(Editor’s Note: This trip originally happened in fall of 2019, when it was still safe to travel. It has taken some time to get these posts in order due to various reasons #Because2020, but the timing is quite impeccable that I begin publishing them now, as Peru has among the highest death rates per capita in the world from COVID-19, and people in the remote impoverished highland villages, where much of this story takes place, have little to no resources to protect themselves and their families. Quechua Benefit, the non-profit that sent me out has been raising money to provide masks, soap and education, and I’ve partnered with them to help bring some attention. Please consider throwing a few bucks their way through this link. As you’ll see throughout these posts, they’re doing wonderful work in Peru. Ok…I know y’all jonesin’ for some alpacas, so let’s get into it…)
I had just boarded my connecting flight from Orlando to Lima, Peru and settled into my seat when I remembered my headphones were still in my bag in the overhead compartment.
So I went to open the bin and immediately, all of the contents from another persons's unsecured and unzipped bag fell out and directly onto the woman's head sitting right underneath the bin.
So now the whole back of the plane was staring right at me.
And I don’t speak Spanish.
And none of them spoke English.
I suppose that's one way to start this thing!
Or, perhaps, I can start from the beginning...
So I'm not exactly what forces and stars and quantum particles and galaxies aligned to make this magic happen, but what I do know is that over the past few years, I suddenly found myself thrust deeper and deeper into the world of alpaca.
Yes, alpaca.
And I couldn't be more thrilled.
You may have seen some of the pictures on my Instagram, or the virtual reality video I captured for Superswell VR sitting in the midst of an alpaca pasture, but never in a million years did I ever think that a simple routine Airbnb photo shoot would eventually land me on a plane to Peru to spend two weeks traveling the highlands of the Andes with a group of the world's premiere alpaca experts, breeders, judges and enthusiasts. All this in a quest to participate in a vicuna chaccu, an ancient Incan Sun God ritual in a remote range in the Andes that culminates in corralling thousands of wild vicuna, a rare distant cousin of the alpaca, into one concentrated area for a bi-annual shearing (trust me, you’ll want to stick around for that post!!).
Ok, fine, I suppose you can't exactly call a cottage on an alpaca farm just outside Portland, Oregon a simple routine Airbnb photo shoot, but, well, one of my streams of income comes from shooting real estate photography and vacation rentals, and being as Airbnb is one of my clients, it started off as just another one of several shoots I'd be assigned each week, and that's all I wrote it off as.
Until, of course, I drove up to the cottage to be greeted by dozens of hilariously, adorably goofy, freshly-sheered alpacas flanking all sides of my car.
I don't know if you've ever seen alpaca just after they've been sheared, but, well, it's an infallible and instant cure for those in the foulest of moods.
Well, over the course of year following that shoot, I was called back a few times to shoot additional units on the property, as well as their 7-acre garden, and during those visits, a friendship blossomed with Mike and Julie Safley, the owners of that farm and garden, Oakwood Gardens & Northwest Alpacas. I came to find out that they were amongst the very first people to bring alpaca to the states from Peru in the mid-1980s.
Needless to say, they have played an integral role in the industry's growth since.
It was during a tea break following this shoot that I learned of their soft-spot for the indigenous populations of the Peruvian Highlands. They have pioneered and been involved in philanthropic efforts to help bring economic opportunity, medical attention, and education to these populations of native women, children and families living and existing through poverty in the Andes. Many of these people were abused and left for forgotten in what are quite literally some of the most remote parts of the planet, and being as how the fruits of this region have brought so much to the Safleys, they knew immediately part of their life would be giving back to these very communities.
That’s when they founded Quechua Benefit, a non-profit "dedicated to social justice for the Quechua people living in highland Peru."
Quechua Benefit works "to relieve suffering and provide opportunity in Andean communities through preventative medicine, education, and economic empowerment."
Which brings me to this unexpected, incredibly appreciated, and borderline criminally-amazing, adventure to Peru.
Every year (well, every pre-covid year), they host a guided tour for some of their supporters to the farms, schools and regions that they do their work in, to give these donors an opportunity to see exactly where their dollars and energies are going and experience for themselves the tangible results of their generosities. It certainly does't hurt that through their unique experience and contacts built in the region over the past almost quarter-century, they've managed to put together a dream itinerary.
The only way you can get in on this thing is to purchase the tour package through their site, or, for those living on a much lower pay grade and happen to know how to push the right buttons on a camera every now and then, be ridiculously fortunate enough to be asked to tag along as a photographer and 360 videographer to help capture the essence of the experience to share with those unable to make it.
Which is how I found myself on that Latam flight en route to Lima, Peru to begin this adventure…
To find out where this goes (trust me, it’s worth it), check out Part 2 - From Coca Tea to Casa Chapi.
And in the meantime, find more of my occasional slabberdaggins on Instagram.