The day had started off just like any other. Warm sunshine streamed down into the courtyard of the old colonial building that was my hotel, as I opened my window shutters in the early morning and breathed in the fresh crisp air of a new day.
As I made my way to the reception to wait for the minibus I felt happy that I’d had a good sleep having chosen to go home early after dinner in town the night before, as I was tired. When the minibus arrived at 8.30am I happened to be first on board, picking a spot on the back seat in the corner.
There were the five of us solo travellers on board for the trip to and around the Colca Canyon, along with our designated tour guide. We also had a driver and a special day-guide who talked us through the passing scenery as we left Arequipa far behind, stopping at points along the four to five hour drive to take photos of the volcanoes in the distance and various vekunas, llamas and flamingos. As we drove along gradually the surrounding countryside became more and more desert-like and bare, with lots of cacti and fewer and fewer vehicles.
After three hours or so we stopped at a rest stop for half-an-hour to grab a snack and have a break before shortly setting off again after noon on the hot dusty road, for the remainder of the journey to the Colca Canyon. The atmosphere in the bus was one of sleepy calmness, bellies were full and the soft growl of the minibus engine lulled everyone into an early afternoon snooze. I put on my iPod, closed my eyes and relaxed in my seat.
I remember dozing for a short while but not falling completely asleep, when we approached a corner on the road around 1pm. I could feel the bus slowing down and saw ahead on the left of the road a man dressed all in black wearing a balaclava. As we got closer I then saw another man on the other side of the road in the same clothes.
I wasn’t sure why we were slowing down as I couldn’t see clearly, and it didn’t look like one of the normal police checkpoints that we usually came across as there were no buildings or signs in view. I wondered if there were rocks or something in the road preventing us from driving on and instantly a wave of fear came over me, and I sat bolt upright and shouted out ‘oh no, what’s happening here?’ which one of the group later said was the first thing he heard as he was roused from his snooze.
It was seeing the balaclavas and the feeling I had in the pit of my stomach that scared me, and I wanted to shout to the driver to keep going but didn’t. I think it was because although I had a bad feeling, I also wanted to trust that the driver and day-guide knew what they were doing and didn’t want to embarrass myself if it was all innocent – sometimes the police hide their identities with balaclavas and plain clothes and a couple of times when travelling on the road we’ve been stopped, and they’ve walked round and opened the minibus door, had a quick look and then left, slamming the door shut again.
But this felt very different. One man initially went to the driver’s side and the other one opened the main door and got in, quickly followed by the first one. They slammed the door shut after them and just stood there for a few seconds. I could see now that one of them had a black gun, and the other a four-or-five inch knife. The one with the gun then pressed it to the day-guide’s head who was sitting on the front seat and told the driver to drive.
From here time moved very slowly indeed.
I know it sounds crazy, but until you’re actually in a hijack situation you can’t possibly guess how you would react, and my instant reaction was to hide most of my stuff. Everything – my money, passport, small digital camera, large SLR camera and iPhone was in my black camera bag that day to keep it secure in one place on the bus. Quick as a flash I’d pushed the camera bag under the seat in front of me with my feet, and stuffed the digital camera deep down the side of the minibus seat on my left. My iPhone I shoved down the back of my trousers, as I had unhelpful thoughts come into my head that I may very well be raped or even murdered and thought that if after they’d robbed us they took us somewhere or dragged us off the bus, I could maybe use it to call for help if I had signal – as long as they didn’t find it first. I kept my wallet out (luckily my cards were kept separately in case I lost it) and put it by my rucksack thinking that if they wanted something then maybe they would be happy with the money. I wasn’t wearing any jewellery as I never tend to wear any when travelling, more because I always lose it than because I thought I’d ever get robbed.
The men started walking up and down the bus shouting things in Spanish at us. Later I found they were shouting “everything, everything!” and told our tour guide (who was fluent in Spanish) who was sitting in the back with us, not to leave anything out when they were robbing him or it would be worse for him. They shouted at the driver to go faster one minute and then slower the next – I think he was driving quite erratically with fear and the knifeman (who seemed the nastier of the two) started shouting “shoot him! Shoot him!” to his accomplice.
The knifeman held the knife to the throat of one of the girls on board – and then our tour guide, as everyone scrambled to get out their valuables. He came to the back and started waving the knife around at me and pointing it in my face and I reached down and gave him my wallet, opening it to show him the money I had in there. I’d just drawn out a wad of cash the day before in small notes, so it looked like quite a lot, in all it was probably a little over £100. The knifeman then stood in front of the guy sitting next to me and after taking his money begun to search his body making him lift up in the chair so he could empty his pockets. He was a tall, big guy in comparison so I started to get more scared at this point at the robber’s boldness to search through his pockets and wondered if I would be next.
The knifeman then went to the front to threaten more people before returning to the back of the minibus waving the knife at me again, shouting something. I knew he was asking for more and I don’t know why, maybe it was being foolish and not wanting to give up my hard-earned possessions but sometimes you almost don’t appreciate how much danger you are in, so I just shrugged pretending not to understand and told him that was all I had. I didn’t dare move my feet and hoped he wouldn’t look down there and spot my black camera bag. He then grabbed my blue day pack from the seat next to me, nearest to him and started to go through it. I remember watching him pull out my MAC makeup powder and inspect it in front of me and thinking how weird it was that something so familiar that I use every day was being handled by a man in a balaclava holding a knife. All kinds of thoughts then started to run through my mind, like not ever seeing my family again and realising with a growing panic that I wasn’t ready to go yet and still had so much I wanted to do with my life, and so much I wanted to still achieve.
The knifeman then moved to the front of the bus again to join the gunman, and after what seemed like an eternity they signalled for the bus to stop. Still pointing the gun at the driver they got off the bus and I felt half-relieved that they’d left but half-panicked at what might now lay in store for us – did they have accomplices waiting for them? Were they going to get us off the bus and search it? What would happen to us if they found the items that several of us had hidden? Suddenly I heard a gunshot and the guy sitting next to me and I both dived down behind the seat for cover – I was sure they were about to start shooting at us. But then the door slammed shut and again after what seemed like forever we began to move and drive down the road again.
Everyone was ok, all the robbers had got was a load of cash, three small cameras, an iPod, a watch and a cheap pair of sunglasses. The passport of the guy sitting next to me had been out and they hadn’t taken it so obviously they’d just been after money and valuables. I’d lost my wallet and money and a memory card I’d lent to one of the guys that was in his camera. He later joked that it had been my memory card and his girlfriend’s camera, rather than his! What’s interesting is I wasn’t the only one to have hidden things, and one of the girls on the minibus had only woken up when the robbers were already on the bus looking down on her, after which she had then got out her wallet and just given them a handful and not all of the money. And when the robber asked for her camera, she had taken out the memory card before giving it to him!
It was a really strange and frightening experience and as we continued on our way we stopped any cars and buses we saw going in the other direction to warn them that there were robbers on the road. We tried to calm the driver down a bit as he was still driving quite fast and there were a lot of hairpin turns as we approached the town with steep cliff drops the other side! When we got to our accommodation near the Colca Canyon we had to abandon plans for hiking and the hot springs and spend the rest of the afternoon waiting at the police station to file a report. For a while I was pretty suspicious of the day-guide as we didn’t think he had much or anything stolen, and after the robbers had gone and we were all emotionally hugging and consoling each other he didn’t once turn round to talk to us or to ask us if we were ok that any of us could recall. Maybe it was his way of dealing with the situation and maybe I’m a suspicious person, but for a while I was worried he’d been part of setting up the robbery!
I asked the driver later why he had slowed down in the first place, and he said he’d seen the men waving their arms at us to slow down and there had indeed been rocks in the road, so he thought they might have been police on site to deal with it. As the first man approached his window the other one had walked round to the minibus door and opened it, right as the first man produced the knife and threatened the driver with it. The driver said he would have slammed on the accelerator at this point, if only the second man hadn’t already been halfway into the bus.
That night we had a lovely dinner and I sat up with the girls drinking red wine in front of a roaring open fire. We were still in shock and it was a while before what had happened begun to sink in.
I was really lucky to have been sitting where I was on the bus and can’t imagine the terror that one of the girls and our tour guide, being nearest to the main doors of the bus, felt when they had the knives put to their throats – they were incredibly brave. It was so surreal at one point driving down the road, no one was saying anything or panicking and everyone was looking ahead – I remember thinking, is this really happening? And only the two men with the black balaclavas standing there with the gun and knife pointed at us made it real.
Sitting in front of the fire that night and even as I write this now, any problem I had and have in my life seems smaller than anything when compared with the feelings from that day – being alive, safe and well is the most amazing feeling in the world – being given another chance, another day to make something of your life, to make people happy, to make a difference in the world and be free is something that none of us should ever take for granted – but we all often do, and I sat there wondering what could have happened if everyone hadn’t been so calm, or if the robbers hadn’t been just after money and valuables. You never know when your time is up and the scary thing is, like in that situation, it can happen so quickly, so quietly – and sneak up on you, so that you don’t even realise what’s happening until it’s too late.
