So once again lots of time has passed, great friends have been made, tons of experiences have occurred and not much has been done as far as writing this page. Anyway back in Peru….the charts had been monitored and last minute plans locked in. It was to be a plane flight from Cuzco to Lima, an eight hour wait in a bus terminal and an eleven hour overnight bus ride north through the desert to Trujillo. Jumping off an overnight bus after twenty four hours or so of travel and trying to then barter a decent price for a local driver to take you an hour and a half into the desert is not my forte. We sorted it pretty quickly however and before we knew it we had pulled up in a small ramshackle village that was actually quite similar to how I had pictured it. Tiny, with half finished crumbling concrete buildings, friendly locals, and a massive bay that stretched as far as the eye could see with, wait for it…..the longest lines of swell I have ever seen. Chicama, widely regarded as the worlds longest wave was firing. Keeping one eye on the charts and a bit of lucky timing paid off. I’ll let some pictures do the talking.

 

This is just as we pulled up and I was pretty much losing my mind. We were there for 5 nights the first time around and it just got better for two days and peaked right in the middle of our time there. This is probably about the first quarter or third of the wave. We never got a photo that really shows the whole lineup well as it would require a much wider angle lens than Beth had packed for this trip. It is one of, if not the most mesmerising lineup I have ever seen.

We really spoilt ourselves on this stop and stayed at the nicest place we have during the whole trip (and the most expensive by far!) and the only really nice place in Chicama, right in front of the wave. A beautiful resort with super cool local staff and a massive deck and pool overlooking the wave, complete with cervezas and cocktails on sunset after surfing all day. I think Beth fell in love with the place. To top it off there was a really awesome few people staying there as well (you guys know who you are!) which really topped off our time there. There is nothing like meeting really genuinely good people to hang out with from all different walks of life during your travels.

Lines for days.

It really never gets above four to five feet, and it’s a fattish sort of wave but…the feeling of coming out of a bottom turn after doing the same turn fifteen times before it is incredible and something that I have never experienced before. The leg burn is intense when you are catching waves that are two minutes long and 1500m in length and I think it breaks even further to the pier at the town when the sand is perfect! Amazing place and I was in awe to be walking around a point that I had seen photos of since I was a kid and to have it as good as it was with a total lack of people.

The long hot walks back around the point in the desert are surreal. Like being on Mars. This little rocket of a single fin got a workout as well. It was so perfect for that wave and was the only board I rode during the whole time in Chicama.

Way down the point near the end of the wave on the best day, still grinding perfectly on sunset.

So… it was with reluctance that we left Chicama and headed north a couple of hours to the town of Pacasmayo and the amazing lefthander of El Faro…which was completely waveless for our week long stay. Oh well I guess you can’t win them all. Beth and I really loved Pacasmayo, it was a really genuine hardworking little Peruvian fishing town with nice local people and amazing food. Hanging out for the week was fun and we met Paige and Clinton, a couple of friends on different journeys who had met up in Peru for a couple of weeks. We really had an amazing time hanging out with the two of them and trading stories. Paige is from San Fransisco and has been surfing for about five years and is probably the most surf stoked human on the planet and has some pretty hilarious info on surfing and travels on her blog. It was so refreshing for Beth and I to hang out with someone that is so high on life and we had such a fun time with the two of them that we decided to go back to Chicama with them for a few more days. She had come down to Peru to meet up with Clinton, a kiwi who has been living in the states for a long time is currently on an open ended motorcycle trip. So inspiring to know that he had ridden his bike from Alaska to where we were in Northern Peru and will be continuing all the way to Patagonia! It made for some pretty amazing conversation and made our trip look pretty easy in comparison.

Peruvian food makes my mouth water…. the seafood is so fresh and so cheap in these towns that it is ridiculous. Peruvian ceviche like the one above is hands down the best ceviche that we have ever had.

Pacasmayo. Peruvian towns are so quirky. The buildings can be so ugly and 80% are half finished but there are enough old colonial ones in between to make do.

Bethy in Pacasmayo. This was such a cool place to watch the fiery pollution filled sunsets and was actually a really old cemetery on top of the hill above where we stayed.

A lot of people from home would look at towns like this and immediately think ‘shithole’ but it is just the way towns are here. With not much money and lots of corruption, the streets end up looking this way. And despite all of the rubbish and pollution in Peru, which was horrible, Pacasmayo was impeccably clean in the town itself. I was so stoked to have gone even with no waves.

It’s hard not to feel sorry for animals in Peru.

Paige and Clinton, see you in Chicama!

Those long hot walks again.

Chicama was smaller the second time around but still had the amazing lined up shape that gets you excited, and as soon as the wave gets too small….just walk further. Around the corner there are two more point breaks almost as long as the first.

The sunset beers, warm weather, card games and fun times in Peru were a blast. It’s a pretty amazing country that we had originally planned to spend more time in. Looking at the swell forecasts was pretty grim, there was nothing significant for the next three weeks. Actually, it looked terrible and the far north of the country that we were headed to didn’t look like the most exciting place out of the water. With no waves I was starting to dream about southern Chile again….winter in southern Chile. Freezing water and a constant bombardment of big swells. There were waves down there that I felt like I’d missed out on. Last minute plans were made, phone calls to Adam in Pichilemu, flights were booked to Tacna, hassles by Peruvian customs on the land crossing into Chile (they pulled us into the office and had a chat followed by a full body x-ray each, I think it’s the beard…), and we were reunited with Seńor Vanchez in Arica, Chile. Then began the huge drive through the desert, south this time, to Pichilemu.

 

Peru you were amazing, but the last minute change of plans have paid off. Instead of sitting up in northern Peru waiting for waves that never came, we have been in southern Chile for the past month. And the waves you ask?

They have been cold… and mind blowing.

Photos to come.

Ciao b+m