Hello Peru

Up at 6:45. We had to catch an 8:00am ranchero to La Balsa, the border town on the Ecuadorian side. It's a 1.5 hour ride. A ranchero is a big truck with seats in the back and no sides on it.At the border, we got our Ecuadorian exit stamp, walked across a bridge over the river separating the countries, into Peru and got all our paperwork done and our passport stamped.Once the formalities were done, we hired a collectivo (taxi) to St. Ignacious. There was an older local couple that wanted to go with the taxi too, so we split the fare with them. Both of them rode in the passenger front seat and the four of us road in the back seat. It was a 2 hour ride. Jason had a package of crackers, and he offered the lovely couple in the front seat some. They grabbed the whole pack and never gave it back, and ate all the crackers themselves. Haha.When we got to St. Ignacious, I was surprised to see....tuk-tuks! Lots of them. When the driver dropped us off near a restaurant, a few tuk-tuk drivers drove up trying to get a fare somewhere.We had lunch in the restaurant, and when we came out, we were descended upon by taxi drivers all offering to take us to the next town (Jaen). They were so persistent, but they all offered the same price, 15 soles per person. Kieran, who loves to bargain in his broken Spanish, insisted on 13 soles person, but they wouldn't take it. We finally walked out of the collectivo area, with the intention of going somewhere else to get $13. Then one young guy broke rank and gave us 13 soles each. We would pay for it later! Along the way, he stopped to pick up a local, which would have meant 4 people in the back seat of an old Toyota Corolla, not comfortable. He told us that unless we pay $15/person, he had to pick someone else up to cover the cost. We relented and said we'd pay 15 soles. The ride from St. Ignacious to Jaen was about 3 hours. Along the way, we were stopped by two guys toting machine guns, who were obviously not police or army. They started spewing stuff in Spanish, but Lisa just kept her mouth shut. The one machine gun dude looked in at us after his speech, we all had dumb looks on our faces, so he let us continue on our way. Lisa remarked afterwards that they were looking for "donations" to help fund road repairs and other road work.When the boy pulled into the collectivo area, we were immediately surrounteded by 5 tuk-tuks. Lisa convinced the driver to take us to the bus depot instead. That wasn't any better. At the "bus depot", there were no busses, only tons of collectivo taxi's and masses of tuk-tuks. When we emerged from the car, they swarmed us. I have no idea how Lisa handled it, but they were all talking to her, telling her different stories....the next bus to Chachapoya doesn't leave until 10:00....there's a roadblock, you can't get through until tomorrow morning....finally one tuk-tuk driver pulls up, upset with everyone else and says "These people are visitors to our city. They just spent hours and hours on the bus. Quit telling them lies and tell them the truth." He told us we could get through, it's no problem.We left the mayhem of the "bus station" and walked down the road, looking for a bus company that we asked some other locals about. They kept pointing us down the street. We kept walking, and finally found it. They have a bus, but it doesn't leave until 10:00pm, and it gets to Chachapoya at like 1:00am, which is no good for us.We walked to a restaurant for something more to eat (almuerzo....again...yuck....), then emerged, and some guy in a mini-van pulled up offering us a ride to the next town, Batua Grande. It was getting late (5:00ish), but we really wanted to reach Chachapoyas tonight. We accepted his offer. His mini-van was really run down and old, as most cars here in Peru seem to be. He picked up other locals on the way.We arrived in Batua Grande after dark, and managed to get another collectivo taxi to take us to Chachapoyas.In Chachapoyas, we got a "posh" hostal for about $10 US each, hot water, TV, free wi-fi. Hostal Revash, right in the centre of town, across from the main square.My first impressions of Peru.It's obviously not nearly as wealthy as Ecuador. I sometimes judge a countries wealth by the number and types of vehicles on the road. In Ecuador, there are a lot of personal cars, and almost all cars are new. Here in Peru, no one has cars. 99% of the cars on the road are taxis and tuk-tuks, and busses and trucks making up the rest.Lots of kids on the street selling stuff. Very similar to Vietnam.Tons and tons of tuk-tuks. Like, I mean tons! I was shocked. Peru could potentially put Thailand to shame when it comes to the number of tuk-tuks on the roads.Harassment. Anyone in the service industry is desparate, and when they see us, they see dollars, and they all converge on us, trying to get us to go with them or buy something from them. Very similar to India in that respect.I expected Peru to be very much like Ecuador...but it's not. My head was spinning at the end of the day.