Day trip to Peru

I checked out of Hotel Amazon, I am moving to Divino Nino and no it was not like a scene from the Omen.

Carlos, my prospective guide I met in Peru yesterday came to the hotel to meet me. The front desk clerk showed a look of grave concern.


"Tours a la selva son muy, muy peligroso.

"Cocodrilos, serpientes o Piraña?" and yes I can find the question mark on this keyboard but it doesn't emit a question mark.

"Los narcotraficantes en el Perú te va a matar."

Then he gave the gesture of a split throat and a man being gutted.

I'm going anyway. I was sitting at a bar last night talking to a couple from Bogota and some big gringo walked up to me and said "Americano?" "Si, I mean yes."

He was also staying at the Hotel Amazonas. I bitched about the fact the front door was always locked and the guard was passed out on the couch. All the keys were in boxes behind the front desk but the guy was too messed up to bother with it so I had to find my own, which was not in it's designated spot.

Richard and I walked down to the river and took a boat over to Santa Rosa (Saint Pink... WTF?) There was nothing going on, but we wanted to get our passports stamped. Immigration was closed for lunch so we went to Restaurante Touristica and played with the monkey. I finally got someone to remove the dead anaconda from the box on the end of the pier. Finally immigration was open and we got the official to stamp our passports.

"Quantos dias?" How many days.

"Cerro" zero.

"Como?" what?

"dos horas" 2 hours.

A quizzical look crossed his face.

"Necessito solo stampe pora recarda visitante Peru." I hope that means something.

"Y comidas, cerveza y bueno chicas" and food, beer and hot women.

Big grin from the guy, who told us where to find all of the above. But they were not of the quality we sought so 20 minutes later we requested an exit notation.

I said the the guy Ingles, Adios Mother Fucker. Richard gave me a startled look. He thought we were going to jail. Como. I repeated it very slowly, the man laughed harder than the parrot next door did.

On the ride back Richard asked how much I thought a boat for the day was. I asked the captain of the canoe on which we were travelling. 150,000 pesos a day. We booked it for tomorrow and figured we would scrounge around town for a couple of chicas to make the day even more pleasant while we were procuring food and water for the trip.

An hour and a half after we departed we were back in Leticia, Columbia.

How dangerous is this trip into the Jungles of Peru anyway

Damn this keyboard.