Greg Back on Track ( almost)

Well One thing about my brother is that he is hard to hold down. I have learned from him to shrug off your past hardships because what else are you going to do? Always look ahead to the bright side which is why the Monty Python song he posted in the beginning of his trip The Bright Side of Life is so appropriate. He was going to leave Pozuzu today but as anyone who knows Greg knows he can't pass up a party. In that respect it is somewhat amazing that he managed to get this far so quickly. Pozuzu is a colony of Tyroleans that came over from Europe in 1857 and settled in Peru after quite the epic journey. From what I can gather they mostly left due to inheritance laws. Here is an excerpt from wikipedia:
"At the time, Tyrolean inheritance laws led to a massive property partitioning because every child received a part of their parental home, business or farm. The result was the fragmentation of estates within a small number of generations. If your own soil wasn't enough to feed a family then by law you were not allowed to marry.
In most cases however, the agricultural property went to the oldest or youngest son in order to secure the continuance of the farm. The other siblings either remained at the estate working as menials or maids or they left in search of a better life someplace else.
In addition, dry and unfertile land in the Alpine valleys and mountains often allowed only a rather humble cultivation. Catastrophes like landslides, floods, wildfires, plant diseases, et cetera, also threatened their existence. For some poor and impoverished peasants emigration was the only way out of their miserable situation."

So here are his last few emails of recovery and observations. I managed to be on at the same time today so there are several emails from the today. Still not entirely clear what exactly he got himself into but it must have been unpleasant. Needless to say he is having a pleasant time now. I hope Miss Pozuzu is fleet of feet.

Oct 7th
thanks susan! nice post that was pretty damn funny to read your intro
and my emails in succession - yeah my own enthusiasm got the best of
me but like you said i set a new baseline for hard. i am feeling beter
today and can walk without a pronounced hobble after doctoring my feet
last night - right now i am setting a new baseline for food
consumption! and enjoying cold beer again. think i may have the energy
to go fishing this afternoon bc thr river runs right thru town. i will
try to find a call center and give mom and dad a ring. gonna be here
for one more full day anyhow bc i am still moving really slow -
realistically will take a couple weeks to fully recover i think but
anyhow taking lots of notes for writing bc as you know pain in the
hardest thing to remember but it is not fading too fast . . . doing
lots of little errands like sewing, shoe repair, bike doctoring,
restocking etc... love greg

Oct 8th
i am resting here one more day then outtie if nothing else bc i am bored and need to move on. my
feet are much better and the knee seems to be fine after all the abuse
it took - it was sore and swollen at night but those 550 sod naprox
sure work wonders! and my hip did not bother me at all which amazed me
- i expected to be crippled and was just sort of resigned to the pain
but didn´t happen! don´t know what is up with that? i was gonna call
mom and dad but not really pòssible here without it costing a small
fortune - meanwhile been staying iin a place for only 10 soles a night
which is nice and affordable for an extended rest. i should be in
oxpampa in two day and will try to get a place with wifi there for a
night or two to get some writing up and be able to chat. love g

Oct 9th
well i was leaving today and as i was getting gas at the edge of town
started talking with a couple guys, as usual, and they are absolutely
positive that no one has ever done the route on a bike and today is a
local fiesta (for cows, rodeo, food, beer etc.) so they basically
insisted i stick around to get interviewed for the local paper and
entered in the local history book . . . pretty amusing - i just hope
this is not my 15 minutes. so here i am still in pozuzo . . . gonna
be hard to get out of peru within the next month bc i still have a lot
of ground to cover just going thru the selva (on a new dirt road!)
back up to the highlands - i am pretty psyched about the next little
bit but should not be nearly as exciting as th last little bit. then
not sure but may diagonal from ayacucho thru a remote region of the
central highlands, that i have been curious about for a long time and
sees no tourism to the coast around nasca (the lines) then shoot along
the coast into Chile. may skip Bolivia all together ($130 visa and i
am just not terribly interested) it will depend on what i find out
about the north chile coast. Hope i get to meet Miss Pozuzo! love,greg

the food is great! i found a place that i have eaten at 3 times now
portions are huge and the german peru mix really is great! the beef is
excellent as well as tube meats - the first thing a lot of people ask
me is ¨do you speak german¨ in german of course and some pretty german
looking folks here and i am often mistaken for a local by tourists
which is sort of amusing (i am good at making myself comfortable
somewhere quick) - fair number of german/lima tourists here all of a
sudden for this little fiesta. the problem is not with the computers
but they only have a satellite connection to the outside so no matter
what it is going to be slow . . . i will prolly reach oxapampa
tomorrow and will have a regular broad band connection there being a
city and all - getting lots of writing done tho - rained hard
yesterday so the river is chocolate and high so prolly best i am not
trying to ride out of here today bc i have lots of river crossings
between here and there (but bad for fishing but i will have plenty of
opportunity in the next weeks) love greg

oh i guess they may be worth posting eh? maybe not all but yeah that
would be nice for folks - the beer is peruvian which is ok Peru has
good beer (best yet actually except a microbrew in medellin colombia)
- i would drink cusquena at home it is a really great beer - been
looking for german beer but the place is just a little too remote to
get it here - traffic here is motorcycles a few local combis then big
trucks to haul cattle. the place has been here a while but i get the
impression that when the rainy season hits it is pretty well cut off
because there are no bridges over the river (except foot) so it could
get pretty dangerous to drive thru . . . or bike for that matter. love
g