Galganov’s mother retraces his trek in Peru
Montrealer Alisa Clamen walked in her missing son’s footsteps.
Clamen flew to Huaraz, Peru, this month to where her son, Jesse Galganov, was last seen alive. She strapped on hiking boots and trekked the mountainous trail from which he vanished without a trace. She said she plastered the mountain’s trees, rocks and crevices with stickers of Jesse pictured with his family, a blue heart and a message: “We love you, Jesse, and we will never forget you.”
Clamen said she followed the same arduous route to the top of Punta Union, about 4,750 metres high, on a poorly kept trail, walking in his steps and sleeping where he laid his head.
“I needed to finish it for him. I feel more at peace now,” Clamen said after returning to Montreal on Wednesday. “But I’m not giving up.”
Galganov, 22, had left Montreal in September for what was to be an eight-month backpacking trip through South America and Southeast Asia. After spending a few days in Lima, he texted his mother on Sept. 28, saying he would be out of contact for a few days because he was planning a four-day hike on the Santa Cruz Trek, a popular route through a mountain range in the Andes.
Despite an extensive investigation, no clues have turned up as to his whereabouts. Authorities suspect criminal activity is behind his disappearance. No one has responded to the family ’s reward offer, now at US$30,000, to find him.
Frustrated by local police efforts, Clamen hired Magnus International Search and Rescue, a renowned Israeli search-and-rescue team, which had sent several drones into the area and interviewed everyone connected with Jesse’s trek.
Earlier search attempts were hampered by delays. The department of Peruvian national police that covers remote areas didn’t know that a young Canadian had gone missing for nearly three weeks. For some reason, Galganov had gone into the park without registering his presence.
Surveillance footage shows him getting off the bus in Huaraz. The Magnus team located two French hikers who had camped beside Galganov on the trail on Sept. 30, which confirmed his presence on the trail. The men reported Galganov had arrived at the campsite late that evening because “he had got a little lost or disoriented.”
Nothing has been heard from him since. In February, his family marked his 23rd birthday.
Determined to find her son, Clamen left Montreal for Peru on May 13. A few days later, she accompanied Magnus, two members of the Canadian embassy and Peruvian police from Huaraz and nearby villages in scouring the trail for clues. She hoped for a miracle — finding Jesse alive — and prepared for the worst. Clamen expected to bring her son’s remains home to Montreal.
But the search on the ground came up empty.
“I had hoped for some results this time,” Clamen said.
This time, Peruvian forces coordinated by Magnus combed the eastern side of the trek called the Punta Union Pass. They sent an underwater robotics camera known as a ROV to explore the lake on the eastern side, a spot closest to his last known position. But the camera’s work was hampered by algae and deep layers of silt.
“They didn’t get clear images,” Clamen said. “There were also divers but without oxygen (tanks).”
She said she was disappointed the team dismissed the possibility of getting underwater images of a second lake on the other side of the trail.
“The west side is really inaccessible. Even donkeys can’t get through. They couldn’t make it down that side.”
Magnus’s detailed report is now in the hands of a prosecutor located in Caraz, a town not far from Huaraz, where a homicide investigation is pending, Clamen said. Magnus has recommended interrogating certain mule drivers on the trail with polygraphs, she said, but the prosecutor has refused.
“I’m tired and frustrated with the lack of competency in Peru, from police to what’s going on the trail,” she said.
Signs are missing or broken where the trail splits, and its climbs are steep, she said. “You’re walking on rocks through waterfalls because there are no alternatives — it’s a cliff on the other side. If I didn’t have a guide, I’d still be wandering on the mountain.”
Clamen said she plans to return to Peru to have both lakes searched thoroughly.
Galganov isn’t the only Canadian who went missing last year and is presumed dead in Peru. Julie Anne Baker, a Kelowna, B.C., mother of five, was last seen on a rafting trip in April 2017.
About 625 Peruvians disappeared without a trace in 2017, and authorities have no clue where they may be, said Rex Broekman, editor of the Huaraz Telegraph in Peru.
Canada is advising against nonessential travel to certain areas in Peru, said Global Affairs Canada spokesperson Philip Hannan in an email. “Incidents of spiked food and beverages, pickpocketing, assault, kidnapping and fraud targeting foreign travellers have occurred in the country,” he said.
For more information or to donate to the effort to find Galganov, go to gofundme.com/helpfindjesse or missingchildrensnetwork.ngo/jesse-galganovfund.