of Cusco, we didn’t have to figure out what to do or how to get there. The ideal trip was already planned for us. Very fortunate. And the food! We tried local favorites, including guinea pig and alpaca and savored a seven-course tasing menu at a fine restaurant.
I never would have made such a distant and exotic trip if it weren’t for Harriet as my travel agent (talk about having past lives!). We were thankful to have Owen along, who made the trip extra fun and memorable, and then continued on to Argentina and Patagonia on his own, and we were sorry Julia couldn’t take the time off work to join us.
I wouldn’t say I have the travel bug, but I’m becoming interested in visiting other countries and cultures while I still have time. Near the top of my list is Scandinavia, countries like Norway, Sweden, and Finland that consistently rank higher than the U.S. for happiness—maybe I can still learn a secret to life. I affectionately call these countries Nanny states because they believe in taking care of and ensuring their people have what they need to lead dignified lives. A visit there would be as different as our visit to Peru.
