California Couple Reported Missing in Peru

Bad bloggers!

I would post sporadically when I was traveling and YFF's never said, "wow, we havent heard from Vinny in over a month, I hope he's OK." It was probably more like "I guess Vinny got lost looking for putarias." Even my mother would say, "Oh, youre still alive?" I felt so unloved.

Good to hear they're OK.

Honestly Peru is one of my favorite places. It has so much diversity and the poeple very hospitable, especially in the places people warm you about like Tingo Maria and Pucallpa.
I could see getting lost there easily for years. The river system is pretty amazing. I spent two weeks riding riverboats last year between Yurimagua, Iquitos and Pucallpa, and there was still so much more to see.

As usual, always the media. And now their parents want a proof of life jajaja!!. I hope Peru charge them the rescue operation ,because it cost a lot of money, big bucks!!!. Bunch of irresponsible kids.........

Same as the Coast Guard in California. They spent over $400K no a rescue mission operation for a suspected missing yacht . 25 thousand square miles covered and now it looks that it is a Hoax

Another couple and a sister were badly beaten with rocks by villagers in peru just a while back, another older heavier couple has been missing since january.
Families have good reason to be worried.

Oh, BS. Bad shit happens to tourists everywhere. Tourists are routinely robbed, beaten up, raped, killed, or less extensively taken advantage of all over the world - the US and Canada included - maybe even more routinely. Just because Peru has had two instances in the space of a year doesn't mean they're developing a serious problem, especially considering the huge volume of clueless foreign tourists they get who are obsessively bent on seeing machu pichu.

yeah, maybe, but when you're a relatively small country who's 4th largest sector is tourism, it makes sense to protect that sector. it's not all that great for tourism when the media splashes missing persons reports. if countries that depend on tourism simply say, "stupid tourists. they shouldda known better..." word may spread about lack of safety and tourism may just drop, which in peru's case, would mean the fourth largest sector of the economy would be in the shitter.

Mom was worried, mom had a Facebook account, mom went on some Facebook campaign and the media grabbed it.

Facebook, the Internet and knee jerking moms should be hated first, because if the next time it happens for real no one will care.

Fucking Californians.

I notice the missing kids pictures on the wall in Wally World many times when I shop there & it gives you the creeps to think how many kids are missing. I also have walked the Riverwalk park along the river in downtown NO,LA in the early a.m. & seen the dozens of kids lying around on the grass sleeping/passed out,etc..
Having worked with juveniles in treatment for some yrs I do know that many are the kids nobody wants. Yes, "some are looked after more than others" is so true.

It depends on what the check-in agreement was, right? Like if you're out there and you say, "I'll check in every day. If you don't hear from me for three days, send Blackwater," then Mom better fucking send Blackwater. But if you're out there and you say, "Mom! Leave me alone! I'll check in when I want!!!" and you're over 18, then Mom is SOL... but she's still Mom, and if she wants to pay Blackwater out of her own pocket, then she can, right up to and including having Blackwater grab her kid by the back of the neck and say, "Listen to your mother, asshole."

-says I, a dad of 2 kids who like to do adventures like their dad; two kids who know that if they don't check in on time, either I or a fucking battalion of ex Marines will find them.

Well said!

(father of two quasi non-adventurous types...at least not yet!)

Yeah I bet my money they where so fucked up on ayahausca it took them a week to walk straight again. As the story Mark posted said, "doing hippie things" screwing with Native drugs and such, seen it all too much before down in the Amazon Rainforest basin, lot of the young backpacker type traveling pot smoking crowd looking for that mythical high losing track of time and place
What a bunch of BS, that parent ought to be charged for the so called search and rescue operation If they are going to be out in the jungle screwing off with or without doing drugs they ought to at least let their loved ones back home know what's up instead of bringing this nanny society shit down to SA. What a waste.

Paul Theroux has a book out about getting that mythical high. Blinding Light, I think. It's on my shelf and I read it but I didn't like it and I never liked the euro-and-american-trash who travel to get high or drunk or both and stuff even though we're not that much different and maybe I'd be like them if drugs had an affect on me that I liked but mostly they just make me puke.

I have a friend who works in Public Relations and I swear to Dog she's paranoid and it's people like her who worry way too much about what things look like and it's people like her who with their advanced degrees end up writing public policy, like the one that says that if you're and American and you're reported missing then the US State Department will do it's best to find your sorry ass no matter what you're doing.

About twenty years ago, an American guy "disappeared" in Panama. Russ, the guy who owns the marina west of Colon, got a call from a weepy mom in Wisconsin asking "Hausmann is missing and nobody has heard from him who should we hire to find him the State Department isn't doing anything!!!" And Russ says, "He's fine, he's sitting right here and he doesn't want to talk to you in the middle of a card game."

True Story.

But there's a happy ending: Hausmann's brother ended up going down to Panama and bringing that sonofabitch back and they both brought girlfriends and the next think (twenty years ago), Wisconsin developed more of this weird Panama connection.

Who said we loved you in the first place

I'll have to admit that it actually pisses me off when I read these "hippies lost in the jungle stories" cause I always had to work when young & spry. No time to really "get lost"! Just never had the time to run around on somebody elses dime. Certain locales collect them (San Cristobal,MX comes to mind as one) in droves & I'm left thinking well maybe I missed out on the "hippie experience" but at least I had a great work ethic which shows well in our kids.
Yeh, its true that many with advanced degrees run everything & write public policy but for me the sad part is that far too many are lawyers/ivy league types that lack street creds in the world of work sense, not just that they're well educated-I know cause I'm both educated & have the what I call a "dirty fingernail" work ethic! If your one of those people that holds politicians in high esteem and thinks we ought to name our bridges ,roads & bldgs,industrial parks(you name it) after them, well your just not in my zone!
This notion of the guvmnt looking for people brings to mind the rescue crews we keep in place all over the USA to go get people that are risk takers. We have them in my area which is a "mecca" of sorts for rock climbers. They come here from all over and fall off cliffs all the time. A few are high/drunk campers that walk over a cliff at night, while others start at the bottom & have skill. I'll admitt it certainly is a little cold to call their mommas & say come and get the body. Read about Yosemite and the climbers we are paying to help out there.
Too bad ADV MC riders don't get the same come & get me help(nothing against ambulance people)?
end of rant.....................................

Sounds like SPOT to me

I think it would be hard to know when to really hit the help button, having it there makes me think too many would hit it before they really try to help themselves. I don't carry one for this reason, I live with my choices. SPOT probably ain't worth of damn in the middle of SA anyway

If I screw up bad enough, I live or die with it

Interesting reply Kantuckid. I'm only 62 and still one of hippie kids. I've worked hard all my life, had a lot of fun on the way, got lost a few times on some fun drugs, raised great responsible kids and now I have grandkids and last night my 60 year old wife told me she was ready to ride south of the border one more time and this time for 6 months and she rides her own.
What I found interesting about your reply was your bi-line
'If I had my life to live over,I'd dare to make more mistakes next time...I'd relax,I'd limber up.I'd be sillier than this trip, take fewer things seriously, I would take more chances... take more trips...climb more mountains...swim more rivers...eat more ice cream'
So when you bark at someone, read your bi-line and limber up.

Let it be known I don't have a problem with drugs unless your mommy is supposed to be finding out where you are or the person is totally out of control!

I was amazed how many people I came across that where out looking for some crazy ass concoction that helps them see the spirit world or the other side. I think anyone would start seeing the spirit world after shitting and vomiting themselves for days that's kinda what happens to anyone when you get severely dehydrated sick To each their own.

I'd still like to know what those two where up to out in the jungle for 15 days...we never get to hear the ending.

The eurotrash and hippies that piss me off aren't the smart ones like Rick, they're the dumb ones that bring trouble into the hotel or the hostel because on their back is a great big MARK that says to the gangsters and cops COME FUCK ME UP.

I've been a rescuer. Sometimes it was extremely rewarding. I quit doing it when I found myself wanting to leave the dumb motherfuckers where they lay.

SPOT sucks. Read the fine print carefully and the insurance policy is actually worthless.

As for what the hippies were doing on the river for two weeks? I can imagine... all kinds of fun things, from helping somebody with a humanitarian project (hippies do humanitarian projects too) to helping somebody with a fucked-up project (read The Mosquito Coast, also by Paul Theroux, or watch the movie), or maybe they were just kind of high, kind-of bird watching, kind of relaxing in a hammock. Or maybe they did finally find that magic concoction!

Which reminds me that I need to get my ass down to Panama pretty soon. My hammock is calling me...