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| Erika receiving her mission call to Peru, in September of 2016. |
After Erika had been home for a few months in 2018, she received word that one of her converts would be going to the Lima temple to be sealed on January 15, 2019, so we decided to schedule a trip to Peru around that, in spite of people being in school and it being the rainy season.
Peru turns out to be a very tricky place to visit. The nature of the spectacular Andes mountains means that there are no easy highways from one place to another. Rather, getting around requires all-day (or all-night) bus rides or small flights. Machu Picchu is also tricky, with limited tickets, odd time restrictions, 11-pound luggage limits on the trains to get there (since there are no roads that go there), and so on.
After a couple of months of research, we came up with a rough plan (in more than one sense of the word), and one night, Linette went ahead and booked our airplane tickets. At that point, we were committed, so I started planning in earnest. Eventually, the plan was for Linette, Kelsi, Erika and I to drive to Las Vegas (spending the night with Bill and Robin Christensen along the way), and fly out of there to Mexico City and then on to Lima; and then take an all-day bus ride to Huánuco, where we would spend a few days visiting Erika's friends; then another all-day bus ride to Huancayo, where we would visit with the mission president and more friends; then an all-night bus ride to Lima.
Meanwhile, Adam and Sienna would fly from Salt Lake City to Las Vegas, and then (with a notarized letter in hand giving Sienna permission to fly out of the country without her parents) they would fly to Mexico City and meet us in Lima. At the same time, Erika's "trainer" (first missionary companion) Leslye Huanaco would take a bus from Bolivia and meet us at the Lima airport, too. I was pretty nervous about all of that working out.
But assuming we all ended up in Lima together, then we would all fly together to Cusco, and then the next evening take a collectivo (shared taxi van) to Ollantaytambo, and the next day explore ruins there and then take a train to Aguas Calientes. The next day we would finally take a short bus ride up to see Machu Picchu. Then we would make our way back by train to Ollantaytambo, bus to Cusco, and (the next morning) fly back to Lima and explore that a bit, at which point, Linette, Adam, Sienna and I would fly home while Erika and Kelsi stayed a couple more days to attend the sealing at the temple.
I kept thinking, "Don't worry. As long as you hit that wire with the connecting hook at precisely 88 miles an hour, the instant the lightning strikes the tower... everything will be fine!"
St. George
So on Saturday, December 29, 2018, Linette, Kelsi, Erika and I piled into our Highlander and drove out, leaving Sienna behind to stay with my sister Sharon. We felt a little bad about abandoning her.
But she seemed to not mind the freedom.
We drove four hours to St. George to stay with my cousin Robin Christensen and her husband Bill.
We had fun chatting about various travels we had taken around the world. I loved hearing a bit more about their trip to Africa and Turkey. It was also fun to visit with their daughter Alex and her husband Mike and their cute kids.
We attended church at the 9 a.m. ward at their church building, and then grabbed our stuff and headed for Las Vegas. (We almost left the laptop behind because it was camouflaged as their couch!)
Las Vegas
After a 2 hour drive to Las Vegas, we left our car at a parking service at a hotel and took the shuttle to the airport, arriving a good 3 hours before our flight. It was a good thing we did, because our first flight was delayed enough that we were going to miss our connecting flight (which is what happened both times we flew AeroMexico before). But, fortunately, an earlier flight was also delayed, so they switched us to that flight, and we busted a move through security to get on it, making it with just minutes to spare.
Mexico City
When we got to Mexico City, we had a nice lunch of tacos with green tortillas.
I had a nice fresh-baked pizza. It was the last good pizza of the trip, as apparently Peru has not yet discovered mozzarella cheese and isn't big on including tomato sauce.
AeroMexico kept us on our toes by never displaying what gate our flight would be at, and changing it to a whole different area at the last minute with just one overhead announcement to that effect that we luckily heard.
Lima
We eked out a little sleep on the flight down, and arrived in Lima at 7:45 a.m., about an hour late. We grabbed a "green taxi" (safe but twice the price) from the airport to get to an area where several of the bus terminals were in Lima. We had our taxi driver pull over at a store so we could grab some breakfast, consisting of yogurt drinks and "pan" (bread).
Erika had asked people in Huánuco how you get there from Lima, and they all said there are lots of busses that run, so just grab one and no problem. The first place we tried didn't have a bus until 9:30pm that night (12 hours later). Another had one at 1pm. Then we found one leaving ahorita (right away), so Erika and I ran back to gather everyone else and our luggage up and sprinted over to the bus to jump on at the last minute.
The seats were cushy and leaned way back for sleeping purposes.
I was amazed at the size and steepness of the mountains that we drove through. They weren't especially pretty, consisting mainly of grey dirt and grey rock (reminding me of Mordor), but their scale was impressive.
As we rose in altitude, we came across some lakes in the upper mountains.
After six hours, we stopped for a break at a little town that had food and a bathroom (for a small fee). The bus ride had been hot (because whenever they turned on the air, someone would complain that they were cold), and had terrible violent movies playing aloud the whole time. The little kid in Linette's row kept throwing up (into a bag, fortunately), and so we were all ready to get off of this thing. We were dismayed to find that there were still four hours to go.
But I thought this lady was legit.
Huánuco
We were so happy to finally get to Huánuco. (We could see why there were so few tourists there: you had to be willing to endure a brutal 10-hour bus ride to get there. In fact, the original plan was to go to the jungle of Tingo Maria the next day, but the 6 hours of travel to do so sounded way too painful at that point, so we skipped that.)We were delighted with our hotel. The rooms were spacious and new, and the lady at the desk was so nice. In fact, she had written me in advance to make sure we were getting the right rooms, and I noticed that her name was Erika. When I told her that that was my daughter's name, too, she said that they were "tocayos", which apparently means they have the same name (like "name twinners.")
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| Erika and Erika, tocayos. |
After we checked in, we took a little walk around the nearby square (Plaza de Armas) to see what was going on.
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| Plaza de Armas, Huánuco |
Then we took a mototaxi (little 3-wheeled vehicle run by a motorcycle engine) to a ward New Year's Eve party that was just starting up.
Erika immediately started greeting her friends there.
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| Celeste, Xiomara (daughter of Erika's investigator Vilma), Erika |
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| Erika, Kathiuska (recent convert when Erika arrived), Yanira, (not sure), Lorena (those two are daughters of Erika's pencionista [cook]). |
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| Xiomara, Estela, Celeste |
When we arrived, nobody was dancing, but our girls soon had a bunch of people out on the floor dancing. Just before we left, Kelsi did a selfie and everyone was excited to jump in.
Around 11pm, we rode over to visit the Huaranga family, who served us dinner. The mom was Erika's pencionista, meaning that she cooked their meals. It was fun to visit with their extended family.
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| La familia Huaranga: Mirium (aunt), Shuany (seated), David, Michelle, Helen, Eric, Pool, Pedro (above, nephew of Prisilla), his wife Marcella, Pricilla, Linette, Kelsi, Erika. |
Helen and Pool (pronounced "Pohl") were expecting a baby soon (to be named Andrés, apparently), and Erika had brought her some baby jammies.
As midnight approached, the fireworks ramped up, and we went outside to watch. It was quite a show! It was like being in a war zone!
I thought it was cute that the sister missionaries were obediently watching from their apartment. One of them had been trained by Hermana Begazo, who Erika had trained, so we called her Erika's "granddaughter."
After the fireworks, Pool took us in the back of his jeep to go visit someone. Travel is much more ad-hoc in Peru, where you do what you need to do, and don't worry about seat belts except when it happens to work out.
Here is a little video that Kelsi made that summarizes our ringing in the new year, including our mototaxi ride, New Year's Eve dance, fireworks, and jeep ride.
Finally, at about 1 a.m. we visited the Muñoz family that Erika had worked with in the past. I don't think that they have joined the church, but I thought that they were awesome. You could tell that there was a lot of love in the home.
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| Back: Randy, Gleis, Axel, Giovanna, Isaís Front: Randy, Kelsi, Linette, Saori, Erika |
On New Year's Day, I walked a block over to the main square to find an ATM, and bumped into some local missionaries there. They said to tell Sister Wilson hello.
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| Elder Brown and Elder Barber |
That day we went to the home of a gal Erika knew named Maria, and her brother David fed us lunch, which consisted of turkey with a great sauce, and a purple juice. The juice looked exactly like purple grape juice, but it was actually a drink made of purple corn called chicha morada, and included spices like cinnamon that made it taste like wassail.
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| Duck, potatoes, rice, and purple corn juice (chicha morada). |
David had a cranky guard dog named Oso that everyone is afraid of because he bites. David had to hold it back as we came and went.
So after lunch we went on an outing with Maria, her son Jose and daughter Valentina, and her daughter-in-law Anita (Ana) with her little daughter Alejandra. (Ana is the sister of Xiomara who we met at the New Year's Eve dance).
Travel in Peru is hilarious. Here's a motorcycle with a big trailer hauling like 12 people.
In addition to regular taxis and moto-taxis, you can also get around in combis or collectivos, which are vans with seating for maybe 10 and standing room for an unlimited number of additional people. One guy drives while another guy yells out the window where they're going, pulls people in, and collects the money. I don't suppose a collectivo has ever admitted to being "full". It reminded me of all piling into a van for early morning seminary.
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| Erika, Valentina, Kelsi, Maria, Linette, Jose |
We took the combi about 25 minutes to a town called Tomayquichua (Toh-mahy-KEE-chwah), where a festival was going on to celebrate the negritos (affectionate term for black people). The celebration dates back to the colonial period, when Africans were brought to the area as slaves. They would get a break after Christmas, and so they would gather to celebrate and dance. Slavery was abolished in 1854, and slowly the African descendants disappeared from the area. But the tradition of dancing was already going, so people would dress up with black masks on to dance and continue the celebration. It's a pretty big deal now in the area, and we saw several groups performing all around Huánuco during the days we were there.
Tomayquichua had the largest negritos celebration that we saw. As we gathered to watch some of the dancing, Erika bumped into Pamela, the relief society president of the Cayhuayna ward, and her family.
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| Alvin, Pamela, Adolfo, cute grandma, Erika, Catherine. |
Then we walked up the hill to visit a little complex that is dedicated to the memory of Micaela Villegas, also known as La Perricholi, who was the most famous Peruvian woman of the 1700s. She was the famous mistress of Manuel de Amat y Juniet, who was the Viceroy of Peru at the time. The pair of them are depicted in the dances that go on there, and are celebrated as a great love story.
We thought our friend Maria looked a bit like Micaela, so I asked if I could take a picture of her "con su gemela" (with your twin). She smiled and obliged.
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| Alejandra and her grandmother Maria. |
She actually really got into this, because when we visited a little historical kitchen, she said, "And here is my kitchen..." as though she were Micaela.
It was a cute place to visit, and reminded me of Salt Lake City's "This is the Place Heritage State Park," with it's 1800s-era structures and furnishings.
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| Linette, Randy, Maria, Erika, Anita, her daughter Alejandra, Valentina, Kelsi, Jose. |
There was a wishing well where you could throw in a coin to make a wish come true. Jose told his little sister Valentina, "Maybe I should throw you in, and then all my wishes will come true." Ah, the love of siblings. That was horrible but hilarious.
Then we got some frozen juice pops, which were delicious and refreshing on a warm summer day. (Oh, and thanks to Sharon and Roger for shoveling the snow off of our driveway while we were gone!)
While we ate our juice pops, a girl walked by that Erika happened to know, so that was cool. Her name is Graciela and she was the Gospel Principles teacher in the La Alameda ward (Erika's last area).
And then Graciela's fiancé and his family arrived as well.
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| Alex, girl, Cherli, Erika, Graciela, Maria, Joel (Maria's son, Graciela's fiancé), Cherli's daughter-in-law and son. |
Back down at the main square of Tomaykichwa, the clowns of the parade were growling and spinning their clicking instruments and posing for pictures with everyone.
The dancing began, and you can see here the negritos with tall colorful hats dancing around.
And here is the famous couple, the Peruvian Micaela and the viceroy Manuel de Amat.
And here is a short video showing the negritos dancing to music played by a band.
Here's Linette doing her Micaela imitation.
After the dance performance, it took us about 45 minutes (and a couple miles of walking) to find a taxi. While we were looking, I noticed this young mother waiting on a corner. Eventually someone pulled up on a motorcycle, and she hopped on the back, still holding the baby, and they rode off.
Eventually we found a collectivo to take us back to Huánuco.
That evening the family took us up the hill from their place to see a few more folks dance around.
That night we went and visited Rosa, who washed the missionaries' clothes. Erika reported that she made really good food and cakes.
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| Randy, Kelsi, Erika, Linette, Rosa and her daughter Ana Carolina. |
Our hotel included a nice breakfast each morning with eggs cooked to order, fresh-blended fruit juice, bread, butter, jam, and random hot herbal teas.
After breakfast, it was back into a 3-person mototaxi with four people. It would only cost something like 4 soles ($1.30) to get somewhere in one of those.
We visited an awesome gal named Dani "could fix any problem." Sure enough, while we sat there, she arranged for someone to drive us to Huancayo so that we could get there in 6 hours without having to endure an 8-hour bus ride. She was a happy, energetic gal with a big smile. We saw her husband on our way out, and Linette told him that his wife was awesome. He kind of answered with, "Well, yeah, I married her."
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| Randy, Linette, Dani, Erika, Kelsi |
Next we took another ride out to an area where we walked for some time on some dirt roads and then visited another of Erika's pencionistas, Rosa of the Tixe family. Rosa wasn't home when we first got there, so we talked with her son, who had returned from a mission not too long before. We also taught them all how to play Uno, which the little boy Tomás especially liked. (We ended up giving him the Uno deck as a present when we left.)
When Rosa returned, she fed us a nice lunch of seasoned chicken, rice and potatoes, and then, as is the tradition, we each said good-bye to each person, with a kiss on the cheek when a girl was involved, and a handshake otherwise.
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| La familia Tixe: Erika, recently returned missionary, Thomas, Linette, Jimmy, Rosa, Kelsi. |
We did some more walking around, sticking to shady parts whenever possible, as it was a warm day and we hadn't remembered to bring sunblock (and nobody really sold it there).
We visited Vilma in her peluquería (hair salon) until she had a customer come in who needed a haircut, at which point we went off to visit some other folks.
Erika arranged for us to meet up with Antoni, a great 17-year-old who was baptized right after Erika left.
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| Erika and Antoni. |
She also bumped into a gal named Carol whose family Erika taught from time to time.
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| Erika and Carol. |
Then, another fun-filled mototaxi ride! (They really only seat 3, but everyone was ok with us squishing in).
We had a nice visit with one of Erika's converts named Ruth. Her niece (I think) was quiet at first, but once we asked her some questions, she opened right up, and it turned out that she was really smart and had no problem talking to adults.
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| Ruth and Erika. |
We visited the family of another of Erika's converts (Sebastian) and had a nice chat. Erika gave them a picture of the Savior to hang up.
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| Cinthia, Wilsons..., Sebastian, Carlos. |
That family also had an adorable little puppy that we had fun playing with.
From there, we visited one more lady who was having a rough time forgiving some people for some awful stuff (I won't include a picture of her), and then we had to hurry to meet a group of people whom Erika had invited to meet us at the park near our hotel, since we were out of time for driving around visiting people individually.
After meeting up with Erika's group of friends, we ended up walking over to a burger place called Lookcos Burger Grill, which had good burgers and tasty milkshakes (liquid like the east coast, not thick like in the western U.S.).
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| Yomira, Betsy, Wendy, Linette, Randy, Kelsi, Branco, Cathy, Erika, Kathy. |
We tried the infamous salchipapas, which are french fries with hot dog slices and eggs on them. It reminded me of poutine in Montreal, Canada (french fries with meat and gravy).
We had a little photo shoot outside the restaurant afterwards.
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| Randy, Linette, Erika, Cathy, Bronco, Kelsi. |
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| Betsy, Erika, Kathy, Iomira, Kelsi. |
The next morning, Erika went out early to visit Yanira, her pencionista's daughter.
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| Erika y Yanira |
Meanwhile, I walked down to the plaza again to hit the ATM, and bumped into yet another pair of elders.
Soon our driver José arrived and drove us towards Huancayo.
He was nice enough to let us stop for one more visit on the way out of town. Erika visited Cinthia, who was her investigator who is battling cancer, which is so sad. Erika said that some of her most spiritual experiences were with her and her family.
With that, the guy sped us up the highway from Huánuco (which is at 6000 feet) to Huancayo (which is at 10,000 feet) along a highway that includes a long stretch that is at 14,000 feet, which is said to be the highest highway in the world.
Along the way, we saw some herds of llamas. We even saw some vicuñas, which are the ancestors of the domesticated alpacas, but are skinnier and have amazingly soft fur. They are rare and can't be domesticated, so gathering their fur is very tricky. I've heard that a fur coat made from the fur from their chests can cost $100,000. There is a reserve that we drove through where I saw a couple herds of vicuñas in addition to this solitary one that I happened to get a picture of.
Our driver went really fast, and passed people with wild abandon, so it was an exciting drive. A couple hours from Huancayo, he passed us off to another driver who drove us the rest of the way. We felt a little safer in his hands because he drove a bit more cautiously. Plus, as I texted my siblings at the time, "Don't worry—our driver is Jesús!"
So our time in Huánuco was great, with lots of nice visits with Erika's friends, and some fun celebrations with the negritos.
In our next episode, the visiting continues in Huancayo. Plus, colorful dancers!
