From Hawera/Porangahau to the Amazon

As I write this in the luxury of the city cafe in Miraflores, one of the nicest parts of Lima, with a Pisco sour coming, I reflect on our trip up the Tambopata river, Amazon Basin.

Day 1: We fly from the high altitude city of Cuzco (the longest inhabitiaed city of the Americas) to he jungle and the city of Puerto Maldonado. Once off the air-conditioned plane, we step out to an instant heat rush! Approximately 36'C with humidity 85% and climbing. We are then whipped away in a packed shuttle, where at the office prepare our duffle bags for the trip. Two nights up the Amazon basin.

The two guides names are Leao and Elvis. Elivis is a funny character, the joker, and we have Leao as our guide. Leao is a local fella from the awa and is a big fan of football. He was the man in short, 25 year old and who is very knowledgeable of the rohe, awa, ngahere. We reach the awa and head up it approx 1.5 hours. Can't beat travelling by waka eh, think our Maori genes kick in around now...

On the motorised canoe trip up, Leao with his eagle-eye points out some of the wildlife. We see the cap heron, red and green McCaw, Red Howler Monkeys, and Capibara (largest rodent in the world). The Amazon has many animals that are the world's largest...

We get to the lodge, dripping in sweat from the days travel, and head straight for our rooms for a cold shower - for some comfort and relief... but this soon evaporates! We are once again hot, sticky and battling. We head for tea, where we are asked to wear long pants and sleeves - as the mossies are most active at dusk and dawn. Our kai area (and bar) is over 20 years old, very tidy, and has a Jumanji feel to it. Its awesome - kai too... Wild tomato juice (yellow); and actually all the kai is local produce and is organic. Rawe!

After tea we head out for our night walk, which is around the premises of our lodge, here is me thinking - this will be a waste of time, what the hell are we going to see... Wrong. All we can see in the pitch black; some jumping spiders, bull ants, fly flies, an ant-eater... and we then see, 40 cms off track, a bloody BIRD EATING TARANTULA... Dee is through the roof, and I hate spiders, but am dedicated to picture this beast of a spider! At Discovery school primary school, I never read in the library, but always pulled out the books that had the biggest spiders, snakes etc. This spider was easily as big as my hand, it was bloody massive! Proud of Dee too, as she endured this night walk - she wasn't on about revisting the pics before bed, but we did it! Day 1 down, sleep time now under our mossie nets.

DAY 2

Up at 530am, kai at 6 and on the waka again at 630am. Leao has a trip in mind to walk 12kms, in Gummies, to the Sachabacatoc Lake (google it). The trek is tough, at 8am it is already mid 30s and sweat is filling our boots. Mossies are is full force - and when your guide says shower yourself in insect repellant, and he is doing it - you do EXACTLY THAT! The walk in is eye opening, we came across a group of monkeys - three different kind! The Squirrel, the Tamarind and the Capuchin monkeys. The Capuchin monkeys are the most intelligent of all primates. We then cross many bridges, some just logs, planks of wood, and some over wetlands primed for anacondas Leao says... I laugh the comment off.

We get to the lake hutt for lunch, and suddendly Leao, quitely yells for us to come and follow him! He has heard something... We rush to the lake side and see the 'king of the jungle' - the Giant River Otter. These fellas, three of them, can reach up to 2.5m long and are the world's largest. These fellas can take down caiman, jaguars if in the water, they dominate, and eat up to 5kgs of fish per day! Leao says this is quite a siting, and we are the only people at the lodge to see them. We have kai, and jump into the canoe, Leoa and I paddle our ope around. He then goes to talk abour pirhanas, electric eels and anacondas. We paddle to the end of the roto and we fricken spot a 4m ANACONDA.... Thought the bro was having me on... NOT EVEN!!! I get a shot, and some shady recording...you try and stand in a canoe and record a anaconda 3m away... Mind blowing experience. And in seconds, the world's largest snake submerges and dissapears. Wow! We then paddle back, seeing the prehistoric bird and stick bats. And were back on land - tough day paddling on the roto - but if Leao can, this Maori can.

Leao then says shall we feed the Pirhanas? We're like sure! So he drops leftover kai from lunch, right next to our waka at the jetty, and all of a sudden the water starts bubbling like Rotorua... And its Pirhanas coming to the surface and snatching the kai... F me! This roto is full of them! Anacondas too, with some 2.5m river otters - this is no average roto whanau. It is the Amazon!

We trek back the hot grueling 6kms back to the Tambopata river, and head home. We are well and truely done. High 30s, humid in the 90s, it takes all your energy to be in the jungel. These Maori are just doing it! Rest time.

Before dinner we prep to go on the waka to spot Caimans. They are part of the croc and aligator whanau. They are some what smaller than their Salt waters cuzzies. The trip is in the pitch dark and the awa - buzzing! Only one light onboard, Elvis with his spot light on the ihu... And thats it. He is taking us up the awa in pitch and the driver at the back is following his signals. Sure enough, he spots some in no time! He spots us some white caimans. Everyone starts taking pics, and it is heaps of fun! After an hour spotting caimans the crew drifts us down stream, no motor no light - with just the sound of the jungle... It is epic and peaceful. We then share our last dinner together, and head straight to bed, we prepare to pack bags for our 8am departure the next day.

After breaky, we gift Leao with some taonga from home. We give him a pounamu pendent and name it Tane. Leao is very knowledge of the forest and has the utmost respect for it. He is brillant at his job, and looks after Dee and I very well. We are blessed to have such a guide.

Again, 1.5 hours down river on the boat - reflecting on what is the Amazon... It is a truely a wonder of the world. Teaming with life, diversity and world largest animals. The trip was exhausting, the heat, the animals, the rohe, the ngahere - it all takes it out of you. But we survived to tell the story, and we enjoy our last day in Lima (dinner tonight with Eli and Chris - our Quechua rider friends) and prepare to leave the South American continent - for Costa Rica apopo.

Thanks for reading the novel. Im getting another pisco sour...

And that was our Amazon journey.

Peace to all

 

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Life changing

Tena koutou e te whanau!

 

Well it's been an amazing life changing 4 days in the Andes mountains, hiking the ancient pathways that the Inca people laid to reach the city of Machu Picchu.

The journey from the beginning, pushed our boundaries in so many ways and levels physically, mentally and spiritually.

 

Tu and I have come closer together (if that was even possible!) after sharing this life-changing experience with each other. Profound respect for each other and appreciation for who we are, where we come from, our heritage, culture, language, whanau and friends.

 

The journey itself was physically gruelling in parts, and in other parts surreal and unbelievable as we came eye-level and face to face with clouds, snow capped mountain tops, Inca ruins, ancient (like years before Christ, ancient) ruins all through the trail. This was all possible because of our amazing guide from the Quechua people, Percy. As well as our 26 porters and chefs who travelled with our group of 14 through the 4 days (they were amazing! preparing all the meals and campsites)

 

Most of the trail is in its original form that was laid by the Inca themselves, so he honore NUI tenei te hikoi i nga ara o enei rangatira. One part in particular, we climb a mountain that is 4,200 metres above sea level, which is 800metres HIGHER than Aoraki. This was the hardest day of them all... but we got to the top, which was one of the best feelings ever.

 

Day 4 (yesterday), we awoke at 3am to prepare for the final hike up to the Sun Gate of Machu Picchu where the sun passes through this ancient ruin (ko Tama nui te ra te tino atua o ratou).

 

We reached the top of the Sun Gate just after dawn... moments of celebration and appreciation were shared as we had finally reached, Machu Picchu after 4 days of a very difficult (but hugely rewarding) hike.

 

As our group gets into a circle, our guide Percy asks Tu to speak. Tu turns to me, asks me to go into the circle...

 

He then got on one knee and asked me to marry him! Of course, I said YES!!!

 

Extremely happy, it's still sinking in... We're off to the Amazon Jungle tomorrow for a few days. Feeling very blessed, happy and excited for the future!

 

Arohanui, Tu & Dee

 

 

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Reflections on the Inca Trail

Since arriving back from the Inca Trail 2 days now, I've had some time to really reflect on what just happened. I felt it pertinent to impart some of these thoughts, not only to share with our whanau, but to keep as a record so we can be reminded of how truly profound the trip was for us.

Tu briefly spoke about Day 1 on the trail, which was a really nice introduction to the physical and mental strength required for this trip. We got to get to know some of our crew a bit more, shared a beer and a yarn. Most of the people in our group were seriously fit, or had hiked/trekked before. I instantly regretted not going to the gym more and increasing the incline on the treadmill lol.

Anyway, on the first night, we were briefed about Day 2... the infamous day 2 where all limits would be pushed. I had heard about day 2 and the physical demands, the altitude, the sheer steepness of a mountain leading to the Dead Womans Pass, but nothing could prepare for me what was to follow.

We woke up to blue skies and well rested bodies. Percy, our guide introduced us to all 24 porters and 2 chefs who travelled with us every step of the way on the Inca Trail, as mentioned, their mahi was to look after us with our homes (tents) and meals. They are what you would call the lifeline of the Inca trail, without porters, hikers can't realistically do the trail as the areas are all too remote to source food and water. The porters themselves deserve more than a mention here. They carry 25 kg packs each, some carrying our (the hikers) sleeping bags and spare clothes, some carrying propane gas tanks, some carrying tables, chairs and tents so we can have a dining mess. It's actually incredible.

The porters themselves come from various highland communities of the Andean mountains. The porters that we were blessed with came from the Quechua people. The oldest porters were 68-70 years old all carrying equally sized packs. Unbelievable. Some were brothers, fathers and sons, cousins and in-laws. All were beautiful, hard working people who literally made the trip happen for us. It was surreal as we would be hiking along, someone would yell "porters!" and we'd all move to the left and make way for a flurry of porters rushing past us to get to the next campsite in order to have our dinner cooked and our tents and beds set up before we arrived... truly remarkable.

Back to day 2... easiliy the most difficult, the most challenging, the most gruelling physical activity that I have ever experienced - ever. Not just the physical pain of climbing up one of the steepest mountains for 5 hours (all up hill) but to deal with the altitude, which we began at 3000 metres above sea level, and walked to the highest point of 4,200 metres... Every breath was a gasp for air as if a brick was laying on my chest. I got nauseas and dizzy and at times felt like floating off the cliff! This is the boundary pusher! Tu kept with me the whole time and knew that I was struggling so he took my day pack and carried both of ours... then the rain came... we made it to the Dead Woman's Pass (Warmi Wanusca Pass) at 12.40pm, taking us just over 4.5 hours from the bottom to the top. We then hiked all the way down the other side of the mountain to our next campsite.

Now, during this experience... I wondered to myself many times why didn't we just bus or train to Machu Picchu. Reaching the top of that mountain, with my darling Tu, in the pouring rain and at freezing temperatures (since we were so high up) I realised the importance of what we were doing. The support and encouragement that Tu gave me all the way up that mountain is what got me to the top. Reflecting on ancient Inca people and this trail, reflecting on my whanau back home, our babies, our old people, my maunga; Taranaki and all the things and people I treasure... it truly reminded me of how the beauty in our lives and I'll never forget the feeling it gave me to reach the top of the mountain.

Day 2 campsite was situated on a mountain side in a valley (Pacaymayu) and our tents had a frontal view of the Andean snow-capped mountains and cloud forest. Truly spectacular! Our meals (both lunch and dinner) were three courses. We ate like we were in a hotel. The food was nourishing and plentiful and the service (we had waiters etc) was second to none. Unbelievable to imagine how they could cook all this amazing food for us in the mountains with no power or facilities, just what they have in their packs and the water from the river.

Day 3... bring it on! The bones and muscles were a bit weary today but everyone was keen to hit day 3 which would be the longest of them all (16.5kms). We climbed up a moutain for about 45 minutes to Runkuraqay Pass where we stopped and took a moment. Percy, both guide and philosopher gathered us at the top of the pass for a moment of reflection. He talked a lot about reciprocity and understanding that before you can give love, you must first love yourself, the same goes for anything in life, to give you must first possess that which you are giving away. He asked us to take a stone from the river next to our second campsite and carry it up to this pass with us.

The Quechua Riders (our name that Tu gave us!) decided to stack our stones together as a family. Each of us were asked to think about leaving something on the maunga (a thought, a burden, a worry, a prayer whatever it might be) and to ask for something. These sentiments would allow us to give and receive. It was special... because my wish came true on Day 4! Hahaha!

During day 3, we ate lunch at the Phuyupatamarca Pass where we could see a condor flying in the sky. Our chef, baked a beautiful cake for all of us saying "welcome to the Inca Trail!" unbelievable once more how they could bake a cake so beautiful in the middle of the Andes.

Arriving to our campsite for Day 3 was a blessing... we could see the maunga of Machu Picchu from our tents and our guides said that the ancient city is just over that mountain. We knew we were all so close... and that in the morning we would finally arrive to our destination. At this stage, everyone is pretty smelly from not showering for 3 days and tired. We had an evening of beautiful food and chats, everyone was in good spirits. The porters were invited into our dining tent and Tu was asked to give a speech of thanks to the porters and present them with a koha that all of us hikers had collected. His speech was beautiful! From te reo Maori, to English and then translated by Percy in to Quechua... Tu and I then presented both Percy and Oddy (our other guide who did the entire trail with us) with some pounamu pendants acknowledging them and their time they spent with us making this trip so amazing. After a hongi and some waiata, it was feeling really lovely sharing our culture with the Quechua people.

Day 4... that's another blog :)

All I can say, is that this trip has been profound and life changing, a time of reflection and gratitude, a time of understanding and learning more about myself and my partner and being open minded and having an open heart to the people and the stories around me. Thank you Quechua Riders, thank you Percy, thank you my darling Tumarangai for this unforgettable experience.

 

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In the middle of the Andes

Kia ora whanau!

Ko te tuatahi, he mihi ki nga mate. Kua rongo maua i te matenga o te rangatira a Koro Sam, no Taranaki maunga, Te Ati Awa tangata. E te rangatira, ia hui ia hui ki Te Upoko o Te Ika, ka tu koe i te paepae, ki te whaikorero, he pou hoki ki nga tikanga o taua rohe, kei te mihi nunui ki a koe. E te rangatira, moe mai moe mai, moe mai ra.

Ka huri ki te ao marama, ki te ao o nga Inka. He mihi maioha ki nga tangata whenua o tenei rohe, ko Quechua. Ka mihi hoki ki nga maunga whakahi o te Andes, raua ko te awa o te Scared Valley. He tino ataahua tenei whenua, he tapu hoki.

E te whanau, ka ora rawa maua ko Dee. He mihi hoki ki te whare teneti, na te mea e ua ana iaianei. Tena koutou, tena koutou, tena tatau katoa.

Well whanau, we are in the middle of the Andes and truly living the dream. I think it starts with our guide, Percy, he tangata whenua ia no Cusco. He tangata mohio o tenei rohe. He got us through all the official process to get on the Inca trail, and he alerted us only 500 people (us, guides, porters) are allowed on the trail.

The first few hills immediately try your fitness and altitude ability. Walking past Inca ruins is something truly amazing, and the crew we are with are cool too, Scots, Canadians, Austrains, Australians and Maori! The porters carry all the gear, and tramp ahead and set up camp and lunch. 3 course meals, spoilt to bits whanau. They are amazing!

After 10.5kms we reached our base camp for the night, tents up (porters), and we settle down to a cool beer or water - the locals were selling them, like angles from above! Then we explore, another archaeological site, and we stumble upon a soccer game. Their national sport, this was a serious game being played and the internationals were up next. Wow - if tramping wasn't enough, try sprinting and trying to out-muscle and play these peruvians - we lost 1-0, but was very proud of the guys.

Dee and I are waiting out the rain and dinner is soon - have no doubt our chiefs are cooking up something good! Well better roll and save batt for later blogs.

Last thing, so proud of my darling Dee. Busting out these maunga, and always having a smile for me. Love you darling.

Love to all our whanau and friend - Tu

 

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Open your hearts, and mind

These past few days in Cuzco and surrounding regions have been nothing short than incredible. We have the best guide in the world, whose name is Percy :) he comes from the Quechua iwi who are one of the Indigenous peoples of this area. They have their reo, values, religion and culture still intact, despite the Spanish conquer in the 16th century

Day 4: Cuzco is a beautiful place. Cobble stone roads and ancient buildings, temples, churches and ruins. It's clear to see the Spanish influence here over the Indigenous Inca Capital. Altitude here is 3200 metres, which made us feel instantly nauseaus and woozy! Walking around the town and eating lunch, shopping and sightseeing helped with the acclimatisation process. We met our tour group that we'll be living with for the next week who are a combination of couples, sisters and solo travellers from Scotland, Austria, Canada, Australia and US! We are the only Native/Indigenous people in the group, so have instantly warmed up to our guide, Percy.

Day 5: Can't quite believe that we've only been away from home for 5 days! Feels like months already! Today started with an early pick up and drive to Ccaccaccollo (a small community in the Sacred Valley who have a textile and weaving project). We spent the morning here hearing about how they make their beautiful colourful blankets, bags, scarves, hats etc. It was such a privilege to hang out with this Indigenous community and hear about how they've resisted Westernisation and Catholicism. Their weaving project helps to bring some economy into the community and our tour company contributes by building a weaving house, and working with the whanau to bring in visitors to learn about the weaving project and purchase their taonga. I just wish we had a second bag on this trip... could only afford (space wise) an alpaca scarf and a small texttile blanky.

We then moved onto Pisaq, a cute as little town at the bottom of these amazing man made terraces. They were built by the Inca's as reinforcement for the mountains. The Inca's would build and settle their communities on top of the Andes mountains, rather than at the bottom (close to the river) so that the river banks would be used primarily for crops. The terraces act as reinforcements incase of erosion and have doubled as irrigation. Amazzzzzzing.

Their houses and urupa are all built with stone that have been carried great distances from quarries. The architecture is 500-600 years old. Many were ruined during the Spanish conquer, their urupa were raided as their tupapaku were buried with gold and silver which were stolen. Hearing of the histories from Percy has made us so emotional and pouri, as we come from a similar place of struggle. 9 million Indigenous people of Peru were killed during the Spanish conquer...

 

We visited another amazing place called Ollantaytambo, which is where we stayed the night. They have huge mountains surrounding this community which a large temple was built (but not finished) along with terraces, houses, and structures built into the mountain side. A great story was shared about the man Ollantaytambo (a commoner) who was the right hand man to the King Pachacuti.

So much ancient history, we feel so lucky and privileged to be here and give honour and respect to the tangata whenua, their awa, whenua, maunga, reo, tikanga me nga kawa. Most of the ruins we are seeing on our tour are of the Incas, but there are many other Indigenous peoples (51) and their unique histories, stories and wahi tapu in these areas and in Peru.

Day 6: It's about to begin. The great hike to Machu Picchu... excited, nervous, humbled and privileged.

Will be sure to write our thoughts down and take photos to share this incredible experience with you our whanau, and post more blogs upon our return in 4 days time.

Our guide, Percy asked us to do one thing on this tour; open our hearts and open our minds to the incredible history and Native people who we will hear about and visit during this haerenga... We're ready

 

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Lima

The higlights of Lima, Peru

Where to start... this place is full of hustle, bustle, colour, culture and mucho passion! We arrived to Lima airport greeted by what felt like thousands of signs in a sea of people. Luckily Tu found a sign with our name on it. A sigh of relief to know that we were to be looked after by our tour company transfer that we organised. The transfer itself to our hotel was more than we could have imagined (!!!) and we could finally sleep in a comfy bed after what felt like 2 days of no sleep.

We awoke to a sensory overload of noise, tooting of horns, espanol, and a smell of fresh pastries. That was our breakfast cooking :) We set out to explore Miraflores and found ourselves on a block or two full of Inca and Cuzco market places. Extraordinary art pieces, paintings, weavings, blankets, bags, alpaca clothing and more. It was hard not to spend all our soles (Peruvian dollar) in one day.

Of course no day of shopping is complete without some nourishing food to sustain the bodies so we visited Cafe Haiti - an up market cafe where the waiters could speak English... it should be noted that at this point we did pretty well to communicate effectively to market staff and others who didn't understand a word of English, but by our hand signals, our smiles and some spanish phrases we had learnt, we were able to break through the language barrier. So back to lunch.

We tried beers from Lima and Cuzco and had a delicious meal. Learning the spanish phrases for "it's delicious" and "can we have the check please" has been a real help. The food is amazing and there's so many options, many with the international flavours that we're used to but most with a Peruvian menu, so we have pointed to one and tried it out - and being really pleased with the choices :)

Lima comes alive at night time... it's still crazy with its unpredictable traffic and vehicles all wrestling their way through the traffic, but it takes on an exciting charm at night time. Tried our first pisco sours at dinner, a Lomo Saltado and some seafood... Cebiche is on the list of things to try apopo!

Day 3 one more day of exploring. We set out for Larcomar it's like a mall on the coast of Miraflores with great places to eat and sit and watch the moana. After being here not half an hour, Tu was itching to get out of the tourist areas and into the heart of Lima so we taxi'd into Lima to the National Museum and saw some amazing ceramics of the Indigenous people of Peru, including the Inca people.

We then learnt some truths about Peru's history through the 'Shining Path' regime that devasted and disenfranchised the people of Peru through terrorism and genocide. We both felt sad that we didn't know of this history before coming to Lima and now have more of an understanding of this ancient place and it's past.

Lunch back at Larcoma and our first try of 'Cebiche' (raw fish, Peruvian style!) it was amazing. The food is truly good here and the price is really good too.

Despite feeling like we fall short every time someone speaks to us in Spanish and we can only partially understand and/or respond, we are working our way through the language barrier but know that next time we come back, we must learn their reo.

For now, we're resting up for the Inca Trail that begins tomorrow in Cuzco.

Adios!

 

HERE WE GO!

Morena whanau!

Amidst the final packing of bags, priming and grooming, final showering and last check of the passport we thought we'd write one more blog before we leave this afternoon for Lima!

Reflection is important and I'm taking a moment to reflect on the year's craziness, the mahi that we've completed and done successfully and the whanau who have been in our lives supporting us all the way through. E kore e mutu nga mihi ki a koutou katoa.

Relaxing is going to be a key word of this trip, well that's once we climb to the top of Machu Picchu, go to the Amazon and survive ridiculous heights and altitude, then we'll be relaxing. The past year for me personally has been physically exhausting and draining and I haven't had a moment to catch a breath. This trip is all about catching breaths! Breathing in the air of another place, taking a step on a new whenua, meeting a new person, connecting with a new culture. Relaxation!

The final 'R' is Refocus. This trip will help us to refocus. Refocus of our goals, dreams and aspirations, refocusing on what's important in our lives. This is truly what I'm most looking forward to. That "ah haaah" moment, the enlightenment period that might happen deep in the Amazon jungle, or visiting a church in Roma, that moment where you figure it all out and think... this is me, this is what I'm going to do, this is where I want to be.

Alright, enough philosophical-ness for a Sunday morning. We're off for a hearty breakie and then time to catch us some international tavel!

Na, Dee

 

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One More Sleep

It’s 10:33pm on Saturday 16 November, 2013.

May I just say, that this has been one tough week. PhD oral examination, revisions for publications, funding round applications, and then organising the final details for the trip. We are smashed! But with less than 20 hours before we begin our world tour, we’re AMPING!

I remember back in March one morning when I was dropping Tu at work, we stole a few minutes to grab some breakfast. I remember asking the guy at the counter for a pen and a napkin. We then took turns at saying one place in the world we always wanted to visit. It was a “dream big” kind of exercise. Nothing was off limits. If you wanted to visit the plains of Africa then say it! After a few minutes, Tu had written a huge list of countries on this napkin.

I jokingly took a photo of him doing this and thought to myself this would be funny to reflect on once this dream trip becomes a reality. Well whanau, here we are…

It’s exciting, nerve wracking and overwhelming when we think about the places we will visit, the people will meet and the things we will see. Personally, these are some of things I want to remember to do/embrace:

• Live in the moment. Don’t worry about whether or not I’ll find a job next year, or if I turned my out of office on for my emails. Just be.
• See the sunrise and sunset in different parts of the world, and remember to reflect on life’s beauty
• Do something different everyday

Easy.

Now, it’s time for me to sign off, get some sleep before the first flight tomorrow afternoon and dream about what’s to come.

Natirā x Dee
x