Joe Stevens Mocks a Llama by David D Hammons

Author:David D Hammons [Hammons, David D]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Amazon: B007OA9QPY
Goodreads: 16109988
Published: 2013-11-21T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 6

Imagine the same scene of the previous day, Freddy and I lumbering down the winding steps to get terrible instant coffee and stale bread. Instead of hung-over delirium, this time Freddy and I attacked the rolls and jelly with a voracious anger that was only compounded by our quickly approaching time of departure.

“Okay, so my friend, he’s my friend, he’s a good friend, he’ll take care of you, hehe,” Louis said as Freddy and I hefted our backpacks with what little caffeinated energy the instant coffee could provide. We stood in front of our hostel owner, urgently tapping our feet and looking out the window for the approaching cab.

Louis was making our arrangements for the trip to Machu Picchu, giving us directions and names of all the people and places he’d prepare for us. Apparently he did such deals often enough he had a contact who would meet us at every stage.

“You ask for Bill, not Steve but Bill, when you get to the Cusco car stop,” Louis insisted, “You will not like Steve, hehe.”

“Bill’s a weird name for a Peruvian,” Freddy noted.

“Well so is Steve, but you will not like Steve. Ask for Bill. And when you get to the train station in Aguacaliente you ask for Lemon.”

“Not orange?” I asked.

“Who is orange?”

“Never mind.”

“You ask for lemon. Lemon will take you to a hostel where you ask for Jorge to be your guide. Avoid anyone not named Jorge. Jorge will be your guide on Machu Picchu. Be sure to give him a stick.”

“Okay, normally I would question everything you just said, but the cab’s here and we’re about ten minutes away from missing our flight,” I said, tossing back a too-hot cup of instant coffee, “Did you get all that Freddy?”

“Give him a stick…” Freddy said, jotting down the last of Louis’s instructions, “Got it.”

“And when you get to the bus!” Louis shouted after us as we ran to the door, “Be sure to look for Rita. Big mole on her face. Huge boobies, hehe.”

“Don’t ever change, Louis,” I said and shoved the door closed behind me.

The cab driver was just as suicidal as every other cab driver in the city of Lima. But this got us to the airport in good time. We’d purchased our tickets to the city of Cusco from the city of Lima a couple days earlier via the hostel’s computer, the first step in our very long journey to Machu Picchu, and quickly got our bags through security. Since this was a simple three day, two-night journey we were only taking carry-on bags.

Now, what I didn’t fully appreciate about a domestic flight in a second world country was that the security features are weakened almost to the point of hilarity. Freddy walked into the Lima airport security checkpoint along with me and we both walked through with no problem. It was only after we were sitting in the gate waiting for our plane to board that Freddy leaned over and said in a low voice, “Hey, don’t say anything.

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