I´m staying in the place now that I talked about last blog. It´s a much different feel than Mancura. Last night a few of us bought a tuna caught yesterday and cooked it on the beach. A local named Coco has showed us a lot of cool stuff here.. he´s been teaching us to surf a bit too.. however.. most of his ideas cost alot of money... hmmm.... Cole goes home in a couple weeks so I am figuring out if I want to stay here until Craig and Jana come in September or go check out Colombia. Cole and I both shaved our beards... he has sideburns and a handlebar mustache and I have big Wolverine-like chops with a soul strip. It was a joke at first and now its kinda growing on me.

Now what...

I´m in Mancura right now and I´ve done some exploring around the area... I´ve met lots of cool people, did the zip line, volleyball, surfing, etc.. I am paying 5 bucks a night for a room by myself close to the beach.. a few ants here and there.. no hot water.. not quite the ritz.. but it works great for what I need. I´ve been taking Muy Thai classes on the beach for $3/class.. I found out about it because my place is next door to the dojo and they practice with ACDC rocking full blast at 8am... so I didnt really have much of a choice.

Mancura is a cool place.. but it might be time for something new soon... something tranquilo in a place that is not so busy.. and I might of found it today.. I was late for surf lessons today with Cole and the gang so I played catch-up all day trying to find them. The surfer dudes told me they went to Los Organos; it is where there is no traffic on the waves... Mancura surfing is really busy. I didnt find them there but I found an awesome bungalow right on the beach that looks like it should be about 100 bucks a night.. Since it is low season here right now I haggled them down to $10 a night... he also is in need of some graphic design so we will work something out there too.. I´ll go back in a few days and try it out. Takes 2 soles to get there from Mancura.. if you dont know it is a 3 to 1 ratio.. 3 soles is the same as $1 US.

Anyways, I gotta get back outside..

Thanks for the comments.. nice to hear from everyone

Beard Update

I just took this 10 minutes ago.. I havent shaved since July 15th.

Comments - Suggestions?

Hey watchers,

Please send me a comment or suggestion on my blog.. I wanna know who´s out there..

Majo

Stay tuned for beard updates.

Tumbes

Cole and the group are in the Jungle and I opted out because it was very expensive. So there I was headed in the Oltursa bus to Mancura with chips all over my chest watching some stupid chick flick they had on all the TVs; in Spanish with Spanish subtitles. There were only a few people on the bus so we had all the room we wanted. A local Peruvian lady sat across the aisle from me. She didnt speak a word of English. I decided to practice my Spanish on her.

Here I am in Tumbes with Augie and her sister Rita; it´s about an hour and a half past Mancura. As far as I think I know, they live in Lima and own a house here too. They rent it out and they´ve come to do some legal mumbo jumbo... some eviction stuff I think. They are teachers and they are between 50 an 60 years old. One of them reminds me of my mom. They are locals here and they´ve been taking care of me all day. They hooked me up with a hotel, Took me for lunch at a wicked local place that I would have never have gone to, took me on a boat, took me to a few different sites, beaches, lots of wildlife..mostly birds and crocs.. or were they gators? Either way, I now have a Peruvian mother.

I will hit Mancura probably tomorrow. They will be there in a couple days to meet me.

MaJo out

Machu Picchu in the rain, Mat chews pee too it's a game... I dunno.



My ankles are swollen from bug bites.. those little "no-see-em" bastards seem to think that my ankles are delicio. I spent the past few days rafting, biking, and hiking on a four day trek to Machu Picchu with the second group. Steve and Kira and super cool.




I might be shedding off a bit of my beach weight... but I wont get too use to it considering I'm back in Mancura tomorrow for some beachin' for about a week or so. I'm going to surf, write some music, do some filming, learn some Spanish, and eat a shitload of fresh tuna. I'm also looking under "Colombia" in my lonely planet guide.




Cusco is wicked. Go there. Bring Imodium. Paddy's Irish Pub has the best pizza in Peru. Jack's has the best breakfast. And there is a Thai place here... forgot the name.. awesome; go there too. There is usually some kind of festival here every time your turn a corner. I've seen parades, concerts, street performers, and lots of fresh food and markets.

I've seem a lot of poverty here. It's pretty intense in some places.

Samana Chakra - Hotel in Mancura


From the hotel balcony in Cusco

We volunteered for a day to build wood burning stoves in peoples homes in a very poor community. The stoves they were using had no chimneys. The walls are made from mud.

This pig was a gift from the community for building the stoves. No flu-like symptoms so far.

Sacsayhuanan, Cusco. (Sounds Like Sexy Woman)

Mancura

Take a deep breath and keep walking.

Hey Homies,

Sorry for the delay on writing something on here. I was on a bit of a technology detox. I just finished on of Cole's adventure trips on Peru. I have to say it was pretty fucking awesome. I got lots of good footage..

I flew into Lima which is more of a transitional place.. busy, dirty, lots of Casinos.. some cool parts by the water but there are better places to see...

We hit Cusco db and checked into a really cool hotel in the midst of all the action. Cusco is where some people get sick flying into because of the elevation change... I got the run-of-the-mill diahrea.. nothing serious... We hiked up to these old ruins that were almost 13000 ft above sea level.. I forgot the name but it sounded like "sexy woman"... I felt like I was 300lbs because the air it so thin up there. The weather is nice during the day but it can get pretty cold at night.

We went on a mountain bike tour that took us to some cool ruins and some salt mines that were located between clevage of two mountains... there were no motorboats there. We were scheduled to do some rafting but there was a strike on. Apparently you dont want to cross the lines if you dont like rocks thrown at you. So we though it would be a good idea to get ripped at our hotel on go out in Cusco... so we did just that. I tried out my patented Antonio Banderas hip kata.. it feel like it worked.

We took a train to Aqua Calientes and hung out there for a few days in a wicked place by a river. I ended up hiking Putucusi, Machu Picchu, and Wayna Picchu while I was there. Pictures or words wont do it justice. It's worth seeing.

A guitar purchase and a bus ride to Mancura brought me to my first surf lesson. It didnt take me too long to stand up but it was tough for me to decide what wave to hit when it got busy. It was sunny and hot there 90% of the time. Cool street markets, lots of cool beach hut hotels along the beach. I was taking daily Spanish lessons from the self proclaimed "whitest girl in Mancura". You wouldnt think her Spanish would be so good.

We hung out at the Milk Bar right on the beach where we played alot of volleyball and "Shithead" (card game). No... it's not the same as "Asshole". I'm back in Lima for the moment and I've had a wicked time so far. I'm about to do a 22 day Peru trip which will have some overdue rafting. I'll try to be better on the updates!

MaJo