I took the bus at 9PM from Cuenca in Ecuador leaving to Peru. The trip would take 15 hours including an hour stop at the border. I was thinking to take the bus until the border and then try to find another transportation from there to the next town in Peru. Good thing I didn’t do that, because when I arrived at the border there was only some taxis and would have cost a lot of money. I continued on the bus until Piura in Northern Peru; it’s a city I visited before. I didn’t want to stay here, especially that I know the city and I remember it was chaotic and not much to see for a tourist, besides I visited the beach near by, therefore I decided I will just continue my trip all the way through Peru until I get tired or get to the border with Chile.
Peru is very long country, it takes 3 days on the bus to reach the south of the country. The bus was supposed to leave at 4PM but didn’t leave until 5PM. It’s a common thing that buses in Peru don’t leave on time. It was warm and the bus didn’t have air-condition, some people were frustrated and started to tap their feet on the bus floor to make noise to try to force the bus to leave. By the time the bus left Piura, it was 6 hours since I arrived from Ecuador. Next while we were on the road to Lima, at around 2AM when we heard some noise coming from underneath the bus, since it’s a big bus the tire was double, luckily one of the doubles was shredded into pieces. It’s funny in situation like these what comment you hear from the passengers. It was warm and the bus didn’t have air-conditioning, they opened the door to let the passengers stretch and relieve themselves, the lady behind me was saying don’t open the door it’s too dangerous, other passengers were helping the driver and his assistant. Anyhow it took almost 40 minutes and we were back on our way.
The bus arrived in the vicinity of Lima around 10AM in the morning, it was almost 17 hour trip. Right next to the terminal they had some washroom and showers, it was refreshing after 2 days on the bus to take a cold shower. After asking for direction, I was told to pick up the next bus to the next destination Ica but had to go to another area of Lima to find the bus company to take me there. On the way to Ica, although the landscape looks very dry, there were many grapevines planted everywhere. Anyhow the trip took 5 hours and I arrived in Ica, another city I visited last time I was in Peru. I was a little peeved to notice that I should have not taken this trip and took another directly to Arequipa, but I learned to stay calm and just enjoy the experience.
Once arrived, I felt good and decided to take another bus about 12 hours trip to go to Arequipa. I thought of spending the night in Arequipa but we arrived early in the morning and I didn’t feel the city has much to offer. I found a bus that will leave in an hour and half and that goes to Tacna, it’s the city that’s at the border with Northern Chile. I went for breakfast and took the bus for 6 hours to Tacna. All the way from the north of Peru until the south, the landscape is dry and desert, to see the beautiful green scenery, one has to go inland towards the east to the sierra, so I didn’t feel I missed much. Besides, I also visited some of the areas in the sierra near Cusco on my last visit. I was chatting with the man next to me on the bus and he told me he works on mines, and the area has lots of mines, he told me he worked for a Canadian company, he knew the whole route very well, every time we pass a little town he will mention the name of the town. I enjoyed the music they were playing on the TV screen. I found myself telling the man next to me about the music that was playing and name of some of the songs, I guess after spending some time in Latin America I started to know a little about the beautiful music.
I arrived in Tacna around 4PM and decided to spend the night here before crossing the border to Chile. Throughout the trip after crossing the border of Ecuador, there were many police checks, the police will get on the bus and ask everyone for their identification cards, they well check the cards with computer systems. The first time that happened on my last trip I was a little concerned but it’s good to see that they do this for the security of the passengers.
Once in Tacna I quickly found a hotel next to the bus terminal, I left my bag at the hotel and walked to discover the city center. I was surprised this city is more organized and clean than any other city I’ve seen in Peru. There are few Chinese restaurants around here, you tend to see Chinese restaurants in many parts of Peru and easy to notice because the name is usually written in Chinese. I came back to the hotel around 9PM, took a cold shower as usual not many places have hot shower and the weather is warm so it’s not needed. Anyhow it was nice to relax on a bed, even if the mattress wasn’t comfortable, but after few days traveling on the bus it was better than the bus seat.
