1. (1) To Lima after crossing the desert

2. (2) The South Peru, great tourist spots

（１）To Lima after crossing the desert

Advancing to the border of Peru, I saw a line of cars on the road 1 km before the border. A black column of smoke is seen ahead. Probably someone put gasoline on the fire. A lot of soldiers are being sent. A man is being conducted away by five to six soldiers by my side. I move a little forward and find that the road ahead is blocked by barricades. The people blocking the road are Ecuadorians. I ask some drivers of the cars or soldiers about what is happening. I don’t understand well, but it seems to be caused by the disparity in the prices between Ecuador and Peru. On the day I got up early in the morning, because it always takes lots of time to get through a border. It was eight when I arrived there. After waiting 50 minutes, I walked to the barricades to see the situation. Then one of the demonstrators told me I would be able to pass. Some of the drivers had already waited three hours. I went through the barricades, leaving a long line of cars behind. Thanks to this, there weren’t any travelers at the border and the procedure of the immigrations and customs was over in only 40 minutes. Unlike Ecuadorians Peruvians are really as friendly as Colombians. As soon as I entered the country, not a few people talked to me. “Where are you from?” “From Japan”. “Oh, you are from Japan, … Fujimori …”. This subject of the last president was what I had expected. However, a man whom I met in Ecuador told me that the presidents prior to Fujimori all left Peru after the presidency for fear of probable terrorism. In fact, the guerrillas are reportedly active like in Colombia. There was a check by the customs at several kilometers from the border. One of the officers advised me, “If someone, besides the police, tries to stop you on the way, never stop your bike”. I thought the guerrillas really existed.

The Pan-American Highway descends the Andes straight toward the Pacific Ocean. The Sechura Desert extends there. The Pan-American Highway now paved well goes straight down south in the desert of 1,000 km. The Highway links the dispersedly located oases of the long desert. After staying in Piura at the entrance of the desert, I went to Chiclayo 200km in the south. Probably because of the repercussions of the bad road in Ecuador, I raised the speed up to 120 to 130km. I didn’t put on the leather pants and jacket as I thought it would be hot in the desert. I would have been seriously hurt if I had fallen off from the bike.

I stayed in Chiclayo for four nights. The sky over the desert was clear every day. In the morning of departure, surprisingly it was raining. There were large pools of water on the streets. It seemed to have rained quite a lot and it was still raining a little. I watched the NHK on television to kill time and later the rain was over. The sky soon turned to be clear while I was riding. Nevertheless, the view of the distance was vague. It was probably due to the sands in the air. The Pan-American Highway vanished into the vagueness. The wind in the desert was strong that day. Past noon it became stronger. I shifted the gear down to the second and hid myself behind the windshield. The cross wind blew from the sea at right angles to the road. The sands in the desert ran across the road. My helmet was open-faced one and the sandblast hit me on the right cheek. The sands hurt me and I covered my cheek by the left hand. The bike wasn’t agitated by the wind thanks to its heavy weight, but a lightweight off-road bike might have had a problem. On the day it was rather cool and I left the hotel with the leather jacket on. The latitude of the area was 7 - 8 degrees south. It was not so hot in spite of the desert close to the equator. Riding on a bike, I felt it would be cold without the jacket. Francisco Pizarro, who conquered the Inca Empire with his men of fewer than 200, left Panama in 1530 and landed on the northern coast of Ecuador. He must have passed Piura and Chiclayo through the same desert. In the southeastern mountains there is the town of Cajamarca, where Pizarro executed the emperor in 1533 after cheating him. Even though Pizarro had a purpose to loot gold, it mustn’t have been easy to cross this desert.

There are pyramids that are supposed to be the oldest in South America, 200 km before Lima and 30 km away from the see. Surprisingly, they were constructed 5,000 years ago! The pyramids are as old as those in Egypt. I went there by a “collective” taxi because I heard the road is not paved. It was a good decision. The road was covered with sand. The BMW surely must have fallen on that road. The taxi stopped for me at the entrance of the ruin. But, there was no road to the ruin. There was only a levee about 30 cm wide. Without the small signboard “Archeological site of Caral”, no one can believe that there are pyramids in the end of the levee. The pyramids appeared after 3 km walking. I crossed a wide river on the way. However, this river didn’t have water. Someone told me the river would be impassable in December because of the water it gets. Only the both sides of the river were covered with greens and the rest of the place was desertified. The eight pyramids in total were in the desert. There wasn’t even an entrance gate to sell tickets, in short, nothing. The pyramids looked like merely low hills from the distance. They were much lower than those in Mexico City, but the area of the ruin was as large as that of Mexico City. Excavation was being done by lots of workers. Will this ruin be ready someday and receive lots of tourists as other ruins do?

The capital Lima abruptly appears after the riding of 1,000 km through the desert. A megalopolis with 7.6 million inhabitants stands in the desert. The streets of the preceding towns of Lima are covered with sand and looked very dusty, but in Lima the ground of the whole city is completely covered by paved streets and buildings and sand is not detectable in the air. There are some large parks in the center of the city, where tall trees grow and flowers bloom. It is just like an illusion. In the past this desert was full of green and the people were hunting and cultivating. Was this land already a desert when Pizarro began to construct Lima in 1535? I think he shouldn’t have constructed the town in the middle of the desert like this. My guidebook writes that Ica located 300 km in the south is noted for its huge sand dunes, and Nazca, 150 km father south, was a barren land without even grass when I saw a TV program. I guess the coastal area in the south of Lima will also be a desert. Or, maybe I am already in the Atacama Desert that continues as far as Chile. If so, Pizarro didn’t have any choice. However, a river flows through the Old Lima. This place must have been covered with trees as the other oasis towns dispersed in the northern part of the desert. And that must have been enough for Pizarro. However, the town has been extended toward the desert as it grew. Las Vegas was constructed in the desert from the beginning. But, the size of this desert is uncomparably much larger. In addition, this is a sand desert with a series of dunes. Lima is a gigantic city floating on a sea of sands. I feel strong power of mankind.

(2) The South Peru, great tourist spots

There are more things to see in Nazca. The Nazca Lines can be seen 30km north of Nazca, but 30km south in the desert there is a cemetery of 1,300 years ago, where about 15 tombs are open to the public. Looking down into the tombs, you can see mummies sitting with clothes on. The dead bodies didn't turn to mummies spontaneously by merely being buried. After the guts being taken out, the body was put in an oven to get rid of its water and fat and then it was processed with herbs. In this cemetery digging the tombs often happened with the aim of stealing gold and ceramics that were buried together. As a result useless bones or sculls scattered in the desert were seen till seven years ago. I was a little shocked by the bizarre view when I saw a photograph of a long line of the bones and the sculls bleached by the sun over the ground. However, the cemetery has policemen now. I saw only one skull, although small pieces of bones were found everywhere. The existence of one skull may mean that stealing tombs still happens. Carlos, who guided me, took out a chin bone from under the sand near the tomb and showed it to me. He had hidden it for tourists. The bone was yellowish and the teeth were good without any cavities.The outskirt of Nazca is dyed in green like other oases in the desert. Cotton and some other crop are planted here. The period when water is available, however, is only three months of the rainy season. The people constructed irrigation aqueducts under the ground to lead springwater from the mountains. The reason why they constructed them under the ground was to prevent the water from vaporizing by the heat of the sun. The shafts to clean the aqueduct are dug in places. These aqueducts were reportedly constructed 1,600 years ago. The people of this area have been fighting against the desert since the ancient days. In the south of the aqueduct a huge sand dune towers. I saw another huge dune in Ica, however, this dune is much bigger on an unheard-of scale. Its elevation is 2,080m above sea level and the height from the ground is 1,400m. This is the highest dune in the world.

In addition, I heard there are two pyramids 20km west of Nazca. The geometric designs drawn on the ground and the underground aqueducts together with the pyramids in Nazca indicate that an advanced civilization was in bloom in this place long before the Inca.

At Nazca I left the Pan-American Highway and headed east toward Cuzco in the Andes. My guidebook writes that attention must be paid to bandits appearing in this route. So I was worried about this road. When I had a lunch at a Japanese inn in Lima, the landlady showed a thick notebook of riders' information. In it I found the note "You may ride through this road because buses commute, but all the riders who took this road confessed that they would never want to go back there again". I got worried more. However, I left Lima for Nazca as I wanted to see the Nazca Lines. I asked about the condition of the road to some people on the way. They answered that the road was paved all the way and really good. In fact the road didn't have any problem and I thought I would want to ride the road more than once. I suppose longtime travelers from Japan mostly get information on traveling at Japanese inns. I remember the information on the Colombian guerrillas was not correct either. All the Japanese travelers whom I met advised me to travel weekdays for the reason that office workers turn to guerrillas weekends to molest travelers. I asked about this to several tens of Colombians including Esperantists. All of them answered me it would be safer on weekends by the reason of both heavier traffic and stricter guard by the military. Guerrillas risk their lives, believing they are at war. Even so, it isn't easy for them to take action. Under these circumstances office workers who are laymen can't make it as a weekend side job. The information from Japanese travelers is not reliable. It is probably because most of them are not good at Spanish or their information is biased or the information itself is old. I would be happy without the information like these.

My guidebook also writes that the roads in Peru are poor. It is probably because the guidebook is old. The road condition of the Pan-American Highway is really good after it entered Peru. There isn't any problem about the road from Nazca to Cuzco either, except some parts of it now under construction. Both of them are toll roads, but motorcycle tourists don't have to pay as in Colombia. Peruvians told me the good roads are the result of the good policy of Ex-president Fujimori who is in exile in Japan now. He is popular among the Peruvian, especially among the poor people, because he improved and constructed the roads and schools, and in addition, eliminated the terrorists. The politics realized for the sake of the poor is good politics. I heard from not a few people that he appropriated the national tax, but that he made a really good job for the nation. They wish he would come back to the presidency as soon as possible. Someone told me there was even a hit tune about him. Some other people told me he had been born in Japan and later got a Peruvian nationality. I felt like being relieved a little.

There are lots of places to see also in Cuzco, however, the principal purpose for the tourists is to visit Machu Picchu. Machu Picchu is about 70km northwest of Cuzco. A railway connects these two places. It's about a 4-hour trip. As Machu Picchu is one of the most popular tourist attractions of the world, it requires so much money that can't be imagined in Peru to visit here. The admission fee is $20 and the round trip by train from Cuzco costs $55. In addition, $9 must be paid for the round trip by bus from the railway station to the ruin. This would make it difficult for Peruvians to visit there. So a reduced fee and fare are set for them. However, there are some budget travelers among the foreign tourists. To cope with this, they take a bus to Ollantaytambo, a town half way to Machu Picchu. Ollantaytambo is in the "Sacred Valley" that extends from east to west. A river flows through the green valley between the snow-capped high mountains. The valley becomes narrower from Ollantaytambo to Machu Picchu and the road ends at Ollantaytambo. The bus fare for the round trip to Ollantaytambo is $3 to $5. As the round trip from this town to Machu Picchu by train is $24, budget travelers can visit Machu Picchu for half-price. I also took this route. Buses are faster than the train and the train runs only a part of the "Sacred Valley" and what is worse, it passes Ollantaytambo, not allowing the tourist to get off. Both Incan houses and a large-scale ruin remain in the town. It is a bad idea to skip Ollantaytambo.

There is the town of Aguas Calientes beneath Machu Picchu. It is a small town, however, has a plenty of cozy restaurants along the streets. The meaning of the name of the town is hot springs and as is expected there are thermal pools. Bathing in a hot spring and visiting Machu Picchu is something. That day I woke up at six-thirty in the morning with Mathew, a US traveler who shared the hotel room. I haven't shared the room with an unknown person for the last 30 trips abroad since I did in a dormitory in London in my first trip to a foreign country. He studies mechanical engineering in Argentina. He was traveling during the vacation between the semesters. As a matter of course he speaks fluent Spanish. We talked in Spanish, not in English. That morning I wake up by the sound of raining. Mathew went out in the rain. Fortunately it ceased raining at past eight. I took a 8:30 bus. I met a Japanese woman Naoko Hatano. She was talking to a Canadian senior man in fluent English. Later I found it a matter of course. She studied at a college in California and later worked for Cathay Pacific Airways as a stewardess. Arriving at Machu Picchu we agreed to climb Huayna Picchu together. It is the corn-shaped mountain that often appears behind the ruin in the pictures. Steps led up to the peak, but they were almost perpendicular and it was a hard climbing. It took two hours. There is another mountain on the other side of Huayna Picchu with the ruin between. We also walked a little up the mountain. Machu Picchu that I looked down from the two mountains seemed to be a town constructed in the air on a narrow mountaintop just like a suspended bridge between the mountains. It is a big project only to bring up stones to the high mountain. A river flows through Aguas Calientes, 700m below the back of the opposite mountain of Huayna Picchu. Under this condition, why did they have to construct a town that cannot be seen from anywhere on the top of the mountain? Is this really a town constructed to be free from the Spanish conquistadors like a hidden village of the "Heike" fugitives? Machu Picchu that I saw in the photos was full of mystery, but the ruin that I saw by my very eyes was more than that.

Before leaving Cuzco, I was informed by an Internet cafe near the hotel that there is another cafe facing the central plaza where they know a lot about an international call by the Internet. I had found great difficulty in making a call to Japan before. The first time it was a call to a Japanese bank from Mexico, and the second time to an Internet provider in Japan soon after I entered Peru. In Lima I saw a cybercafe giving an international telephone service and I bought the software "Net2Phone" and a set of a microphone and an earphone. I had an idea that the Internet call would be free, but it was wrong. However, the calls are very inexpensive. A call to Japan costs only 5 cents per minute. But I couldn't find how to pay for calls and I left Lima. The cybercafes in the countryside don't know about this system. So I really wanted to solve it in Cuzco. The name of the cafe facing the plaza was W@SINET. The manager is a young, intelligent woman Ruckminy. She teaches physics and chemistry at a school and at the same time runs the cafe with her brother Denis. Both of them were really friendly to me and very happy to help me. First of all I came to know that the payment is not met by a prepaid card, but just by buying a number for the right of usage. I wanted to test the "Net2Phone" that I had bought and installed in Lima. Ruckminy let me use her own account of one dollar. But somehow, this "Net2Phone" didn't work well. She downloaded a proper program for me. I bought an account of $100. However, I wouldn't know where to get a new account when I spent all the hundred dollars. I thought I wanted to add the account directly by the Internet, not through a shop. So I checked the Web site of "Net2Phone", but somehow I could find the menu for application. Ruckminy made a call to the US, but the line was not connected. Then she made a contact with a wholesaler of the account in Lima by chatting and found the page. From now on, I will be able to add an account by my credit card whenever I want. I will be able to make a contact not only with Japan, but also with all over the world. My PC has finally turned to even a telephone.

The river flowing from the southeast of Cuzco branches into two rivers in the east of Cuzco. One of them flows parallel to the railroad from Cuzco to Machu Picchu and the other flows west to Machu Picchu through the "Sacred Valley" in the north of Cuzco. The two rivers merge again before Ollantaytambo, turns the direction to the north after flowing by the side of Machu Picchu, in the farther north merges once again into the river that flows through Ban^os in Ecuador, and it becomes the Amazon. On the contrary, I will go upstream to Lake Titicaca.

When I went out of the hotel for Aguas Caliente, a man walking on the street said to me, "There is another hot spring at Universidad a little before Aguas Calientes and the springwater is cleaner with less visitors over there". Getting off the bus, I saw the hot spring on the foot of the mountain of the opposite side of the valley. I regretted not having come by my bike, but I walked two kilometers. Hot springwater was led into four small bathrooms. I was the sole visitor. I chose the room with hottest water. I bathed without underpants for the first time in this journey. The water was sufficiently hot and I felt as if I were in a hot spring of Japan. As I didn't want to go back on the same 2km road, I took a path along the foot of the mountain to Aguas Calientes. It took more than an hour, however, I enjoyed a good view of the whole valley. I saw lots of alpacas as well. In the hot spring at Aguas Calientes, the water hotter than 50 degrees sprang out of the ground here and there. On the signboard at one of the thermal pools, it was written that the temperature is 48 degrees. There was a hotter pool. There was no one bathing in the pool. Probably its springwater must have been too hot for Peruvians. In the hottest pool I repeatedly mumbled to myself, "This is great!". I wanted to take the resort back to Bogota if possible.

On Friday, the 19th of December. the final tournament of the South American Cup was televised from seven in the evening. It was a game of Peru vs. Argentina. Probably because there were few televisions in the small town of Santa Rosa, the restaurant next to the hotel, where there were usually few guests, was full of people. I decided to cheer the team of Peru as I was traveling in Peru. Peru kicked a goal in the latter half. I clapped my hands. But, about twenty Peruvians didn't show any reaction. In these countries a fuss, as if a war were won, surely starts when a favorite team gets a goal. But ..., my anticipation was betrayed. Even the deadpan Japanese would have reacted a little more. In the district around Cuzco there is larger population of indigenous people and they usually speak Quechua. This town must be a different world from Bogota, Quito or Lima.

From Santa Rosa, which is located halfway between Cuzco and Puno, the valley becomes wider and soon turns to a plateau. The sky was clear when I left in the morning, but it was gradually coming in cloudy and finally I had to ride in the rain though for a short time. Because of the high elevation of 4,000m, it was cold there. The sky ahead was covered with dark clouds. When I came under the cloud, rain changed into hail. The hail not only fell down on the helmet, making a big noise, but also hit me on the cheek and chin to give me a pain. It was more painful than the sandblast of the desert. I covered my face with the left hand just as I did in the desert. The road went up a small mountain before Lake Titicaca. Lake Titicaca extended below. And, the sky cleared up as if the dark clouds were a fantasy. After riding to the south for a while, looking down the lakeside, I saw the houses of Puno clinging to the mountain from an upper part of the slope down to Lake Titicaca.

The purpose of my visit to Puno is to see the life of the people who live on the floating islands made with reed in Lake Titicaca. Puno is in the bosom of a large cove. At the entrance of the cove there is a cluster of reed and among it the reed islands are floating close to each other. A tourist boat dumped out 13 tourists of us onto one of the floating islands. Needless to say of the island, all the things including the houses are made with reed. In each floating island an observation tower with a height of 4 to 5m is constructed. When I stepped out on the island. I felt my feet sinking a little into a soft foundation. The border of the floating island was about 40cm higher like a sea wall. I sat on it and smoke for a while. Reed might absorb water from the lake. When I stood up, I felt even my underpants were wet. It must be very uncomfortable to sleep every night in a place like this. In addition, it gets cold at night, for the elevation of Lake Titicaca is as high as 3,800m. Water is unlimitedly abundant, but electricity is not supplied. As reed will rot away, regular maintenance is required. If you leave it, the island will be sunk. I wonder why the people living here chose the inconvenient place like this. 42 days have passed since I entered Peru. I have ridden through the interminable sand desert, the 5,000m-high altiplano where alpacas are disporting themselves and the green valley, and at last I have come to Lake Titicaca where the reed islands are floating. The Bolivian border is only 150km away from Puno. I will head toward Copacabana, a border town in Bolivia. I will spend Christmas there.