{"id":621176,"date":"2025-06-09T16:00:55","date_gmt":"2025-06-09T16:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/tour\/621176\/"},"modified":"2025-06-09T16:00:55","modified_gmt":"2025-06-09T16:00:55","slug":"peru-the-deadly-peaks-deadliest-journeys","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/tour\/621176\/","title":{"rendered":"Peru | The Deadly Peaks | Deadliest Journeys"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title = \"Peru | The Deadly Peaks | Deadliest Journeys\"   width=\"580\" height=\"385\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/d-gYvWVkup8\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><br \/>\n<br \/>\nPeru | The Deadly Peaks | Deadliest Journeys<br \/>\n<br \/>\nPeru, in the heart<br \/>\nof the Andes Cordillera, the kingdom of the Apus, the Inca gods. Forbidden mountains<br \/>\nwhere the Apus promised death to any human who dared approach. Five centuries later, the legend lives on. There is a bold handful<br \/>\nthat defies the decree of the gods without a second thought. Among them is Juan Carlos,<br \/>\nwho takes the Cordillera route twice a week<br \/>\nand not without a certain pride. To drive on this road,<br \/>\nyou need nerves of steel. You need it in your trousers,<br \/>\nyou&#8217;ve got to have balls. Be a real man,<br \/>\nbecause the slightest mistake and you&#8217;re dead. Especially into the narrow<br \/>\nsingle track tunnels. In these sacred mountains,<br \/>\nthe only way to drive is with the horn. Tunnel or no tunnel from morning to night,<br \/>\nJuan Carlos travels at breakneck speed. Each tunnel exit is a lottery. There could be an oncoming vehicle<br \/>\nor rocks from a landslide. The mountainsides<br \/>\naround the tunnels are rarely reinforced. You can&#8217;t drive on this road<br \/>\nif you are scared. The other day, a landslide almost<br \/>\nknocked me into the ravine. When Juan Carlos takes his foot<br \/>\noff the accelerator, it&#8217;s not because he&#8217;s afraid of death. It&#8217;s because of the price of spare parts. I could go faster,<br \/>\nbut it may brake an axle. To avoid accidents,<br \/>\nyou have to slalom between stones. Peru&#8217;s rugged geography<br \/>\ncauses drivers no end of problems. To get across the Andes,<br \/>\nthere are a few paved roads, but winding trails that snake<br \/>\nto dizzying passes 5000 meters high. There are a lot of corpses<br \/>\nat the bottom of the ravine. Along the narrow roads, it&#8217;s not uncommon<br \/>\nfor a truck to slide into the void. Now we&#8217;re done. The bus began to reverse,<br \/>\nbut its weight dragged it over the edge and into the ravine,<br \/>\n40 people were killed. In Peru, they rely on shamans<br \/>\nto ward off the evil eye. We chase away evil spirits from the body. At the foot of the Cordillera<br \/>\nflows the Amazon, the largest river in the world,<br \/>\nin parts, some 40 kilometers wide. It&#8217;s monstrous, treacherous<br \/>\nand indomitable waters crossed by hundreds of ships. Passengers can remain stranded<br \/>\non sandbanks for weeks at a time. Trujillo, on the Pacific coast of Peru, nothing much has changed<br \/>\nsince the time of the Incas. Today, there are surfers,<br \/>\nbut the fishermen still use boats built from reeds<br \/>\nlike their ancestors before them. Juan Carlos set up<br \/>\nhis company here six months ago. The idea came from his father,<br \/>\nwho used to take his son with him as he drove his truck. It&#8217;s an addiction<br \/>\nhis father today regrets he passed on. I&#8217;ve seen many accidents,<br \/>\noften very serious ones. Falls, car wrecks, fires, collisions. Many of my friends<br \/>\nhave died in road accidents. Juan Carlos does more than just drive. He also buys and sells goods<br \/>\nfor his own account. Today, he&#8217;s taking an enormous gamble<br \/>\nby transporting 260,000 eggs across the mountain roads. They&#8217;re fragile,<br \/>\nbut the eggs are well packed. They&#8217;re securely attached<br \/>\nand it should hold. If the truck has an accident,<br \/>\nit might make a good omelet. It&#8217;s happened to colleagues<br \/>\nwhose trucks have overturned. The cargo is not insured. Juan Carlos has invested<br \/>\nall his savings in the venture. If there&#8217;s an accident,<br \/>\nit&#8217;s almost certain his business will go under. It&#8217;s a tough bet. To get to Yungay,<br \/>\nthe town where he&#8217;s to make the delivery means traveling<br \/>\n300 kilometers on rugged terrain. He must never slow down<br \/>\nor even stop overnight. Otherwise, he&#8217;ll be late<br \/>\nfor the marketplace. I usually arrive<br \/>\nat the market in the morning at about 7:00 or 8:00 o&#8217;clock. If I&#8217;m late, my competitors<br \/>\nwill have sold their goods to my customers. Juan Carlos has planned everything<br \/>\nto his own advantage. He&#8217;s stealing a five hour march<br \/>\non his rivals. Just two hours later,<br \/>\nat the entrance to a tunnel, he&#8217;s forced to stop. Two cars have collided. What have you done? It was your fault. You could have gone round that way. You could have gone that way. The accident isn&#8217;t too bad,<br \/>\nbut it&#8217;s created a huge traffic jam. The tunnel has only one lane,<br \/>\nand by the time it&#8217;s cleared, Juan Carlos has lost two precious hours. To make them back will take time. Even if he&#8217;s the macho he claims to be,<br \/>\nhe&#8217;s scared of accelerating. A few weeks ago,<br \/>\nhe pushed the engine so hard, it finally gave up<br \/>\nand he almost lost his life. I was on a very steep descent<br \/>\nand my brakes failed. I tried to stop,<br \/>\nbut the truck had picked up too much speed and in addition,<br \/>\nthere was the weight of the cargo. Can you imagine? If I&#8217;d been a coward<br \/>\nwith nothing in my pants, well, I would have jumped from the cabin,<br \/>\nbut I&#8217;d be dead, crushed by my own truck. However, I kept my composure. I spotted a large rock<br \/>\nand I pointed the truck towards it, and it stopped. It&#8217;s a long night for Juan Carlos. There&#8217;s no rest, let alone a break. He needs to be doubly careful<br \/>\nnow to maintain his slight lead. Luck is against him, and once again,<br \/>\na few kilometers further on, he&#8217;s forced to stop. A bus has broken down<br \/>\nand another is trying to tow it. I need to make a loop in the cable,<br \/>\nthen tie it on. Here we go, and then attach it. That&#8217;s fine, let me put it on. In the Cordillera, buses are the only way<br \/>\nto go from city to city. Ancient and often poorly maintained,<br \/>\nbreakdowns are frequent. Passengers have little choice but to wait. They should check<br \/>\nthe state of the bus before leaving. The bus was making<br \/>\na really funny noise for about ten minutes and then it just stopped. We&#8217;ve had it now. They&#8217;d been waiting<br \/>\nfor more than three hours. There&#8217;s nothing to eat,<br \/>\nthere&#8217;s no water and no one knows when we&#8217;ll be moving again. The road is poorly maintained. There are landslides,<br \/>\ncars going off the side. A lot of people killed. These passengers are not willing<br \/>\nto go home quite yet. As they wait for the tow truck,<br \/>\nthe drivers have managed to get the bus onto the side of the road. The road is finally cleared. By now, Juan Carlos is late. His lead has melted away<br \/>\nand he has no choice but to go flat out. The bumps could damage<br \/>\nhis precious cargo of eggs. Yungay is still<br \/>\nanother 20 minutes drive. Juan Carlos is afraid that his clients<br \/>\nwill buy the competitor&#8217;s eggs. He does his sales pitch over the phone. Hello? Yes, I&#8217;m coming. We can talk when I arrive. It&#8217;s 7:00 in the morning<br \/>\nand Juan Carlos finally arrives just a few minutes behind schedule. He checks the condition of his cargo. Did it make it? Yes, everything is good. Sometimes you have problems,<br \/>\nthough, don&#8217;t you? Well, of course. I could&#8217;ve lost the cargo back there. Juan Carlos has just enough time<br \/>\nfor a quick breakfast before the return journey<br \/>\nand a new shipment. Yungay, population<br \/>\n20,000 is one of the few towns of any size in this remote valley. As elsewhere in the Andes,<br \/>\nthe women wear their distinctive hats, a custom forced on them<br \/>\nby the Spanish conquistadores. Each tribe was given a different style. It was one way<br \/>\nto recognize and control them. Somewhat bizarrely,<br \/>\nthe Indians have kept up the tradition. Each kind of transport<br \/>\nin this part of Peru faces its own constraints. The bridges, for example, are rarely<br \/>\ncapable of supporting more than 20 tons. Pedro checks his load of cement<br \/>\nis within the legal weight limits. Pedro is heading<br \/>\nto the other side of the Cordillera, 350 kilometers over some<br \/>\nof the highest peaks in Peru. His destination is Huancrachuco, the last town<br \/>\nin the Andes before Amazonia. Barely 20 kilometers out of Yungay,<br \/>\nthe road turns into a dirt track. There are quite a few abandoned roads<br \/>\nthat are no longer repaired. The government just forgets about us<br \/>\npoor people, we peasants. On the horizon, the white Cordillera and Huascaran, at 6700 meters,<br \/>\nthe tallest peak in all Peru. It&#8217;ll take 15 or 16 hours<br \/>\nto reach Huancrachuco, but occasionally<br \/>\nbecause of potholes and landslides, it can take up to two or three days. To start with, the road is easy. Pedro drives quickly and safely. As the mountains loom ahead,<br \/>\nthe road narrows to a thin strip of dirt. It&#8217;s the same track messenger&#8217;s would take<br \/>\nin the days of the Inca emperors. Come on! Come on! When it&#8217;s this narrow, I need to be able<br \/>\nto see clearly out of my rearview mirror. Between the ravine and the mountainside, the track is just wide<br \/>\nenough for the truck. This is where the path starts to climb<br \/>\nto the peaks, 4000 meters up. The warning signs are a reminder<br \/>\nof the extremely dangerous bends ahead, and the so called bend of death. I can&#8217;t drive too fast<br \/>\nbecause of all these bends. The truck is heavy<br \/>\nand because of the poor road, if I go too fast, I could tip right over. Tipping over here means ending up<br \/>\nin the bottom of the ravine. Fatal accidents are common. Recently, one experienced<br \/>\nbus driver was careless. The incident happened here<br \/>\nat the top of the climb. On the so-called bend of death. He was trying to make the curve,<br \/>\nthe turn here, but he didn&#8217;t manage it<br \/>\nthe first time, so he stopped. Then he began to reverse. Suddenly, the weight dragged him backwards<br \/>\nand the bus fell into the canyon, 40 people were killed. Their relatives have put the crosses<br \/>\nand the small altars here. A short distance further on, Pedro<br \/>\nstops to check the tires, but he hears an ominous whistling. Yes, I need to patch this up,<br \/>\nit&#8217;s a puncture. I have to do it because one wheel<br \/>\nwon&#8217;t be enough for this truck. You&#8217;re meant to check these things, instead you&#8217;re just sitting<br \/>\nin the truck doing nothing. Is it difficult to change the wheel?<br \/>\nI&#8217;ll take about 20 minutes. Altitude 4000 meters,<br \/>\nand there&#8217;s not much oxygen. Any physical effort<br \/>\nis painfully difficult. Maneuvering a 100 kilo tire is hard. It was a stone that made this hole. Instead of 20 minutes,<br \/>\nPedro and his assistant take almost two hours to repair the tire. It&#8217;s very tiring,<br \/>\nthe wheel is too heavy. However, I like this sort of work. I like traveling along the road,<br \/>\ndiscovering new places. It&#8217;s good, Pedro is behind schedule,<br \/>\nbut he&#8217;s still hoping to make it before nightfall. In the Andes, the roads may be tough,<br \/>\nbut they do at least link all the towns in the Cordillera,<br \/>\napart from one. That town is Iquitos. In the jungle, in the middle of nowhere,<br \/>\nits 400,000 inhabitants are cut off from the rest of the world. There are no roads. The only way in is by boat and by plane. People have got used<br \/>\nto doing without cars here. They get around on scooters or on bicycles<br \/>\nthat have been shipped in along the river from Yurimaguas,<br \/>\n400 kilometers upstream. The commercial port at Yurimaguas<br \/>\nis not much to write home about, but the unkempt riverbank is where the boats that supply Iquitos<br \/>\nwith food and goods are loaded. This ship, the Eduardo sixth,<br \/>\nis ready to cast off. In the hold, they&#8217;re loading<br \/>\n30 tonnes of fruit and rice. Iquitos is a sprawling town<br \/>\nthat swallows up everything. In just two hours,<br \/>\nthis entire cargo will disappear. Nothing will be left. In addition to food,<br \/>\nthe Eduardo sixth also carries animals. On the upper deck, passengers, 300 altogether jammed together<br \/>\nin hot, sticky conditions. It&#8217;s so hot. We still need to wait. There are no cabins. Everyone finds what space they can. This rope can easily come undone. You need a proper knot. Most of the passengers<br \/>\npay after they&#8217;ve boarded. The fare to Iquitos<br \/>\nis the equivalent of \u20ac30, a week&#8217;s average wage in these parts. Many try and sneak a free ride. There are plenty of fake tickets,<br \/>\nbut this helps me to detect them. On board, being multi-skilled<br \/>\nis essential from selling tickets to piloting, Captain Raphael<br \/>\ndoes everything. He&#8217;s been sailing this river for 30 years. He knows its pitfalls. Yet just last year, his boat sank,<br \/>\nalmost taking all hands down with it. A year ago, we hit another boat and sank. The water reached the second level here. The cargo was lost in the water. Before casting off, Raphael<br \/>\nputs on his uniform. That&#8217;s the whistle, we&#8217;re leaving. Engines on, come on, let&#8217;s go. Madam, put your bags over there. You can&#8217;t block the emergency exit. Let me through, hoist the gangways. The ships are berthed<br \/>\none on top of the other, and extricating oneself is tricky. Push it a bit, we&#8217;ll get through. Go on, keep shoving. Keep going,<br \/>\ngo on, keep pushing. That&#8217;s good, we&#8217;re through. It takes at least three days<br \/>\nto sail down to Iquitos. In the dry season,<br \/>\nit&#8217;s even more complicated. You see that sand,<br \/>\nthe channel is over there. The rest are all sand banks<br \/>\nand very dangerous. You need to navigate through the middle<br \/>\nwhere the water&#8217;s deep enough. I swear you need a good eye<br \/>\nto avoid running aground on the sand. The pilots take it in turns<br \/>\nat the helm every six hours. They need to concentrate 24 hours a day. Eyes peeled on constant watch<br \/>\nfor the sandbanks. The currents are always changing<br \/>\nand the Amazonian river pilots have to navigate by guesswork. Late in the afternoon,<br \/>\na violent storm strikes the Amazon. The curtain of rain reduces visibility and the pilot can no longer spot<br \/>\nthe sandbanks. He needs help to steer away through. Go this way. Keep going this way. More to the left a little more. See, the channel is gone. Turn the wheel this way. This way, it&#8217;s too late. The boat is no longer in the channel. Stuck between two sandbanks,<br \/>\nthe vessel is now firmly in the grip of the current,<br \/>\nunable to steer and heading straight for the riverbank. We can&#8217;t get out. The level is too low,<br \/>\nthere&#8217;s not enough depth. It&#8217;s too narrow,<br \/>\nand I couldn&#8217;t maneuver. Forced to go straight. For the time being,<br \/>\nonly the bow of the ship is stuck. It needs to be freed<br \/>\nbefore the whole ship gets bogged down. It shouldn&#8217;t ever really happen,<br \/>\nbut it often does. Now we&#8217;re stuck here and maybe<br \/>\nwe&#8217;ll get stopped further down too. This will mean a long wait. Oh, well, we&#8217;re delayed now. What can you do when this happens? Well, if the ship gets stuck even more,<br \/>\nwe&#8217;ll need to lighten the load and put the cargo onto another boat. It&#8217;s a very slow process. We need to get back<br \/>\ninto the channel urgently. Two sailors head out to check the depth<br \/>\nof the river to find a route out. All they have to measure with is a pole. Two meters, 40, they found deeper water<br \/>\nand after reversing, the boat is finally free. We&#8217;re at two meters 40. That&#8217;s it. The water&#8217;s deep enough. We&#8217;ll head that way. Two meters 40. Two meters 70 here. Two meters ten,<br \/>\nit will be enough to get through. Two meters 40. To be safe, we&#8217;ll continue<br \/>\nto take depth measurements all night, at least for another 12 hours<br \/>\nand all through the journey. The Eduardo the sixth has scraped through. For now at least, there&#8217;s two more days<br \/>\non the river before Iquitos, their destination. Up in the Cordillera, Pedro is now<br \/>\non the toughest part of the journey for his truck,<br \/>\na succession of mountain peaks, forcing him to constantly alter his speed<br \/>\nand let the clutch in and out. The abuse is wearing out the engine. On the dashboard, there&#8217;s a warning light. The radiator is overheating<br \/>\nand the needle&#8217;s in the red. That&#8217;s not right, look, it&#8217;s heating up. It&#8217;s over 98. There&#8217;s a hole in the radiator,<br \/>\nthere must be a leak. Now we&#8217;ll need to keep<br \/>\nstopping to add water. The good news, though,<br \/>\nis that in these mountains, there&#8217;s plenty of water everywhere. It&#8217;s spring water. It&#8217;s like cooling fluid. Come on, we need to get on<br \/>\nif we want to arrive today. I can&#8217;t hang around here anymore. Soon there&#8217;s another problem. It can&#8217;t climb anymore. The overheating<br \/>\nhas damaged the engine, and Pedro can&#8217;t figure out<br \/>\nwhat&#8217;s causing it. Luckily for him in the Andes,<br \/>\nthe drivers help each other out. Hi, how&#8217;s it going? Listen, my engine&#8217;s rolling over nicely,<br \/>\nbut it can&#8217;t climb. It keeps stalling. That&#8217;s the diesel oil. That&#8217;s probably dirt<br \/>\nand it&#8217;s blocking the filter, and that stops it<br \/>\ngoing through the engine. Okay, thanks very much. If that&#8217;s all it is,<br \/>\nit can be repaired in the next village. If it&#8217;s more serious,<br \/>\nthen it&#8217;s an end to the journey. After the next bend, there&#8217;s a bridge. It&#8217;s one way of checking<br \/>\nwhether the truck is not overweight. This is risky<br \/>\nbecause some of the planks are rotten. We could fall through,<br \/>\nit could collapse. I&#8217;m 19 and a half tons. Five hundred kilos under the limit. Nevertheless, crossing is risky. The key is to get across<br \/>\nwithout shaking the planks too much. By about 10:00 at night,<br \/>\nhe finally finds a garage. In these remote mountains,<br \/>\nit&#8217;s not good to break down and the mechanics work day and night. It&#8217;s the moment of truth<br \/>\nfor Pedro&#8217;s truck. This is what there was. The diesel was filthy,<br \/>\nthe dirt blocked the filter. Even if there are so many problems,<br \/>\nwhat can I do? It comes with a job and you accept it. I need to make a living. I think that&#8217;s better now. A little further up in the village,<br \/>\nthere&#8217;s an unusual commotion that&#8217;s blocking the traffic. Thousands of people are marching<br \/>\nto the sound of drums and flutes. All are heading to the same place. The valley of Qoyllur Riti. They&#8217;ve come from all over Peru<br \/>\nto take part in the largest pilgrimage in Latin America. The celebration of the Virgin Mary<br \/>\nand Viracocha, the Inca sun god. 100,000 faithfuls have undertaken<br \/>\nto travel for three days and nights to pay homage to them both. Among the dancers are the Ucucus who according to legend,<br \/>\nare half man, half bear. The mock fights represents<br \/>\ntheir strength and resistance to pain. Bizarrely though,<br \/>\ntheir voices are far from virile. They&#8217;re high-pitched. Tradition has it they disguise<br \/>\ntheir voices to avoid being recognized. However, not all are here to dance. The majority of the pilgrims<br \/>\ntrek up the mountainside for hours without flinching<br \/>\nto reach a small sanctuary. Only a few pilgrims are allowed to enter<br \/>\nand implore the gods of Qoyllur Riti. People visit the sanctuary<br \/>\nof Lord Qoyllur Riti because he can perform miracles. Many people believe<br \/>\nhe can make them healthy, get them a good job,<br \/>\nand many other things. Those who can&#8217;t enter<br \/>\ncan always visit the miracles market. I&#8217;m selling houses, cars, land,<br \/>\nwho wants some? The fact is, the woman is selling dreams. Rectangular stones symbolize houses,<br \/>\nthe toys, cars. Purchasers believe they might see<br \/>\ntheir wishes come true within 12 months. Here are the fake documents<br \/>\nfor buying a car. Here&#8217;s the receipt, sales certificate,<br \/>\ndriving license, and the tax sticker. You can get a car with these. Fake US dollars, to be precise,<br \/>\nbought in this fake bank. $30,000 for $0.30. At that rate,<br \/>\na make believe house would cost about \u20ac4, twice the daily income of the Indians. Need a solicitor? This way, this Indian couple<br \/>\nhave just purchased a house. The fake solicitor<br \/>\nofficially registers the sale. Who is the buyer? Holgey Almeria. We&#8217;re also buying land. Have you really bought it? Yes, but the papers are a joke. In addition to couples,<br \/>\nthere are also students here to buy entry diplomas. Will you actually study? Oh, yes, to get a place,<br \/>\nyou need to leave your wish to the Lord. That&#8217;s why he&#8217;s buying his admission,<br \/>\nso his wish can come true. Of course the wishes come true,<br \/>\nif you believe in it and have faith. The last day of the pilgrimage<br \/>\nis the most important. Only the privileged can carry the crosses. After hours of climbing,<br \/>\nthey&#8217;ll reach the glacier 5600 meters up and that much closer to the heavens. Whether their gods are Christian or Inca,<br \/>\nthe Qoyllur Riti faithful hope their prayers will be heard. To Pedro, who is delivering cement,<br \/>\nit&#8217;s one thing after another. He&#8217;s got another 350 kilometers to go,<br \/>\nbut he&#8217;s been on the road for two days already<br \/>\nand his trip seems interminable. To avoid the rainy season,<br \/>\nturning the route into a swamp. Workers are surfacing<br \/>\nthe roads with stones. To Pedro, what they&#8217;re doing<br \/>\nis a waste of time. Why are they putting stones down? They&#8217;ll need to take them up<br \/>\nbecause the weight of the trucks will shred the tires like razor blades. The Stones might also cause<br \/>\nthe tires to burst, which is what happens next to Pedro. Stone gets in between the two tires. You see, with the pressure,<br \/>\nit will burst one of them. Usually the driver<br \/>\ndoesn&#8217;t even realize it. Changing tires<br \/>\nin these conditions can be dangerous. If you inflate a tire and this part<br \/>\nof the rim is not properly placed, it could come off and hit you in the face. These metal bars provide protection. A lot of drivers and mechanics<br \/>\nhave been hurt or killed by the wheel rims breaking their necks. Pedro has another 60 kilometers to go. The hardest part. What time is it? 2:38. Well, we might make it<br \/>\nby 8:00 or 9:00 p.m if we don&#8217;t stop. It&#8217;s unwise to drive here at night. There are bandits<br \/>\nin these remote mountains. They could block the road<br \/>\nwith rocks and then rob us. Until recently,<br \/>\nthis region was a stronghold of the Shining Path Maoist guerrillas. They fought the authorities<br \/>\nfor almost two decades to impose a communist regime. When their campaign ended,<br \/>\nnot all the guerrillas returned home. Some have become highwaymen. Recently, they&#8217;d held up a trucker<br \/>\non this stretch of road. It&#8217;s now midnight and Pedro<br \/>\nhas finally reached his destination. He gets lost inside the village. In Peru, signposts are rare. The parish should be that way. I don&#8217;t know which way to go. I think we&#8217;ll sleep here<br \/>\nand we&#8217;ll find my way tomorrow. Pedro took three days<br \/>\nto cover 350 kilometers, an exhausting journey<br \/>\nwhich earns him less than \u20ac5. It&#8217;s day two of the Eduardo<br \/>\nthe sixth trip on the river. The 300 passengers rush<br \/>\ninto the restaurant at the same time. On the menu are meat, rice and bananas. There&#8217;s only one person serving,<br \/>\nso it could be a long wait. No, it&#8217;s not great, but it&#8217;s all there is,<br \/>\notherwise, what would we eat? There are so many people that those<br \/>\nat the end of the queue will go hungry. Eduardo the sixth is the river omnibus. It stops in every remote hamlet,<br \/>\nwhich is welcome news for the villagers. They can make a few pennies<br \/>\nby trading with the passengers. Their life is hard, they&#8217;re a long way<br \/>\nfrom towns and commerce. Then you know their hills<br \/>\nand they live off hunting and fishing and eat bananas, mainly. Dozens of women<br \/>\ngather to sell their wares, such as grilled lava kebabs<br \/>\nand more expensive goods too. The small parrot is \u20ac3. It&#8217;s against the law to sell those. People buy them and take them to Iquitos. The police might confiscate them<br \/>\nso they drug them and hide them in their baggage. The monkeys, parrots, and parakeets<br \/>\nare all sold as pets, but not the coati. It&#8217;s a baby, it&#8217;s very small. The coati is much prized<br \/>\nfor one thing. For it&#8217;s small bone and it&#8217;s penis. You put several in a bottle<br \/>\nand mix it with schnapps and you get achuni. Old men drink it<br \/>\nfor its remarkable effects. It&#8217;s better than Viagra. Ancestral remedies not just to invigorate but as cures too. Along the river medicine is rare, so the native Indios<br \/>\nturned to healers, the shamans who invoke the spirits to ward off evil. As with this small boy<br \/>\nsuffering from malaria. The doctor couldn&#8217;t help him,<br \/>\nand it will take two or three sessions to make him better. My father healed this way,<br \/>\nand my ancestors too. The shamans get their skills<br \/>\nfrom the plants in the forest. This is ayahuasca,<br \/>\nwhich is a creeper with mysterious power. It&#8217;s been used since time immemorial<br \/>\nwhen there weren&#8217;t any doctors yet. It&#8217;s the only ingredient<br \/>\nhe was willing to reveal. The rest remains a secret,<br \/>\nespecially since the wrong dose could prove fatal. If you use too much,<br \/>\nit might make you mad. It&#8217;s like a short circuit. Many people have died, but we healers know<br \/>\nwhat the right dose is. The shamans are more than healers. Thanks to the mystical creeper,<br \/>\nthey have other powers. This man wants his wife<br \/>\nwho left him to return home. This young<br \/>\nIndian woman wants to get pregnant. The third patient<br \/>\nhas painful stomach cramps. Before the ceremony,<br \/>\neach of them has to swallow a bowl of a magical extraction. The immediate effect<br \/>\nis to make the patients vomit. Then they fall into a hypnotic state. Ayahuasca is so strong<br \/>\nit provokes visions. You can communicate with jaguars,<br \/>\ntigers, anacondas. These animals can draw out<br \/>\nthe illness within the body. The sickness is like a black smoke<br \/>\nloaded with negative vibes. The plants acts like a magnet<br \/>\non this man, for example. It attracts the woman,<br \/>\nso the couple can be reunited. That&#8217;s the power of ayahuasca. May God bless you. The Eduardo the sixth<br \/>\nis due to end its journey. It&#8217;s been a hard trip. This is where two tributaries<br \/>\njoin the Amazon and this is where it becomes<br \/>\nthe largest river in the world. Now we&#8217;re on the Amazon,<br \/>\nthe most unpredictable river in the world. You can see the power,<br \/>\nsee the whirlpools down there. If the boat&#8217;s overloaded,<br \/>\nthose could suck the boat in and sink it. That&#8217;s why we need to be careful<br \/>\nwhen we navigate these waters. By the end of the day,<br \/>\nthey can see Iquitos. Journey&#8217;s end. Go to K 19. Sorry, careful. Mind the gangway. Every week, a dozen boats like the Eduardo<br \/>\nthe Sixth supply Iquitos. For the town without cars,<br \/>\nthe river Amazon, despite all its dangers, remains the only link<br \/>\nto the outside world.<br \/>\n<br \/>\nPeru\u2019s Andes span the country with peaks rising above 6,000 meters. Dangerous roads link the Pacific to the Amazon, claiming thousands of lives yearly. Juan Carlos delivers eggs along the deadly \u201cCanyon del Pato.\u201d Pedro hauls cement over the \u201cWhite\u201d Cordillera. During the sacred \u201cSe\u00f1or de Quyllur Rit\u2019i,\u201d pilgrims climb 5,000 meters, dancing and praying in freezing silence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Peru | The Deadly Peaks | Deadliest Journeys Peru, in the heart of the Andes Cordillera, the kingdom of the Ap<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":621177,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[144745],"tags":[100850,361297,361299,361302,361292,361293,8669,361301,361304,361294,361300,361296,361305,361295,361298,290786,361303,1170,150535,6603,145025,32659,144539,145024,64319],"class_list":{"0":"post-621176","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tokushima","8":"tag-amazon-jungle","9":"tag-andes-cordillera","10":"tag-canyon-del-pato","11":"tag-cement-truck","12":"tag-deadliest-journeys","13":"tag-dicing-with-death","14":"tag-documentary","15":"tag-egg-transport","16":"tag-indigenous-pilgrims","17":"tag-les-routes-de-limpossible","18":"tag-pacific-coast","19":"tag-roads","20":"tag-senor-de-quoylloriti","21":"tag-travel-south-america","22":"tag-treacherous-roads","23":"tag-trucks","24":"tag-white-cordillera","25":"tag-ytccon","26":"tag-150535","27":"tag-6603","28":"tag-145025","29":"tag-32659","30":"tag-144539","31":"tag-145024","32":"tag-64319"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/tour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/621176","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/tour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/tour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/tour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/tour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=621176"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/tour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/621176\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/tour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/621177"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/tour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=621176"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/tour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=621176"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wacoca.com\/tour\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=621176"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}