I am back at Peńascal point surf camp after a big mission to Peru’s premier tourist location Machu Picchu. I’m still slightly shell shocked after just recovering from a food poisoning bout and a day of travel. I knew it would happen sooner or later so my gastro kit saved my ass… Literally.
Let me backtrack a little…
The boys (Mark, Tom and Sean) would be on the last day of the Inca trail right now. It is a four day hike through the ruins of the Inca civilisation. I’m sure they will be rewarded for their decision to take the hard road, discovering a lot about the demise of an ancient civilisation and cures for massive blisters. I preferred to take the easy road and get the train from Cusco and the get back to the coast while they mission further to Bolivia. We’ll meet up further north in Pacasmayo or Mancora (which I hear have siiick surf).
My last month was awesome, I scored good waves and had fun with the super sweet surfer girl from England, Hayley… Four weeks ago the boys opted for a 20 hour bus ride North so Hayley and I chose the seaside town Vina Del Mar near costal city Valapariso, 2 hours bus from Chile‘s capital, Santiago. We cruised around and enjoyed the best a seaside city could offer. The surf in Valapariso town was lousy so after lapping up the good food and comfy cheap accommodation, we opted for the sick waves at Pichilemu. Many long surfs at the unbelievably consistent 800m left hander followed until we were fed up with cold water surf and decided it was time to get to Peru. A bit of solid messing around to change our flights and some more missions around Santiago, we were in Peru.
After some recon and stuffing around in the airport, we got a taxi 45km south of Lima (the massive and dingy capital city of Peru) to our surf camp Peńascal (pronounced Penyascal). We found the joint on the web via www.wannasurf.com and found exactly what we were looking for. For only $30 US per person per night (a little expensive by Peruvian standards) we had a nice apartment overlooking the surf with three awesome meals a day. It also includes daily surf tours involving Antonio (the English speaking owner and surfer) taking you to a potential 20 different surf breaks within 20km. Choice daily surfs and munging out for 8 days later, Hayley had gone back to England (her one year around the world ticked expired that day). So I gathered up my stuff, picked up my bottom lip and headed for Cusco. Cusco is the touristy base camp for the Inca trail and Machu Picchu and the home of Giardia and Ecoli (food poisoning) as it turns out.
It was good to hook up with the fellas for a couple of nights and hear all about the amazing and death defying… Bus rides… No, SURF that they had got (mind you 20+ hours on a bus does sound pretty bad to me). They had surfed Hawiian style reef breaks for weeks on end and made many friends (see marks e-mail here). Turns out, they had scored the best couple of weeks of surfing ever and the bus ride was in chairs that were “better than first class” and almost a complete bed! I was not disappointed however, we each had been having the respective times of our lives.
The day after the fellas had embarked on their mission on the Inca Trail, I was struck down with savage food poisoning after only just recovering from a mild dose. I’m sure it wasn’t the alpaca that I ate, nor the guinea pig that I almost tucked into (I was dared to order it from the menu, but couldn’t quite bring myself to). Despite being careful, I’m sure it was the Pork chop that I paid too much for that gave me the awesome experience of being up all night spewing and, well, shitting through the eye of a needle in-voluntarily. Oh well, I guess my flawless run had to come to an end and it’s not the first time this has happened to me on a overseas trip. The travel doctor in Hobart ( www.traveldoctor.com.au ) had supplied my with a gastro kit and I followed instructions and pumped myself full of pills then jumped on a plane back to Peńascal. Rough trip, highs and lows, all good now, looking forward to the surf tomorrow…
Emerson
2 days later…
Just got back from a filth surf at this perfect left-hand point called Punta Vejos. On one of my million waves, three or four dolphins jumped out of the water surfing the wave!! I’d seen it on video before but it had never happened to me. I could have shat myself when the first one jumped out only a meter or two ahead on the wave. Never forget that huh, big smiles…
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