Getting ready: the weeks before
we left for Perú

The process of preparation for this trip took far longer than for one our Country Walkers tours. Mark spent months dealing with AdventureSmith, and had to arrange flights within Perú in addition to the usual to and from. And don’t forget travel insurance, in case the geezer comes down with the collywobbles. We needed special im­mu­ni­za­tions, and needed to consider protecting ourselves against malaria and rabies (we did). Yellow fever required a special trip to the county health department, ’cause our regular physician’s clinic doesn’t carry the material for those shots. Get anti-insect goo at REI—the lady at the health department re­com­mend­ed rub-on rather than spray—and apply a different, and semi-permanent, kind of anti-insect stuff to the clothes we would be wearing when we went into the jungle. Besides that, we had to update our gear in any number of ways: new walking sticks for both of us, new raincoat for me, for instance.

Finally the big day of packing came, 12 April, day before we were to leave. Up top, that’s what it looked like in our always messy guest bedroom. Even that is mostly Mark’s stuff.

But then we were ready to go the next day.