The Paddler ezine WW kayak collection 2013 | Page 167

which banned

A new law had been implemented in Lima,

Matt Wilson at Matthuaga Canyon.
Photo: Evan Ross

This word (with no direct English translation)
is a nice way of saying: a mountain of
bureaucratic nonsense to spring our kayaks out
of customs. Since this was my big idea, and my
Spanish was the strongest within the group, I
spent the following week in the lovely Barrio of
Callao where one can enjoy the many smells of
death on a stick. As I took off from our Mira
Flores hostel, in an unmarked black taxi with
dark tinted windows, the driver informed me,
“hay mucho pistoleros en Callao.”

the transport of all goods
on top of vehicles

After a week of shenanigans in Lima, we finally
had our boats. Our next challenge was to get
them to Huánuco, the launching point for our
expedition. We were soon to find that, prior to
our arrival, a new law had been implemented
in Lima, which banned the transport of all
goods on top of vehicles! This forced us to ship
our boats from Lima to Huánuco, which would
take another three days. When it was all
said and done, it had taken us a total of ten
days of travelling from Durango Colorado
to arrive at the put-in of the Huallaga.
‘Operation Huallaga’ had now become
‘Operation blue balls.’
Huánuco is town of about 30,000
inhabitants and has the self-proclaimed
slogan, “El mejor clima en el mundo” (the
best climate in the world). While unpacking
our boats on the roof of our hostel in
oppressive heat, this claim to the best
climate in the world seemed a little farfetched as we were eaten alive by sand flies.
These pesky insects attack every piece of
unclothed skin with vigour, and would
accompany us throughout the journey.

“Great,” I thought. “Am I going to get shot
before I even get to the put-in?” I spent the next
three days running around this sketchy zone
like a headless chicken.
“Ok gringo, you go to this place to get this
invoice and go to this bank and deposit this
amount,” I’d hear over and over. Once every
company, which had any hand in the process of
taking our boats off the container, was paid off,
it was time to deal with the Aduana.
“Ok gringo, do you want to import your kayaks
to sell, which will take a few days, or do you
want import them temporally which will take
ten days,” the Aduana asked. I went for the
importacion simplificado, which took two
days and we were charged a reciprocal tax of
20% of the total value of our boats.

After haranguing two taxies and halfhazardously tying our kayaks to the roofs, we
arrived at our put-in bridge ten miles north of
Huánuco. As we rushed to put on our gear
before the sand flies arrived an older woman
approached us dressed in the traditional alpaca
attire. She began to wave her finger at us, “Es
muy pelegroso y no es posible.” She went on to
tell us that her husband helped the previous
group out of the canyon and that we were
fools. Although this was all information we
had already known it was not comforting to
receive it first hand from a local. We told her
not to worry as we scurried down to the river
through a disgusting heap of trash, which had
been thrown from the many buses travelling
between Huánuco and Tingo Maria.
Continued on page 30.

Te am Beer. Photo: Matt Klema

Left to right: Ryan Casey, Ben Luck, Nate Klema, Matt Wilson, Evan Ross, Matthew Klema

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