We started out at 4 a.m. from Urubamba, about an hour outside of Cusco. The trip from there to Ocobamba, the destination of the health campaign in the jungle, was expected to only take four hours, but due to an unforeseeable sequence of events, it took eight hours. The two buses we took turned out be be problematic, as within two hours one had broken an axle crossing the mountains, and the other couldn´t quite ford the many rivers in the jungle. Hence, we had a welcome delay in the rainforest for about two hours, as eight "gringas" tried to push the bus out of the river. We did succeed! But actually only with the help of a giant produce truck that happened to be going along the same deserted road that we got stuck on. Quite the start to a weekend!
In order to reach this jungle, we had to cross two mountain passes along the way. That was kind of mind boggling - stand on top of a 15,000 ft peak with others towering above us, and not three hours later start shedding layers as we descend into a raiforest at about 6,000 feet. But as we passed all that magnificent scenery in the Andes, we also passed countless tiny villages and large herds of alpacas, llamas, sheep, and donkeys. As we drove through a cloud at about 14,500, we came across a small mountain market. The villages are so small and spread apart that the locals travel in truckloads to the highest points in the area, and set up business alongside the roadways. It's freezing up there, of course, so they all have hug pots of steaming rice and vegetables and random stews, and they´re all dressed in layer upon layer of brightly colored clothing. Passing through these markets and llama herds felt strangely surreal.
Upon arrival in Ocobamba, a tiny jungle town, we almost immediately set up for the health clinic. We were traveling with Peruvian doctors, and at the clinic had a family doctor for general medicine, a dentist department, a laboratory, and an obstetrics department. We started the clinic around five (three hours late) and worked until about 9:00 (two hours late). The people, who only outside of the U.S. could have possibly been this nonchalant about such a delay, had walked for days to get here because health care in the jungle is so limited. The hardest part was diagnosing patients with cancer, for which no one could offer any cure, and turning people away after we closed our doors three hours later than scheduled at the end of the clinic. I had the privilege of working in obstertics and dentistry for a day each... quite an unexpected opportunity!
The night before we left, it rained. Jungle rain! It washed out the road that we had come in on, and so we had to take an alternative route. Predicted: eight hours. Reality: twenty four. After seven hours, we pulled into our halfway point, Quillabamba, at midnight. After being told that there was a mudslide blocking the road ahead of us, we decided to sleep for a few hours until they cleared it off. Sadly, the hostel (group hotel) had only 15 beds, so the 30 of us had to double up, two to a bed, for three hours of much needed sleep. We had an early breakfast at 4 a.m., and then piled back into the buses for about five hours of surprisingly uninterrupted travel.
By this time, my camera battery had died, so I didn´t get any pictures of the mudslide we encountered. But with traffic lined up on both sides and barely enough of a road cleared for one car to cross at a time, we waited for three hours on the mountain side. The people could not pass over the mudslide while inside the car or the road would collapse again, so through a painstakingly slow process all thirty of us and our two overweight buses passed: First one bus, then all the people ran across to avoid the still falling rocks. Then the other bus passed, and they cleared off the fresh fallen debris.
Needless to say, we were very happy to reach Cusco again, 24 hours after we left Ocobamba. However, it was an adventure that few of us would have traded for the world, and we passed some pretty spectacular scenery on the way! God was protecting us every step of the way, even in delaying us with rains to avoid getting crushed by the mudslide.
If you made it through this rather long narrative, I applaud you, and thank you for sticking with it! Your prayers and thoughts are much appreciated. :)
¡Hasta luego!
The night before we left, it rained. Jungle rain! It washed out the road that we had come in on, and so we had to take an alternative route. Predicted: eight hours. Reality: twenty four. After seven hours, we pulled into our halfway point, Quillabamba, at midnight. After being told that there was a mudslide blocking the road ahead of us, we decided to sleep for a few hours until they cleared it off. Sadly, the hostel (group hotel) had only 15 beds, so the 30 of us had to double up, two to a bed, for three hours of much needed sleep. We had an early breakfast at 4 a.m., and then piled back into the buses for about five hours of surprisingly uninterrupted travel.
By this time, my camera battery had died, so I didn´t get any pictures of the mudslide we encountered. But with traffic lined up on both sides and barely enough of a road cleared for one car to cross at a time, we waited for three hours on the mountain side. The people could not pass over the mudslide while inside the car or the road would collapse again, so through a painstakingly slow process all thirty of us and our two overweight buses passed: First one bus, then all the people ran across to avoid the still falling rocks. Then the other bus passed, and they cleared off the fresh fallen debris.
Needless to say, we were very happy to reach Cusco again, 24 hours after we left Ocobamba. However, it was an adventure that few of us would have traded for the world, and we passed some pretty spectacular scenery on the way! God was protecting us every step of the way, even in delaying us with rains to avoid getting crushed by the mudslide.
If you made it through this rather long narrative, I applaud you, and thank you for sticking with it! Your prayers and thoughts are much appreciated. :)
¡Hasta luego!
