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| My Mode of Travel and Tourism |
he main reason I chose to visit South America was to experience the culture, the lifestyle, the people, the traditions, the pace of life.
And as long as I was planning to immerse myself in the local culture, maybe I could find Spanish tutors along the way to help me learn the language, something I've wanted to do all my life.
I didn't want to look and act like a tourist because I knew this would make me feel separated from the local people. Almost without exceptions, I didn't pay to go on any tours, to enter any tourist exhibits, or to enter any parks. I even passed up on Macchu Piccu because of its infestation by tourists. (There were plenty of sacred places that didn't cost money to visit.) I tried not to spend money on anything that a local person wouldn't buy. For example, in Perú I wanted an "Inca Kola" T-shirt, but it wasn't until I saw a local laborer wearing one that I bought one myself.
I tried to appear less different than the local people, less gringo, less rich than the typical tourist.
At times I was jealous of the tourists with the large comfy internal-frame $500 backpacks, cargo pants, $300 Gore-Tex hiking shoes, camera gear, and altimeter watches.
But they stood out like so many sore thumbs. I wore jeans, simple outdoor shoes, and carried a fanny pack or a small badly-worn non-brand-name day pack.
For a camera I had only a tiny pocket-sized point-and-shoot, usually in my pocket out of view (thanks, Jen, for letting me borrow it!).
Kids in small villages stared at me usually because I was a gringo, not because of the exotic gear I was wearing and carrying.
I think that this made it easier to approach people, start conversations, and establish friendships.
Because I wanted to impulsively travel wherever I wanted, I got shots and medication for travel anywhere within the borders of Ecuador, Perú, and Bolivia. I reserved a spot at a Spanish school in Quito for the first week or two, and the school arranged for me live with a local family. Other than that, I made up my schedule and itinerary as I went, day by day, día por día. For me, that was the most liberating way to travel. Every morning I woke up without any deadlines, schedules, or responsibilities except to immerse myself in that one day and enjoy that day to the fullest. If I decided to move on, I generally had no problem finding a bus to the next little town along the way.
For a guidebook I used the Let's Go edition for Perú, Ecuador, and Bolivia, and a map of northwest South America, and whatever information I collected from local residents and fellow travelers as I went along.
| Note to fellow travelers: Leatherman Micro Leave that Leatherman Micro at home. The scissors don't cut when you want them to, but the blades are sharp enough to slice skin accidentally when opening or closing the tool. A regular Leatherman with pliers would have been helpful a few times. Once when the clasp on my duffel bag came apart, I had to look up the word for "pliers" in my Spanish dictionary in order to ask to borrow a pair. NOTES INDEX |
| Approach to Photography |
t was a real struggle deciding whether to take my expensive Nikon camera gear or a pocket-sized point-and-shoot, or both. In the end, I'm glad I only took a tiny point-and-shoot. Sure, I probably missed out on some photographs that I could only have taken with the Nikon gear. But my policy of "try not to look like a tourist" worked well for me, and a bunch of camera equipment hanging off my shoulders would have spoiled the effect. It would have a been a barrier between me and the people who I wanted to get to know. It's hard to be relaxed when someone is aiming a camera at you, and probably hard to feel on equal footing with someone who has more money invested in the camera around his neck than you can earn in five years of labor. I took more than 200 pictures with a point-and-shoot. Those pictures will remind me of good memories for a long time to come, including some memories that I wouldn't have at all if I had been burdened with a load of expensive camera gear.
For simplicity, I shot only 400 ASA consumer-grade print film. It's a bit grainy, but the higher speed let me shoot more often in natural light in situations where a flash would have gotten the attention of people around me. I carried a pocket-sized plastic tripod which I used for longer-exposure night shots. The wider exposure latitude of print film over slide film was more forgiving in the point-and-shoot, over which I had no exposure control.
I got my film processed when I passed through towns large enough to have a high-volume processing lab. Only once did I get some negatives back with fingerprints on them. After getting film processed, I carried the prints in one piece of luggage and the negatives in my backpack. By separating the negatives from the prints, I had some little measure of insurance in case one of my bags got lost or stolen. By processing film along the way, I never had to take unprocessed film through airport security X-ray machines.
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