17-Feb-2005 --
When I came across the confluence project web site for the first time,
I immediately liked the idea. I decided to participate actively by
visiting at least one confluence point. When my Peruvian wife and me
planned to visit her family which lives in the department of Piura in
the northern part of Peru it was clear that I had to take that
opportunity. I told her about the project and so we went back to the
web site, looking for the most interesting confluence point in that
area.
Finally we identified the point we liked to visit:
6°S 81°W. It is located in the middle of a peninsula formed by the Illescas mountain, which is a relict of an ancient range
of the Andes, called 'Cordillera de la Costa' which is nowadays mostly
lost in the Pacific Ocean.
This abandoned peninsula forms the most western part of the Desert of Sechura. While not very high - ca. 500 meters at it's highest point - satellite images of the region we found in the Internet showed a seemingly difficult profile. We asked my wife's family members about Illescas, but although it is not far from
where they live not anybody of them had ever been in that isolated
area. There was hope for mastering the confluence point in a one day
trip because maps indicated a river originated more or less in the
middle of the mountain running from the north to the south passing
close to the confluence point. Therefore it would perhaps be possible
to follow this river, avoiding the cliffy terrain for most of the
way. We had to go there and to see how it were ...
After two weeks of sightseeing in the southern part of Peru we arrived
at Piura airport. From there we went to Bernal (a small village 60
kilometers away from Piura, located on the road to the seaport Sechura
at the Pacific Ocean) where my wife's family lives. Fortunately, it
now turned out that an uncle of my wife knew a person living in Sechura
who sometimes guides excursions to an archeological excavation in the
southern coastal part of the Illescas peninsula not far away from the
point where our river should meet the ocean. He offered us to contact
the guide and to organize a 4x4-vehicle which would be mandatory for
that tour. We agreed and a few hours later he came back and told us
that we could go the next day.
At four o'clock in the morning the uncle and his son picked us up with
a large 4x4-camioneta. Also accompanied by a few more family members
we went through the night for one hour until we reached Sechura where
the guide awaited us. We told him about the details of our plan and
fortunately he stated that it might indeed be possible to reach the
confluence exactly on the route we had planned. The river that should
be our entry to the mountain would be a dry and relatively broad river
bed. As far as we could go by car he would guide us, but then we would
be on our own. We picked him up and along the Pacific Ocean the road
lead us to the south. Having left the town of Sechura behind us the
scenery began to change. With the first light of the day the fields
vanished and the ground became more and more sandy until large dunes
appeared on the left. We had reached the desert. After an hour on the
road we approached the small seaport of Bayovar, to be situated at the
northern border of the Illescas peninsula.
Here the road suddenly became worse. The road from Sechura ended up in
a small sandy crossroad: To the right the road to Bayovar and the road
to Chiclayo to the left. We had to keep straight on and now it became
clear why the 4x4-car was necessary. Although marked as a road on most
maps of the region, it wasn't much more than a path in the desert,
mostly covered by sand. As our guide told us, that track had been in a
better state when the phosphate mines of that area were still
active. After the mines had been abandoned, the road was no longer in
use and little by little the desert reclaimed it. Sometimes we spotted
parts of the old pavement, deeply washed out by the heavy showers
which afflict even that desert in times of 'El Niño'. Now, only
the sparse green islands of the big Algarrobo trees (which is a very
typical plant in this area of Peru and from which a nutritious syrup,
'Algarrobina', is extracted) let us realize that there must be some
water.
To the right we now could see the destination of our expedition. The
Illescas mountain looked like a dark cloud over the Pacific Ocean. Of
course, we knew that the mountain is sprawled over about 30 kilometers
in length but now it looked really huge. Accompanied by the mountain
we followed the road for half an hour until the ground suddenly became
flat. We had entered the southern border of the peninsula, which must
regularly be flooded by sea water. Although it couldn't be too far
away we did not see the ocean: we just saw an absolutely plane and
untouched beach.
From there we turned to the west and followed the invisible coast line
until after a few minutes we leaved the beach again, turning to the
north, to the place where the river bed leaves the mountain. We passed
the excavation place but sadly we had no time to have a break. Nearly
half an hour later at eight o'clock we finally reached the river
mouth. The river bed was flat and sandy and we were advancing
rapidly. But the more we entered the mountain the more frequent we
found big stones lying around. It became clear that it would not be
possible to follow the river by car until the point most adjacent to
the confluence. We went by car as far as possible and had to stop at a
point six kilometers away from our destination. We probably could
follow the river bed for the next five kilometers. The last kilometer
would be more or less climbing, but that did not seem to be very
difficult, because as far as we could see, Illescas - at least in that
part - was a collection of small hills. Five of us decided to go, the
rest, including the guide, stood with the car.
At this time - early in the morning - the air was cool and so we had
no problems to follow the river bed. It turned out that it was not
absolutely dry. We found puddles of water, seemingly very salty
because they were bordered by crystals, probably from the same
minerals which were produced by the mines of that area. Around this
puddles we found mats of small plants and sometimes a small tree so
the river bed looked somewhat friendly. We covered the next five
kilometers easily whilst the valley became narrower and the confluence
came closer. The GPS showed us that it was time to leave the valley
and to enter the lunar scenery around when we were nearly one
kilometer away from the point. We found a place where it should be
easy to climb and after a few minutes we reached the top of the first
hill. What we saw then was rather surprising; as far as we could see
all around was covered with smooth hills like the one we just had
climbed. The hills had few vegetation; sometimes we encountered large
mats of dry and pricky scrub; later we saw some cactuses.
Passing the hills we noticed that they are nerved by waterless creeks with a
smooth and rocky ground, polished by past waters. Sometimes we could
advance faster by following them but sometimes we had to bypass them
because they went up vertically like large stairs we could not
climb. Half an hour later we finally reached the confluence point
which is located in a small dell formed by one of the waterless
creeks. There we took the photos and had a few minutes of rest. On the
way back to the valley we spotted a big black bird which observed us
curiously: A Condor escorted us for a quarter of an hour drawing large
circles in the air, sometimes coming as close as fifteen or twenty
meters. It was the one and only animal we saw in Illescas. Some hills
later we reached the the valley again.
The five kilometers back in the valley now turned out to be much
harder than the first time. It was early afternoon and the valley had
lost all of it's morning coolness. We had to rest frequently and last
we counted every meter. Sometime in late afternoon we finally reached
the car. Absolutely tired, we took the same way back to Sechura: out
of the valley, passing the excavations, the endless beach, the sandy
path to Bayovar and finally the road to Sechura. A small restaurant at
the road invited us for a stop. With 'Ceviche' and other delicacies of
the region an exhausting but unforgettable day finished.