The end of the World aka Huanuco Pampa (11:30pm Sunday July 31, 2011)

Today was definitely an absurd day. It started with me getting 2 hours of sleep and catching a 3:30am car service from Huanuco to a small town 4 hours away with 2 friends from the Jewish community.  We were 8 people squished in a 5 person car–not particularly safe. There were 3 in the front area, 3 in the back seats, and 2 in the trunk. Oh, and I forgot to mention that from my experience Peruvian cars don’t do the whole seatbelt thing.  Even better are the occasional checkpoints on the highway, in which a policeman opens the cars trunk to make sure you’re not smuggling drugs, but then doesn’t seem to care that there are an illegal number of people in the car.

Shanti, Miguel, and I arrive to La Union, a small village in the mountains 11,500 above sea level, and are greeted by the coldest I’ve ever been in Peru. That’s not saying much, but for a day in July, wearing a ski cap, long pants, long sleeves, and a jacket seems pretty insane.  Both Miguel and Shanti were great companions for this journey; Miguel has specialized in tourism in university and has been a guide in the past, and Shanti is the leader of numerous Indigenous Andean organizations and lives somewhat of a dual life of Judaism and Incan traditions. Shanti made some really interesting ritual offering to Pachamama (Mother Earth) that included some leaves of coca and playing a flute before visiting the important site of Huanuco Pampa.

Knowing that the last bus back to Huanuco was at 2pm, we didn’t have much time to waste. After having walked 20 kilometers through prairie with sharp prickly pieces of giant weed that somehow made it into our shoes and socks, we made a group offering to Pachamama in the site of Huanuco Pampa, which basically involved shaking lulav (but with the coca leaves), we saw the highlights of the ruins–the tremendous Ushnu, Kallanka, and Collcas (if you’re interested in this, have no idea what I’m talking about, and you’re a Penn student, take Dr. Clark Erickson’s Archeology of the Incas course.)   I was awed by the Incan stone, so perfectly carved before the wheel and serious metal tools made it to the New World. The multi-ton bricks are so perpendicular, tremendous, and mysterious (Modern anthropologists still aren’t sure how the Incas built these structures.

 

 

The Ushnu of Huanuco Pampa

It’s really a pity to see how the Peruvian tourist industry isn’t taking advantage of arguably the 2^nd most famous surviving Incan ruin.  It’s not well maintained. It’s a pain in the butt to get to (4 hours of serpentine 1 lane highway through the mountains with no direct rides to the ruins themselves). And there’s no tourist shop or restaurant within 40 minutes drive.

Arriving back in La Unión in time for our 2pm bus, we find out that we’d been lied to and today there just was no bus. Upset we check the car service companies back to Huanuco, but they all tell us they are sold out until the next day. Our only option is to hitchhike or stay the night in La Union, but clearly we opt to hitchhike. The next 4 hours involve a lot of waiting, 50 cars passing and not picking us up, the temperature in the mountains dropping to near freezing, me getting a migraine and a fever, and us nearly giving up and staying in a roadside hostel for the night.  Finally as the sun was setting at 6:30pm, we hopped in a van and arrived home in Huanuco at 10pm.

The town of 200 people where we waited 4 hours for a hitchhike.

I’ve never been so happy to see Huanuco in my life.