A long way for a drink

A few years ago, I was in Peru. I loved Peru and I still bore my friends with stories about Peru. It was my first experience with the third world. It was my first experience with a lot of things.

As a travel companion, I am really annoying. I am the person who ditches out on the prearranged tours. I make friends on buses and try to get my companions to just go stay with people we don’t know. I’m the person who gets really lost and has to be found. I drive people who travel with me nuts, but we certainly have adventures.

My first night in Peru was one such adventure. We had booked a tour for part of the trip. Only part. I wanted to just “do my own thing” for the rest of the trip. This turned out to be ill-advised, but worked out really well. The trip, however, started with a tour. This meant that the first night, we were outside of a pretty poor town in a really nice resort with walls, razor wire, and armed guards. This was clearly meant to keep THEM out because it didn’t keep US in.

The whole resort thing felt really bizarre to me. Mind you, I like a nice resort. But, there is something unseemly about being in a resort with high security to keep it nice. Frankly, the people on the outside of the resort seemed a lot more like what I had come to Peru to visit than the people on the inside. Plus, I was more interested in the local Pisco (drink) I had heard about than I was one more walk on the beach. I decided to make a break for it.

I talked to my travel companion. He was less than interested. Fine by me. I headed toward the exit. I suppose his valor got the best of him. He tagged along. As we passed the guard, he gave us some sort of warning I don’t remember.

By golly, I wanted a drink. I walked with my companion into the local town. There wasn’t much to see. Some dirt. Some people. Some run-down buildings. Other than that, not much.

So, I asked some random guy on the street where I go to get a drink. He had a run-down car and opened the door for us and motioned us to get in. Now, this is the point where my travel companions and I always are at odds. I jumped right into the car. My travel companion, on the other hand, had a fit.

“What in the Hell are you doing?!?!”

“I want a drink. This guy seems to know where we can get one.”

“Or he could kill us. Or kidnap us for ransom and then kill us. Or torture us. Or…who knows!”

“Geez. It’s just a drink. He seems nice.”

At this point, our new buddy points at himself and says, “yes. Nice. Very nice. You want drink?”

So, my travel companion gets into the car. “You know, you are totally insane and if you get us killed, I’ll never forgive you.”

I get told that I am crazy a surprising amount. I’m a little worried there might be some truth to it.

So, the guy starts to drive. There isn’t much common language, so we can’t really ask the guy much about where we are going. This is all about trust and adventure. And worry.

You see, the guy drives right out of town. He keeps going. We pass the last gas station. We pass the outlying farm. Things are not looking so good for our heroes. Then, he turns….

Onto a dirt road behind a little shed.  He heads down this dirt road. We drive through a hole in the road that we literally have to drive down into and up out the other side. The car strains to get out. Dogs are chasing the car and barking. At this point, I turn to my companion.

“You know, you might have been right about the getting killed thing.”

He just glared at me.

I will never forget what I said next and I really see a lot of my philosophy in this one statement, “Well, it’s been a good life.”

Finally, the driver pulls the car up to this squat little house. He jumps out and motions us to follow. My companion now wants to stay in the car. I’m already getting out and he is grabbing my clothes to keep me in.

“Hey, we’ve come this far. Let’s see it through.”

(You are probably now starting to see why no one ever travels with me more than once.)

So, we get out of the car and follow the driver into the cellar of the house by way of some rickety wooden steps.

And….hey, there was a bar there. It’s small and they clearly make their own, but it’s fairly clean and they definitely were ready to serve us a drink.

There was a woman behind the bar and a man who came in and out a lot. We stayed for a while and sometimes we were the only patrons and sometimes we weren’t. The owners gave our driver a sandwich for bringing us.

I got my Pisco Sour. The drink is a little disturbing. It is frothy and involves an egg. Frankly, I recommend it only if you can avoid watching someone make it. I also got a tour and a long explanation of how the Pisco is made. The explanation process was fascinating because of the language barrier. Have someone explain fermentation to you in a language you don’t understand and you will see what I mean, but after a while, we caught on.

We stayed and had a good time. We made friends with everyone who came and went. We got a bit tipsy. Then, we had the guy from town drive us back to the resort. And he did. No kidnapping. No killing. Just a nice drink and some new friends.

The next day, the guy with the car was hanging around outside the resort. I saw him and went outside again. We said hello and he said something to me I totally didn’t understand and motioned to the car. I turned to my travel companion.

“Well, it sounds interesting. Want to find out?”

He sighed one of those weight-of-the-world sighs, but said, “why not.”

Huge oasis resorts and sand dunes you snowboard down are pretty cool too.