April 28, 2000
Day 189 To Juliaca: time to ride the bikes again
Time to ride our bikes again.
We start the last leg of our trip, about 400 kms to go to Cusco. Today won’t be long though only 44km to Juliaca to get us in position for three one hundred km days.
So, we take our time this morning to first go out for a big breakfast. Then we carry all our gear back down all those steps and assemble. Getting out of Puno involves a decent climb as we saw on our tour to Sillustani. We need to gain about 200 meters via a couple of switch backs. It’s not too steep (or we are finally getting in shape) though, before we know it, we face the prison on the top of the hill. According to our guide the leaders of the Shining Path guerrillas / terrorist organization, including one American woman are imprisoned here for life.
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We don’t linger but start a nice, long downhill back to the lake. After that follows another rather boring but fast flat stretch of road to Juliaca. Patrick tries to get a license plate at two car body shops but with no success. Just as we find one of the recommended hotels a cameraman and interviewer lady corner us and ask for an interview. Patrick warns her he doesn’t speak much Spanish, but that doesn’t stop her from asking a series of questions. We then ride a little circle for the benefit of the camera, and who knows, we might be famous in Peru by now.
The hotel is very nice but also expensive. There are many other options in Juliaca, and therefore the price quickly comes down from 85 to a more reasonable 30 soles. We have cable TV with HBO and a couple of other movie channels. First, we watch Stallone in Cliffhanger (What a bad, bad movie) and then we head out for an internet place. Patrick does some research on airfares home and from St. Louis to Boise. Just to get an idea of options for when we get to Cusco.
We eat dinner in the restaurant of the hotel, a Chifa we saw earlier was unfortunately closed this evening. The rest of the evening is spent watching pieces of several other movies and the whole of Anaconda (bad, bad movie).
Today's ride: 45 km (28 miles)
Total: 5,827 km (3,619 miles)
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