Day 14 Macara to Chulucanas

We were about to leave Ecuador and enter Peru, but that was not going to be as quick as you may think!  We arrived at the border about 8:20 am and the plan was to let the trucks go ahead of us and the riders follow once the trucks had been cleared.  Well, first surprise, the border guards on the Ecuadorian side were not exactly sober shall we say.  It was quite a while before we got our passports stamped and we could progress the 100 metres to the Peruvian border.  Another slow process getting through, but the sobriety seemed to be better here!  During our wait the Peruvian Police were chatting to us and explaining that they would be "escorting" us all the way through Peru, around 5 weeks!  We did not really understand what they meant at the time, but after over 2 hours we were all cleared and on our way with a police car, lights flashing, leading us into Peru.  The police escort continued all day.  More about that later.
Unfortunately by now the sun was really getting hot after our long delay and I soon dropped off the group.  I was finding the terrain very boring, rolling roads with a nagging head wind.  We did not have lunch until around 60K by which time I was really feeling low.
After lunch we carried on until nearer the finish we had our first serious stretch of unpaved flat road for about 14K including riding through a couple of rivers for good measure!  By the time we reached the end I was in quite a bad way, really suffering from dehydration and when I arrived at the hotel Didier, our nurse, took my bike from me and got me sat down and drinking straight away.  He took my bags to my room and I just sat drinking anything that was put in front of me and trying to enjoy the soup that we always get at the end of each day.  Slowly I got better and went off for my shower and washing out my kit before going out to get some Peruvian money from an ATM.  I bumped into some of the guys in a bar/restaurant and stopped by for a beer or two along with some food.  There were some Peruvians playing a guitar and the spoons as well as singing.  It was a really good night and it turned out that the first day of 124K into Peru was not that bad after all!

Welcome to Peru!