Terror at the Terrapuerto

Arequipa bus terminal, Peru

We are sat in the new bus terminal - the oddly named Terrapuerto (Earthstation?) listening to the elevator music. Now we have a pan pipe lounge version of Hotel California. This is then followed by an equally Andes-ed up version of the Lennon classic Imagine.
We are waiting for a bus to Cabanaconde on the cheapo Señor de Los Milagres bus service (Father of Miracles). Unfortunately it is a full 2 hours before we will see the purple livery of the bus pull up. The 2pm service was the only one we could get so now we are killing time.

Lindsay is drinking coffee she bought from a hole in the wall. In her words it was made from "coffee so finely ground that it was just dust, topped up with condensed milk fresh from the tin". It tastes ok-ish though. Not so my llama pasty (alpaca empañada). This is horrible, and I am forced to spit some kind of tube-like rubbery internal organ into the bin, along with the rest of the pasty.

The pan pipes are taking on a Celine Dion cover version now, and if there is another key change the melody will only be audible to dogs (which will be a relief for all concerned).

I note that since we entered peru we really have hit the 'gringo trail'. There are too many 'traveller-trousered' cr-ay-zee guys around here. You know the clown pants I'm talking about now. Particularly sad are not the men with piercings and unwashed dreads, but the otherwise smart haired guys who are soon to return to their IT support roles in Leicester, Lyon or Tel Aviv.

The cover versions continue as I sit guarding the bags, Lindsay browsing the shops. Nikita segues into Sac-er-if-ice for the Elton John section. Winds of Change by Scorpions. Pretty Woman. The Big O, I'm certain, would not approve.

I am reading the guide book about our next destination, Colca Canyon is twice the size of America's Grand Canyon. You are almost guaranteed to see America's largest bird- the Condor. We plan to do a 2 day hike into the canyon floor and back. Suddenly an old man drops some coins onto the floor to my left. The coins are about a yard away from me but he shouts across at me 'disculpe, disculpe'. I think this is odd, but I keep on reading. He hasn't upset me in any way yet he is apologising to me. (In my experience Latin Americans rarely apologise without very good reason).

I then become aware that a few more coins have hit the floor. He is picking them up again, looking me in the eye, and again saying 'disculpe, disculpe', louder this time.

It is at this time that my brain engages. This is one of those scams you read about in the guidebooks! Wow! How exciting. But this means that I am supposed to be helping this poor old guy pick up his few dropped pennies, which means... Yes... that's right... As I look directly away from the man, to my hard right, there I find myself locking eyes with the accomplices...

As I look over my right shoulder there are 2 Peruvians looking straight at me, but immediately, almost as one they put mobile phones to their ears and start talking into them. Their cunning ruse hasn't worked. The man and woman make about-turns and walk away into different parts of the crowd.

My heart is beating hard now because in the instant that I looked around we all knew what was happening (and not now going to happen). I keep watching the man in the bluetrack suit and his small dark haired female accomplice who are back together again. They are staring straight back at me from 20 yards away. They are pretending to wait at the Cruz del Sur company ticketing desk but their eyes are still on me, and my eyes on them. I suspect that any second now they will move away and into the crowd. They do just that.

Lindsay returns and I tell her what happened. We wonder how long they watched us before Lindsay went away leaving me alone on point. We speculate that they wanted the bag that is furthest from my reach. I tell the security guard what happened in ropey Spanish. He is a nice guy. He thanks me and shakes my hand and goes to talk to his colleagues.

It is time for our bus, so we move quickly to the gate, fully on guard for any other con men who would see us as soft targets. We aren't. At least not today. I kiss the lucky travel charm the witch gave us in La Paz. But really what forestalled disaster today was just basic common sense. If I had helped a poor guy in distress then two crooks might have run off with a bag with passports, credit cards, cash and more. It's the kind of thing that ruins holidays, and the people that want to make that happen are scum.

Fingers crossed that this luck can last for the rest of the trip.

* Footnote- sometimes luck is a trade off. We weren't inconvenienced by the scam artists this time, but the alpaca empañada is another matter...