Birdwatching Machu Picchu
Lost City Bird Guides • Urubamba • Peru
Gladys Jiménez
Born in Yungay, Perú under the shadow of Huascaran (the nations highest mountain), Gladys acquired her deep appreciation of nature from her grandmother. She is trained as a high mountain trekking guide, and when not guiding bird tours leads treks in the Cordillera Blanca. She is also a lover of film and was instrumental in the creation of Huaraz Satyricon, which was a micro-cinema in Ancash, the first of its kind in the region, about which the Lonely Planet wrote, "this place may just be the world's most perfect little cinema".
Jim Sykes
Jim is a musician from Seattle whose long relationship with Perú began in 1990 with a series of mountain climbing trips. A full time Peruvian resident for almost a decade, he, in addition to being an admirer of the local bird life, is an avid mountain runner, is fascinated by lesser-know archeological sites, and still gets out climbing every now and again. Jim was the owner of the aforementioned micro-cinema Huaraz Satyricon, which is in hibernation for the time being.
Our Dreams and Values
Upon realizing that it made no sense to continue, for the time being at least, with our cinema project in Huaraz, Gladys and I thought hard about what might be best thing to do at this stage of our lives. We chose birds, not only because it was a mutual interest and a challenging hobby that would surely continue to be fascinating for a long time to come, but because it is a form of tourism that appears to have no political downside. Building a birdwatching culture here in Perú will be, we hope, part of a long term conservation strategy for a country whose wilderness has historically been protected more by its inaccessibility than by any thought of preservation.
From the visitor's point of view, birding holds a special charm that makes it at its heart something other than conventional tourism, and perhaps not really tourism at all. After all, the birds don't put on a show for us. They just do what they do, and there is something very honest, direct, and even magical about that, something which is easy to find appealing. The truth is that, in general, I am somewhat wary of tourism in Perú. I think it is economically dangerous to depend wholly on it, and I think it often results in an unintentional belittling of the very cultural values it means to celebrate. Birdwatching is better in that respect. It can draw huge numbers, but spread them over a large area. Enough to be economically significant, but not enough to make a community entirely dependent on it. Also, cultural interactions with local people will hopefully be based on a mutual and authentic interest in birds. That's what we are working towards.
As far as the future, who can say what it will bring. If we are successful with this project there are various directions it can take us. I for one would like to get involved in forest restoration. We hope to organize weeklong treks into more remote bird country for more adventurous birders (like us), and we hope to expand our abilities to guide to anywhere there are birds, which is to say everywhere (especially Ancash and Huanuco). Even if one limits oneself only to Perú, the endless potential for discovery is intoxicating. Life here, for all its inconveniences, is rich with wonder and potential, and I'm pretty sure that there will always be birds we haven't seen yet.
Jim
