|
First Expedition |
|
Peter and Maaike built the base camp for the first expedition at the premises of Pantiacolla in the Manu rainforest at the slopes of the Andean Mountains. An area of almost 2.000 square kilometers. Tourists might visit only a small, tiny, part. The rest is forbidden territory, inhabited by natives of different tribes. Some unfriendly, living in a dense jungle with snakes, tapirs, mountain lions, wasps and spiders.
Maaike: "We reached the camp at the Pantiacolla River after a fourteen hour drive by a six-wheel Russian truck and a quite wet boatride of an hour. From almost 4.000 meters of altitude we ended up at 600 meters. The last hours the truck fought its way through rugged mountains. At times I thought the wheels would loose its grip and we would tumble down in the canyon, hundreds of meters below."
|
 At the end of the road and almost at the end of the world, Maaike discovered a small coca plantation "Hidden in the bush, it showed the Peruvian involvement in the drug business," she says. "But drug trafficking was not our goal. "
|
 |
While
the rain pored down and the earth became soaking wet,
muddy slippery and dangerous Peter and Maaike planned
to leave with a native guide. A well-known Machiguenga
Indian.
|
|
"Only the man disappeared the day of our departure." Maaike was disappointed. To search for another guide would create rumors around the expedition that was carefully kept secret. And indeed. In the whole area everyone started to whisper. Did you hear? Do you know what is going on? In addition, the competition became active. A guy called Darwin left under direction of the US based Spanish born Luis Valles. They were heading for a mystic mountaintop that was covered by clouds. A mountain that had never been searched by satellites and never had been visited by human beings. And another adventurer Varges starts looking for El Paititi east of the Inca ruins at Machu Picchu. This man already found three villages which he claimed to be El Paititi. Nonsense off course because he did not find a city or a settlement but some ruins like there is so many of them.
|
All these people are eagerly watched by natives who still remember how gringo's took their children and families in custody and urged them to work as a slave on rubber plantations. They still remember and want to be left alone. Do not trouble them, because they will shoot arrows in your entire body. And before you know you disappear without a trace in a rainforest.
|
Fortunately Maaike and I found two die-hards who would compensate the loss of El Chico. The guide Fernandez and Angel, the boatsman. Two diehards who know what we are looking for. They also believe - like us - in the rumor of the pyramids. The entrance to what we might believe is El Paititi.
|
 |
|
 |
By the end of the first day Maaike and Peter found a small settlement of civilized Machiguenga Indians. Natives adapted to a non-western lifestyle would be nicknamed as a savage creature and the moment they know how to turn on a radio we welcome them as a member of the Western Lifestyle.
The chief of the village and ‘president’ of the Machiguenga community offer a helping hand. He knows the area well, including the Indians who never met gringo's.
Maaike: "We staid overnight and enjoyed the warmth of these people. I t is unbelievable that white man killed tenth of thousands of them not more than maybe a hundred or an eighty years ago. That all started with the rich rubber baron Carlos Fermin Fitzcarrald. During an exploration to enlarge his rubber holdings - some people whisper he was looking for the secret lost city of El Paititi - he discovered a narrow pass between the Urumbamba and the Manu river systems. At cost of many Indian lives he transported two steamships to the Manu river, steamed downstream and killed all the Indians who offered any resistance. Werner Herzog made a not quite truthful movie of it named ‘Fitzcarraldo’ starring Klaus Kinski. The ensuing years saw thousands of rubber tappers coming through the pass to Manu. Every Indian who refused to work was instantly killed. In addition, many others were ultimately sold as slaves to Bolivian and Brazilian landowners. The moment the rubber boom ended abruptly in the 1920's the departing rubber tappers left aw virtually uninhabited Manu behind." |
|
 Next |
|
|
