For a small town, Mocoa surprised me with a buzzing traffic of gasoline trucks, yellow taxis and small motorbikes coming and going just everywhere. Not long ago, the region was classified as very dangerous with all the guerrilla hiding in the jungle and coca plantation just everwhere. Now things are pretty quiet, the oil industry took over the economy and the environment. Locals will tell you that they miss the time when the cocaine traffic was the rule, life was easy and wealthy.

Nowadays, few tourists pass by. Too bad, regarding the beauty of rivers and waterfalls hiding just everywhere. The water is truly amazing, fresh  and crystal clear, tumbling down limestone river beds with kids jumping off trees or swinging off giant wines, gorgeous butterflies flapping by your ears… a small paradise. Only you need not be afraid of getting muddy. Consider getting the local pair of shoes: plastic boots!

I was once more making my way to the heart of Putumayo, coming from Ecuador, climbing down from the Sibundoy valley through the only access: a 3 hours ride dodging holes and rocks, traversing small rivers, avoiding loaded trucks… and hopefully getting down the amazon basin in on piece after having done a 2000m dive on one of the most dangerous – and amazing – road of south America.

I was to meet Tupac once more and this time the plan was to make happen what we couldn’t work out last time, cook the spirit vine: Ayahuesca. The experience took me to some depth of the shamanic tradition of the amazon. I knew it was a privilege he was offering me, having never taken anybody with him, yet. Depending on traditions, shamans would not take their apprentice cooking before 3-8 years of dedication, lucky me!

 - I hope this article will reflect some of the reasons why ayahuesca cannot be just offered or bargained down too much just because it is a medicine coming from mother Nature, something I hear regularly. -

The first battle: encountering a place to cook.

Not all shamans have their own cooking place, probably most of them don’t. They usually have contacts with others, with communities, and rent a place to prepare the brew themselves. Quite a few requirements are necessary to meet so that the preparation will be possible and doable in appropriate conditions.

We had an arrangement made and a place was waiting for us, supposedly. But when we called them, it appeared they were not ready to lend it to us anymore. Apparently, they learned that tupac had been offering the medicine to foreigners for low price and were not happy with it. - Ouch, it’s happening again! - One of the reason we couldn’t cook it last time was that he was bringing a foreigner in the community, or so we thought… Yep, doors can be pretty closed. Back to zero. I was back with my worst enemy again: impatience. Indeed, things can linger for a while around here. Phone calls, meetings, discussions, ideas… but only a couple of days later, things seemed to sort out.

We met Luis, a young indigenous boy living some 20km further. He said he could have us a kitchen and the necessary ingredients, “A ver!”

To give you an idea, here renting a place usually cost around a 1000 dollars. This includes the ayahuesca, the chakruna leaves – although the amount has to be discussed – and wood. Often communities are deep into the jungle and you might need to rent horses to bring food and other supplies. In our case, we were lucky, Luis was living close by and the cooking place was to be a 20 min walk only, great!

Nest building

We set up on buying food, a pair of boots, a filter, a jar, candles… and headed to his place. He was living with his wife and his daughter in a little cosy wooden house. Simple but comfortable enough. The next day, we headed to the cooking place. First surprise, there was nothing, yet. Usually things are done in the maloca, the ceremonial center. In our case, he just asked the permission to use a piece of land and we started all of us to build up what would be our little nest for a week, from scratch. We found a location sort of flat with some shade and started cutting trees and weeding the ground clean to consequently put up a shelter, dig a fire pit, cut wood, install a hose to the closest stream for water etc. I was witnessing jungle engineering done with amazing grace from Luis and his brother that we would call from now on  “los tigres” – the tigers!

In half a day, we had our place ready with enough wood to keep the magical brew bubbling a mere 72hours or so. The next day, we brought 130 kg of freshly cut spirit vine and started the process. It starts by scratching the bark off and cleaning it well. The bark has nothing to offer besides an awful bitterness, a commonly shared attribute of the brew because many shamans don’t take the trouble to scratch it off! Tupac seemed excited with the quality of the vine, some pieces were pretty old and were  dripping blood like juice – what they call “el vino”, the wine. It actually smells like wine, has the color of red wine and of course, one of the effect of ayahuesca when it kicks in, is to make you feel drunk!

By now my gringo hands were tainted red by the wine and started to have blisters popping up here and there. The work was like a meditation, a pleasant one, for once I was working with my body and feeling some exhaustion. I also had the feeling to take part into something, being in a team and working together, something I had not experience for a while, good to lift my spirit up!

It took us four around 6 hours to peel it clean. Then we had to protect it for the night and keep it wet to help to next process.

Smashing time

Within 15 minutes, Luis came back with 4 hammers he sculpted with a machete and we all started hitting and smashing the wet vine until it turned into small fibres. The process can be long and painful depending on the hardness and size of the product. In our case, it was easier than what I expected although it did ach my shoulders and arms as well as definitely tearing open my blisters. Before everything was done, we headed to a closed by field where the ayahuesca’s partner was growing: the chakruna, a coffee family plant.

-  What they call yahe in Colombia or ayahuesca in other places, is a mix of two plants: the ayahuesca vine and the chakruna leaves.

The ayahuescan is the motor, the power, the vibration. The chakruna, a coffee family plant, is what takes you to other realms: the visions. On the other hand, if the chakruna is to be consummed alone, the DMT molecules contained into it get annihilated by our stomach enzymes before any effects would be felt. Hence the ayahuesca also acts as an enzyme inhibiter. –

Different proportions of chakruna are added. Gathering it can take long, imagine collecting more than a 100kg of leaves!

Cooking time

Back to camp. We brought two huge aluminium pots (traditionally done with 3, easier and faster) and it was time to start the long and final process, the cooking. Once the fire is started, there is no more recess but a constant surveillance. The extraction process requires a lot of water that we boil down before filling up again a certain number of times. The main tasks are to feed the fire properly, refill the water, empty the pots… and stir the final brew in the second pot. The stirring gets more and more intense as it get to the end. Indeed, as the brew thickens, its composition get more ayahuesca like and react almost like milk. I saw it lying at the very bottom before the next time I looked, it was about to pour over the edge of a really deep pot.

 “It’s the ayahuesca’s spirit” goes Tupac “strong and wild”.

Normally, during all the time, one is supposed to blow tobacco for protection and to keep the place energetically clean. Since we were in a new place, absolutely wild, there wasn’t such need. Also, in the traditions, if you cook with the elders, there is no sleeping or eating but an absolute dedication to the preparation – something else! And of course, you are asked to be totally there, to get rid of outside thoughts, especially when stirring it.

Now while from a normal perspective it looks like “regular” cooking, it’s good to mention that the shaman is always connected with the spiritual realm. As the cooking goes along, he sings it, sends it incantation, puts intentions, calls different spirits etc. Everything needed to give it the right attributes. Gladly, I could play it my drum a few times and put it special intentions for the special work coming for me.

Muddy time

Now we are in January, it’s the rainy season and tropical showers kept turning our nest into a mud pool. We had to dig trenches around us to try protect the fire and even to dig one inside the fire pit as the water was percolating from inside the muddy ground, FUN!

But was it even more fun is when you are now on your 4^th day, at 3 in the morning, splitting wood under the pouring rain by the light of a headlamp before going back to “bed”, a couple of plastic bags between you and the wet ground, not flat at all and big enough so that we had to bend our legs to keep them out of the dripping water pouring from our plastic tarp improvised as our kitchen roof, good memories!

It was a very simple cooking place indeed, far from the comfortable maloca provided in indigenous communities BUT we were close to the road with few bugs, had food prepared by luis’wife as well as our freedom and independence – cooking around elders in  a community is not always the most entertaining and they usually don’t slack on rules from what I understood – and here we were, the two of us, on a mission of cooking a magical brew, swayed by a roaring nature challenged by our surviving sense of humour!

Finally, we hit that moment where only one pot is left. The one with the final brew that is slowly reduced until desired.

- Here is another secret from turning what they call Chicha to Honey. The first being the common liquidish bitter drink that turns your stomach upside down. The latter being an almost sweet and spicy honey like wine that becomes waaaay easier to swallow down -

This is the moment of all attention, constant dynamic stir and surveillance of the fire for 24hours or more.

To the stars…

Pffff…. after 5 days of preparation and cooking, my mind as much as my body was happy to walk to road back. Despite the tiredness growing heavy in my head and aching in my body, we were proudly marching back to Luis’s place, with a new adenture in my journal, a new determination in my heart and 1 heavy jar in each hand loaded with enough spiritual fuel to launch the rocket of my being into any distant galaxy I would fancy…