Yukoners endured harrowing floods in Peru

On Friday, Jan. 22, the owners of the Yukon’s Bean North Coffee Roasting Company, Michael King and Helen Voogd, along with their young son,

On Friday, Jan. 22, the owners of the Yukon’s Bean North Coffee Roasting Company, Michael King and Helen Voogd, along with their young son, boarded a train for South America’s most famous tourist attraction, the Incan ruins of Machu Picchu.

The family had just wrapped up a tour of the coffee farms which produce the fair trade beans sold from their Takhini Hot Springs Road café and wanted to spend some time vacationing before returning to home and work.

Their first stop was the 600-year-old ruins perched atop the soaring Andean mountains and looking down upon the town of Aguas Calientes.

The three travellers arrived in a torrential downpour, along with the approximately 500 tourists who come into the town every day.

“I was a bit nervous on the train itself,” Voogd told the Star Friday of the trip into the Urubamba Valley.

“We could see the river raging underneath us. The force of it was unbelievable .... In Cusco, we asked people about the rain and they said it was heavy but weren’t too concerned. By the time we got to Aguas Calientes, we could see this was out of the ordinary.”

Things were still running normally in Aguas Calientes when they arrived, so the family made their way up the mountain to see the ruins, although they kept their visit short because of the rain and some concern they would have to return to Cusco prematurely.

Their train was the last to leave Cusco that day, the family learned on their return from the ruins, and none were making the return journey. All trips had been cancelled because of the rapidly rising river which was beginning to threaten the railway tracks.

Although the trains began running again on the Saturday, they were permanently cancelled on the Sunday.

“More and more people kept coming and coming,” Voogd said. “Hikers coming in off Inca Trail were still coming in because they hadn’t shut the trail down yet.”

About 500 people a day set out on the four-day walk from Cusco to Aguas Calientes.

Authorities did not close the trail until Tuesday, when a Peruvian guide and an Argentinean tourist were crushed by a mudslide as they slept in their tents. Three others were injured during the same slide.

With no way to leave the isolated town of Aguas Calientes, rooms were soon full and resources stretched. The electricity would go off and on intermittently and there was no running water, because both systems had been all but destroyed by the floods.

Restaurants began shutting their doors because they were out of food or fuel or both.

“It was cold and it was packed and people were starting to get worried and scared,” Voogd said of the feeling in the town. People were sleeping on the floor of the train station, she said, and many had no access to money because credit card machines were down and bank machines were running short of cash.

By Monday, the stranded travellers were still waiting for information when the first evacuation helicopters arrived,

“Michael was quite sick at that point,” Voogd said, noting she had been sick with a similar stomach bug the week before. “He couldn’t keep anything in; he was quite faint.”

Because of his condition, King was put at the top of the list along with children, seniors and other sick and wounded adults. Many locals were evacuated, and Voogd said she did not hear of or see tourists getting priority over Peruvians

“There was a crush of people trying to get to the helicopter,” Voogd recalled of the scene when the first helicopters landed, “and there were a few scary moments.”

Voogd said goodbye to her husband and son and settled down for a night at the large tourist information centre.

She eventually got herself a room at the town’s hostel, thanks to the generosity of a young Peruvian.

“I’ve heard some stories of people gouging and taking advantage of people, but I never saw that,” she said. “A young waiter actually lent me money so I could get into the hostel because my card wouldn’t work and I couldn’t access any cash.

“That money represented a lot more to him than me, but he lent it to me anyway. He had no way of knowing if I was going to come back.”

Voogd spent Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday nights in Aguas Calientes, and though she didn’t know anyone when she arrived, she said when she left she said goodbye to lifelong friends.

“It was incredible how everyone helped each other and gave whatever they could to others in need,” she said. “I formed some strong friendships there.”

Although the weather had abated by last Monday, evacuation efforts were stalled through the week because of thick clouds which filled the valley.

On Thursday, the fog lifted and Voogd was on her way out along with hundreds of others.

“The evacuation effort was a little disorganized but by Thursday it was super-efficient,” she said. “Food, water and meals were being delivered and everything was going really smoothly. I think people were encouraged by that.”

Peruvian police reported a total of 3,900 people were flown out of Aguas Calientes, with the last 1,277 tourists evacuated on Friday.

Voogd spoke to the Star from her hotel room in Cusco, where she was resting in the company of her family.

“I was never in any danger, and right now I’m very tired and I think I’m decompressing,” she said.

Far from being left with negative memories of their first trip to Peru, Voogd said she and King are eager to come back to the South American country.

“I would have wanted to come back anyway, but with all this happening, it almost makes me want to come back more.

“I can’t say enough how kind the Peruvians have been,” she added. “They are going above and beyond to help people even though many of them have lost everything.”

Voogd said that most of the coffee growers who sell to Bean North live in the northern part of the country and were spared but that she has not heard from one co-operative in the south.

“We are quite worried about them,” she said. “ A lot of these folks are so poor they have way less to lose than we would, but when they lose it, they lose everything.”