Chapter 12: Into the Andes
Colombia to northern Peru — immense climbs, botfly extractions, new friends, and shifting climates.
I waited for the other passengers to offload before I navigated the aged, wooden ferry dock to the beach into Necoclí’s thick, humid air—my first steps on the Colombian mainland. Along the waterfront, tent encampments stretched toward the edge of town, housing Venezuelan and Ecuadorian migrants preparing to journey northward through, or to circumvent the Darién. Their presence stood in stark contrast to mine—privileged, self-directed, and intentionally moving toward the unknown.
Leaving the port behind, I rolled south along the coastal road to Turbo, the pavement smooth beneath my tires, the resistance of rubber on asphalt grounding me in motion. Flat roads and a wide shoulder offered a comfortable introduction as the Colombian coastline unspooled before me—an easy welcome to a land that would soon demand more.
Beyond Turbo, the Andes rose gradually at first, almost politely, until the road turned stern and the inclines stiffened. This was the start of something immense, the scale of which I couldn’t yet grasp. That understanding would come only later, with each climb, each breath, each day in the Andes. The longest continental mountain range on Earth would transform from an impression on the map—to terrain beneath me, the air thinning in my lungs, its slopes shaping each mile. The physical shift mirrored a psychological one: from here forward, every day would be measured in gradients, altitude, weather, and breath. My legs gathered courage in the unfamiliar rhythm, and my mind cleared. I had dreamed of these mountains. Now it was time to truly get to know them.
Soon, I was deep into Antioquia Department, Colombia. Here, there was no escaping from the heat, down low or up high. The road rose and fell in dramatic succession until I reached Santa Fe de Antioquia, a preserved colonial town nestled amid harsh terrain. Its cobbled streets and sunbaked plazas felt like a portal to another time. I stayed for two nights, walking the narrow lanes, eating with locals, and absorbing the town’s quiet strength. It was a short pause, but a valuable one, offering shelter and contrast before the next wall of mountains.
From Manizales, where I quickly established friendships with the hostel owners and their neighbors, I climbed above 4,000 meters—nearly 13,500 feet—through the Nevado del Ruiz volcanic complex. Páramo landscapes emerged: alpine tundra unique to the northern Andes, where frailejones rose like sentinels from high clouds that blew over the road ahead of me. The air was razor thin. On the steepest climbs, I pedaled slowly, focused on rhythm and breath. And then, the descent: long, quiet, and unforgettable, delivered me into Murillo, Tolima, where the Andes showed the depth of the culture they have nurtured for millennia—for the first time on my tour.
That climb—to nearly 13,500 feet—was a turning point. It marked not only one of my highest ascents on a bicycle to date, but also the beginning of what would become a new reality: extended stretches of exploration above 10,000—and sometimes even 13,000—feet. I wasn’t yet conditioned to it—or even aware of what it would demand. The air felt foreign in my lungs. My thoughts, scattered by altitude and scale, took effort to gather. Riding at this elevation wasn’t just physical—it was existential. My sense of scale had to stretch to meet the magnitude of the land. And my control of the bike was challenged by more than terrain. This was my first real sojourn into the thin-aired upper world of the Andes—a realm I would come to know well, but that now felt immense and unknowable. In that moment, Climate Zero gained new dimension.
Murillo embraced me. A local family gave me shelter in their home-turned-hospedaje. The father baked bread in the basement and offered me the same directly from the basket as it was taken from the oven. The children were curious and kind. It was the sort of place that made leaving hard, but the road couldn't be ignored for long. From there, I dropped again, this time toward the Magdalena River valley—the central artery of Colombia.
In Neiva, the capital of Huila, I faced a different kind of test. My bike, possibly corroded from the sea crossing, needed a full overhaul. Bearings, rims, grease—everything had suffered. Ultra Biker Group, a top-tier shop in town, took me in. Over the next two days, they rebuilt my ride from the ground up, including a new rear-hoop and lacing, while I rested, ate, and recovered. Their work was meticulous. Their hospitality unmatched.
Refreshed, I was rolling again—through heat, through green, through the great Magdalena basin. But then came Pitalito. There, feeling depleted in a way that reminded me of similar states during my bike racing career, I sought B-vitamin and iron intramuscular injections to aid recovery. The exhaustion was layered—heat, distance, nutrition, and the sheer accumulation of time on the road. I knew these nutrients could help reset my system, especially in a place like Pitalito, where I could access both medical resources and rest.
It was during this visit that a pharmacist, while preparing an injection, noticed inflamed welts on my back. Her concern was immediate and specific: she suspected botfly larvae—a tropical parasite I’d only read about. She was right. What followed were two field extractions using only thumbs and pressure. The pain was considerable, sustained for several minutes until two larvae—each about two centimeters long—were forced from my body. Travel in the tropics brings unsuspected dangers and inevitable consequences when one moves extensively through those regions.
The following day, already feeling stronger—likely due to decreased inflammation now that the larvae had been removed and the benefit of the nutrient injections—I rode away from Pitalito and entered the Amazon basin for the first time in my life—by bicycle. The first two days brought me deep into southern Colombia’s Putumayo department, culminating in the jungle town of Mocoa, gateway to the Colombian Amazon. The shift was unmistakable: dense tropical forest, moisture in the air, and the kind of immediate and relentless rain you only find in a rainforest ecosystem.
I’d officially crossed from the Andes into the Amazon watershed, where all rivers now flow east toward the Rio Amazonas, thousands of kilometers away. The E45 gradually flattened as I descended from highland cloud forest to lush lowland jungle, accompanied by rising humidity, new bird calls, and massive rivers that told me I was deep inside the world’s largest drainage basin.
On the periphery of Mocoa, I found a place to camp and recharge after a soaking ride, a hostel operated by a mother and her children, vigilantly patrolled by their flock of chickens and rooster. This town, located at a crossroads between highland Colombia and the Amazon, marked not only a geographical threshold but also a psychological one: ahead lay the border with Ecuador—a new country and new challenges in the Climate Zero journey.
My final night in Colombia was spent in La Hormiga, a border town in the Putumayo Department. I stayed at Hotel Simaro—a family-run place that offered warmth, a simple restaurant, and secure space for my bike. In the morning, after a final breakfast and a few kind words exchanged with the family, I pedaled toward the border crossing.
Hours later, I descended into Coca—a steamy, mid-sized city nestled deep in the Amazon basin. The Rio Napo, wide and brown with sediment, moved steadily past its banks, bound for Peru and the larger Amazon River system beyond. Coca is one of the region’s most important gateways to the rainforest, a place where oil workers, scientists, and travelers all converge, each drawn by different motivations. I took a full rest day there, grateful not only for the chance to recover but to reflect. Among all the places I had passed through, this felt like the moment I fully stepped into the Amazon—not just as terrain but as presence. Walking the elevated walkway above the river, I contemplated the vastness of what lay ahead, the ecological and emotional weight of it all. This pause, brief though it was, allowed me to recalibrate—body, mind, and purpose.
After my rest day in Coca and a long, steep ascent into the eastern Andean foothills, I arrived at the Yacu Reserve—a place I hadn’t planned for but felt mysteriously pulled toward, as if some invisible current had drawn me there, perhaps a tributary of a tributary of the Rio Napo. It was perched in the transition zone between Ecuador’s mountains and the Amazon basin, nestled in a pocket where the landscape shifted and everything—air, water, birdsong—felt alive with meaning.
The family who founded the Yacu Reserve were themselves born of this place, a multi-generational lineage tied to the shifting ecologies of the forest edge. They found me on the road and welcomed me without hesitation, offering a campsite beside a pristine creek. I bathed and drank from its clear waters, surrounded by the symphony of nocturnal birds and insects. That evening, we gathered by a fire, sharing a meal of local foods served on banana leaves, which we tossed back into the forest when finished. Their hospitality transformed the night—it was no longer just a stopover, but a moment of connection.
Before dawn, I joined their morning tea ritual—made from forest plants, the details now blurred in memory but not in feeling. Their kindness lingered as I departed, replenished not just by food and rest, but by the sense that I had been invited, however briefly, into something sacred.
From the Yacu Reserve, I explored a wide swath of forests, mountains, and rivers along the E45 as I made my way to the cloud forest town of Puyo. It rained before I arrived, again in the evening, and through much of the next day—at times a tropical downpour that seemed to rise from the ground as much as it fell from the sky. The saturated air and relentless water blurred the lines between earth and atmosphere. I took shelter from it all at Hostel El Colibrí where the proprietor offered kindness and eyes that revealed a deeper curiosity about my journey.
The following morning, I set out into the heart of Ecuador’s Oriente—the upper Amazon basin. The rain returned, heavier than before. I pedaled into it, sweating under my raincoat, moving steadily toward a stranger that would become a new friend, the Rio Pastaza. The descent into this part of the Amazon watershed felt geological, like I was being folded into the continent itself. By the time I reached the broad, fast-moving river, the deluge made sense: these waters—and thousands of others—fed the Amazon. The ecosystem was hydrologically alive. I paused on the bridge for fellowship and laughter, establishing a fond memory amidst timeless, flowing water and an impressive, aged, steel bridge.
From Puyo to the Rio Pastaza and beyond, the route climbed and descended—into the mountainous terrain between Macas and Indanza. This part of Ecuador offered a different kind of beauty: not as wet, but just as wild. I climbed through steep valleys and cloud-forested slopes, crossing rivers on narrow bridges, passing quiet villages barely etched into the hillsides. One moment I was sweating under the weight of my gear, the next I was coasting through mist.
In Yantzaza, I found a soft landing at Hostel Carolina. The proprietor greeted me with a warm smile when I arrived—one that seemed to express genuine joy in playing even a small role in my safe passage. He later introduced me to his nephew, and together we talked in Spanish, enough to share encouragement and establish camaraderie. Yantzaza, known as the Valley of the Orchids, sits cradled between rivers and mountains, a cultural and commercial hub for southern Ecuador. I ate street food from two local vendors near the town center and settled in to rest. But by midnight, a familiar discomfort stirred—gastrointestinal distress that I had now come to recognize as a recurring hazard of the journey. It was my third such episode of the tour.
Though the night was uneasy, I managed a few hours of real rest. By morning, I felt stable enough to continue. I set a modest goal: reach and reassess at Zamora, 25 miles away, at the base of a long climb to Loja. I knew the ascent was serious—rising to over 9,000 feet—and I wasn’t sure I could manage it in my current state.
As the miles passed, my condition deteriorated. The nausea and fatigue deepened. To make matters worse, my front hub bearings—critical to the bike’s performance—were clearly failing. The wheel wobbled when tested. As I approached the outskirts of Zamora on the Loja side, I ran a quick risk assessment in my mind: try to summit and descend into Loja with questionable wellness and a failing hub, or head to Zamora and hope for rest and repair? I decided on neither. With the Loja shops in mind—modern, well-stocked, and known among touring cyclists—I made the call. I turned around and rode to the bus station.
Within an hour I was on board, but it was not a comfortable ride. The driver attacked the curves like a rally racer. My stomach churned. I changed seats, tried breathing exercises. Eventually I raced toward the bus bathroom only to find it locked. Desperate, I lay flat in the back seat, trying to quiet either motion sickness or gastro or both. But it caught up with me. I vomited into a thin plastic bag—twice, but also onto my legs and seat. The bag was nearly full by the time I arrived in Loja. I disposed of it discreetly at the terminal, gathered my gear, and rode about three miles to Bicimania, a top bike shop in Ecuador. After a long discussion, still in helmet and bike shoes, I left the bike with the shop guys, walked with my gear to a hostel and collapsed.
The next morning, I returned to Bicimania. The hub—brand new when I left Massachusetts—was destroyed, and no local service was possible. After a full day of waiting, the staff offered a rare exception: they sold me one wheel from a complete set. The solution wasn’t cheap, and I'd lose access to my power generating front wheel hub, but it was reliable and available. I purchased a rechargeable headlight that I mounted on my handlebars.
Three nights in Loja gave me time to recover. When I pedaled away, I felt light again. My legs remembered how to climb. I marked Day 200 of the journey with one of the most scenic rides to date—southward through a remote mountain corridor on Route 682. Ridge and valley, dirt and pavement, it was a stretch that reminded me why I was here.
I spent the night in Palanda. By morning, I was navigating the final, remote stretch of Ecuador to the Peruvian border. Occasionally dogs seemed to press in from both sides of the road, an indication of what was to come. In contrast, at a military checkpoint at the top of a high pass, the guards waved me through and wished me well with a smile. About the time the Rio Canchis came into view, I descended steeply, braking hard, trying to avoid crashing on loose gravel and hairpin turns, stunned to learn that tourist buses used the same treacherous route.
At last, the road leveled. A village appeared—simple buildings, scattered trees, stray dogs, a few quiet greetings. I got my exit stamp and crossed a modest bridge spanning the Rio Canchis into Namballe, Peru. Country sixteen. Then I stood in the shade, exhausted and quiet, the weight of a new border settling in. Another threshold crossed. Another chapter turned.
Leaving the port behind, I rolled south along the coastal road to Turbo, the pavement smooth beneath my tires, the resistance of rubber on asphalt grounding me in motion. Flat roads and a wide shoulder offered a comfortable introduction as the Colombian coastline unspooled before me—an easy welcome to a land that would soon demand more.
Beyond Turbo, the Andes rose gradually at first, almost politely, until the road turned stern and the inclines stiffened. This was the start of something immense, the scale of which I couldn’t yet grasp. That understanding would come only later, with each climb, each breath, each day in the Andes. The longest continental mountain range on Earth would transform from an impression on the map—to terrain beneath me, the air thinning in my lungs, its slopes shaping each mile. The physical shift mirrored a psychological one: from here forward, every day would be measured in gradients, altitude, weather, and breath. My legs gathered courage in the unfamiliar rhythm, and my mind cleared. I had dreamed of these mountains. Now it was time to truly get to know them.
Soon, I was deep into Antioquia Department, Colombia. Here, there was no escaping from the heat, down low or up high. The road rose and fell in dramatic succession until I reached Santa Fe de Antioquia, a preserved colonial town nestled amid harsh terrain. Its cobbled streets and sunbaked plazas felt like a portal to another time. I stayed for two nights, walking the narrow lanes, eating with locals, and absorbing the town’s quiet strength. It was a short pause, but a valuable one, offering shelter and contrast before the next wall of mountains.
From Manizales, where I quickly established friendships with the hostel owners and their neighbors, I climbed above 4,000 meters—nearly 13,500 feet—through the Nevado del Ruiz volcanic complex. Páramo landscapes emerged: alpine tundra unique to the northern Andes, where frailejones rose like sentinels from high clouds that blew over the road ahead of me. The air was razor thin. On the steepest climbs, I pedaled slowly, focused on rhythm and breath. And then, the descent: long, quiet, and unforgettable, delivered me into Murillo, Tolima, where the Andes showed the depth of the culture they have nurtured for millennia—for the first time on my tour.
That climb—to nearly 13,500 feet—was a turning point. It marked not only one of my highest ascents on a bicycle to date, but also the beginning of what would become a new reality: extended stretches of exploration above 10,000—and sometimes even 13,000—feet. I wasn’t yet conditioned to it—or even aware of what it would demand. The air felt foreign in my lungs. My thoughts, scattered by altitude and scale, took effort to gather. Riding at this elevation wasn’t just physical—it was existential. My sense of scale had to stretch to meet the magnitude of the land. And my control of the bike was challenged by more than terrain. This was my first real sojourn into the thin-aired upper world of the Andes—a realm I would come to know well, but that now felt immense and unknowable. In that moment, Climate Zero gained new dimension.
Murillo embraced me. A local family gave me shelter in their home-turned-hospedaje. The father baked bread in the basement and offered me the same directly from the basket as it was taken from the oven. The children were curious and kind. It was the sort of place that made leaving hard, but the road couldn't be ignored for long. From there, I dropped again, this time toward the Magdalena River valley—the central artery of Colombia.
In Neiva, the capital of Huila, I faced a different kind of test. My bike, possibly corroded from the sea crossing, needed a full overhaul. Bearings, rims, grease—everything had suffered. Ultra Biker Group, a top-tier shop in town, took me in. Over the next two days, they rebuilt my ride from the ground up, including a new rear-hoop and lacing, while I rested, ate, and recovered. Their work was meticulous. Their hospitality unmatched.
Refreshed, I was rolling again—through heat, through green, through the great Magdalena basin. But then came Pitalito. There, feeling depleted in a way that reminded me of similar states during my bike racing career, I sought B-vitamin and iron intramuscular injections to aid recovery. The exhaustion was layered—heat, distance, nutrition, and the sheer accumulation of time on the road. I knew these nutrients could help reset my system, especially in a place like Pitalito, where I could access both medical resources and rest.
It was during this visit that a pharmacist, while preparing an injection, noticed inflamed welts on my back. Her concern was immediate and specific: she suspected botfly larvae—a tropical parasite I’d only read about. She was right. What followed were two field extractions using only thumbs and pressure. The pain was considerable, sustained for several minutes until two larvae—each about two centimeters long—were forced from my body. Travel in the tropics brings unsuspected dangers and inevitable consequences when one moves extensively through those regions.
The following day, already feeling stronger—likely due to decreased inflammation now that the larvae had been removed and the benefit of the nutrient injections—I rode away from Pitalito and entered the Amazon basin for the first time in my life—by bicycle. The first two days brought me deep into southern Colombia’s Putumayo department, culminating in the jungle town of Mocoa, gateway to the Colombian Amazon. The shift was unmistakable: dense tropical forest, moisture in the air, and the kind of immediate and relentless rain you only find in a rainforest ecosystem.
I’d officially crossed from the Andes into the Amazon watershed, where all rivers now flow east toward the Rio Amazonas, thousands of kilometers away. The E45 gradually flattened as I descended from highland cloud forest to lush lowland jungle, accompanied by rising humidity, new bird calls, and massive rivers that told me I was deep inside the world’s largest drainage basin.
On the periphery of Mocoa, I found a place to camp and recharge after a soaking ride, a hostel operated by a mother and her children, vigilantly patrolled by their flock of chickens and rooster. This town, located at a crossroads between highland Colombia and the Amazon, marked not only a geographical threshold but also a psychological one: ahead lay the border with Ecuador—a new country and new challenges in the Climate Zero journey.
My final night in Colombia was spent in La Hormiga, a border town in the Putumayo Department. I stayed at Hotel Simaro—a family-run place that offered warmth, a simple restaurant, and secure space for my bike. In the morning, after a final breakfast and a few kind words exchanged with the family, I pedaled toward the border crossing.
Hours later, I descended into Coca—a steamy, mid-sized city nestled deep in the Amazon basin. The Rio Napo, wide and brown with sediment, moved steadily past its banks, bound for Peru and the larger Amazon River system beyond. Coca is one of the region’s most important gateways to the rainforest, a place where oil workers, scientists, and travelers all converge, each drawn by different motivations. I took a full rest day there, grateful not only for the chance to recover but to reflect. Among all the places I had passed through, this felt like the moment I fully stepped into the Amazon—not just as terrain but as presence. Walking the elevated walkway above the river, I contemplated the vastness of what lay ahead, the ecological and emotional weight of it all. This pause, brief though it was, allowed me to recalibrate—body, mind, and purpose.
After my rest day in Coca and a long, steep ascent into the eastern Andean foothills, I arrived at the Yacu Reserve—a place I hadn’t planned for but felt mysteriously pulled toward, as if some invisible current had drawn me there, perhaps a tributary of a tributary of the Rio Napo. It was perched in the transition zone between Ecuador’s mountains and the Amazon basin, nestled in a pocket where the landscape shifted and everything—air, water, birdsong—felt alive with meaning.
The family who founded the Yacu Reserve were themselves born of this place, a multi-generational lineage tied to the shifting ecologies of the forest edge. They found me on the road and welcomed me without hesitation, offering a campsite beside a pristine creek. I bathed and drank from its clear waters, surrounded by the symphony of nocturnal birds and insects. That evening, we gathered by a fire, sharing a meal of local foods served on banana leaves, which we tossed back into the forest when finished. Their hospitality transformed the night—it was no longer just a stopover, but a moment of connection.
Before dawn, I joined their morning tea ritual—made from forest plants, the details now blurred in memory but not in feeling. Their kindness lingered as I departed, replenished not just by food and rest, but by the sense that I had been invited, however briefly, into something sacred.
From the Yacu Reserve, I explored a wide swath of forests, mountains, and rivers along the E45 as I made my way to the cloud forest town of Puyo. It rained before I arrived, again in the evening, and through much of the next day—at times a tropical downpour that seemed to rise from the ground as much as it fell from the sky. The saturated air and relentless water blurred the lines between earth and atmosphere. I took shelter from it all at Hostel El Colibrí where the proprietor offered kindness and eyes that revealed a deeper curiosity about my journey.
The following morning, I set out into the heart of Ecuador’s Oriente—the upper Amazon basin. The rain returned, heavier than before. I pedaled into it, sweating under my raincoat, moving steadily toward a stranger that would become a new friend, the Rio Pastaza. The descent into this part of the Amazon watershed felt geological, like I was being folded into the continent itself. By the time I reached the broad, fast-moving river, the deluge made sense: these waters—and thousands of others—fed the Amazon. The ecosystem was hydrologically alive. I paused on the bridge for fellowship and laughter, establishing a fond memory amidst timeless, flowing water and an impressive, aged, steel bridge.
From Puyo to the Rio Pastaza and beyond, the route climbed and descended—into the mountainous terrain between Macas and Indanza. This part of Ecuador offered a different kind of beauty: not as wet, but just as wild. I climbed through steep valleys and cloud-forested slopes, crossing rivers on narrow bridges, passing quiet villages barely etched into the hillsides. One moment I was sweating under the weight of my gear, the next I was coasting through mist.
In Yantzaza, I found a soft landing at Hostel Carolina. The proprietor greeted me with a warm smile when I arrived—one that seemed to express genuine joy in playing even a small role in my safe passage. He later introduced me to his nephew, and together we talked in Spanish, enough to share encouragement and establish camaraderie. Yantzaza, known as the Valley of the Orchids, sits cradled between rivers and mountains, a cultural and commercial hub for southern Ecuador. I ate street food from two local vendors near the town center and settled in to rest. But by midnight, a familiar discomfort stirred—gastrointestinal distress that I had now come to recognize as a recurring hazard of the journey. It was my third such episode of the tour.
Though the night was uneasy, I managed a few hours of real rest. By morning, I felt stable enough to continue. I set a modest goal: reach and reassess at Zamora, 25 miles away, at the base of a long climb to Loja. I knew the ascent was serious—rising to over 9,000 feet—and I wasn’t sure I could manage it in my current state.
As the miles passed, my condition deteriorated. The nausea and fatigue deepened. To make matters worse, my front hub bearings—critical to the bike’s performance—were clearly failing. The wheel wobbled when tested. As I approached the outskirts of Zamora on the Loja side, I ran a quick risk assessment in my mind: try to summit and descend into Loja with questionable wellness and a failing hub, or head to Zamora and hope for rest and repair? I decided on neither. With the Loja shops in mind—modern, well-stocked, and known among touring cyclists—I made the call. I turned around and rode to the bus station.
Within an hour I was on board, but it was not a comfortable ride. The driver attacked the curves like a rally racer. My stomach churned. I changed seats, tried breathing exercises. Eventually I raced toward the bus bathroom only to find it locked. Desperate, I lay flat in the back seat, trying to quiet either motion sickness or gastro or both. But it caught up with me. I vomited into a thin plastic bag—twice, but also onto my legs and seat. The bag was nearly full by the time I arrived in Loja. I disposed of it discreetly at the terminal, gathered my gear, and rode about three miles to Bicimania, a top bike shop in Ecuador. After a long discussion, still in helmet and bike shoes, I left the bike with the shop guys, walked with my gear to a hostel and collapsed.
The next morning, I returned to Bicimania. The hub—brand new when I left Massachusetts—was destroyed, and no local service was possible. After a full day of waiting, the staff offered a rare exception: they sold me one wheel from a complete set. The solution wasn’t cheap, and I'd lose access to my power generating front wheel hub, but it was reliable and available. I purchased a rechargeable headlight that I mounted on my handlebars.
Three nights in Loja gave me time to recover. When I pedaled away, I felt light again. My legs remembered how to climb. I marked Day 200 of the journey with one of the most scenic rides to date—southward through a remote mountain corridor on Route 682. Ridge and valley, dirt and pavement, it was a stretch that reminded me why I was here.
I spent the night in Palanda. By morning, I was navigating the final, remote stretch of Ecuador to the Peruvian border. Occasionally dogs seemed to press in from both sides of the road, an indication of what was to come. In contrast, at a military checkpoint at the top of a high pass, the guards waved me through and wished me well with a smile. About the time the Rio Canchis came into view, I descended steeply, braking hard, trying to avoid crashing on loose gravel and hairpin turns, stunned to learn that tourist buses used the same treacherous route.
At last, the road leveled. A village appeared—simple buildings, scattered trees, stray dogs, a few quiet greetings. I got my exit stamp and crossed a modest bridge spanning the Rio Canchis into Namballe, Peru. Country sixteen. Then I stood in the shade, exhausted and quiet, the weight of a new border settling in. Another threshold crossed. Another chapter turned.