I first met Clark in about 1998, almost certainly in that expat hangout, the “Cross Keys Pub” in Cusco, Peru, where we lived every “Happy hour” to the fullest.
He was studying, I think, Latin American Studies and Adventure Tourism and had wangled a “credit” just for visiting Peru! As fellow kayakers, we got on instantly and soon, we were kayaking the mighty Apurimac together (sometimes for work, sometimes for fun) and partying hard in between river trips.
A year or so later, we met at a travel show in Chicago, and he hit me up for a job and joined Amazonas Explorer in 2001 as safety kayaker, trekking guide, tour conductor, office general body, and part-time babysitter for my daughter, Lara.
Clark’s 1st job in Tourism…. Lara Cripps’ (now age 23) babysitter in the Amazonas Explorer office
…and Safety kayaking on the Apurimac whenever possible
Boy, did we have some fun together, be it on bikes, kayaks, on foot or in the pubs, bars and nightclubs of Cusco. We all lived in our mad house in Magisterio in Cusco, office downstairs, a rotating mix of guides and random friends, and the Cripps / Thomas family, all on top of each other, upstairs. I remember that kayak well, how we all wanted to have a go in it, as it was “the” kayak of the day. And one day, whilst Clark was out on a trek, I “borrowed” it from the store room and took it down the Apurimac and somewhat sheepishly had to tell him a few days later:
“The good news, Clark, is that your kayak has run “Toothache” rapid (a gnarly class 5 rapid on the river that he usually walked around for good reason) – The bad news is … I wasn’t actually in it much!” I had taken the beating of my life in the 1st hole at the top of the rapid, and swam the whole thing, desperately chasing his kayak! Clark just laughed.
It took me 10 years to run that rapid again!
I remember the day we moved office. Clark had been out the night before and was, shall we say, a little “worse for wear”, but as always keen to help where possible. Eventually, we gave him the seemingly simple task of plugging in the “state of the art” Fax machine, which we’d imported all the way from Switzerland.
Easy enough right? He plugged it in, waited a little while for the lights to come on, then a little worried said “Is it meant to smell like this?” I looked over to see smoke coming out of the fax machine. He’d only plugged a 110v machine into a 220v outlet and it was now on fire! Needless to say, it never worked again, and we put Clark back on Lara babysitting duty which he was very good at indeed! I did wonder if he’d ever manage an office job, should one come up!
Recovering after a strenuous day blowing up our fax machine….
Out biking above Cusco with Juan Carlos, Paul, Bill and Carol – just for fun. Boy did we get muddy and laugh a lot that day!
Clark’s 1st job in Latin American Travel – Lara Cripps’ (now age 23) official baby sitter. He was very good at it indeed.
For some reason, our new office phone number apparently was extremely similar or maybe even the same to that of a cake-making business called “La Casa de la Torta” and we were regularly getting phone calls asking for cakes to which we had to explain they had a wrong number and we were a travel agency. After one particularly frustrating series of increasingly insistent calls from one lady, we let Clark have a go at answering the phone, as we were fairly sure it was yet another cake order. Cool as ice, Clark replied in perfect Spanish, taking a complete cake order, including special flavour and lettering on top, date and time of delivery and hung up with a “Muchas gracias for your order”. How we laughed, and I still feel rather bad to the day when that poor lady must have turned up at “La Casa de la Torta” who had no knowledge of her order. Funnily enough, we stopped getting cake orders soon after that!
It was on one of his first Apurimac rafting trips with us, that he met Jacqui who went on to become his wife and we enjoyed watching the two of them come together and create Dental Project Peru, offering dental treatment to the far side of the Apurimac canyon which in those days was the true “wild west” of Peru.
Pre “going out” shots to warm us up in the freezing madhouse that was the Amazonas Explorer office and home to us all.
Clark even went out of his way to learn Quechua when he and Jacqui founded Dental Project Peru and Jacqui selflessly offered to give all my porters a checkup as a Christmas present!
Practising Team building games for a Grupo Inca event at La Sorda bay, on the Arequipa coast with Jacqui, Beat, Paul, Dougie and Piero
A few of his nicknames during this period were “Clarkie”, “Darkie” (my daughters attempt to pronounce his name) “Manan Clak” (his best Quechua phrase) and “Taliban” (long story there!)
Here’s an example of how selfless Clarkie was. As a guide in Peru, getting “tips” is definitely one of the perks of the jobs, but behind the scenes, to make sure the trips run seamlessly, is our magnificent operations manager, Maria Handa, who started work in Amazonas Explorer the same day as Clark (and still manages us all, magnificently, to this day) At one Christmas office party, (naturally, in the Cross Keys Pub, of course) I remember Clark busily coordinating with all the guides to put together a “tip” for Maria Handa, not a mean feat (getting money out of guides that is!) but so totally justified, and Maria being totally overwhelmed with this gesture. This photo shows it all….
I just remember the fun we had all the time, packing so much in. At a travel show in New York a few years later, we even found time to go up the Empire State Building, between meetings “because it was there”. We never got bored together, always scheming up ways to squeeze the most out of every minute.
We couldn’t afford the “official” photo so got this one beside a mockup of the Empire State Building to prove we’d been up it!
I remember him coming back from a particularly tough “Source of the Amazon” trip where a client had capsized her kayak so many times, she was clearly going hypothermic in the ice-cold waters at 4000m and, “as if by magic”, a local llama herder called Erasmus appeared and ushered them all into his hut and got a fire going and seriously saved the day. Clark was so grateful to Erasmus that, every time I travelled through “Tres Canyones”, about once every couple of years, Clark would make sure I hiked up to Erasmus’s house to thank him with a variety of gifts from a wetsuit to a raft paddle and regular food supplies.
It will be with a very heavy heart when I go next time to visit.
With Clark, we rafted the Rio Tuichi in Bolivia and probably the 1st and last commercial descent of the Rio Tumbes in North Peru. I remember, January 1st, 2002, all of us somewhat mysterious, me negotiating with Clark to buy that kayak off him, on the Panamericana highway outside Mancora, North Peru, as he was struggling to get any serious hitch hiking offers to try and get himself to Quito in Ecuador, as no one would pick him up with a kayak for luggage! I’m not sure either of us got a particularly good deal but that was just how we did things back then!
A year or so later, I went on to introduce him to Ignacio Masias, then at Inkaterra, and Clark joined me on an agent visit to the UK, me talking about Amazonas Explorer and he about Inkaterra properties and then in reverse in the USA with Ignacio. I guess that’s how he started the process of becoming a “Rep”.
How can we forget their wedding at the Sol y Luna hotel a few years later, and the stag do before, mountain biking down to Paucartambo and then probably best not to go into what we got up to afterwards!!
It was very clear he was going to go far and with some intrepidation, I wrote his reference for a desk job as head of Latin American sales at Geographic Expeditions, as his main office skill to that date, had been successfully blowing up the fax machine. I was somewhat amazed he got the job and stuck at it so long and he rewarded our friendship and training by awarding us a Choquequirao trek with him and a group, which went down extremely badly with their usual Peru operator, but Clark stood his ground, and our relationship with Geographic Expeditions started. Thank you, Clark!
I can’t believe I was actually in his house in San Francisco the day his second son, Blake, born a few days earlier, arrived home from hospital, but somehow Clark still managed to sneak me out for some local mountain biking and introduce me to several agents over a meal at Gaston Acurio’s recently opened Peruvian restaurant and even a few beers on the ferry back. I remember that day, rocking up to his house in San Rafael in this insanely large Buick. I’d paid for the cheapest rental car available and the guy behind the counter had just said, oh just take whichever car you fancy, so I had.
“Nice wheels” said Clark and we promptly went off for a cruise around town in it, no doubt leaving Jacqui quite literally, “holding the baby”.
But we were back soon enough and we all went out for a pizza when Carter, age, I’m guessing about 3, managed to get himself locked in the restaurant toilet, and whilst the restaurant owner called the fire brigade, Clark did a master class in fatherhood, calming down a distraught Carter and on release, even persuading Carter to get his photo taken with the firemen – boy I wish I could find that photo! Man, he loved his family so much.
Our paths continued to cross frequently, be it in Cusco, USA or at the Remote travel shows all over Latin America. One day, he even persuaded me to swap my kayak in Barichara, Colombia, so he could go in it on the grounds that “Paul got to do way more kayaking than Clark, so it was only fair!” Always the deal maker!
Always introducing the right people to the right people with a friendly smile. Clark could work a room like nobody else and he just seemed to know everyone, well, all the “right” people that is, and was always willing to lend a hand, share a contact etc. Just don’t let him anywhere near your electrical appliances! How many times over the years did I get asked, “Hey, do you know Clark Kotula?” and with a wry smile, I used to calmly say “Yeah, I taught him everything he knows” which was a total lie, as he was clearly way better at networking than I will ever be, but, like a proud parent watching a prodigal son graduate, I had to get one back at him from time to time.
I remember a truly funny tale he used to tell whilst leading an Inca Trail to Machu Picchu for Amazonas Explorer with a somewhat elderly and hard-of-hearing group of trekkers from the UK. At some point, he was telling them about me and who I was. Well, my name is “Paul Cripps” but apparently one trekker was later heard to remark “Pork Ribs? Pork Ribs? – Wow, it’s amazing what these cooks can create in a tent at 3800m!!” And I can only guess, if anyone ever asked Clark “ Hey, do you know Paul Cripps? Apparently he taught you all you know?” he’d almost certainly have told them this story in revenge!
As Covid struck, we stayed in touch and I watched with admiration how he held it all together and kept travelling as soon as he was allowed. To watch his holiday videos and the fun he had with Jacqui and the kids was truly inspiring. It was totally clear he just loved what he was doing and was so good at it. When we were finally allowed back together in 2022 at the Remote travel show in Cafayate in Argentina, I experienced one of the scariest experiences in my life, giving a talk in front of 300 travel professionals. As I came off the stage, Clark was the first one to reach me and gave me a big hug and whispered in my ear “Man, you absolutely nailed that!” That was a truly emotional moment for me, the “student” giving his “teacher” a hug of approval and a true show of our friendship and admiration for each other.
The last time I saw Clark was December 4th last year, when I literally “bumped into him” on a street in Miraflores, Lima. We chatted for a while and talked about meeting up for dinner but later texted each other out of it. We were both busy and knackered, but also aware of what mischief we might get up to! We agreed to catch up properly at Remote in Puhuyue in Chile this October…. I will have to live with that regret forever.
4th of December 2023 “Magical Realism” moment, bumping into Clark in Miraflores, Lima and agreeing not to meet up later. Sadly, this was the last time we’d see each other.
Carol and I going to the recent Clark Kotula Memorial Weekend in San Rafael this September was so cathartic for us all. To catch up with “blasts from the past” and meet the so many friends, contacts, family and business associates Clark had, was truly amazing. To see his local network of friends coming together for this event and their support and obvious love for all his family, was truly insprational, and so comforting too.
Clark, I will miss you forever.
To Jacqui, Carter and Blake, you will always be in my thoughts. “Mi Casa es tu Casa” whenever you want to come down memory lane, here in Cusco, and grab a kayak, bike or tent and join us for an adventure, we’d dearly love to see you all.
All my love
Paul,
And Carol, Lara, Oliver, Charlie, Maria, Alex, Efrain V, Efrain C, Piero, Zaccy, Pollo, Huevo, Andres, Pepe Negro, JC, Francois etc… and all of us at Amazonas Explorer here in Cusco.
3 Responses
Enjoyed reading this Paul. He was a special one.
Thanks for sharing your heart Paul and capturing the essence of Clark. He had such a deep respect for you for helping to shape his life in such a significant way for over a quarter of a century.
This is such a beautiful history of your time with Clark. We went on a “ Clark trip” to Peru and it was the most magical place we’d ever been. We loved all of it. Miss him so much.