7.9. - Trujillo – Huanchaco
The night on the bus was ok and we arrived around 7 in Trujillo. In the terminal we met Chris and Ryan two brothers from the US with whom we shared a taxi to Huanchaco, the beach town next to Trujillo. We went to the “My Friend” hostel, which was recommended by Arturos sister Melissa. It was indeed a nice and cheap place. Later we found out that it was even listed in the Rough Guide, but not as hostel but in the category night life. Soon we saw the advertisement for the cocktail night every Thursday, 3 Sol each cocktail. Well the plan for the evening was clear, it was Thursday. :) First, we had breakfast as we had to wait for a room to get cleaned. Soon after we left for the close by ruins of Chan Chan. The place is very huge and it is only possible to visit one of the numerous walled temples each several hundred meters side length. Inside there are nice wall decorations, but unfortunately several parts were closed for renovation. After this Radka was tired and went back to the hostel. A taxi driver talked me into taking his taxi to get to the other places included in the ticket and after some negotiations I agreed. He took me to the museum of Chan Chan which was quite small and run down but had some nice ceramics. Then we went on to two other nice but small temples, Huaca Esmeralda and Arco Iris. Then he took me to a bus company for buying a ticket on to Mancora. Unfortunately they only had one bus arriving at 4 am. So he took me to another bus company, as unfortunately they are spread over the city. Again a 4 am arrival we then tried Cruz del Sur which finally had a bus arriving at 8 am. We were lucky as this one is the only such bus and it does not run every day, quite expensive though. I paid the taxi and walked to the main square, where a big Corpus Chisti celebration was taking place. Many schools prepared flower carpets for a procession to walk over later. They had a band there and were singing songs to praise god with salsa rhythms and people waving their hands. Unfortunately, they had the volume on max and even some of the Peruvians had to cover their ears. So I did not wait for the procession, but bought a coconut to drink and eat and went towards the place the collectivos would leave for Huanchaco. Back in the hostel Radka and I had dinner, and later Chris and Ryan joined us. We were finishing the coconut while waiting for the happy hour to start. Then the place filled rapidly and the music got louder. It was like in a disco. The cocktails were good but one less would have been enough. We went to bed by the (late) end of the happy hour and luckily other people started to leave then too so it was possible to sleep soon after. :)
8.6. - Huanchaco
In the morning it was a bit hard to get up but after breakfast we took a collectivo to the other end of Trujillo and then changed to another one on to Huaca de la Luna. The second one was a very old mini bus and we were surprised how many people fit in. The maximum was around 30 people (including some 15 school children) in a bus the size of a VW bus. Well, after 1h we arrived at the huaca and had to go on a tour as it is not possible to walk around individually, any more. The guide was quite ok and there was a nice German guy in our group who managed to hitch hike all the way from Germany to French Guyana for free or just part of the gas. The Huaca de la Luna had really nice colored frescoes and was an impressive site. Unfortunately, the Huaca del Sol right next to it was closed to the public one month earlier due to new excavations. We visited the new museum afterwards, which showed some incredible ceramics and then went back again by collectivos. Back in the hostel we had a Avocado filled with shrimp and a salad and arranged a meeting with Melissa, the sister of Arturo who lives in Trujillo. We also had some very nice lemonade. Later, we took a collectivo to Trujillo and a taxi on to Melissas place, which took a bit longer than expected as the address was much further away as Google Maps told us. Apparently, they have more than one street named Los Angeles. We put our luggage in her place and soon after left, together with Dana a friend of hers, for the center. We went to a nice place to eat sandwiches and it was fun talking with them. After that we picked up our luggage and left for the Cruz del Sur terminal. We were already a bit stressed as we arrived just 15min before the scheduled departure, but in fact the bus turned out to be 1h late. The bus was ok, though and we went to sleep right away, as it was already 1 am.
9.6. Mancora
We arrived in Mancora at 9:30 and were surrounded by moto i.e. tuc-tuc drivers and touts. We got our luggage out of the lower toilet of the bus (I really don't know why they had to put the luggage there) and then agreed to let us show a hostel by a moto driver. The place, Guacamayo hostel, looked nice and quiet and after some negotiation the price also seemed to be kind of ok. Then we went to the beach close by and in front of the party place, Loki hostel, we met again the Australians we last met on Machu Picchu. We spent some time talking to them and otherwise just relaxed on the beach. We also had some really nice filled bread. One with banana and chocolate was especially nice! Later, back in the hostel we realized that we got quite some sun burns although we used sunscreen. Not enough obviously. Then we went to a recommended Thai restaurant, Tao, where I had a delicious tuna steak and Radka some also really nice chicken dish. We also had really nice fresh juices. Not cheap but a great dinner. After that we bought some beer in a shop, at a price you wouldn't pay in Austria in a shop, and took a moto back to the hostel. We had the beer in front of our bungalow like room and listened to music. A relaxed evening.
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