The Day I Was An Illegal Immigrant

Soooo....You know those times when you are sitting at a bus station in Peru close to the border, and you just got off of a 21 hour bus ride.  And your brain doesn't seem to function right?

Well that is the state our minds were in when we agreed to pay the equivalent of $2 a person to these random bus station guys to take us to the next town across the border into Ecuador in mini-vans.  We thought that everything was kosher up until they blew through customs and immigration on some back road to drop us off at another shady bus station in Ecuador.  Upon their departure, and our subsequent confusion, we realized that our bus buddies didn't have passports...so that's why they took the back road.  We however had no intention of staying in-country illegally, and thus began the search for the border...

I didn't really search.  I sat on my pack eating the last Oreos I had from civilization (you know the chocolate ones with chocolate inside.)  Our fearless leaders found us a bus that would take us to customs...a legit one this time.  And we hopped on with all our gear.  Well only half could fit on so the other half...me included, accidentally commandeered a regular city transport to the border.  The bus driver made us apologize and thank the patrons on board for the route change.

Once to the border we legally "exited" Peru on paper, and legally entered Ecuador.  But for an hour and a half, I was an illegal immigrant, with my Oreos and an apple I smuggled in on my journey.

Once that was all sorted we took a supposed-to-be 12 hour bus ride to Quito, the capital.  But, the crazies who were driving got us there in 10 hours.  I recall taking turns so fast that people and luggage fell, and I recall almost going into a ditch on the wrong side of the road.  However, I am safely in Quito.

So far, I accompanied some of our guys to breakfast, to a large lookout over the city, and to two markets, a park, and the cheapest burgers I had in forever (here's to not getting sick off of street food!)  Our debrief starts tomorrow bright and early so I believe I will take it easy for now.