I’m Working… I Swear

Its weird to me but I always feel the most at peace while traveling when I’m sitting in an airplane terminal waiting to board. Maybe I just love the idea of getting to go somewhere new.

I don’t know why but just the act of moving somewhere far from where I’m at brings me some sort of satisfaction. Maybe its due to my subconscious desire to escape the reality of everyday existence. Maybe it’s just the idea of a new adventure. Maybe I’m overthinking this.

I got up this morning a bit worried because it was already 45 minutes passed my alarm. As I was checking out from my very small hostel there was another guy checking out who… Was taking a cab to the same airport, for the same two flights, to the same city. Coincidences are weird sometimes. This one saved me 15 dollars in cab fare.

I managed to create and execute some sort of weird plan when getting to Leticia. I knew I wanted to get to Iquitos but I thought the first boat would be tomorrow, not today. The taxi driver took me to the place to buy the ticket. The boat leaves at 4 am. They kept saying something about a time difference which confused the hell out of me but I finally figured out there was no difference.

They said the best place to stay to make catching the boat easy was Santa Rosa. This was just a bit up the river and is considered Peru.

The town was 2km long, consisted of a few restaurants and hostels. The one I chose was 5 dollars and gave me a private room with a shared bath. I wish I’d used more bug repellant as everything I didn’t spray got chewed up pretty bad.

I walked up and down the main walk of the town during the evening, bought some sugar cane juice water stuff that was suppossed to cost 5 cents. I gave them 50 because they didn’t have any change. I watched a few different groups playing volleyball and they were really good… Even the women looked way better than me. There was pretty much nothing to do so I spent a good part of the evening reading Tolstoy at the restaurant across from my hostel.

Electricity shut off at around 10:30 there so 3:40 packing was a bit difficult in the pitch black but I had gotten used to it yesterday. It was a bit eerie walking through town at 4 am not knowing where the hell I was going. Fortunately there were a few people awake who directed me, I had to take a short canoe ride up the river to where the boat was and get my immigration stamp.

This boat is less than ideal, its pretty cramped but I hear its luxurious compared to the slow boat that takes 3 days.

Lots of time to read and think on the boat… Not exactly sure why I thought a ten hour boat ride would be fun. But at least my mind is getting its chance to wander, sometimes that’s the best part about traveling for me.

I keep thinking of how my mom recently told me about her recent religious doubts about the efficacy of prayer. That followed by my tirade of anti-christian comments seemed to have put her in a state of doubt about god.

I can’t help but wonder what a ceremony like the one I went to would do for her. What if I invited her to try something like that with me at home? Would it help her? I can’t see how it would hurt. Its a strange thought but for some reason I’m seriously considering making such an offer to my mother. I really can’t imagine her living her whole life without trying something like that.

When I got off the boat at Iquitos I was greeted by the typical mob of cab drivers. One started talking to me and he wasn’t so bad. I was in a cranky mood, I smelled bad, I hadn’t brushed my teeth in over 24 hours, and I was hungry. Needless to say I was not in the mood to be asked by 30 people whether I wanted a cab. I stood there waiting for my bag and one of the drivers started chatting me up, I started responding to his questions coldly, in Spanish.

He actually didn’t seem that bad, I told him I just wanted some food to eat. He drove me a bit down the road and ate food with me and chatted with me for a bit, he only asked for 33 cents.

I told him about some of the shamans I had contacted in Iquitos and he told me that it wasn’t a good idea to deal with gringos regarding this type of thing, they are just here to make some money and aren’t really Shamans. I told him the name of the couch surfing guy I had talked to about staying with and he knew him and said he was good.

After lunch we found a phone and called him, he told us to come by his house. We went over there and after talking for a while I decided to set up a tour with this guy even though I couldn’t stay at his house. 50 dollars a day for 4 days through the amazon and on the last night I get a private ayahuasca ceremony with a “good” shaman.

Sounded pretty good. After that was settled the cab driver took me to get an airplane ticket and change my money from pesos to soles. I just realized I got a little ripped off on that by about 33%. Shitty. At least it wasn’t as bad as the 80 bucks I got ripped off for in Cartagena.

I had a nice evening walking around the town and finding a nice chicken place to have dinner. Its quiet here, there’s really not much going on but the people seem really friendly and helpful.