On our first day in Peru we found ourselves fleeced out of $50 and stuck in some random bus stop at 10pm hoping all our belongings would be kindly returned to us...

The night bus across the border was easy - we were woken up at 3am for immigration, but some clever person thought that it might be more effective to have both Ecuadorian and Peruvian immigration in the same building, so it was nice and quick. After our pizza breakfast (and a nazi movie on a bus full of children) we arrived in a bus terminal in Chiclayo around 11am. Our first lesson for Peru was that not every / many / no cities have central bus stations, and instead you are delivered to the HQ of the company you are travelling with. This can make interchanging to another bus more limited and definitely more confusing.

We wanted to take a bus direct to Trujillo and stop the night there, and so we explained this to a nice employee at the terminal called Carlos, and he told us that we´d need to go to the central bus terminal to catch a different bus. We said ok and instantly he picked up our bags and took them to his taxi; so perhaps Carlos wasn´t a helpful bus employee after all. Once we were in the taxi he treated us to a very impressive display of blatant deception that we - as two young women just off a night bus and in a strange country - were totally powerless, yet not unwise to.

As we set off Carlos started telling us that we weren´t actually in Chiclayo, but actually a nearby town that was very dangerous, and for effect he told me to lock my door. He drove us to what he claimed was the bus terminal for that town (which was not the kind of place we´d consider getting out of a taxi at anyway), and his mate came and told him there were no buses to Trujillo from there, and we´d have to go to Chiclayo bus terminal. Not only that, but as it was very far it would cost 150 soles (plus the fee to the terminal we were just at)... oh and he´d need all the money straight away to get fuel. At the petrol station I am fairly sure he didn´t get a single drop of fuel but had a good go at pretending, and then he drove us in a perfect rectangle along some rough, dirt roads which resulted in a flat rear tyre... a little bit of karma. Alex had to come and sit in the front and I got to sit part on her lap and part on the gear stick as we drove to another petrol station for him to change it. He cut his hand in the process... some more karma. Moments after rejoining the road we past the city entrance sign for Chiclayo and to some very curious, rustic-looking bus stop that had a bus to Trujillo later that day. We said farewell to Carlos and gave him the Vs as he sped off down the road on his thread-bare tyres.

We bought tickets for the bus to Trujillo and they informed us that it left at 4pm... it was now around midday. We went to go grab some lunch and kill some time, but as we were leaving the porter took our rucksacks and put them in the bus hold. We checked once again that it left at 4pm and once he had confirmed it for the 4th time we left the yard. After walking 2 blocks our jaws dropped in disbelief as we passed the very same bus terminal that we arrived at from our night bus and first encountered Carlos! Justifying that these things will happen at least once when travelling for 5 months, we accepted it and went for our first Peruvian almuerzo returning to the bus yard around 2:30pm. I went to get my diary from my rucksack in the bus hold, but when I opened the door it was empty save for two sacks of shells and a basket of turkeys. It was a different bus - s***!

Lucky for us, when we seem to be having the worst experiences is when we usually meet the nicest people, and Luis (the new bus ticket vendor) was one of those. He spent a fair amount of time on the phone tracking down our bags with the Peru Bus Company (a company that apparently only has one bus throughout Peru). He told us that the bus driver would leave our bags at the Peru Bus Office in Pacasmayo bus terminal (on the way to Trujillo) and we´d need to take a bus there to collect them. So we bought two more bus tickets and two beers, and sat at the bus stop a little pissed off at Peru actually.

The bus was due to leave at 4pm (where have we heard that before?!), but 4pm came and went and we were still sat in that same bloody bus yard. The porter put an english film on for us as we waited - Death race 3: Inferno - hmmm... thanks for that! At 5pm the bus made an agonizingly slow start out of the city and continued on to Pacasmayo at an equally slow pace. Alex and I sat there in silence watching the rain come down on the stark, desert landscape outside.... I think the only words we said to one another was ¨how s*** is this?!¨.

Eventually we arrived at Pacasmayo around 7:30pm and despite our searching (it´s not a big place) we could find no Peru Bus Office. Our new driver told us to wait as our bags will be delivered by a car at some point... suitably vague information for people who had little faith in the day already. As he started pulling out of the bus station, a car full of policemen turned up and immediately got involved. One guy grabbed his huge gun, while another asked us what our story was and then chased after the bus driver with his whistle. A little later the policeman made a call and told us our bags will be returned around 10pm, in the Peru Bus. We were skeptical, but we sat and waited. I bought some peanut brittle from the cutest old man ever and later on we were joined by some American Jehovahs Witnesses... with no more buses to Trujillo that day we asked them about a decent place to stay.

10:20pm... behold, our bus returned and our bags were right where we left them, completely untouched. The porter was very friendly still and asked us if we wanted to sleep on the bus that night since it was staying in Pacasmayo. No way. We took a moto taxi to the recommended hostel and on the way our lovely driver (who ironically was called Carlos) stopped by some more policemen to ask for directions. They didn´t seem to know, but were equally as interested as the first lot, so drove behind us on their motorbike until we tracked it down! The hostel offered us an uncompromisingly bad price considering the time of day and so instead Carlos took us to his friends hotel in a very bizarre neighbourhood of Pacasmayo. Here we enjoyed two double beds, an en-suite bathroom and some very VERY loud karaoke coming from upstairs. Lucky we had encountered Posh so early on in our travels (Puerto Iguacu) as we fell straight asleep regardless.

Day 88 - Carlos returned at 9am to take us back to the bus station, which looked very different in the daytime and with a very different perspective. We had an egg sandwich in the cafe and caught a bus to Trujillo with a company called Linea. The journey took 2 hours through foggy desert, with a film based on an Afghan kidnapping to lighten the mood.

Arriving at Trujillo - much like Chiclayo - we came to the Linea-only bus terminal... but this time we´re wiser. We asked after buses to Huaraz at the ticket office, but with departures only at 9pm we decided to take a taxi to another company and check there. The same story, so back at Linea (now tried and tested) we bought the last two seats on the 9:15pm night bus to Huaraz. Since there was no space on the economy bus, we were forced to upgrade to semi-cama for an extra pound. I doubted we´d regret that decision.

A full afternoon to kill so we went to the centro and found out that Trujillo is quite nice actually! It has a huge plaza surrounded by really nice colonial architecture. We headed to a sandwich place recommended in the LP, which was of course closed. Instead we had some almuerzo next door... then to another cafe for coffee... then in search of a bar. Trujillo seems to be full of casinos but we couldn´t find a bar open at 4pm on a Friday for the life of us. We went and asked at the tourist info office and the only place they could suggest was TGI Fridays in a mall miles out of town. Without even discussing it Alex and I instead walked around the corner and settled in a open-air cafe that seemed to sell wine.

3 hours to go until departure we headed to a Chifa (chinese) restaurant that had tables entirely segregated by curtains... kind of like a peep show. As we left into the busy, commerical street we saw a line of taxis, but remembering (through experience and advice) that taxis weren´t necessarily safe, we looked for the driver with the least agressive face and were rewarded by a safe, fun and reasonably priced drive back to the Linea terminal. As we had the last two seats on the bus we weren´t next to each other. As neither of our neighbours would switch I said goodnight to Alex and sat down to Lord of the Rings in spanish. It seemed the upgrade was worth the extra pound as we had larger leather seats, a blanket, pillow and snacks. Regardless of those luxuries, I´m fairly sure I didn´t sleep the entire journey!