Iquitos, Peru: Hostel La Casa del Frances

Those with a sharp eye will see locations from Werner Herzog's film Fitzcarraldo in the following photos. Claudia Cardinale was here along with the ever lunatic Klaus Kinski shooting after Jason Robarts and Mick Jagger gave up and sailed away.

Herzog Film Poster

Mostly Spanish at the hostel I now call home, but many speak French as well, and some also speak German. I had a friend here who spoke Italian, another who spoke Dutch, and some speak languages I can't begin to understand. The hostel is home to us all, at least for a while.

I sit sometimes by the pots at the entrance inside the hostel and I watch people beyond the gate on the sidewalk, and i think about almost nothing at all.

Many of us sit at the table in the morning and have breakfast and plot our days.

There are children in the morning....

and during the heat of day, some take time off to rest.

Some stand and think about adventures to come.

Some sit, living the life of family and home.

I have found that family is the meaning of life. 

Here at the hostel I sit sometimes and smile at the little girl who is so charming I want to have a dozen kids like her. I am happy beyond recall.

I often just sit. Sometimes I stand. Some stand proud and tall and grin that life should be so good to the undeserving. That would be me. Not that I complain.

In the kitchen at the Frances Hostel. The most macho teeshirt I have ever owned, with the possible exception of "East River Surf Boys" from New York City, picturing a cartoon rat on a surfboard. My wife at the time accidentally poured bleach all over it. This teeshirt is too dangerous to get near.

Such is my life this day at the hostel in Iquitos.

One of the many plaques announcing the importance of a building in Peru.

For a very different view of life, consider turning to this link for my current book, An Occasional Walker. Or, one might read reviews at this link, "Dagness at Noon."