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Yurimaguas to Uchiza – The Peruvian Jungle and Coca

Friday, September 15th, 2006

From Yurimaguas, in the Peruvian Jungle, I followed dirt roads south and planned to cross into the Andes through the national park Rio Abiseo. Arriving in the town of Juanjui, near the park, I learned that my map had lied to me. The road did not exist.

My map also showed a road further to the south crossing into the Andes. This road was thicker on the map, so I had higher hopes for it. Before traveling, though, I first visited a school in Juanjui and spent the day at the fire station.

Continuing south, I entered a region where helicopters were constantly flying overhead. I soon learned that the helicopters were paid for by the U.S. government, and were flying to look for coca plants to eradicate (coca plants are the source of cocaine, and the coca plant can be found only in the foothills of the Andes). While large scale coca farming has been largely eradicated in this region, the plant grows naturally, and the plant can still be found everywhere. For instance, on the right is a picture of a healthy coca plant with smiling children just 200 feet from the main road. (After taking this picture, one of the locals offered me coca leaves. “Chew on these while you bike, and you won’t get tired or hungry”).

The eradication has hit the local economy hard. A hotel I stayed at in Tocache was nearly empty, and I was told it was full a year ago. I camped on a farm of a man who grows coca – “nothing else here makes any money” he told me, and then told me everyone was waiting for the helicopters to go away so they could grow more coca. This region is poor, and eradication has made it poorer — outside the cities there is little electricity, and some people I stayed with work with a machete for $3 a day. On the other hand, one farmer I talked to said that although he had less money, he was more relaxed, ”with all the drug traffickers there was a lot more crime.” (Indeed, it would not have been safe for me to travel here a year earlier.)

Turning into the mountains, I learned my map had lied to me again. The road to Huacrachuco was under construction, and I either had to rent a horse or keep biking south. To see what I did, wait till the next entry, or go here.

Thanks to the bomberos of Yurimaguas, Tarapoto, and Juanjui, who helped me out and even gave me my own bombero uniform (photo center and right). I also attended my first fire in Juanjui — a palm tree on fire from a lightning strike, which eventually went out from the rain (video below).

Posted in Peru, Schools | 2 Comments »

Two weeks up the Amazon River

Wednesday, September 6th, 2006

From the city of Manaus, I biked to the river port, where I found a boat headed upriver towards Peru. A space to put a hammock and food for six days of travel cost $100. I purchased a ticket, a hammock, and then made friends with a Colombian-Spanish couple who had a cabin on the boat and would guard my valuables while I slept in my hammock.

The river here is enormous — in Manaus, 1,000 miles upstream from the Amazon’s mouth, the river is already by far the world’s largest river (over 150,000 cubic meters of water per second), and over 300 feet deep. Manaus is a large city of 3 million people, yet the other side of the river is almost unpopulated.

My boat followed the largest of the Amazon tributaries (sometimes called the Solimoes, sometimes called the Amazon), upstream towards Peru (see map). To maintain sanity while on the boat, I woke up every day at sunrise and ran laps on the deck (see video, center— I had company). This was followed by a shower, reading until lunch, lunch, more reading, a nap until dinner, dinner, and then talking with other people on the boat until bedtime. It was a demanding schedule.

The boat did make a few stops in small towns along the way, unloading goods and picking up passengers. Most of the riverside, however, was unpopulated.

Arriving upstream, Peru, Colombia, and Brazil’s borders all meet, and in the course of a day, I visited all three before boarding another boat, this time a high speed cruiser (shown left below) to take a one day trip to Iquitos (map). Iquitos, with half a million inhabitants, is the world’s largest inland city with no roads to it — you can get there only by boat or plane. In the late 1800s, the town experienced a brief boom from rubber production, which produced a number of now-historic buildings in the town’s center.

I intended to go to the fire station to ask if I could stay there, but never made it, as two families offered me a place to stay first. Unable to choose between them, I resolved the problem by staying three days, giving me enough time to also visit two schools and appear in the local paper. I also received a tour of the town from three high school students, and also visited an AIDS clinic (perhaps one of the saddest parts of this trip) with a group working for the Catholic Church.

From Iquitos, I took a two and a half day trip upriver to Yurimaguas. The trip–food included–cost less than 30 dollars, and only after paying did I realize that I had paid for first class hammock space — second class, in the floor below, cost 15 dollars.

I have now arrived in Yurimaguas, a small city in the jungle, thus ending my two weeks of boat travel on the world’s largest river system. From here there are a series of small dirt roads that I will be able to follow southwest and into the Peruvian Andes.

Posted in Brazil, Colombia, Peru, Schools | No Comments »

The future of the Amazon? A week in Manaus

Tuesday, August 22nd, 2006

I spent a week in Manaus, staying in the apartment of two graduate students and visiting Instituto National de Pesquisas da Amazonia (INPA), a famous research center. Here, in addition to giving a presentation for INPA and also for students at a neighboring University, I talked with scientists modelling climate in the Amazon rainforest. From what I gather, the rainforest faces three major threats. 1) Direct deforestation, 2) Decreased rainfall caused by deforestation, and 3) the possibility that global warming will dry out the basin.

Although the Amazon basin is enormous (similar in size to the contiguous U.S.), deforestation is a major threat. Everywhere roads are built, the forest is cut down, making way for fields of soy beans or beef cattle. From one of the researchers at INPA, I received the images below which show the forest in 1992, deforestation by 2002, and then projected deforestation in 2033 (deforestation shown in red).

I talked with two climate modellers at INPA, Francis and Theotonio (shown on the right with their ‘supercomputer’), about how this deforestation would affect the rainforest, as cutting down a forest changes evaporation and thus rain patterns. If the entire forest were cut down, they estimate that rainfall would decrease on average 30%, with many areas becoming too dry for forest. Indeed, one study suggests that there are two stable states of the Amazon — one state like the rainforest we find today, and another state where much of the forest is dry savannah. If too much forest is cut down, there is a possibility that it would push much of the Amazon into the drier state, unable to easily return to forest. (More on this here.)

These studies, however, do not consider the effects of global warming. To be sure, the effects of global warming are uncertain because large scale climate models are not good at modelling rainfall in the tropics. Nonetheless, a few models (not all) suggest that a warmer earth means a much drier Amazon, which would turn much of the basin into savannah. This may be wrong. It may also be correct.

Decreasing rain and savannahization are real risks to the rainforest. Due to uncertainty in the science–we can’t be sure if deforestation or global warming will reduce rain–it is difficult to put percentages on these risks, and Theotonio and Francis, while claiming it a real possibility, balked at guessing its probability. Nonetheless, if it is true, the results are very bad. A loss of the Amazon would not only loose countless species, but also release incredible amounts of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, accelerating global warming. Do we really want to find out if it is true or not?

My last full day in Manaus, I travelled with Alexender, one of my hosts, to a large forest preserve near the city. In the preserve, Alex maintains a large tower that measures CO2 concentrations, and is he trying to understand how CO2 fluxes into and out of the forest. Alex let me climb to the top of the tower, where I was able to look across the treetops of a forest that stretches for thousands of miles beyond the horizon. Listening to the birds, monkeys, and insects, it was hard not to be both awed by the Amazon and to wonder what its future will be.

Posted in Brazil, Climate, Schools | 3 Comments »

Through the Panama Canal

Monday, May 15th, 2006

I spent a week in Panama City, where I stayed with a friend of a friend, visited three schools (Balboa Academy, Academia Interamericana, and Instituto Atenea), and somehow found myself on the front page of the national newspaper (see article online).

Panama City sits next to the Pacific opening of the Panama Canal, a 50 mile waterway that connects the Pacific to the Atlantic. A large portion of global trade travels this canal, and many of the goods you have, especially if you live on the east coast of the U.S., were likely shipped through this canal. The canal, built by the United States in the first decade of the 1900s (history of the canal), consists of a number of tubs, called locks, that raise and lower boats to a large reservoir in the center of the country (see a map of the canal).

Small sailing boats are required to have four line handlers to help with the transit. Yacht owners can hire professional Panamanians for $50, or they can take me for free.

After some time at the marina, I found a sailor interested in my line handling services – Ray on a sailboat named Velera. As the small boat was raised or lowered in the lock, it was my job to adjust lines to keep the boat centered in the lock and not banging into the walls. This is harder than it sounds.

I may never again be so close to so many huge moving ships. I have created an album of photos from this transit, and even have a few movies of the locks – the devices that raise and lower the boats – in action. Thanks again to Ray, for letting me on his boat for this transit.

We arrived in the Atlantic side of the canal, where I was dropped off at the local marina. As there are no roads between Panama and Colombia, I instantly began looking for boats to take me to Colombia.

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Mangua to San Jose – two weeks with Pops

Saturday, April 29th, 2006

As I said in the previous entry, my father flew to Managua with a silly looking bicycle and the plan to bike with me to Costa Rica. Two years ago, Pops and I biked from Virginia to Oregon (watch the movie of this trip) and, amazingly, we still want to ride together.

After spending a night with a family in Managua, my father and I biked for two days and then took a boat out to a volcanic island in the middle of Lake Nicaragua, Central America’s largest lake. After three days of enjoying the island, we took a second boat to the far side of the lake near the Costa Rican boarder. We rode ‘first class’ on this boat, which meant we slept on the crowded second floor with tourists instead of the crowded first floor with Nicaraguans, many of whom we were told were hoping to cross the border into Costa Rica to work.

After another short boat ride, we entered Costa Rica. Costa Rica has a stronger economy than the other Central American countries (see facts), which is why many of the Nicaraguans wanted to go there to work. In comparison to Nicaragua, the farms were not small family lots but rather large efficient farms. While there were still people using machetes, many others used gas powered weed-whackers. Roadside trash was nearly non-existent, and somehow I felt far safer biking into the major cities. Also, the dogs in Costa Rica are more likely to chase cyclists (watch movie of dogs), which I would guess is because they are better fed.

Pops and I climbed up into the mountains, following steep dirt roads with 20% grades . We spent two days at a biological preserve, where I met with scientists studying climate change and my father recorded birdsong. (Pops studies birdsong — he even wrote a book about it.)

From Monteverde, we biked to the coast and then back up into the mountains to San Jose, Costa Rica’s capital, where I visited the American School of San Jose. I now have to say goodbye to Pops, who is catching a flight tomorrow morning.

Posted in Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Schools | 4 Comments »

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