Rosa the Peruvian activist: helping people help the rainforest

A child in the Amazon village of Comandancia.
Photo by Sally Kneidel

I really want to help Rosa. Especially since I'll be helping the rainforest and Amazonian villages at the same time.

We met Rosa Vasquez in Peru in June, when we stayed at her family's hostel in Iquitos, Hospedaje La Pascana. Rosa runs a travel agency at the hostel and she's really good at it. She helped us change a lot of our travel plans after we left the Amazon, giving us great advice for the Andes which I've mentioned in my last 3 posts. I'm very grateful to her for that help. It made a huge difference in our trip.

But Rosa, as we are learning, is a lot more than a travel agent. She's also an environmental activist and humanitarian. I just found out today that she serves on the board of a ACDA, a highly-regarded nonprofit that promotes health and sustainability in Peru. Right now Rosa is focused on five remote villages along a tributary of the Amazon River.

An Amazon home near the village of Yanashi.
Photo by Sally Kneidel

Rosa travels back and forth between the hostel in Iquitos and the five villages. She can't always answer my emails right away - there are no computers or even electricity in these villages. The villages are in the Tamshiyacu Tahuayo Communal Reserve (ACRCTT), a critical area for conservation. The rainforests of the region have a mind-boggling diversity of primates, 16 species!! These 16 species represent every South American primate family. There are few places in the Amazon that have as many as that - maybe no other places, I'm not sure. The primates there include squirrel monkeys, tamarins, capucins, marmosets, night monkeys, saki monkeys....ACK!! I want to go there! Maybe next time....

A monk saki monkey in Peruvian Amazonia.
Photo by Sally Kneidel

Rosa's project is a health fair this September for the 900 people living in these five villages. The health fair will provide not only dental care and basic health care, but also reproductive health care and family planning, services that the villagers are eager to have.

Rosa sent me some info today from ACDA, advertising the health fair. The e-mail pointed out that the Amazon rainforest is the lungs of planet Earth. It said that ACDA is working to reduce the stress of human impact on the rainforest by educating and training local villagers to become stewards and conservationists of the forest, for the benefit of the world as a whole. "The health of the rainforest of this region depends on the health of these villagers who are trained to protect it," says the e-mail.

Children in the Amazon village of Santa Ursula
Photo by Sally Kneidel

Rosa and ACDA are right - the connection between family planning and stewardship is well established. All over the world, smaller families are more likely to be able to provide for all of their children's needs and send their children to school, where they can learn about choices in using natural resources. Right now, many or most Amazonian families rely on logging as their primary income - a practice that pays them very little, is dangerous, and is destroying the rainforest at an accelerating rate. This was something we learned and observed when we were there. Anytime we took our skiff out on the river, we passed local people floating downriver on rafts made of logs they were taking to sawmills. We passed the sawmills too. Sometimes we passed a single man standing on just one huge tree trunk, or a section of it. Just floating down the river to sell the wood. We didn't blame them, I don't mean it that way. They were doing what they felt they need to do to support their families.

A man floating a piece of tree trunk downriver to a sawmill, on a tributary of the Amazon River.
Photo by Sally Kneidel

Not surprisingly, ACDA's health fair is sponsored by the Rainforest Conservation Fund. And by Planned Parenthood South America. Ken and I have promised Rosa $50 for the health fair. Rosa's phone numbers, from the United States,are 011.51.65.236.002 and 011.51.65. 233.466. Her email address is reservas@pascana.com. Call or email her if you'd like to make a donation.  You can also support this project by making a tax-deductible donation to the all-volunteer Rainforest Conservation Fund. Click here for the RCF webpage about how to make a donation.

My post about our trip to the Amazon is here.

All photos and text by Sally Kneidel

Keywords:: ACRCTT Rosa Vasquez ACDA RFA Rainforest Conservation Fund Planned Parenthood South America Peru Amazon logging timber industry sawmills primates tropical deforestation

Guinea pig was the main dish at Lake Llanganuco in Peru

Juan Albino, our taxi driver from Huaraz to Llanganuco in the Andes. (The previous post is about our family's stay in Huaraz.)

"How much farther is it?" someone whimpered. Our rear ends were aching, jammed into another Peruvian taxi - older cars that have lost most of their seat padding and shock absorbers. But the views out the window soon distracted us from our discomfort. Our jaunt through the Andes in the taxi, from Huaraz to Llanganuco Lodge, was so scenic I was soon beside myself. I exclaimed on and on about the sights like I'd had way too much coffee - sometimes to the annoyance of my fellow passengers. The taxi bounced across luscious green and brown slopes, past occasional adobe homes with plots of potatoes or corn, past sheer rock cliffs. Quechua women in brilliant clothing sauntered along the narrow curving road, or worked the vegetable gardens with their husbands. Beyond the slopes were snowy peaks, among the world's highest. I tried to memorize the whole thing: the landscape and the thrill, for me, of being in Peru instead of behind my desk at work. It was worth 10 months of slogging at the job for a couple of weeks of this. Compared to Europe or the U.S., Peru is a pretty economical destination. Our travel agent in Iquitos, Rosa Vasquez Zanetti, turned us on to some great Peruvian places with great Peruvian prices.

Andean peaks: Huandoy (above) and Huascarán (right) loomed ahead as we hurtled up the mountain in Juan's taxi. Huascarán is the world's highest tropical peak, at 22,205 feet. (These two photos by Alan Kneidel.)

We passed through the market in the Andean town of Yungay

As we jostled along in the taxi, we were intrigued to find that our driver Juan's first language was Quechua. We begged him to teach us some words and he complied. Hello is yameyocko, he said. Yes is ohmee. No is mana. Mother is mama, oddly. At least I'll remember that one. Juan even told us how to say "Can I take your picture?" - Oto hotootah tomarishkekee - one of my necessary phrases in Peru.

Our driver Juan with my family - Ken, Alan and Sadie - at a quick stop to look at a gold mine

After two and half hours, we pulled into Llanganuco Lodge at the end of Huandoy Valley. Charlie Good, the British owner of the lodge, welcomed us with his beloved pooch, Shackleton. The rooms were nice - hot water from a tankless gas heater, and duvets on each bed. At 11,500 feet, the nights are chilly. Charlie is a young economist from London who gave up the rat race to pursue his dream, and he's doing a good job of it. He offers gear for climbing and rappelling, and he's created a bunch of hiking trails around the lodge, one to a glacier, and some that provide views of soaring Andean Condors (click here to see on youtube). We saw a lot of birds at Llanganuco, including the Giant Conebill, Giant Hummingbird, Great Thrush, Puna Ibis, and Andean Goose. I'll give more details about birding near Charlie's Llanganuco Lodge in a later post. Charlie is also involved in the challenges facing the local Quechua farmers. He wrote a great piece about the threats to the Quechuan rural culture that appeared in a Huaraz magazine. I'll reprint that piece in a later post too.

The two pics below: Llanganuco Lodge, and our room's view of Huascarán

Pic below: a small lake we hiked around, right next to the lodge

Birding near the lodge: l to r, Charlie (lodge owner) with Alan and Sadie

Higher and higher:
Huascarán National Park
and Lake Llanganuco
We'd started taking Diamox the day before we left Lima for the Andes. It's the most popular medicine for treating and preventing altitude sickness. It works by making you breathe faster, which compensates for the reduced oxygen in the higher air. My brothers had used it on hikes in Colorado and they said it worked. The day after we arrived at Llanganuco Lodge, we called a taxi from Yungay to come get us and take us to Lake Llanganuco, a very big lake in Huascarán National Park. It was a walkable distance from the lodge to the lake, but involved a 1000 ft rise in altitude - too much exertion for the first day at 12,500 feet, even with the Diamox. We planned to walk back from the lake to the lodge instead, which would be all downhill.

The day at Lake Llanganuco was one of the happiest days of my entire life. I know I said something similar about Huaraz, but here it is again. This day was even better. On the way up to the lake, in the taxi, we had to stop at the park office to pay an entry fee, and we spotted a Quechuan family who had a food-stand outside the office. They were selling whole baked potatoes and baked corn from their garden. We bought a couple of hot potatoes to munch on, and they let me take their pictures.

Below: dad and mom, then daughter and mom - selling baked potatoes & corn at the park office

































We soon arrived at charming Lake Llanganuco (below), surrounded by snowy peaks. The rock face on the right side of the photo was covered with bromeliads of the genus Puya, which grow only under harsh conditions such as high altitudes or deserts. Photo of lake by Alan Kneidel. (If you click on any picture, the picture enlarges.)















But even more interesting than the lake, to me, were two groups of local Quechuan women who had set up shop under the two shelters in the picnic area next to the lake. Yay!! I was so excited. Now was my chance to get to really talk to some Andean people and take some pics, if they'd let me. And if they spoke Spanish. They did. The first group was cooking lunch to sell to hikers and lake visitors. The selection: roasted or fried guinea pig, crunchy corn kernels cooked in oil, similar to corn nuts but a lot better, potatoes, corn on the cob, greens, tomatoes, and fried unleavened bread that was so good it made me giddy.

Below: guinea pig cooking over the fire, and guinea pig on the plate ("cuy picante," a traditional Peruvian dish)










































One of several women sharing a fire to cook guinea pig, etc.






I did my best to engage the guinea-pig-roasters in conversation, but they were busy cooking and tending a small child who was unhappy with the smoke in his eyes. I tried to amuse the child so the women could work, but he was afraid of me with my light hair and freckled face. So I gave up on that. I decided to try my luck with the second group of women, who were selling woven hats and scarves and gloves. They too had a fire going, but it was only to heat water for the mate de coca tea they were selling, made of brewed coca leaves - a tradition in the Andes since Inca days. They weren't nearly as busy as the women who were cooking, and they had no children to distract them. I was in luck. I made friends right away with Maria, a jovial Quechua woman who tried to get me to buy a hat, and modeled an assortment of hats to win me over.


















First hat above, second hat right. Maria looked lovely in both. I only wish I had her address to send her prints.








After the hat modeling, I had to buy a cup of hot tea from the gals, and a bag of leaves for later tea-making. (I was interested to learn that coca leaves alone have no excitatory or intoxicating properties. But they do have a lot of medicinal properties.) I then proposed some general photo-taking of whoever was interested. All six of the women selling hats jumped up, peeled off their fleeces and comfy clothes, and put on their Quechuan finery. About that time Sadie wandered up from her trek around the lake, and joined in the fun. She too had to have a cup of tea, and procure a bag of tea leaves for later. Sadie was a good addition to such a gathering because her Spanish is flawless and her social skills are better than mine too. We were hummin' along.

Photo below: Tucking in the finery for a pose.











When Sadie ambled away to prepare for our upcoming hike, the women waved goodbye like old friends (below).
We ate some lunch (yes, some of our family tried the guinea pig) then took off down the trail through Huascarán National Park back to Llanganuco Lodge. We hiked through a forest of red Polylepis trees, which are endemic to high altitudes in the Andes. Polylepis forests are disappearing, we learned, because of population growth and increasing demands on the land.

Below, four photos of the Polylepis forest by Alan Kneidel. In the second photo, a Giant Conebill forages on the tree trunk.




























In this picture, Puya bromeliads are visible on the Polylepis trees.





The trail followed the stream that ran through the forest between these cliffs.



Hiking through the red trees between monstrous cliffs was fun, but I'm not sure we were quite ready for the altitude factor. The trail was covered with rocks in places and was hard to walk on. As I discovered later, one symptom of altitude sickness is "loss of coordination" and I may have had that affliction, because I had to go at a snail's pace to keep from breaking my leg. Another symptom is fatigue, and I was definitely experiencing that. By the time we made it back down to the park office where I'd photographed the food vendors, I was completely exhausted. But we pressed on. We met some boys on a dirt road with their llama, and that seemed to revive me.
Just before dark, we made it back to Llanganuco Lodge. I popped another Diamox and got ready for our gourmet dinner, cooked by Tito, a friendly local guy who whipped up the meals at the lodge. I was ready that night for our free shot of pisco. However, one of us who hadn't taken any Diamox that day missed dinner and instead spent the evening hours hugging the toilet bowl. Luckily Llanganuco Lodge has great toilets. Was it altitude sickness? I don't know...nausea is one of the first symptoms. Or maybe it was the guinea pig, which wasn't really entirely cooked. At any rate, it wasn't our first date with johnny on the trip. In the Amazon, we'd had several days of erupting from either end, or both.

No matter, after a couple more days of hiking and birding around the picturesque Llanganuco Lodge area, we were telling Charlie goodbye and heading back to Lima for the final leg of our Peru blast...the desert coast along the Pacific. Specifically, we were off to bird the Reserva Nacional de Paracas and Islas Ballestas.

Photos and text by Sally Kneidel, except nine photos by Alan Kneidel as noted above

Click here for great photos of a birding trip to Huascarán National Park by Jeff Pippen of Duke University (not related to our trip, other than the destination, and the fact that we're all from N.C.)

Keywords:: Peru cuy picante Alan Kneidel Huascaran Huandoy Llanganuco Lodge Lake Llanganuco Andes Quechua guinea pig Andean Condor birding in the Andes Polylepis Puya pisco Diamox altitude sickness Giant Conebill Sally Kneidel adventure travel birding trip

Taking Rosa's good advice, we veered up the road into Huaraz and the Peruvian Andes

Rosa looked concerned. "Why are you going to Huancayo?" she asked, brow furrowed. Rosa Vasquez Zanetti runs a travel agency out of her family's inn where we were staying, on the Amazon River in Iquitos Peru. Rosa had been so helpful already, I'd asked her to look over our plans for the Andes.

"We picked Huancayo at random - because it's a small mountain town with no Americans, and not too far from Lima by bus," I answered.

"But...that's not the best plan," Rosa continued, in her soft-spoken way. "For birding and trekking, you should go to Huaraz in the Cordillera Blanca. And you should ride the Cruz del Sur bus from Lima. It travels during the day and makes no stops so it's safer." Night buses that make frequent stops are vulnerable to occasional muggings, as we heard from more than one source.

a view of Huaraz from Zarela's hostel

"Stay at Zarela's hostel in Huaraz for a couple of days to get acclimated," Rosa told us. "Then from there, you can go up to Llanganuco Lodge and Llanganuco Lake. You'll like that better than Huancayo."

Rosa arranged it all. As it turns out, the Cruz del Sur bus does make pit stops on request (the onboard bathroom is for liquids only, the driver announced). But no scheduled stops. And it didn't freak me out like I feared it would, swooping around mountain curves with no guard rails. I just didn't look out the window.

kids of a Huaraz street vendor

We loved Huaraz - at 10,200 feet, the highest place we'd ever spent the night. (Click for map.) We loved La Casa de Zarela too, a first-class backpackers' hostel with hot water, great views, and helpful staff, especially spunky owner Zarela Zamora (online reviews and contact info). Most of the guests staying there left early in the morning on treks or climbs arranged by one of the local trekking companies. Huaraz (and Zarela's) are featured in Outside Magazine as the mecca for mountain adventurers in the northern Peruvian Andes. Nestled between the Cordillera Negra (brown peaks) and the Cordillera Blanca (frosted peaks), Huaraz is within spitting distance of some of the world's highest summits. The Cordillera Blanca has more than 50 peaks of 5700 m (18,700 feet) or higher. North America has only three; Europe none. (Click here for a Huaraz trekker's online journal entry.)

Much of the adobe town was leveled by an earthquake in 1970 that killed 20,000 people in Huaraz alone - half the population. The town has been rebuilt, this time with rebar reinforcement in every wall. In fact, a good proportion of the homes and buildings still have rebar poking out the top. But the funky construction and the steep cobbled streets just add to the town's personality - a blend of local enterprise and Andean indigenous culture, along with the trekkers, birders, and wanderers like ourselves.

a Huaraz weaver and her alpaca

I spent our time in Huaraz skulking around the town, trying to get pics of Andean street scenes and the beautiful Quechua women who were everywhere, with their long thick braids and brilliantly colored hand-woven clothes and baby-slings. In the afternoons and evenings, indigenous women from outlying farms and villages set up stands or spread blankets on the sidewalk to sell produce or woven items. They all wore traditional fedora-style hats, often with an arrangement of feathers lying flat against the felt. Most of the women didn't want their picture taken, even when I asked politely. But a few acquiesced, a couple of them even asked me to mail them prints. It was a blissful day for me, I can't say why exactly - one of those few days where the world seems a lovely place; I felt grateful to be alive and well.































































After just one day of acclimating in Huaraz, and scampering about annoying people with my camera, we hired a taxi driver from Yungay to take us to Llanganuco Lodge at 11,500 feet, and later Llanganuco Lake (12,500 feet) in Huascarán National Park. The lodge is right smack at the base of snow-covered peaks Huascarán and Huandoy. At 22,200 feet, Huascarán is the highest tropical peak in the world. I'll tell you about the National Park and the lodge - and altitude sickness - in my next post. Between our amoeba issues along the Amazon and altitude sickness in the Andes, we had a few sick days. But that's all forgotten now. I said in my previous post that I'd move to Iquitos in a heartbeat; I'll have to include Huaraz as well. If a job opened in either place, I'd be gone in a flash.

Huascarán by Alan Kneidel

All other photos, and text, by Sally Kneidel

Keywords:: Huaraz, Andes, trekking, trek, climbing, Huascaran, Llanganuco, Pascana Amazon Services, Rosa Vasquez, Quechua, La Pascana, Zarela, Zarela's, alpaca, Kneidel, Sally Kneidel, Alan Kneidel

From the Amazon to the Andes, Peru knocked me silly

Be sure to ride the moto-taxis in Iquitos, and hold on tight

If you're interested in adventure travel, as in someplace really different from home and not too expensive, consider Peru. If you want a ground-level view of what's really going down in the tropical world, Peru will show you that.

We're just back from 24 days in Peru, a trip that included the Amazon, the Andes, and the desert along the Pacific Coast. Peru is one of the most varied and stunning countries I've seen. It has the highest biodiversity of any country on the planet - a big bonus for us. We also found opportunities to interact with indigenous people in villages along the Amazon and in the Andes. One of our goals was to spend as much time as possible in places where other Americans don't go - remote villages and nature reserves. We accomplished that, partly by avoiding Machu Picchu and the Sacred Valley.

My trip included husband Ken, son Alan, and daughter Sadie. Sadie and Alan are both in their twenties.

A whole lotta birds
We saw 301 species of birds in Peru - not bad. Compared to 314 species in Costa Rica (over a period of 12 weeks), 220 in Kenya, and 141 in South Africa. [The Kenya trip was only Alan.] Birds we saw in Peru included the Humboldt penguin, Inca tern, Peruvian booby, Peruvian pelican, blue and yellow macaw, vermillion flycatcher, white-throated toucan, wattled jacana, Andean flicker, white-winged parakeet, burrowing owl, etc. I can post a list if anyone is interested. Leave a comment on the blog and tell me.

A street vendor in Iquitos

Wild and woolly Iquitos
We spent 4 or 5 days in Iquitos, the world's largest city that's not accessible by road but only by river or air. It's a friendly, hyper, and funky little town on the Amazon River. And cheap. Our lodging cost us $9 per person per day, on a quiet dead-end street that ends at the river. The roads of Iquitos are traversed by "moto-taxis" instead of cars, like 3-wheeled motorcycles with go-cart engines (see picture at top of post). For half a dollar, a mototaxi will take you anywhere, darting through town at break-neck speed. A first-class thrill, better than any carnival ride. I love Iquitos. I would move there next week if I had a job there and I'm not kidding.

Biological station on stilts
After a few days in charming Iquitos, we took a boat to a very remote biological station about 90 river-miles from Iquitos. We went east on the Amazon and south on its tributary, the Orosa River. The biological station, Madre Selva, is operated by Project Amazonas, a conservation and humanitarian non-profit. The station provides "rustic" lodging for biologists studying Amazonian plants and animals. Project Amazonas also offers some medical aid to remote families and under-served villages on the rivers. At the biological station, we slept in tents on raised wooden platforms under a thatched roof. Thatched homes with open sides are traditional in Amazonia. Every single house you pass on the river is built that way, and on stilts, which protect against flooding - because Peru has a rainy season and a dry season and water levels fluctuate dramatically. Summer in the U.S. is Peru's dry season, good for travel. Especially July and August.













Photos: Our housing at Madre Selva, outside and inside. Our house had screen walls, but most homes don't.




We had the station to ourselves, with our Peruvian helpers

The biological station is open to anyone who wants to go. The director of Project Amazonas, Dr. Devon Graham, is affiliated with Florida International University (in Miami) and frequently takes student groups to the station to study the use of forest resources by local people, all of whom are indigenous. He also takes groups of tourists, but none were there when we were. We had the station all to ourselves, along with our cook, boatman, and our naturalist guide - all native Peruvians whom Devon engaged for us.Photo: Our boat is visible behind Raul Viena our cook, Edwin Ruiz our boatman, and Cesar Peña our naturalist guide

The wildlife delivery crew
We loved the local indigenous children who paddled over to the station every day in their dugout canoes. When their mothers came too, they brought stuff to trade: woven baskets, bags, fans, carved jewelry. The moms welcomed what we offered: lotion, mosquito netting, toothpaste, socks, shirts, anything. Sometimes the children brought their "pets" to show us: lizards, turtles, and even monkeys! This was not at our request, and we were uncomfortable seeing wildlife as pets, especially the primates. But as we learned, people living in remote places along the Amazon do keep wildlife as pets. We saw plenty of wildlife for sale as meat too, back in Iquitos, which made us equally uncomfortable.

But we were grateful to have the chance to talk with the families around the biological station.















Above photo: A group of sisters brought us a little frog in a baggie (which Sadie released into the forest). Right: Another family brought their two pet monkeys to visit with us, just to be neighborly. The monkey pictured is a monk saki monkey.

Belen market: teeming with life and death
Captive wildlife often winds up in Iquitos. Part of Iquitos is a floating shantytown of huts built on rafts that rise and fall with the river. The floating area of the city, called Belen, has an extensive and colorful open-air market on the shore, which offers every imaginable jungle resource. It's an exotic sensory deluge, crammed with foods and spices and jungle products I've never seen before. It reminded me of Diagon Alley in the Harry Potter books for some reason, maybe because of all the traditional medicines for sale, made of plant and animal parts. (The use of animal parts to treat ailments and impotence worldwide is based almost entirely on superstition, folklore and tradition. I don't know of any animal parts that have been demonstrated to be effective medicine.) The part of the Belen market that offered traditional medicines was troubling, and fascinating. As I've written elsewhere, the trade in wildlife and wildlife parts worldwide is the third most lucrative blackmarket commodity in the world, after drugs and arms (according to Interpol).

Photo above: In the Belen market, plant and animal parts were sold as medicine (see "Medicina Natural" sign above. "La Selvita" means "The Little Jungle.")

I saw traditional medicines made of animal parts while visiting a medicine man in a remote village in South Africa last year. He had a few animal tails and skulls, and some unidentified animal parts in jars, but his collection of animal parts was meager compared to the array on display in the Belen market.

We also saw baby monkeys for sale in the Belen market, for 5 soles, about $2 each. I was stunned at that. These were saddle-backed tamarins, spider monkeys, pygmy marmosets, animals whose habitats and population numbers are declining, and who should be protected. There were more than monkeys for sale....living anteaters, parrots, and sloths, too. It was distressing, yes, but if it's happening, I want to know about it. I was grateful for the opportunity to see it for myself, and grateful to our guide Cesar Pena for taking me there. Cesar has been a nature guide on the Amazon for Project Amazonas for 12 years. He works independently too. If you're interested in hiring him as a guide on the Peruvian Amazon, contact him directly at cesars99@hotmail.com. His phone number in Iquitos is 965-658361. To call him from the U.S., dial 011.51.65.965658361.

Rosa was a life-saver in planning our trip. Maybe literally.
Before this post gets too long, I want to recommend an excellent resource for anyone considering a trip to Peru. Rosa Vasquez Zanetti. Her family owns and operates the modest little inn where we stayed in Iquitos, the Hospedaje La Pascana. Rosa is also an excellent travel agent, through her own Pascana Amazon Services. Not only did she make a number of our bookings before we arrived in Peru, she also helped me change some of our Andes plans at the last minute while we were in Iquitos. She recommended some safer means of bus travel into the mountains for us, and booked the tickets. She also recommended safer and more interesting mountain towns and Andean peaks for our hiking plans, and she booked those too, while we were in Iquitos. She was a fantastic resource and speaks very good English. You can contact Rosa directly at reservas@pascana.com or call her in Iquitos. From the U.S., her number is 011.51.65.233466. I'll write another post about what we did in the Andes.

I recommend Miguel Quevedo
I want to recommend too a Peruvian driver that we hired to drive us from Lima to the Reservas de Paracas, a mind-blowing desert nature reserve 4 hours south of Lima. Devon Graham of Project Amazonas recommended both Miguel and Rosa to us. Miguel stayed with us the entire 56 hours or so (two nights) that we spent in the area of Paracas. When we left the car to go birding, he stayed with the car to guard our things. His name is Miguel Quevedo. He's smart, responsible, trustworthy, fun. On many occasions, he acted as our advocate - straightening out misunderstandings with vendors, etc. Miguel can be reached through Rosa Vasquez Zanetti (she will call him for you if you email her at reservas@pascana.com.) Or you can call him directly, but he speaks little English. His phone number in Lima is (511) 99664-1254. If calling from the U.S., it's 011 511 996641254.

Miguel and Sadie at supper, at Paracas on the Pacific coast

More later on Peru, and why I long to get back there.
Photos and text by Sally Kneidel

Keywords::Peru travel, adventure travel, Amazon, Andes, Paracas, Iquitos, South America, tropics

Vegetarian/Vegan Club of Charlotte

Readers, I am passing along this message from Ileana:

Are you a vegetarian or vegan in the Charlotte community and surrounding area that would like to get to know others in the area? Would you like to learn more about which local restaurants have food we can eat? Would you be interested in monthly dine-arounds? Are you thinking of becoming a vegetarian or vegan and need a support group?

If so, email me at charlotteveggies@gmail.com to join the Vegetarian/Vegan Club of Charlotte.

Energy-efficient and Water-saving Clothes Washing Machines

Our avocado-colored washing machine is 20 or 30 years old; we inherited it years ago and it was old even then. We've been expecting it to break down for a long time, but it keeps plodding on dutifully. Still, we feel like we should replace it with a more energy-efficient and water-conserving model. Although we'll plunk down some change up front, a new washing machine will save us money on electricity and water bills But how can we tell which new ones are the best in terms of energy efficiency? Tons of products make "green" marketing claims that I've learned not to trust.

You might know about the EPA and Department of Energy's Energy Star program. The program identifies appliances that meet federal energy-efficiency standards. According to the Energy Star website, appliances with the Energy Star logo can reduce household energy consumption and greenhouse-gas emissions by 33%! The Energy Star website says this efficiency saved consumers $12 million in electricity bills in 2005 alone. That same year, the use of Energy Star products reduced the USA's greenhouse-gas emissions by an amount equivalent to 23 million cars – the same as if one car in ten were retired. Sounds pretty good.

A lot of major brands have models that qualify for the blue Energy Star logo. The Energy Star website has search engines for different products and stores that carry them.

So what about washing machines in particular?

According to these green building guidelines from California, Energy Star washing machines use 50% less energy and 45 to 60% less water, but perform as well as conventional washers. For maximum efficiency, these guidelines recommend models with a water-factor rating of 6.0 or less. Most Energy Star washing machines are front loaders. They not only wash and rinse with less water but most models have a high-speed spin cycle that removes more water than conventional models, thus saving energy on drying.

The websites listed below are helpful sources of information. For the present, before we choose a new washer, I'll keep trying to reduce our energy use by washing only full loads and by washing in cold water. And even after I get the new washer, I'll keep hanging the clothes on the line to dry. Yeah, they get bird poop on them now and then, but what the heck. The little gobs flake right off when they're dry. The trick is to bring in the clothes as soon as they're dry. The longer they stay out, the greater the chance they'll get bombarded.

See our new book, Going Green, for more information on energy-saving appliances and other environmentally-friendly consumer choices.

by Sally Kneidel, PhD

Sources and more info:
1. Going Green: A Wise Consumer's Guide to a Shrinking Planet
Sally Kneidel, PhD, and Sadie Kneidel

2. Energy Star
http://www.energystar.gov

3. Green Building Guidelines. G. Appliances http://www.co.contra-costa.ca.us/depart/cd/recycle/gbg/Grnbldg-NewConstruction-9Chap4-2.pdf

4.Consortium for Energy Efficiency
http://www.cee1.org/resid/seha/refrig-main.php3
http://www.cee1.org/

Keywords: clothes washer clothes washing machine energy-efficiency energy-efficient appliances Energy Star energy-efficient clothes washer water-conserving clothes washer front loading

Most Earth-friendly Mass Transit?

What kind of mass transit is the most eco-friendly?

Intercity buses. Yup. Most of us don't travel much on intercity buses, and we have reasons for that. Bus routes between cities in the U.S. can be unreasonably long - I think Charlotte to Birmingham takes 1 or 2 days one-way, as I recall from our friend Carra. But other bus routes make a lot of sense. The trip from Charlotte to Asheville NC is only about 3 hours (same as by car), it's cheaper than the gas to drive it yourself, and the bus is remarkably punctual - unlike Amtrak and many airplanes. All in all, buses are not a bad way to go, unless it's a very long route that stops in every burg and holler.

Convenient or not, bus travel is green, we have to give it that. Michael Brower and Warren Leon of the Union of Concerned Scientists calculated that intercity bus travel is by far the least polluting mode of personal travel per passenger-mile. Intercity buses are 2 to 4 times less polluting than cars and trucks, per passenger-mile. Intercity buses are also less polluting than passenger trains and air travel, per passenger-mile.

You might guess that cars and trucks are the most polluting form of travel. And you'd almost be right. But motorcycles are actually worse. A motorcycle generates the same amount of greenhouse gases as a car, per passenger mile, but twice as much toxic air pollution and 3-4 times as much toxic water pollution. Even though motorcycles get good gas mileage, their small engines have fewer emissions controls than cars. Also, they're made of a higher proportion of steel and other metals than other vehicles, which accounts for their high toxic air and water pollutant emissions.

The best way to reduce consumer fuel consumption is obviously to travel less, but that’s hard to do when lots of us live in the suburbs and work downtown. Our local newspaper here in Charlotte often features developers who are planning self-contained and mixed-use communities, which in the future will house workers closer to jobs and services. We need more such housing and we need it now, before we pass one of those infamous "tipping points" on our journey toward climatic upheaval.

For now, we could reduce fuel consumption tremendously by making better use of mass transit, especially in cities. Half of the United States' 26 largest urban areas currently fall short of the EPA’s minimum air-quality standards. Increasing ridership on the 35 public transportation systems serving these cities (subways, light rail, intracity buses) would improve air quality, congestion, and the financial strain of building new highways and widening roads.

But... municipal dollars won't be funneled into mass transit unless consumers demand it. So let's start demanding. If you live near a functioning mass-transit system, consider using it, even if just one day per week. Every little action helps. Just doing one little thing can inspire you to tell someone else about it, who might then do it themselves, and might tell someone else. Action generates its own momentum. I believe that.

by Sally Kneidel

Sources:

Michael Brower and Warren Leon, The Consumer’s Guide to Effective Environmental Choices: Practical Advice from the Union of Concerned Scientists (New York: Three Rivers Press).

Robert J. Shapiro, Kevin A. Hassett, and Frank S. Arnold, “Conserving Energy and Preserving the Environment: The Role of Public Transportation,” American Public Transportation Association, July 2002, www.fypower.org/pdf/RES171664_shapiro.pdf.BKeywords:: mass transit buses motorcycles greenhouse gases climate change global warming

Last kid graduates: When do we get to stop working?

Straw bale house (photo courtesy of www.solarhaven.org)

Our second and last kid graduated from college in May. Ken and I are thinking "When do we get to stop working?" We live in a very small house (1415 sq ft), we drive cars that are 13 and 14 years old. I wear clothes from Community Thrift or Goodwill. Ken wears his until they're threadbare. We've socked away more than 20% of our earnings into retirement accounts since we were thirty. And yet, because we've both worked as educators and I as a writer, we have not made enough to have a hefty retirement account yet. Yeah, we could keep working until our mid-sixties. But our friends who have worked in banking or other more lucrative careers are retiring now. It's hard to watch. They get severance packages plus lifetime health coverage, neither of which we will get.

What's to be done?

We've thought about retiring to Costa Rica, where the average wage is $3,000 per year. In such an economy, we'd be relatively wealthy. But we're not ready to do that, at least not now. We're developing a different kind of plan that involves building a very inexpensive new house, and renting out the house we're in now. While we're renting it, the property will hopefully appreciate. It's in a neighborhood that is pretty close to downtown in a growing city, so that's a fair guess.

What kind of inexpensive housing do we want to build? Ken suggested a trailer, but I don't think so. While interviewing green entrepreneurs for our last book (written with daughter Sadie), I met a number of families who have built environmentally friendly and low-cost homes. I keep thinking in particular of Barry Ford of Lancaster SC, featured in our book Going Green. He, his wife, and his young step-son built a 2300 sq ft house for only $13,000 in 1998, which works out to $5.65 per sq ft! They didn't even need a mortgage. I toured it; it's a beautiful home. Ford says it's been appraised above the value of his neighbors' conventional ranch homes. The walls are all made of stacked rows upon rows of bales of straw, covered with stucco.

The Fords started by gathering 1000 strawbales, purchased directly from farmers and piled up on the building site. They kept the bales covered with a tarp until they were ready to begin construction.

Some strawbale homes are post-and-beam, meaning that the bales of straw are laid between load-bearing vertical posts that are more or less like studs in a stick-built home, although the posts are much farther apart than studs. In post-and-beam construction, the bales serve as both insulation and as a substrate for the stucco or plaster surfacing.

But in the Ford home, the strawbales are load-bearing. There are no posts and beams. The Fords didn't even use rebar, which many strawbale builders run vertically from the concrete foundation upward through the bales to stabilize them. The engineers at Cornell and Clemson who served as consultants to the Fords advised against rebar, because the penetration by the rebar (threaded steel rods) allows moisture to get inside the bales. The Fords built their home, one bale at a time, over a period of 10 months, while they were both working at full time jobs. They worked on the house evenings and weekends. The only labor they hired was for one or two days while framing the roof.

Or we might build a paper-bale home. Our publisher turned us on to a couple in Colorado who built one. They used bales of post-consumer paperboard and PVC trash. These materials - glossy coated cardboard (like laundry soap boxes) and waste plastic (old toys, laundry baskets, shampoo bottles) – are hard to recycle and usually end up in landfills. For this Colorado couple, the paper-bale walls give their home an insulation value of R-30, far beyond the energy-efficiency of most conventional homes.

Ken and I like the fact that both strawbale and paper bale construction use waste materials. (Straw is hay that has had the edible seeds removed.) Making use of waste would feel good both environmentally and financially.

We might build an earthship home, like our friends Carol and Neil are doing. It is sort of the ultimate in sustainable builidng and sustainable living. The walls are made of old tires, which Neil and Carol are collecting now. The home has passive solar design to save on heating and cooling costs, and it has a water recycling system that reduces the home's need for well-water or city water to almost nothing.

Then there's Trip Overholt of Chapel Hill. He moves older houses that are slated for demolition because of land-development plans. He hauls them to a new foundation on a vacant lot, and then sells them for a lot less than a custom home would cost. That's the ultimate in recycling, because it keeps the older house out of the waste stream, plus it avoids all the new materials and energy required for new-home construction.

A lot of exciting options! At one time I wanted a bigger house so I could have a home office and a guest room and a den and a dining room, none of which we have now. (We do have 3 bedrooms.) Now, I just want a cheap house. A really cheap and energy-efficient house. I'm optimistic that we can be economical and green at the same time. I'm eager to get started. But where should we build? That's the first question.

All the people and homes mention in this post are described in detail in Going Green, available on amazon.

by Sally Kneidel

Keywords:: strawbale house paper bale house earthship recycled house

Can a Warmer Planet Feed Us?

Before too long, our most direct link to global warming will be the food on our dinner tables. The vast bounty of our neighborhood supermarkets all depends on cycles of rain and air temperatures in far-off parts of the globe. Now, across the world, those cycles are changing and the effects will be profound — for all of us.

As patterns of wind and rain shift, no one knows exactly where the water will end up or when it will arrive. But most of the big computer models predicting Earth's future climate, including those created by NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, foresee declining rainfall in the tropics. Harvests in those regions will decrease too. In India and much of Africa, already struggling with food shortages, food production will drop.

Climate change will produce more extreme weather, such as hurricanes and monsoons that can destroy crops and leave people with no food at all.

Most scientists don't foresee major changes in total food production during the next decade or two, as average temperatures increase by just a few degrees. As food production falls in sub-Saharan Africa and India, food production will actually increase (temporarily) in temperate regions such as North America and Europe. As a result, the world will become increasingly dependent on a handful of major food exporters, such as the United States, Canada, Australia, Brazil and Argentina.

Forty or 50 years from now, as today's children reach middle age, things are projected to get worse. As temperatures continue to rise, along with levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, most models show global food production falling. The areas most affected will be those least able to purchase food from abroad. Foremost among these is Africa. According to some estimates, tens of millions of people could go hungry unless there's a major effort to help these countries adapt.

Agricultural communities can adapt in some ways, but it won't be easy, especially in the poorest parts of the world. The soil in many parts of Africa is highly degraded from overgrazing and overharvesting. There's very little organic matter — decomposed leaves, roots and grass — left in the soil. It isn't replenished because any leftover vegetation is used for fuel. Improving the soil would help Africa prepare for climate change by increasing harvests and also helping the soil store water. Providing alternative fuels for rural households is one way to help improve soil in sub-Saharan Africa.

Anything that increases the wealth of developing nations, especially in the tropics, will help them adapt to coming food shortages.

What can we do? Decrease our own contribution to greenhouse gases, with our driving choices, our food choices, and how we heat and cool our homes. Our new book Going Green: A Wise Consumer's Guide to a Shrinking Planet offers guidelines for these three high-impact consumer categories.

Sally Kneidel

Source: "Will a Warmer World Have Enough Food?" Dan Charles. NPR. November, 2007

Keywords:: greenhouse gases global warming food shortages Africa

Our new book is out: Going Green: A Wise Consumer's Guide to a Shrinking Planet

Our new book is out, as of May 2008. It's Going Green: A Wise Consumer's Guide to a Shrinking Planet.

While Sadie and I were researching our first book together, Veggie Revolution (2005), we learned so much about the environmental and health impacts of the food industry. It profoundly changed my life, and I think Sadie's too. One thing we learned is that the food industry is completely consumer driven. In Going Green, we looked farther afield to see how we as consumers fund other environmentally-damaging industries. We also took a closer look at the dark underbelly of food production, and in the new book we report some startling interviews.

Before these books, we had often debated whether our own lifestyle choices - our diet and other purchases - were really making a difference. So we took the time to find out. We wanted to help busy consumers make informed choices about the products they buy without sacrificing their comfort or way of life.

Specifically, Going Green guides consumers in the most effective and economical ways to reduce their ecological footprint and greenhouse gas emissions, especially in the highest-impact categories of food, transportation, and how we heat and cool our homes. We included clothing too, because readers ask about that.

For example, the book reviews the different kinds of “green” cars, from hybrids to flex-fuel cars to diesel cars equipped to run on pure vegetable oil. For a reader interested in “green” clothing, the book compares the environmental and health effects of organic vs. non-organic cotton, bamboo and hemp fabrics, synthetics, wool, as well as second-hand clothes. We cover dyes and finishes too, which vary widely in their toxicity.

Want to reduce your home energy bills? In Going Green, we report on the greenest (and cheapest) choices for new home construction, such as passive solar design and building with waste materials. But the book is loaded with information about reducing energy consumption in an existing home by sealing leaky doors and windows, buying Energy Star appliances, or simply changing your light bulbs. It’s a very practical book with a positive outlook.

Why is this book timely?
There is an explosion of interest right now in eco-friendly lifestyle choices. That interest is driven by the escalating cost of fossil fuels for transportation and for heating homes. It’s also driven by scientific reports published in the past year about global climate change, and the urgency of taking action to slow it right now before we pass certain “tipping points.” This is a book to guide conscientious citizens in taking action. None of us make perfect choices across the board, we’re all human. But if everyone does something, the effects add up.

Sally Kneidel, PhD

Shoestring Victory: Never enough space

Ricky's and my struggle to begin our microfarm was proving difficult at every turn. No materials. No space. No money. Somehow we'd managed to plow our field, make our potting mix... and now, finally, on a cool February evening, we filled nine 128-cell flats with seed. Dwarf Thumbelina Zinnias… Blue Scotch Kale… the names brimmed with promise. As I swept off the porch, Ricky went off in search of the watering can. She came back, lugging it full of rainwater.

Gingerly, she tipped it forward to water the first tender tray. Immediately, the spray-end fell to the ground, blasting a few cells of dirt with an undiffused jet stream of water. She looked at me reproachfully. “It’s broken!” she said in a tone of surprise.

“Oh, yeah…” I said vaguely. “It’s cracked, but you can just stick it back on there liiiike…. oh. Crap. I guess it really is broken.”

That night we watered the trays with mason jars. That worked until the dirt formed a hard crust from having thick layers of water poured over it. Then it was time to upgrade to a drugstore watering can for $1.29.

In addition to gentle watering, seedlings need steady, constant temperature and light. I kept remembering the farm I’d worked on: the warm, humid greenhouses with their automatic watering systems and gently humming fans. How could I replicate that here?

In the back yard, we have a small hoop house that one of my housemates built out of a pallet and some scrap plastic. It does a great job of converting lukewarm spring sunshine into steamy heat – at least while the sun’s out. But I wasn’t confident it would protect delicate seedlings at night, or when the temperature got below freezing.

Meanwhile, Ricky was in the process of moving into a house under construction. All her possessions were in boxes; her house was full of tools and sheetrock dust. She couldn’t take the seed trays.

No, it was up to me. I prowled through the house with an appraising gaze. South facing windows… wait, that just might work!

I ran to the kitchen for an armful of plastic shopping bags and old newspapers. Then to my bedroom. Clearing off my desk, nightstand, and dresser – all within reach of the south-facing windows’ light – I spread out bags and covered them with a thick layer of newspaper. With a little rearranging, I fit five trays on my dresser, three on my desk, and one on my nightstand. I didn’t really need my lamp. My alarm clock could go on the floor. Perfect!

Well. Maybe not perfect, but functional at least. Hopefully. Would anything grow?

by Sadie Kneidel

Sheep flatulence innoculation developed

By Peter Allen in Paris
Last updated: 3:38 PM BST 05/06/2008

New Zealand scientists claim to have developed a "flatulence inoculation" aimed at cutting down on the massive amount of methane produced by its sheep and cows.
Such animals are believed to be responsible for more than half of the country's greenhouse gases, causing huge environmental problems.

But Phil Goff, New Zealand's trade minister, told an Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) in Paris yesterday that a solution was in sight.

"Our agricultural research organisation just last week was able to map the genome ... that causes methane in ruminant animals and we believe we can vaccinate against" flatulent emissions, Mr Goff said.

Scientists in New Zealand have been working around-the-clock to reduce emissions from agriculture, such as changing the way fertilisers are used on pasture land, Mr Goff added.

Sheep, cattle, goats and deer produce large quantities of gas through belching and flatulence, as their multiple stomachs digest grass.

Ruminants are responsible for about 25 per cent of the methane produced in Britain, but in countries with a large agricultural sector, the proportion is much higher.

The 45 million sheep and 10 million cattle in New Zealand burped and farted about 90 percent of that country's methane emissions, according to government figures.

In comparison, livestock are responsible for about two per cent of the United States's greenhouse gas emissions, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency.

Under the Kyoto Protocol to combat global warming, New Zealand must reduce its greenhouse gas emissions to 5.2 percent below 1990 levels by 2012.

In the past New Zealand's farmers have showed their disgust at government plans to impose an animal "flatulence tax" by sending parcels of manure to members of parliament.

The OECD conference is discussing climate change, trade and the global economy.

Story from Telegraph News:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/2076607/Sheep-flatulence-inoculation-developed.html