American Tourists Feared Missing In Peru Found On Boat In Peru

[HuffingtonPost]

By Terry Wade                

LIMA, Feb 26 (Reuters) - A young California couple feared by  family to have been abducted while on a cycling trip through  Peru have safely surfaced on a river boat headed for Ecuador,  surprised to learn they were subjects of an international  search, the Peruvian government said on Tuesday.                

"The American tourists are continuing to enjoy their trip in  the Peruvian Amazon," the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Tourism  said in a statement, adding that a national police official had  spoken with the couple and found them to be "in good health."                

Garrett Hand and his girlfriend, Jamie Neal, both 25, had  last been heard from by friends and relatives about a month ago,  according to co-workers and a statement issued on Monday by the  U.S. Embassy in Lima, the Peruvian capital.                

The embassy said then that Peruvian authorities had mounted  a search for the pair, who are residents of Oakland, California.                

The couple were said to have vanished while en route to Lima  from Cusco, in the mountainous southeastern Peruvian interior  near the ancient Incan city of Machu Picchu, an area where U.S.  citizens have been warned by the embassy of kidnapping risks.                

That advisory last month was widely interpreted as linked to  efforts by a remnant band of Maoist Shining Path rebels to repel  a government push to regain control of jungle valleys that are  rife with coca cultivation and cocaine trafficking.                

Friends and family of Hand and Neal said they worried the  pair had been abducted and that their bank accounts had remained  idle since they disappeared.                

But a day after relatives and co-workers went public with  efforts to organize a search for the couple, the Peruvian  government said national police had caught up with the duo in  the northern village of Angoteros along the Napo River.                                

SURPRISED BY CONCERN                

The tourism ministry said the couple were passengers on a  boat headed up the river, a tributary of the Amazon, to a town  on the border with Ecuador.                

The couple "were surprised by the concern generated by  family, friends and the international community after the  cessation of their communications in late January," a ministry  statement said.                

It added that the pair had been traveling overland by  bicycle, bus and river boat through remote areas where access to  telephones and the Internet was limited.                

Meanwhile, Hand's mother, Francine Fitzgerald, posted a  message on Facebook saying she had been informed by U.S. Embassy  and Peruvian authorities that the couple were spotted in a  remote village and were now on a river boat.                

She gave few other details but said she would not be  satisfied until receiving "proof of life" from her son.                

"Proof of life is my son's voice on the phone and a picture  of him holding the missing poster," she wrote.                

ABC News reported on Tuesday that the tourism ministry was  sending a crew with video cameras to the location where the  couple's boat is scheduled to dock on Wednesday to show they are  alive and well.                

The U.S. Embassy issued a separate statement saying it was  aware of "reports that the missing U.S. citizens have been  located," adding, "we are working with local authorities to  confirm those reports."                

The location of the couple in northern Peru was reinforced  by previous accounts from police and officials of an ecological  community in the Amazonian region of Iquitos. They had told  Reuters earlier this week that Hand and Neal were seen embarking  on an upriver boat trip toward Ecuador on Feb. 16, three weeks  after their families had last heard from them.     (Additional reporting by Laila Kearney in San Francisco;  Writing by Steve Gorman; Editing by Cynthia Johnston, Bernard  Orr and Eric Walsh)

Via: HuffingtonPost