OneWayTicket

Day 61: Inca Kola and Hamara Bajaj on the Pan American Highway

(Photo: on the Pan American Highway, 180 km out of Lima)

Coca Cola´s biggest challenger in Peru -- a land of sweeping landscapes, rough edges and friendly people proud of their Inca heritage -- is a sugary, piss-coloured drink called Inca Kola.

As we head out of chaotic, colourful Lima, the first thing we see is advertisements for Inca Kola. Surely some archaeo-pop patriotism at work? After all the Inca empire was wiped out by the Spanish before the British took over India. But our driver, Richard, a shy Quechua Indian from the Andes -- now a Lima boy, he can only understand this ancient Inca language --demonstrates that the subliminal call of being an Inca is strong. At every rest stop, he calls for Inka Cola (photo, below)

"He just likes it," laughs Annelies, our soft-spoken and bright, young guide, a Belgian with a sports science degree who now makes a living conducting tours and running her own company targetted at medical tourists, enticing them for treks perhaps after a tooth filling. She is also our interpreter and organiser, getting us settled in hotels, organising our activities and translating everything that Richard asks us -- like, what does the word Bajaj mean?

Bajaj autorickshaws swarm Peru´s small towns (see photo above), serving as the principal means of transport within. Inter city transport is taken care of by gaily painted and rattling Suzuki 800s, older cousins of our dying Maruti 800s. Richard was delighted to know we were from India. He finally got to know that Bajaj is the name of the family that makes the all-conquering autorickshaw.

Richard and Annelies and the Landcruiser 4x4 are luxuries we have not experienced on this trip. A far cry from country buses and struggling for directions to the next town. All we have to do is watch, imbibe, experience and enjoy the ride through Peru. It´s dramatically more hectic than the rest of our trip, obviously, since the tour company, Peru Expeditions, is trying to give us full value for our money.

It´s nice to sit back while Annelies points out Lima´s trendy Victorian seafood restaurant that overlooks the Pacific Ocean; the spot where parents bring their children to surf on the gentlest breaks; and how the original Peruvian dog is a hairless, ugly creature (see photo). She´s full of gritty stories about Lima´s excavation of roads to build a tram system that never ran after it was sucked into a bog of corruption, how people have no option but the micros, or mini buses, with some people having to change upto five micros on their daily commute.

Today is day 1 of our tour and we are barrelling down a six-lane expressway at 120 kmph, 20 kmph over the limit. As we head out of town along Peru´s southern desert coast, we pass strange, stunted palms and wide swathes of swamps that attract migratory birds from the US. Anelise updates us on the scandal of the Chilean pasta company that was forced to shut down as we pass the abandoned factory in the midst of the swamps. Ah, so much like home.

It was by lunch time -- when the road had shrunk to a two-lane affair -- that we realised we were travelling down an iconic road: The Carretera Panamericana, the Pan American Highway. Quite simply, it´s the world´s longest land route, some 16,000 miles -- though its actual length is unclear, as is its starting point -- from Alaska (or Canada) to Argentina. In north America, its route isn´t defined, but in the south they are proud of this route and define it specifically.

More than a road, the Pan American an expression of an ideal of continental unity, the idea that the lifestreams of two diverse continents can be woven together. In 1951, the father of all leftist revolutionaries, Che Guevara, travelled along a part of the  Pan American, as part of his life-defining motorcycle journey, now encapsulated in the film The Motorcycle Diaries.

We saw the merging of Peru´s European and Indian traditions as we watched our Quechua guide Miriam -- the Indians of the high Andes, where we are headed this week, speak Quechua, using Spanish only for tourists -- at the lost, excavated city of Pachamac outside Lima fished out a picture of her patron saint, El senor de los temblores. Father of the Earthquakes. None other than Jesus Christ, with the Inca symbols of the sun and the moon on either side of this head. Jesus has become one of many saints here, revered by the descendents of the Incas and other Peruvians.

(Photo, above: Miriam, the Quechua story teller)

Why Father of the Earthquakes? Peru is ridden by tremblors, a devastating earthquake of 9 on the Richter scale devastated the country last year. Driving down the Pan-American, we could still see toppled poles and crumbled walls.

At Panchacamac (literally, earth energy), some 30km out of Lima, Miriam spins tales of Inca and pre-Inca civilizations. At any given time, 200 or so beautiful or talented virgins were housed separately in this centre of pilgrimage in Pre-Hispanic times. The best made fertile Inca wives or concubines; the rest taught their skills to the next generation and lived as mamaconas or spinsters who were not chosen.

There were once 16 pyramids with ramps and the Temple of the Sun. Of course in the 1500s the Spanish came along and wiped out an entire civilisation in the name of Christianity. Today the remains of Pachacamac stuggle to survive the voracious appetite of shanty towns sprawling out of Lima.

We zip through deserted coastal settlements that come alive in the summer. We pass a town called Chilka where residents claim to have seen lots of UFOs. That´s where Richard switches to four-wheel drive, bounces along rocky roads and onto the vacant town beach, save for a silent fisherman repairing nets (see photo below).

We get off, take in the sea and the salty air, watch a couple of surfers struggle against the waves (see photo, above). As we climb back in, Richard suddenly guns the engine and drives the Landcruiser into the surf! Water sprays across our windscreen as the vehicle struggles to stay in a straight line.

Back on the Pan American, we watch the desert unfold on both sides. Ever so often the barren hills on the right dip into cliffs that overlook the rocky Pacific coast. Add the lines of electric poles bent over by the earthquake of 2007 and this is a landscape straight out the X-files.

We have lunch at a beach town called Cerro Azul (Blue Hill). Anelise helpfully mentions that this town made it to a Beastie Boys surf song. As we settle for lunch, within 30 minutes we find more diversity in food than 17 days in Costa Rica. No more fried plantains. We start with conchito, a snack of dried, roasted, salted corn, following that with caufa, (Peruvian Chinese rice), mixto jalea (a mountain of fried seafood) and cebiche lenguada (a tangy mix of raw fish, lime and salt). A milky water leaches out of the cebiche. ¨"Ah," says Annelies with a grin, "That is called tiger´s milk, and you know, it´s umm considered very good, for ummm making babies." Down the hatch, then. "So," she continues, "if I visit you guys in India, there should be some babies in the house." Cheeky.

As the sun sinks, the wife asks -- as is her wont -- about the local liquor (she´s already scoped out the local beers). Pisco, a strong grape liquor, is the answer, drunk usually as Pisco sour, much like whiskey sour. That´s when we stumble on the town of ... I can´t remember, will get the wife to fill it in when we get our internet connection. At the entrance of the town, bang alongside the Pan American is this giant bottle of pisco. Stop (see photo, below).

They also stock the local wine (not very much better than Indian wine and not a patch on Chilean wine), and offer us tastings in little plastic cups as giant trucks, buses, and yes, Bajaj autos, rocket past us on the two lanes. New Zealand wine country this isn´t. (Photo, below: Richard watches as the wife starts the tasting session)

But ah, we love the atmosphere, the chill in the air and the warmth in people´s soul. And the humour on the bottle labels. One has a photo of a priest in a wineyard and is called Sangria de Cristo. Another, Veterano, has a caricature of a jolly old man (see photo, below).

Suitably jolly -- not Richard -- we continue down the Pan American. A minor jam. A truck is reversing and buses, autos, Suzuki 800s and trucks first wait patiently, then try to squeeze any which way, India style. The rest of the journey continues past police checks and the headlights of oncoming traffic. The police -- also in a Landcruiser, one of many parked alongside the highway -- stop us, check documents and wave us on. Corruption is rampant, but we don´t see it. Accidents are also clearly a Peruvian road tradition: the Pan American is littered with thousands of memorials to those who perished (photo, below). I estimate there are about three to every kilometre.

Night has fallen as we pull into a modest but comfortable hotel outside the marine national park of Paracas. It´s hard getting our blog entry done. We are a pisco sour down and the connection is terribly slow and is drops as we type. I´m going to try to upload some photographs, but it´s going to take a long, long time. If you see any in this post, thank the pisco sour.