At the beginning of this month we decided to take the trip to cross the border so that we could officially apply for our resident religious visas. We got a call on a Monday that we needed to make the trip urgently for time’s sake, so we turned around and left on Tuesday morning. We’ll recount the adventure...
We start the morning at the Immigration office here in Trujillo to try and pay a fine for our expired visas. The immigration official tells us this option does not exist. We must pay at the border. We decide to head to the national bank across the street (where you pay the fine), to double check. They tell us that it is possible, but you have to get the code from the immigration official across the street. Ugh. We decide to head on to the border.
A private auto picks us up with two drivers - an expensive route, but there are no available seats on buses. Once on the road, our drivers inform us that the transportation service only took us to Piura - 5 hours away - NOT Mancora (our destination) - 8 hours away. They do however, offer to take us on to our destination for an extra s/. 300 ($100). We stop in Piura at the Immigration office to see if we can pay our fine there. The official tells us that it is possible, but we do not have proper documentation handy, so we must wait for the border. We decide to go on to Mancora with our drivers and fork over the extra $100. We later find out that we had paid for the full service, and the drivers scammed us out of the extra money. Argh.
Wednesday we head north a couple more hours to the Ecuadorean border in taxi. We pick up a man along the way who will help us in the process. We make it to the immigration office there. We talk to two men, then the supervisor, and get a fine voucher. We head 15 minutes to the border to wait in line at the national bank to pay our fine. We head back to the immigration office to show our receipt and get an ‘exit’ stamp and are questioned by police/customs. We get back in the car and head the 15 minutes back to the border.
The taxi drops us off and on foot we head into Ecuador, clutching our passports and cash, as all Peruvians have warned us how dangerous it is. After a 5 minute walk, we catch a taxi and drive 15 more minutes to the Ecuadorean Immigration. We get our ‘entry’ stamp and then find out that you must stay 48 hours in Ecuador for them to allow you to leave. With no belongings and very little money, we go for the emergency route. At his suggestion, our Peruvian friend takes a $20 bill and our passports around back, we wait what seemed like a nerve-racking eternity, and retrieve our passports as quickly as they were handed off, with ‘entry and exit’ stamps and all.
We hail another taxi, drive 15 minutes back to the border, cross on foot, find our other cab driver, and drive the 15 minutes back to Peruvian Immigration. We stand in line for our new ‘entry’ stamp and have to convince the officer of why we are leaving and entering the country on the same day. We get our stamp, pay our helper, and start the 2 hour drive back to our hotel.
We celebrated surviving the ordeal upon our return and were able to spend the following day in a bungalow on the beach. Friday, our auto came to Mancora, to pick us up and take us home... It arrived, of course, with two new drivers. :)
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