Mancora Peru = Surfers Paradise

After successfully vacating the black hole that is Bolivia, the BV Show, The Weapon, and I landed successfully in Lima.

Sidenote: I received quite a bit of interrogation from the airport security in the La Paz Airport as apparently I look like a Coke smuggler.

I had spent four days in Lima months ago but the boys had not been yet and wanted to check out the nightlife in town. It proved to be very strong :). We met a lot of really good people in our short time there. Once again, we stayed at the Point Hostel which is franchised throughout Peru. Although it was nice to to be in warmer weather, a heavy fog loomed over Lima for our entire time there. We all were in need of some sunshine. Three months in the mountains can really grind on you.

So, we decided to jump on an 18 hour bus to Mancora on the northern coast of Peru. After getting settled in, we realized that we were living in a Jack Johnson song (I think I might have used this analogy before when talking about Florianapolis, Brazil). This place was amazing and just what we were looking for.

We stayed at what may be the worst hostel of our entire trip. It was run by a 20 year old surf bum named Alonso. This kid surfs three times a day, and thats about it. We did not even get a key to our room. There were no sheets on the bed, no pillowcases, no running water between 10am-8p, and it was completely empty.

Apparently, Alonso is taking care of the 5 bedroom place in prime real estate for his cousin who lives in Spain. I am pretty sure his cousin would not like to see what has become of the place. Alonso has three dogs that were constantly getting out. His day pretty much consists of surfing, laying around watching surf movies, and looking for his dogs. Oh yeah, he also smoked pot from sunup to sundown.

Enjoying some gentle cocktails on the beach.

Anyway, Ben and Davey, coming from Australia are both into surfing. I figured it was about time I gave it a try and took a two hour lesson. The size of the board that they gave me was out of control. It had to be at least 10 feet long. Nonetheless, after a few tries and some fundamental lessons, I got up and surfed. A family of four could have easily set down on my board and had a nice seafood dinner, but that is besides the point. I surfed… and it was ¨GLORIOUS¨.

This is a picture of me surfing in the sunset…Either that, or its a big lie.

We only had two days in Mancora and we made the most of them.

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Notes: Currently I am sitting in a bus station in Tombes (Northern most city in coastal Peru). We are getting ready to cross into Ecuador to make our way to Guayaquil. Tomorrow we fly to the Galapagos Island for an 8 day boat cruise. We are all getting excited.

> I think the weapon looks like the Florida Evans from “Good Times” in this pix. Or is it just me… Either way, Davey is not going to be happy that I posted this.

> Sorry for the lack of posts. We have been on the move. It seems that I have been sitting on a few posts for too long. I will be trying to update more regularly when we get to coastal Ecuador or Colombia or wherever the hell we end up next. I do not think I am going to have any type of internet access in the Galapagos.

> It looks like American Lisa and Australian Jess will be joining us for our three week romp through Colombia. We are all looking forward to it. They are two of the best people we have traveled with.

> If you have not signed up yet, sign up to have updates directly emailed to you. You can do so on the top right hand side of the page under the pix.

> Currently, 700 people are reading the blog a month. I am pretty stoked. We figure that if the three of us get kidnapped by Guerillas in Colombia the numbers could shoot even higher… (Just a joke Mom)

> Benny and I will celebrate 6 months traveling on July 9th in the Galapagos. It should be magical.

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