Our Last Days In Ayacucho
There is not much to report from my side for the 27th. I was mainly sleeping or going to the toilet way too frequently so all in all feeling quite miserable. Jacques wasn’t great yet either, but he felt good enough to get up and eat, but he did nap a lot during the day as well. He and Göran went to the terminal terrestre in the afternoon to inquire about tickets from Ayacucho to Abancay and whether our bikes would fit. They bought tickets for the night bus the following day. Given that Göran was feeling completely fine, we suspect the Muyuchi ice cream was the culprit of our bacterial infection. To be fair, it is travelling 101 to not have drinks with ice cubes or ice cream from street vendors in developing countries. But given that the stall we chose had already had quite a few customers, we thought that the product throughput would be quick enough that the products would have to be fresh. How wrong we were.
The 28th was a bit better but today was also the day that we would leave and take the night bus to Abancay. My intestines still weren’t okay though, so I hoped that the bus ride would be manageable for me. After sleeping a lot (meanwhile Jacques made banana pancakes which the guys munched for breakfast) and doing another round of laundry (wool items this time) we had a cozy afternoon with Iván, who brought out a set of games. This was great fun! I will miss staying at Iván’s place.
Afterwards we got ready to head to the terminal terrestre. After quite a bit of cycling through the dark and a few stupid aggressive dogs, we finally got there. Only for them to tell us that we couldn’t depart that evening because our bikes wouldn’t fit in the bus. Despite their colleague guaranteeing Jacques and Göran just the day before that they definitely would. Needless to say that we weren’t amused. But with no alternatives there was nothing for us to do but cycle back to Iván, who luckily took us back in with open arms. There we had a quick dinner and headed to bed.
On the 29th, I had a fever again and during the night and in the morning I was very sick again. After feeling very shitty (pun not intended) and subsequently having a long lie-in, I finally felt better than the previous days although my stomach still wasn’t okay. For the first time I was hungry again though.
So to give chef Jacques a break I volunteered to cook lunch that day so we had a kind of vegan Spaghetti Bolognese-type dish. Afterwards, Jacques and I went to the massage parlour and enjoyed a heavenly and relaxing 1-hour massage of our backs, necks, heads, legs, feet, hands, and arms. What a dream, especially for a tensed-up biker. To round up our days in Ayacucho, we treated ourselves to one more nice time at a café with chocolate and strawberry-filled crêpes and a milkshake. Muy rico!
That night, we had to cycle to the bus station through a sudden heavy downpour of rain which was so intense that all the water from the sewers rose up and spilled out onto the streets. Yuck. This time our bikes fit into the bus though so we didn’t come all the way for nothing again. We were concerned for the well-being of our bikes though, since we had no protective layers such as cardboard or foil available for them anymore. The ride itself was not perfect but alright and despite the discomfort of the serpentines, we all managed to get varying degrees of sleep by the time we reached Abancay the next day.
