Saturday, October 4, 2008

2nd October 2008 - Puerto Maldonado

Our last night in the jungle passed without any real incident although I did attempt to sleep outside in the hammock once again, also without success due to all the insects. I sat and watched all the night time creatures for about an hour and in the moonlight it was just possible to see bats flitting around whilst trying to feast on the multitude of bugs. These bugs included fireflies and it was quite eerie to see their tiny little lights moving around all over the place.

Then, after another breakfast which included scrambled turtle eggs, we left the lodge at around 9:30am for the 45 minute boat ride back to Puerto Maldonado. Other than ourselves everyone else was flying out from Puerto Maldonado airport later that day but as they had a few hours to kill beforehand they were also visiting the local market along with a guide. We would not be flying until the following day and so we first needed to find a hotel to stay in for the night.

When we arrived at the port we bought some drinks at the shop kiosk there before being taken by minibus to the office of the tour operator who had organised our package. Once there we told our guide we wanted somewhere to stay that was cheap but decent and close to the town centre. He suggested one called the Hostal Moderno which was just down the street (Jiron Billinghurst) from the tourism office we were dropped off at.

I guess it must have been one of those ironic name like short people being called "Lofty" as it may have been modern when it was first built (about 50 years ago by the look of it) but it certainly couldn't be described as such nowadays. There were only shared toilets and bathrooms and they were pretty filthy it has to be said. The beds were quite comfortable but the room was crawling with ants and we had to ask the receptionist to spray our room to try and get rid of them. This worked quite well and the fan we also asked for managed to cool the place down sufficiently that we were able to stay there without sweating too much. Luz described it as "the worst hotel I have ever stayed in" but I think it was still far better than the place we stayed in for one night on Amantani Island in Lake Titicaca on our previous trip to Peru. Still, at least it was very cheap at only 15 dollars each per night.

Now we had sorted out somewhere to stay we now needed to find out how to spend the rest of the day in Puerto Maldonado. Our guide had also suggested that we should hire a couple of motorbikes in order to explore the area but when we tried the guy refused to let us as we said we had never ridden one before. I guess we could have tried another place but I wasn't really comfortable with the idea anyway as, with all the other motorbikes whizzing around the place, I thought it could potentially be quite dangerous and wasn't worth the risk.

After 3 days in the jungle our clothes were rather dirty and smelly and so we decided to take them to a launderette. We found one on the main road, Avenida Leon Velarde which leads SW from the Plaza de Armas and is lined with many different shops. Their prices (they charged by the kilo) were very reasonable and so we left a few black bags with them which they said would be ready at 7pm that evening. After visiting the ice cream parlour that was next door to the launderette we then decided to visit the market which was about 5 minutes from the main square by motor-taxi.

A was a typical Peruvian market with no real difference to one in any other town or city in Peru. It was possible to buy all sorts of things, including the ubiquitous pirate CDs and DVDs, at very low prices as well as various types of fruit. However, one difference between this market and others I've been to in Peru was that here it was possible to get strange jungle fruits that aren't available elsewhere although we passed up the opportunity to do so as we'd already tasted many of them during our trip to the jungle. One thing I did want to buy was some new insoles for my trainers as they were the only pair of shoes I had brought with me on the trip and they were now rather ragged from all the jungle walks we had done. Unfortunately my feet are pretty big (Euro size 45), especially for a country like Peru where the average height of a person is a lot lower than in Europe (5'5" for a man, 5'3" for a woman), and it proved impossible to find anywhere that sold them in that size.

Whilst in the market Luz discovered that some of the coins she had been given by the woman in the kiosk at the port were fake and so, as we were planning to take the ferry across the river anyway, we returned to the port where we were able to change the coins for real ones. The woman actually admitted that she had given Luz false coins. And it wasn't the first time it had happened here in Puerto Maldonado, we had noticed a few other false coins from unknown sources.

At the port we asked about the possibilities in hiring a boat to visit other parts of the area along the river but were told that, for just the two of us, it would be quite expensive. Therefore we decided to just take the passenger ferry across the river to visit the small community of El Triumfo. There is also a vehicle ferry which is still in use due to the current postponement of the construction of the Guillermo Billinghurst bridge because of financial problems. At the moment there are just two bridge supports on each side of the river with no more work being planned any time soon. The bridge was part of a plan to build an Interoceanic Highway that would link the southern Pacific ports of Peru with the Atlantic ports of Brazil. Parts of the highway have already been constructed but due the project has suffered greatly with delays and financial problems so far.

Whilst we were crossing the river on the ferry we were told that there was a bus that was just about to leave for the town of IƱapari close to the Brazilian border, a journey which takes around 4-5 hours. It is then possible to cross over the Rio Acre to the small town of Assis Brazil. Luz was very keen to do this so that she could say she'd been to Brazil but I was very wary of doing so as I didn't want to travel all the way there, in the heat of the afternoon, only to spend a few hours there and then come back. I'd have preferred to have spent a few days doing so but that wasn't possible. In the end I managed to persuade Luz that the trip wasn't really sensible. There really wasn't a lot to do or see in El Triumfo but the weather was extremely hot and so we paused for some time at a small kiosk where we drank a number of bottle of very cold and refreshing Inka Cola before taking the ferry back across the Rio Madre de Dios to Puerto Maldonado.

One important industry in the Madre de Dios regions is logging and as we were leaving the main port we saw a huge lorry trying to make its way up the steep, winding road which lead from the port up to the main part of the city. It had a lot of difficulties navigating the tight bends and became quite a popular attraction for the hour or so it took to make the journey, holding up all the other traffic on the road during that time.

The next site on our tour of Puerto Maldonado was the "Obelisk", an 8 storey observation tower which offers very views of the city, its jungle surroundings and the two rivers (Rio Madre de Dios and Rio Tampopata) that converge just to the east of Puerto Maldonado. The entrance fee is apparently a few sols but the guy at the desk had disappeared when we first entered and so we were able to climb (the lift was out of order) to the top for free! The view from the top was very nice and it was possible to see much of the surroundings, including more fires, but due to my vertigo I kept well away from the edge!

After heading back to the Plaza de Armas we took the opportunity to try out one of the many Internet cafes there were dotted around the square. The rate was very cheap (1 sol per 30 minutes) and we were able to catch up on news and emails. We then went next door to another ice cream parlour for a snack and yet another large bottle of Inka Cola. I have no idea how much of this drink I consumed during my time in Peru but it must surely be measured in gallons! And I've managed to find a company in Belgium that can supply it so it appears my Inka Cola drinking days are not quite over yet!

We had now just about exhausted everything that was possible to do and see in Puerto Maldonado and it was only late afternoon. The conditions were still very hot and humid and so we decided to head back to our fan-cooled room at the Hostel Moderno for a rest until the evening and to get cleaned up (if that was possible given the state of the bathroom!). At least the ants seemed to have disappeared now our room had been sprayed.

At 7pm we headed back to the launderette to pick up our laundry only to be told that it wasn't quite ready yet. The woman in charge said that it would be delivered to our hotel once it was finished but that they would close at 8pm. We hoped it would be ready in time and we wouldn't have to wait until the following day to receive it as we had no other clothes to wear apart from those we were wearing and they were by now rather dirty and smelly from having worn them most of the day. Luckily the turned up just up time.

We had been recommended a restaurant just around the corner from the hotel and it was OK but nothing special apart from the small jungle on the ground floor which contained various plastic jungle animals. Maybe the mixed grill we ordered used meat from these animals as it was pretty tough and we left most of it. We drank the two 2L bottles of Inka Cola though!

Afterwards we visited a small "video-pub" on the Plaza de Armas for a few drinks which showed Peruvian music videos from the 80s. Apparently 80s music was just as cheesy, and the 80s clothes and hairstyles were just as rubbish in Peru as they were in England. We were told that there had once been a disco in Puerto Maldonado called El Jaguar that also contained a zoo, or more correctly a zoo that became a disco during the evening. However, due to the poor conditions of the zoo and the stress the animals had suffered (no wonder!) the place had now closed. There were a few other discos in the area but as it was a Thursday evening and things were pretty quiet we decided to just go back to our hotel to sleep instead.