The Manchu Picchu Adventure and then some...

Ok Everyone… so nice and early, 6:30am, the remaining seven of us boarded a small taxi that drove the long way around to the Train station 1/4 of a mile from our hotel. We all jumped out and boarded the train to Aguas Calientes, the small town at the bottom of the mountain from Manchu Picchu. Since we didn’t do the Inca Trial or the Lourdes Trek, we got to spend the whole day in Aguas Calientes, which is know for it’s hot springs and cutesy setting. We also got the pleasure of a 4-hour train ride with our knees pushed into random corners or up again our unknown seatmates. The train seats all faced one another. Rows and rows of two seats forward facing two seats backwards. Robby and I were just thankful we got the “facing forward” seat as looking backwards on a train makes us sick. Our seatmates turned out to be a lovely couple from Argentina. But for some reason they decided to talk to me when Robby was off at the coffee cart, so I got to have a dumbfounded expression on my face as I tried to understand their Spanish and they got to look utterly confused as they tried to interpret my Spanish. Luckily Robby came back and we all semi-understood each other. I have to say that I am thoroughly impressed with Robby’s Spanish. She says it sucks, but I think it came in handy quite nicely. Now, if only I could learn it.

After freezing to death on the train while it did a ridiculous number of switchbacks to slowly crawl up the hills of Cusco and out into the Inca Valley, we made it to Aguas Calientes. We were told to look for a guy holding a sign to our hotel. What we found was a horde of people all holding signs to various hotels, hostels, and asking for certain people. What we did not find was someone holding a sign for our hotel. Instead, someone told us the young man holding a sign for another hotel was our guy. Turned out he was when we checked his list of people he was picking up. Apparently he worked for four different hotels that kind of worked together. He dropped us off at the end of town, in the last hotel before the hills.

The hotel turned out to be rather pleasant, except for the fact that our room opened out onto the train tracks. We were fairly certain it wouldn’t be a problem as we had to get up early to catch a bus to Manchu Picchu, but you never know. Turned out the train ran well into the night and was quite annoying with it’s horn. Gary and Joyce ended up switching rooms to the best room in the hotel. They had a balcony with a view of the rocky river running through the town and leading to the bottom of the mountain that held Manchu Picchu. If we used Gary’s binoculars we could glimpse part of the ruins.

After we ditched our bags, we went to get lunch with Gary, Joyce, and Jamie and then went to explore with Gary and Joyce. Aguas Calientes is a small town consisting of two main streets that run up hill and are crowded with souvenir shops and restaurants. There is a town square near the train tracks at the bottom of the hill and a hot springs at the top of the hill. A beautiful rocky river flows down one side of the town with numerous wooden bridges built across it. I decided that we should walk along the river to the base of the hot springs to see how much they cost and see if it was worth coming back later to take a swim. What we didn’t realize was that when you hike up a 45-degree hill for 10 minutes, you don’t much feel like getting in hot water afterwards. More like a cold shower. But since the town was known for the hot springs and I really wanted a picture of the bridge inside the springs, we decided to come back later for a swim. I don’t think Gary was too happy about it, as he was gasping for air, but hey, it’s good exercise.

We walked all the way back down the hill, looking at numerous trinkets and doohickeys along the way, but we didn’t really buy anything because the prices were ridiculously high, probably because we were in a solely tourist town. After I offered some of my ice cream to a scary statue of a native woman, we found Jamie wandering in the town square and decided to take a walk to the Ruin Bridge that we saw a sign for earlier in our exploration. Gary and Joyce decided to rest instead of take on the 1.7 KM journey. I figured that since we didn’t hike the 42 KM Inca Trail, then we were inclined to hike this small feat.

We actually made it .4KM before a tour bus stopped and told us to hitch a ride. The driver asked where we were going and we told him the “Ruin Bridge”. It took a few tries for him to understand what we meant because we were walking on the road that lead up to Manchu Picchu and most people who hop on that bus go all the way up the hill to the ruins. Not many want the suspension bridge at the bottom on the hill that is fairly new and only called “Ruin Bridge” because it is at the base of Manchu Picchu. The driver let us off with a polite wave and we were slightly disappointed at our bridge. But it was suspended over the river and gave a wonderful view of the Valley.

We decided that since we were down at the Bridge we should explore and see what else was around. We took the road to the right and started walking. A few yards in front of us was the beginning of a very long staircase made of rocks that lead all the way up to Manchu Picchu. We found out later that the staircase hike was suppose to take an hour to reach the top, but considering it takes the buses 30 minutes to drive the switchbacks, I wasn’t so sure. I also didn’t much feel like finding out as I’d had enough of stairs for a while. Beyond the staircase was a museum accompanied by a Botanical Garden. We all pretended to not have read the sign stating the garden was included in the expensive museum entry fee and ventured into the uneven brush waiting for someone to tell us to leave or pay. We attracted the attention of two museum employees, but they just watched us for a bit before wandering away. I think they don’t get very many people where they’re located and they probably figured we couldn’t do any harm looking at their over grown mess of Botanical plants covered in spiders and other creep crawlies.

There were numerous signs telling what all the dead or dying bushes we were looking at were called, but it still didn’t help us much. Some bananas fascinated Robby, maybe because they grow upside down, and Jamie liked the fact that we found some clothes neatly folded at the base of a cliff leading to the river. The Garden was a perfect setting for Jurassic Park 4 or any of the bad SciFi movies involving ominous, gloomy jungle settings. I tried to get the others to pretend we were being chased by a deadly creature, but they looked at me like I was nuts.

We made it back to town with a few hours to spare before meeting with The Loudes Trek guide who was to tell us how our Manchu Picchu trek would work. The only reason we even knew about the meeting was that we had spotted Ian earlier in the day and he told us they would be meeting later on in the evening. He didn’t know that we would be traveling with his tour group for Manchu Picchu. But then we didn’t know much when we hopped on the Train to Aguas Calientes. Paul just told us people would meet us when we arrived on the train and then we would go from there. We decided to drink a few beers looking out at the ruins from Gary’s balcony before starting the long hike up to the Hot Springs before the meeting.

The hot springs turned out to be swimming pools filled with cold to luke-warm sulfur water. A bunch of kids were chilling in the pools near the base of the springs, while the majority of the adults hung out in the center pool, which turned out to be the warmest at about 70 degrees. This was not what I had planned when I wanted to take a relaxing bath in natural springs. We floated around in the murky water for a bit before noticing a group of 50 or so school children climbing their way up the hill to the springs. Then we decided it was time to head back. We rinsed off at an out door shower that turned out to pour extremely hot water. Now why wasn’t this shower tap hooked into the swimming pools? At least the sulfur water was good for my skin.

At 6:00pm, the seven of us milled around our hotel lobby waiting for the Lourdes Trek people to show up and start the meeting. At 6:15pm I suggested that we venture to the hotel Ian was staying at because they might be having the meeting there. Turns out I was right and that the poor Lourdes Trek leader had no idea we were coming. We showed him the letter we were handed before we left Cusco that stated him as our guide. He finally accepted this and told us how the following day would go. Since Jamie, Robby, and I were the only ones from the Cusco people wanting to get up extremely early, 4:00am, and hike Waynapicchu with the rest of the Lourdes trek people, we got different instructions.

Everyone but the “Old Folks” would be meeting at the bus stop at 4:30am to wait in line for an hour to catch the very first bus up the hill to Manchu Picchu. From there, we would race to the gate entrance of Waynapicchu to secure one of the 400 tickets that allow you to hike the Inca mountain. They can only allow so many people on Waynapicchu a day as to try and preserve the ruins for a few more years and it is a narrow pathway up to a single house on top of the mountain. Robby and I figured that we needed to prove to ourselves that we hiked some of Manchu Picchu, the Inca trail, and so we decided to go for it. The “Old Folks” would be coming later and meet us at a predetermined meeting place so we could begin the tour of the ruins.

After the meeting, the “Old Folks” went to have dinner by themselves, while Robby, Jamie and myself went to hang out with the Lourdes Trek crew who turned out to be people from the 18-35 year old Tucan Travel group. They were all very nice and if not, a little crazy. They’d been traveling together for the last 7 weeks and we definitely a party bunch. But it was a nice reprieve to talk with people are own age. We ended up walking up and down the town hills looking for a good place to eat, or rather, drink, according the Lourdes Trek crew. Robby and I just wanted the bet deal on food and they wanted the best deal on drinks. We ended up getting the drink deal because the pesto pasta I got was some sort of green slime paste tasting like Oregano and moth balls over under cooked linguini. I ended up eating Robby’s dinner. Jamie ended up with a random bug in her enchilada. She wasn’t hungry after that, By 11:00pm we said goodbye to the people because we really wanted a few hours to sleep if we were going to be any good hiking tomorrow. We agreed to meet Jamie in the morning and walk over to the bus stop.

4:00am came all too quickly, but since we didn’t get a good night’s sleep, more like a refreshing power nap, we were ok. The trek leader told us we needed to be at the bus stop early because the line to get on the bus would be very long. When we arrived, we were literally the first people at the stop. I was starting to believe the leader was full of shit, but within 15 minutes the line of people was starting to stretch up the hill towards the hot springs. 5:30am finally came and we boarded the bus. It left the stop when only our tour group was on it, which was weird before they were suppose to fill up. We stopped a mile down the road and ended up picking up the rest of the Younger Tucan group, the people who had hiked the Inca trail. Apparently they hiked really fast and made it to Manchu Picchu the previous evening. Usually we would be meeting the Inca trek people inside the ruins later in the day. A random dog also decided to board the bus with the extra people. 30 minutes later, we were getting our tickets stamped and rushing through the ruins Waynapicchu’s entrance.

I really wanted to take pictures of Manchu Picchu before the tourist over crowded the place, but the people I was following had other ideas. I got off a few blurry shots while running up flights of stairs and across stone walkways. Eventually we made it to the gate and could take a breather. The ticket issuer for Waynapicchu wouldn’t be arriving for another hour, so we had time to finally take in the sites. Machu Picchu is not nearly as big as I had it expected it to be, but it was non-the-less impressive. The city was built as a temple/ritual place that was between the Sacred Valley and the Lost City of the Incas. The bottom part of Manchu Picchu was where the villagers lived and the higher up areas were for rituals. When Manchu Picchu was discovered in 1911 by Spanish Explorer Hiram Bingham, he asked the local nomads currently living there, “what is the name of this city?” The locals didn’t know. Bingham asked what they called the mountain, “Manchu Picchu,” they said and so the name of the ruin was christened.

The Waynapicchu ticket guy finally showed up and we were given the 2nd time slot to climb the mountain – 10am-1pm. We all walked back through ruin and up a rather large stone staircase, mirroring farming and structural tiers to the house at the top of the hill where we would begin the tour of Manchu Picchu. Along the way I ran into the “Old Folks” and told them where our meeting spot would be. It was quite a strenuous hike and I’m not sure how the Inca’s did it. They either have extremely large lungs to make up for the lack of oxygen 1100 feet into the sky or they were very fit. Too bad they weren’t smart enough to invent escalators.

As the Tour Guide told us about Manchu Picchu, the morning fog started to creep down and over the ruins. By 7 am, I could see about 20 feet in front of me. I have to admit that fog covered ruins are very spooky, but fascinating looking, but I was also extremely worried that I had finally made it to Manchu Picchu and all my pictures would show was a fog covered building. I was also at one of the highest places in Manchu Picchu and I wanted a picture of the lay out of the entire place, so the fog had better clear the fuck up. Luckily, as the guide told us about the rock quarry and how the Inca’s built this magnificent city from the stones in front of where we were standing, the fog lifted. Rays of sun poked through the early morning clouds and illuminated the stone village below.

Our tour lasted for about two hours, giving us an hour to wander on our own before the hike to Waynapicchu. All we knew of Waynapicchu was that it was a mountain that over looked the city of Manchu Picchu and that there was a house built on top of it. It was said that there was a great view at the top. I think the house was built to house the look out guard who was on alert for dangers, although, Manchu Picchu being hidden way up on a large mountain, it’s hard to imagine many dangers. But considering the Inca’s vanished after 500 years, maybe they had something to be worried about.

Finally it became our turn to hike Waynapicchu. For some reason, Jamie stayed with us as we huffed and puffed our way up the small mountain. The hike was suppose to take an hour, but no one told us it would be a lot of uneven rocky steps that were extremely steep in some places. As we neared the top of the mountain we had to climb up and through a small cavern that I’m sure a person weighing over 210 pounds would have a little bit of trouble squeezing through. When we finally made it to the top, it was not at all like I thought it would be. I thought there would be a flat plateau with the house near the middle. Instead, there was a pile of jagged rocks with the house a 50 yards below. All the other people who had hiked up the mountain were sitting on the rocks looking out at the spectacular view of the valley below and Manchu Picchu in the distance. There was one rock that jetted out like the “Lion King” rock where we all stood to take pictures because Manchu Picchu was stretched out below it.

When we recovered our breaths enough to hike back down, we crawled down a steep rock face before wandering around the house. A very simple 2 story house missing its roof, but built in a great location, if you didn’t mind the hike up to it. To get back down to the trail, we had to climb, or rather, crawl on our butts, down a series of tightly spaced steps leading down a 85 degree slope. I really need to look up how many people just happen to “fall off” Waynapicchu each year. It’s a little dangerous to climb up and down and in America there would be some serious railings installed along the hillside or people would just be handed binoculars and told to look up. Speaking of binoculars, the Peruvian government is in talks now about preserving Manchu Picchu and by preserving the ruin, I mean, closing it to the public. They will probably let rich people wander the ancient steps for a high price, but normal people, like myself, will only get to view the city from a set of binoculars. It’s said that this will most likely happen within the next 10 year, so if you’ve ever wanted to see the ruins, you should make plans to go soon.

By the time that we landed on solid ground in Manchu Picchu, we were exhausted and very sweaty. We had considered hiking back up to the house we had started the tour at to get the “typical Tourist shot of Manchu Picchu”, but that was out of the question now. All I wanted was a cool drink and a shower. We sat in the shade for a bit truly deciding if we had seen all there was to see of the ruin before deicding, that yes, we were done and ready to go back to town.

Since we no longer had a hotel room to wash up in (we were catching a bus back to Cusco later that evening) we found a place that made us strawberry milkshakes and chilled out. We met the other Tucan group later in the day and hung out with them for a bit before they caught their train back to Cusco. We were on a later train. Eventually it was time to go and we were all a little thankful, if not, just to have a place to sleep for a few hours. Robby and I go to sit with Joan and Dale on the train and we talked about our experiences at Manchu Picchu. Everyone thoroughly enjoy the ruins. When we were back in Cusco we settled into our old hotel rooms, showered, and went to bed.

Robby and I woke up early to get breakfast before we headed to Puno. This would be the first time that we would be riding on Jumbo, the big yellow Tucan school bus. Since the bus sat about 40 people and there were only 19 of us, we all got our own row of two seats. Comfortable enough to try and sleep for a few extra hours. We stopped for lunch on the side of the road in a dusty gully. Paul and a few of the other prepared a lunch of sandwiches and fruit while Robby and I looked around. We noticed a little girls that had come to sit near us. No one else seemed to see her and she looked hungry, so Robby made her a sandwich and handed her some fruit. After that, other people from the group randomly handed her other bits of food. I think she was very happy.

We finally got on the road again and made it to Puno in the late afternoon. Paul gave us a tour of the small town and then set us loose to enjoy the night. We would be traveling to Amanti Island in the morning. Puno is a small town resembling Trujillo and next to Lake Titicaca. Titi and Caca are two Ayranda (the original language of the Incas) words that mean Puma and Great. If you take a picture of the Lake and flip it upside down, it vaguely resembles a Puma with Puma at its tail. Hien, Robby and I went to explore the main tourist street of Puno and buy more souvenirs (because we apparently didn’t have enough). Robby also went to call American Airlines. We had recently learned that Bolivia was having a small Civil War and that flights were being canceled. American Airlines said that they were not canceling their flights, but redirecting them and to call back in a few days to see if anything changed. This made us feel a 100 times better as we didn’t want to be strained in Bolivia during a war.

Back to wandering. Hien, Robby, and I had a nice dinner at a restaurant that seemed to cater to rich, snobby people and for some reason we seemed to be the attention grabbers of the place. For no reason people would give us weird looks. It could’ve been because we were younger than everyone in the place by a good 15 years or that everyone in the place was just plain rude. It would have been awesome to start a food fight, but I don’t think the others would have agreed with me. Oh well. After dinner had a drink with Gary and Joyce before retiring for bed. I think I was still exhausted from hiking around Manchu Picchu.

We got up early because we were taking a boat ride to the Floating Islands of Uros. The floating islands are small thickets of water reeds tied together to create a platform that you can walk on. There are over 100 floating islands still in Peru that have Quechua people living on them. Many of the people survive by making arts and crafts, food, clothing, etc. and then trading them with the different villages on the other islands. A few of the islands, like the one we were going to visit, allow for tourism. For three months a year, boatloads of annoying tourist come to ogle and snap pictures of these people, which I find slightly sad. I know that the Quechua people rely on the money they earn during the months of tourism, but the fact that they have to put themselves out on exhibit is just wrong and the fact that us, as tourist, will get to experience what it is like for them living on the islands, but they will never get to experience what it is like to be a tourist – to travel, see other countries. They’ll forever be bartering and staying with their families. It’s all a little depressing.

Sorry about the rant. Sometimes it gets to me how so many people don’t get to experience even them simplest of things like going to school or eating different kinds of food each night while others get to freely travel between worlds, tasting and experiencing everything. So, we all exited the hotel lobby and were greeted by 8 rickshaw type carts. Paul had arranged for them to take us to the boat pier. I hopped in one of the rickshaws with Hien and then we proceeded to race to the pier, coming up even with Robby and Ian a few times before eventually passing them.

When we made it to the pier there was a small market where we all shopped around to find things for our host families that we would be staying with on Amanti Island. We were asked to spend about 10 Sols each on things for the family. Robby and I bought pasta and milk and then toothbrushes and toothpaste because we were told not to buy candy since the people don’t go to the dentist very often. We figured we would help them prevent cavities. Hien wanted to buy her family a soccer ball because she figured that she would get a family with kids. It turned out that she ended up staying with us and our host family and we had kids, but I’ll get to that later.

We had about an hour boat ride before arriving at the reed islands. As we approached them on the boat they looked like a film set. A bright brown color to the reeds with the huts and boat all built out of the same substance. The Quechua women were all lined up on the arriving side of the island, dressed in bright pinks and yellow looking like mini Umpalumpas await our boat to dock. Four of the women, all about 5 feet tall, pulled our boat to shore and guided us to a row of sitting reeds. They put on a mini demonstration of how they built their islands and lived on them with a mini play about the bartering with other islands. After the play we all got divided into groups and ushered into the Umpalumpas houses. Their huts were single roomed reed buildings containing a bed and some hooks on the wall for clothes. Very minimalist.

Our hsot grabbed Robby and started to dress her in the Quechua outfits. She approached me with the brightly colored clothing, but I refused, instead, opting to take lovely pictures of Robby and the others who were slowly coming out of the nearby huts dressed similarly. I now had some great blackmail pictures to go with an awesome story. After they change of clothes we all were encouraged to look at the crafts the Quechua people had on display and strongly encouraged to buy something as this was the last month of tourism for the people and they would need money to survive on for the coming months. You got to love prearranged tours and their encouragement to support the locals. Sometimes I don’t mind giving money to people, but I don’t want to feel obligated to do so. I’d rather do it out of the kindness of my heart (and yes, sometimes I have a heart).

We stayed on the island for a little while longer, looking at arts and crafts and taking a small boat ride around the island in a reed boat before continuing to Amanti Island. After 3 more hours, we docked at the bottom of the small island and all proceeded to climb to the first landing and meet our new host families. The “mothers” had all gathered to greet us and then take us to their homes to get settled in and have lunch. Robby, Hien, and I were given over to the care of Celya. She said hello and proceeded to walk up the hilly terrain to the houses in the distance. We had to stop several times to catch our breaths, as we weren’t used to the altitude. As we were crossing a small gorge, a small boy came bounding along to greet us, putting us all to shame. We later found out he was Celya’s five year old son, Ruy. Her daughter, Luz (8 years old), was still at school.

Our family turned out to live in the outskirts of town. We were in the middle of the island, but on the side, last house before some trees. It was a two-storey house with an external kitchen and out house. The house was made from mud bricks, but was surprisingly sturdy. The only fault was the kitchen as it had bad ventilation so when you cooked food in the fireplace, all the smoke would bellow into the kitchen, rather than outside. Slightly dangerous with CO2 and all.

All of the people on Amanti Island spoke Quechua, a few spoke Spanish, and I think about one person spoke English. Since we were given only a sheet of paper listing how to say basic things in Quechua, we had to rely on Robby’s broken Spanish and charades to communicate with our family and the other villagers. After we had settled in, we asked if we could help Ceyla and were rewarded with two dull knives and a bowl of potatoes. While Robby and I tried not to cut ourselves, Hien found our troubles entertaining enough to record on her video camera. About halfway through cutting the potatoes, Luz came home. She watched us for a bit with keen interest,

After we managed to peel all our potatoes without cutting ourselves too many times, we figured we would entertain the children while Ceyla finished lunch. We tried to play numerous games, such as Cat’s Cradle, jump rope, and piggy back rides, before eventually doing jumping photos. At first the children had no idea what we wanted them to do, but once they saw Hien jump and we showed them how it looked on the camera, we couldn’t get them to stop jumping. They loved seeing themselves on the photo cameras and the video camera. It was kind of cute, but got quite exhausting.

After a while Ceyla called us into the kitchen to eat lunch. She had made a really good vegetable soup and then potatoes and some sort of cheese that we at first mistook for bread. The meal was very good, except there are only so many potatoes I can eat. As we later learned, the Amanti people eat a lot of potatoes. After lunch we volunteered to wash the dishes, but no one showed us how and so we were pouring water on them from a gas can and mixing in some substance we assumed was soap. I guess the Quechua people are easy going when it comes to maintaining cleanliness of items.

Later in the day Ceyla took us to the soccer arena to hang out with the other tourist on the island. We had to walk up hill for about 20 minutes before reaching the field and at that point I didn’t much care for playing soccer before I found my breath again. I don’t know how the Quechua people do I, but I don’t think it is natural to be able to breath normally 12000 feet into the air. The soccer field was a concrete rectangle about 3/4 the size of a normal soccer field. There were bleacher seats on both sides with numerous other tourist watching the current soccer game or talking amongst themselves. We found our tour group and join them in watching the game.

A little while later the people playing soccer asked if anyone wanted to sub in and I volunteered, along with Ian. We seemed to be the only ones that wanted to play from our tour group. The teams playing currently were locals vs tourist, although most of the tourist looked to be large German men that knew how to kick a ball. I made it about a minute into the game before taking a ball to the face. It hurt like hell, but I was determined to stay in the game and prove I still knew how to play the sport. I managed to play in about three games, lasting an hour and a half. I even got to play goalie for a bit, but after the four goal got past me, I decided to give up the position. Robby even joined in on the fun and did surprisingly well. Actually, way better then me. She could at least stop some of the big guys while they did the two-step around me.

At about 6pm, Ceyla came to get us and take us back to her house for dinner. We were hungry, but we didn’t really want to climb all the way back down the hill to her house, just to come back up in a few hours for the community dance they were throwing for us. But, as we had no choice, we followed obediently. Nothing like a lot of exercise at high altitude to stir up an appetite.

Dinner consisted of more soup and potatoes. I don’t think the potatoes would have tasted so bad if they’d had flavor, but they were boiled potatoes in a bowl. After dinner we were all forced to don Quechua clothes for the dance. It wouldn’t have been so bad had we not had to wear three skirts, two shirts and a wrap around cloth that made you feel like you were wearing a corset and then hike back up the hill to the dance while trying to catch our breaths in the tight material. We also got black head coverings to wear that made us look like Umpalumpa nuns. Very appealing. At least all the other tourists looked he same, so we weren’t too much out of place.

We joined in on a few of the Quechua dances, which resembled 1800 style square dancing. Everyone holds hands and skips around in a big circle, changing directions occasionally, and then dancing through each others intertwined hands. It was fun, but tiring ‘cause the music went on for 10-15 minutes at a time. Eventually it stopped and Quechua people put on a mini dance demonstration to show us how the dances really went. We danced until about 10:00pm before everyone said good night and he headed back to our house for bedtime.

Ok, I sick of writing and I really don’t think anyone reads this blog anymore, so I will say goodbye for now and maybe I’ll finish the last chapter of this journey.

Lima again all the way through Cusco.

I bet you all have been anxiously awaiting this new entry (wink, wink). so, we arrived in Lima at about 6 in the morning, tired and cranky. It didn't help us any that the hotel wouldn't let us into a room without a voucher that Tucan travel was supposed to have given us, but that we couldn't find. After rechecking our emails, we found the voucher and were allowed to rest. I desperately wanted a shower, being on a smelly bus for 10 hours will do that to you. After i had gotten everything ready for the shower and was about to turn the water on, i realized that the lights didn't work. i guess i should have suspected something when we walked down the half lit hallway and our room happened to been right at the start of the darkened half. Needless to say, i didn't feel like trying to find my shampoo in the dark, so we called down to reception who sent up a porter that messed around with the circuit breakers for a bit before saying, "un momento" and scurrying away. robby and i waited in the doorway until he can back with a smaller guy who effectively turned on the hall lights and every other light in the place, but not our room. i think it was the tiredness that made the situation that much more entertaining. The poor porter would flip a switch and yell to us, "lampo?" and we'd say, "nope." eventually the front desk asked us if we would like to switch rooms and i said , "yes, unless you have some candles."

Refreshed by a hot shower and a little nap, robby and i went to wander the city again. i really wanted to find Arroz con Leche which is like a rice puddling, but i took a wrong turn somewhere and couldn't find the place Oriana had taken us to the last time we were in Lima. we ended up at a bakery where you ate on top of the pastry counter. very odd. Of course i wasn't satisfied with a small empanada, so we munched on some churrios from a street vender and eventually found a small food stand inside the central market that sold sandwiches. the central market is the place where all the Peruvians buy their good. it's stocked with aisles of toiletries, bags of grains, rows of hanging animal flesh (that really stink and make me want to permanently become a vegetarian), and numerous other goods. our food stand was a small square with three stools on two of the sides and two people behind the counter making drinks and sandwiches. it's the kind of place that most Gringos would steer clear of for fear of bad bowel syndrome. But not Robby and I. It said 1 Sol hot chocolate and we were sold. i got the sandwich as a side note after spotting it in the hands of my seat mate who was very sweet and a little entertainment by the fact that two white girls had sat down next to her. the hot chocolate turned out to be the best we'd get in Peru and the cheapest.

At 4pm we waited in the lobby of the hotel to meet the rest of the Tucan Travel group that we would be with for the remainder of our journey through Peru. It turned out that there were only 8 of us staying in Lima and that we would meet the rest of the group when we flew to Puerto Maldanado the following day. Miriam, the local tour guide, took us, the 5 Brits (Ana, Lauren, Andrew, Claire, and Sarah), and Hien (The Vietamese Aussie) on a tour of Downtown Lima (most of the places that we had already been, but whatever) showing us the sights. We ended up walking through The Wall Park which has a piece of the wall that used to surround the rich section of Lima about 60 years ago. One King built it and then another ordered it destroyed, but the destroyer was lazy and decided to only tear down 90% of the wall, therefore leaving the part in the park. The Peruvian King wasn't happy at first, but now Peruvians are happy because they have a piece of their history still around.

There was a small carnival happening at the park and i found my Arroz con Leche, which made me extremely happy. i tried get the others to eat some, but they looked scared. Afterall it was their first time in Peru and some of their first times ever traveling and they were sketchy about eating things from venders off the streets. Robby and i don't care anymore. if the locals can eat it, then so can we. if we're going to get sick so be it. so far the only food that has made us sick had been the tourist restaurant food. at the carnival there was also two small (about the size of a large hamster) fuzzy blobs moving about in the distance. one had on a sweater that was way too large for it. i made everyone go see what they were. they were the cutest, smallest puppies i'd ever seen. one looked like a pint size Chow. it just sat on the ground and stared at you like you were an alien, while the other one resembled a mini guerrilla because it had a smushed nose and walked all bone legged. it was the cutest thing. we wanted to keep them, but their 7 year old owner was having none of that.

Our tour ended at a semi expensive (for Peru) restaurant. Apparently our tour would only be going to medium-high priced touristy restaurants and if Robby and i wanted to keep eating cheaply we were going to be eating by ourselves. so it was camaraderie or cheap. we chose to go with the group. I forgot that earlier on the tour we spotted Pervian doughnuts and as we were waiting for them to cook, one of the chefs decided he wanted to show us a church he looked after. it happened to be a burnt and broken down church that i found very gothic and a great place to film a scary religious movie. they had a door to the catacombs and a path that lead all the way into parliament. it was very cool.

We arrived in the lobby at six thirty in the morning the following day to catch our 8 thirty flight to the Amazon. Miriam said that the bus would be arriving then to take us to the airport, but as seven thirty rolled around all of us started to get a little antsy. we had at least a 20 minute drive and then the line to check our luggage and to pay the airport tax before boarding the plane. at ten to 8 we found out that the taxi driver had a family emergency and so they would be sending a new taxi as soon as they could. we got to the airport at 8:15am and did the whole Home Alone thing of running through the terminal going, "hold the plane!". But first we were refused access to the bag check and had to carry on all our huge backpacking backpacks that would have not been a problem had most of us not had knives on us. the security people confiscated all of them and dropped them into a giant glass box piled halfway full of knives, scissors, nail clippers, etc. it was a little sad and upsetting, but we managed to make our flight, stuffing our backpacks into the overhead bins with the help of other passengers and snickering laughs.

We briefly landed in Cusco to pick up the rest of our group and some other passengers before continuing on to the jungle. both flights lasted a total of 2 hours and 15 minutes. Once off the plane we all met everyone else from the trip. There were about 9 others that had all been traveling lower Peru together for the last week. They all seemed to be a nice big family and now us 8 had to infiltrate their little clique. It turned out not to be too hard. everyone was extremely nice. There were two older Canadian couples- Joyce and Gary and Joan and Dale, the late 20's Aussie couple- Neil and Alexi, the Kiwi Jamie, the Brit Ian, and the Canadian Maureen. Our tour leader was Paul.

We were all stuffed into a mini bus by the Amazon tour guides, Two young ladies, Natalia and Erika, who gave us some background information on the jungle and the city of Puerto Maldanado. Puerto Maldanado is a small city where many people live out in the boonies and work off the land. It's on the cusp of the Jungle and the farther you venture into the jungle the less people, electricity and normal amenities you'll find. The town is the main place to buy and sell vegetables, spices, household items. The main transportation is motorbikes. there were so many that it puts Sturgis to shame.

First stop on the tour was the Guides office in town. The 8 of us from Lima had to ditch our big backpacks and only take with us a small daypack because we would be going on a boat to the campsite and it couldn't carry much. Since robby and i didn't know that we would be needing a small overnight bag for a lot of the Tucan Tour places, we ended up becoming the "bag ladies" and using shopping bags from the local market. It looked a little silly, but did the trick. Natalia and Erika broke us up into two groups and took us around the local market pointing out their native fruits- a papaya thing that tastes like semi sweet water, and various nuts and grains. Robby and i ended up purchasing a huge container of candy coated Brazil nuts for 4 Sols (about 1.2$). great deal. After everyone had stocked up on goodies for the hour and a half bus ride through the jungle and then an hour and a half boat ride to the nature reserve we would be camping at, we loaded back on the bus and started our journey.

The Amazon is totally not what i expected. When i think jungle, i think monkey's swinging from vines, Tarzan, wild animals scurrying about, thick brush... but this part of the jungle looks like a bunch of random trees and bushes that don't seem to fit together all growing wildly for 100's of miles. most of the trees were brownish, like the last of the summer season. i wanted to take photos, but everything seemed so ugly that i couldn't find the right shot. a little disappointing, but all was made up for in the day to come. The bus parked at the edge of a river where all of us loaded into a long canoe like boat with an awning. It was a little cozy, but very relaxing.

Once at the camp, we had to hike up a small, but steep hill that opened to a grassy null surrounded by a series of wooden cabins. We were all lead into the dinning cabin for a welcome drink of the nasty local papaya fruit and an introduction to the camp. We were staying in a nature reserve where we would go on a few hikes and learn about the animals. there was no electricity, so we got to walk around with flashlights and candles. There were mosquito nets in all the rooms, so we would be ok as long as we put on bug spray and slept in the nets.

Erika said that we would all be going on a night walk to see what nocturnal creatures we could find in the jungle and if we hurried getting settled into our cabins, we could watch the sunset at one of the lookout points. We were given our cabin keys and set out to inspect our new home. The cabins were a wooden buildings consisting of four side-by-side 2-3 bed rooms. Robby and I got the corner room, but it didn’t really matter as the building was made from logs tied side by side and so you could hear everything in and out of the rooms and see some things through the cracks in the logs. Very rustic, but definitely not for the people wanting privacy.

Everyone met back up at the dinning room after 20 minutes to begin the 5 min walk to the edge of the cliff. We arrived just as the sun was descending behind a small hill. Since there isn’t much pollution in the Jungle, the colors of the sky weren’t too fantastic, but the fact that I was watching the sun disappear around a bend in the river with a caiman (small alligator animal) chilling on a rock and monkey’s swinging through the trees behind me, kind of made up for the lack of colors. I was in the Jungle…the Amazon jungle!

When the last of the sun could be seen, we divided into three groups of 6. Robby, Ian, Paul, Hien, Maureen, and me wandered into the unknown with Natalia. We were on the lookout for spiders, frogs, creepy crawlies, monkeys, tapins, and anything else that might happen to cross our path. Natalia had grown up in the Amazon and so she knew the sounds of numerous creatures and where to find them. We saw a bunch of spiders, including very colorful ones. It’s said that the more colorful an animal, the more dangerous. The color is to attract prey and then when it comes close, the predator strikes. We spotted a lime green spider blending in to a green leaf. Very pretty, but I wasn’t going to get too close.

Our favorite find in the Jungle was little froggy’s that like to hide in the km marking poles. The poles stuck into the ground and had a round opening of 1/2 inch across. We would shine our flashlights into the opening and two large eyes would stare back. We found a pole that had two little froggy’s in it. I don’t know how they found it comfortable to squish on top of each other, but they didn’t seem bothered.

Natalia also thought it wise to inform us about the giant black ants that are worse than army ants and about an inch long. She said that if one of these suckers bites you it is an intense pain that can lead to temporary paralysis and a huge welt. I tucked my pant legs into my socks and found myself countlessly shining my flashlight up and down my legs looking for any unwanted visitors. I had a small scare with a giant flying something or other, but it was quickly flung into the oblivion.

We ended our night hike an hour or so later and went to have a Jungle feast. I have to say that the Jungle food was one of the best dishes I’d had this whole trip, but that could be because I’d had chicken and French fries for the past 9 days. There was soup, then a main dish and then desert – fruit salad. Of course the nasty papaya thing was included, so I decided I didn’t need desert. Everyone talked about the animals that they all got to see in the jungle. One group waited for a tarantula to emerge from it’s webby home. She did, along with a few of her babies. I would have loved to have seen that as I like larger spiders, but I got to see the little froggy’s and they didn’t. We all talked for another 1/2 hour before retiring back to our cabins. We had to get up at 4:30am to start a 5km nature hike to a Lake. I tucked myself into the mosquito net, trying to get it securely under me, before drifting off.

4:30am came too soon, but I doubt I would have been able to sleep any longer as a whooping monkey decided to be really chatty around 5am. If I had a sling shot I would have probably tried to kill it. At least there was coffee to settle my nerves a bit and wipe the dew from my eyes. The sun was just coming up and it was a relatively cool out. Robby, Hien, Gary, Joyce, and I ended up being in a group as Erika led us through the trees to the Lake. We spotted tucan (ominous of the trip?) chilling on a tree branch way off into the distance. We all need binoculars to see it, but Erika had managed to spot it without them. She’s definitely a Jungle person. A whole clan of little money’s resembling lemurs jumped across our path. We tried to take a good picture of them, but they stayed just outside my camera’s zoom range. I now have a picture of a Monkey butt, but you have to look closely to see anything other than dense foliage. A Tarpin ran across Erika and my path. It looked like a giant reddish blob.

We were first to arrive at the bird watching cabin set on the lake. We sat and had some snacks that Erika had brought with her. Gary decided that it was more beneficial to feed the piranhas with his crackers than to eat them. He had us throwing in bits and pieces so he could try and snap a picture of the flesh eating fishies, but they were too quick. Up, grab food, and gone again. I found it beneficial to eat my snacks, Robby’s snacks, a granola bar from Hien, and trail mix from Joyce. Apparently that 5 Km walk worked up an appetite in me. Everyone on the tour group teases Ian about eating enough food for 2-3 people, but now I think they are starting to believe he has some serious competition.

We sat and enjoyed the cool breeze and the serene lake for a bit before clamoring into a rickety canoe that was crawling with hidden spiders. As Erika paddled us out into the lake, I fretted about checking how close the spiders were to me. I could see a few crawling around the front of the boat (I was at the back), but for the most part, there weren’t any near me. Now, I don’t mind spiders if they stay to themselves, but I really don’t like the small ones because when they climb on you, you can’t feel them and half the time you can’t see them. I was trying to relax and enjoy the canoe ride, but the spiders had me a little on edge. About two were climbing on Erika, but she just said she didn’t care. I wish I was like her.

We floated close to the shore, checking the trees for birds and the rocks for Caimans. We spotted a couple birds in a tree up ahead, but they took flight as we approached. It could have been Gary and Joyce bickering about who had the best shot or it could be the fact that the ores made noise in the water. But we didn’t have to worry as we came across a tree full of turkey looking birds with yellow peacock looking heads. They just starred at us as we took pictures, to the point of annoyance. We wanted action photos, so we started to yell at them until they flew away. I now have a few ok shots of the in-flight birdies.

The sun was starting to get warmer and the other groups had now joined us at the bird watching post, so we decided to head back to camp. We said bye to the other groups who were now just starting their canoe adventures and ventured into the woods again. Erika was a fast walker, which didn’t bode too well for Joyce and Gary, who wanted to see some of the random insects, but I just wanted to sit in the shade and so I didn’t mind. We made it back to the dinning cabin about an hour before anyone else. We sat and chatted, waiting for the other groups to come back so we could discuss the animals that they saw, but what we didn’t realize is that some of the people had been back for a while and had already taken showers and cleaned up. By lunch time, we were the smelly group of the bunch. Oh well, I had planned on playing soccer with the locals after lunch and so I didn’t really want to take a shower and then get all dirty again anyhow.

After lunch we had about 4 hours of free time. The locals wouldn’t be available to play soccer until four, so that left me 2 1/2 hours to reads or rest. I managed a small nap before coming outside to chill with Jamie and Hien. I felt really clammy, so I ended up taking a shower and by the time the guys started to play soccer, I didn’t really want to. I felt clean and content. It wasn’t until everyone I passed said, “hey, I thought you were going to play soccer?” that I decided I had to. I had put up such a stink about it, I now had to follow through.

Robby and Hien decided to join me. We walked out onto the field and were joined my three of the locals. It was a three on three game for a while. Robby, Hien and a local VS me and 2 locals. They decided to play full field instead of half, so by 5 minutes in I was very tired and my clean shirt wasn’t so clean anymore. Sara came out and played for about 8 minutes after Hien mysterious left the field. Our game last about 20 minutes with all the girls scoring a goal and everyone in camp cheering us on. Joan said that just the fact that we got out there and attempted to play was a great achievement. I guess I was happy I had played after all. I later found out that Hien realized too late that she should not eat before playing soccer. I still give her credit for playing a little bit.

After soccer we went on a Caiman hunting boat ride. Caimans are nocturnal, but if you shine a light in their eyes, they reflect back red, making them easy to spot. They are very sensitive to sound, so we had to all shut up and wait for Erika to spot a caiman with her flashlight. We managed to spot one large one out of the water, but as we approached in the boat it slid beneath the water. The four others that we managed to find were just eyes and part of a nose popping out of the river. If you didn’t know it was an animal, you would have though it a small dead tree branch floating on the surface. Many of the tour people thought it was still worthy of a picture and so the poor creature was not only frightened by our presence, but also probably blinded. I can’t wait for people to get their pictures back because they will probably be like, “why the hell did I take a picture of trees in a murky lake?”

We had a farewell buffet feast for dinner that night with some of the best vegetable dishes we’d ever had. Apparently Peru doesn’t believe in vegetables very much. Most of their diets consist of meat and potatoes. So, the fact that we got some nutrition, that actually tasted good, was amazing. Of course Ian had 2nds and thirds. I just wanted everyone’s desert cake. We all stayed up chatting for a bit before turning in early. It seems that every since I ended up in Peru I’ve gotten up really early, 4, 5, and 6 am and gone to bed around 9 or 10pm. I guess traveling changes your habits.

We awoke, had our coffee and said goodbye to the Amazon camp. Natalia, Erika and Listen (another camp guide) followed us all the way to the airport to say bye. It was a heartfelt goodbye and we took a group picture before boarding the small plane back to Cusco. I was a little worried before arriving in Cusco because Cusco was the start of the high elevation cities that we would be traveling through. Cusco lies at about 3200 meters high, roughly 10,500 feet. Since the air is thin people tend to get mass headaches and feel nauseous. I didn’t want that to happen. As it turned out, I was one of the lucky ones. Robby and Hien fell prey to Altitude Sickness while I seemed to gather crazy energy. I was all antsy and jumpy, but I would get out of breath quicker when climbing the hills of Cusco. Who ever thought of putting lots of stairs in a high elevation city was just cruel.

We put all our stuff into our hotel, located off the main square in Cusco, before taking an orientation walk with Paul. It was Robby, Hien and the five Brits that went on the walk as everyone else had already been in Cusco prior to the Amazon. Paul took us first to the Happy Plaza and then to the Weeping Plaza. Both looked like square parks with a fountain in the middle and stupid names. Not sure where the name comes from. When we were at the Main Plaza I decided that smiling, happy pictures were not going to cut it and so I made people do jumping pictures. Of course everyone starred at me like I was crazy, but after they saw how funny the first one Robby and I took, everyone wanted to be a part of the fun. We all realized Hien is a brilliant jumper as she got great height. She did a jumping picture with Paul where it looks like she’s kicking his ass and he’s flying backwards. Makes me laugh every time I see it.

Continuing on from our breathless fun, Paul decided we should climb a large hill of steps to get a grand view of Cusco. I think I was one of the only ones who made it up the hill still jubilant. Everyone else dragged himself or herself forward. The view was worth it though. Cusco is a city of red shingled roofed building spread across a vast valley and up unto the hillside. The Spanish invaded sometime in the Incan times and left their mark on the town square and numerous buildings. Paul decided that we should have lunch at 2Nations, a restaurant owned by an Aussie that came to Cusco, fell in love with it and stayed. The food was very good.

After the tour we all went our separate ways. Paul went back to the hotel to finish some paperwork, while the Brits went to find postcards and Robby, Hien and I went to look at all the souvenirs. Hien teaches little kids as a side job and so she wanted something special to give them. We came across small, and slightly hideous finger puppets in one store. Since they were only 1 sol each, after bargaining them down from 2 sols apiece, the storeowner spread them on a blanket on the floor for us to weed through. Hien only wanted Lions, tigers and bears or other “jungle” animals. I found a disturbing Spiderman and a freaky lady that I tried to sneak into Hien’s purchasing pile, but she found them and threw them back into the discard pile. She went from wanting 40 puppets to 60 to 80 to finally buying 107. We made the storeowner’s day with the purchase and the amusement of us on our knees picking through his supply.

When we got back to the hotel to tell people what we’d bought, Joan informed us that we got ripped off. We had apparently found the expensive shops and she had found the cheap market. Robby bought an Alpacka hat for 15 sols that was only 5-7 sols in the cheap market. Well, you have to learn some time about getting ripped off. We vowed to find the cheaper stores the next day to buy souvenirs for everyone back home.

By dinnertime Robby and Hien had succumb to altitude sickness and were in bed by 8pm. That left me hungry and without people to hang out with. I decided to chill with the “old folks” as I called them. They were Gary and Joyce and Joan and Dale. I liked the stories they told about the places they’d been in all their years traveling. They didn’t really have a plan on where to eat, so we hooked up with the British girls (Andrew was sick as well) and head to a place that said they had live music. We arrived to a near empty restaurant that was ecstatic to have us as patrons. They even went as far as to go outside and find a band to play for us inside. The music wasn’t so bad, but I resented the fact that they came around our table asking for tips afterwards.

The next day, Robby, Hien and I went to breakfast at a little place we found that sold crepes. Hien thought that Peruvian crepes would be like normal sized crepes and so she ordered two. When the first one came out it was huge and Hien asked the Waiter if it was both crepes made into one. The waiter said, “Yes.” As Hien was finishing the last bite of the crepe, that Robby and I had to help her eat, the waiter brought out another crepe. Apparently he didn’t understand her question before. He started subtly laughing at us as Hien’s mouth dropped open and her head shaking in bewilderment. We managed to get the crepe to go and it was an effective means to awaking Ian. Free food and he’s there. Since he was now awake, he willingly chose to coming shopping with us girls. Brave soul.

We all headed to the cheap market that Joan had told us about the previous day and discovered that everyone else was already there. We also discovered that we had to wear our backpacks on our fronts because Dale was almost pick pocketed by two old ladies. One lady pretended to pick lint off Dales arm while the other reached into his pants pocket for the wallet. The only reason they didn’t succeed is that the wallet was attached to a cord. Dale kind of just stared at the old ladies, but would you really want to hit a grandmother for trying to steal your wallet. He let them off with a stern warning about them being bad.

Robby stayed with Ian as he tried to find some warm gloves that weren’t too ugly while I helped Hien find a Traditional outfit. She was adamant about finding something that the locals wore for a Halloween costume, but everything the locals wore were layers of ill fitting skirts and shirts. Their dance outfits were comprised of brightly colored stitches in ill-conceived patterns. Truly ugly. Robby and I found numerous little gifts, including my new lime green and black stripped Alpacka sweater. I look like an escaped convict, but I can be easily spotted for the brightness of the green. It’s an awesome sweater.

After leaving the Market we wandered through the streets browsing many of the street vendors carts and looking for a hot chocolate shop. Robby and I had had some amazing hot chocolate in Peru and we wanted Ian and Hien to try it. They melt real Peruvian chocolate in milk and serve it piping hot. We eventually came to a hole in the wall bakery that had the drink as well as delicious looking cakes. One slice of cake was five layers high, so when we asked anyone if they wanted to split a piece, they all misinterpreted and so we ended up sitting at a two person table, crowded with 4 cups of chocolate or coffee, and three plates of cakes. Our chairs and backpacks stuck out in the walking path making the other customers stare at us. We asked why no one wanted to share our giant piece of cake and Ian said that, “woman always say they’ll share a piece of cake, just take a small bite, but next thing you know, the cakes gone and the woman’s like, ‘opps, I didn’t know I was that hungry.’” I guess he’s right.

Since we didn’t know where we were and we knew that we were trying to find another market off Ave del Sol, we asked the bakery lady where we were. She stared at our guidebook map for a bit before saying we were somewhere off the map and down. Lucky us to have wandered where the tour books don’t go. She pointed us back in the direction of town that we eventually headed toward, but not before first hiking the remainder of the hill we were currently on. We started up the hill because of a church we’d seen at the top and we were determined to see said church. Of course the church turned out to be a school, but we’d made it to the top of the hill with out too much loss of breath.

After a few jumping pictures, we were set to find the main section of town. We spent the next several hours jumping from small bazaar to small bazaar. They all sold the same junk: key chains, sweaters, pants, alpacka, hats, etc. If we bargained enough we got the right price, but even if we didn’t everything was incredibly cheap. We headed back to the hotel to drop off all our shopping bags and to figure out what we wanted to do next. Robby decided that she wanted a haircut and Hien wanted her legs waxed, so that left me and Ian wandering around the Main square and back up to the lookout point Paul had taken us to previously.

I had become fascinated by the doors and windows of Peru because of their beautiful brokenness. Most everything in Peru is damaged in someway, either slightly off kiltered or with a missing piece, yet still functional and in use. I stopped to take a picture of a spray painted window between a barbed wire fenced in alleyway. Ian looked at me like I was nuts and said that we were going to get mugged if we didn’t get a move on. The alley was between a drop off cliff above people’s homes and a school. We were perfectly safe, but I found his worrying amusing. Later Ian went on to tease me about taking pictures of doors. Every time we came across a weird door Ian would go, “hey Em, you want to take a picture of this?” Most of the time I would.

We met back up with Robby, Hien and a couple of the others for dinner. We ended up at this very nice restaurant with wooden tables outside. They served free Pisco Sours, the natural alcoholic drink of Peru. It tasted like a margarita, but a little tangier. I really liked them. Hien ended up ordering Alpacka and she let me try some. Yea, it’s gross, but probably not to you meat lovers. Tasted like salty pork.

We headed back to the hotel so everyone, but Robby, myself and Jamie could get a good nights rest. Everyone, but us and the “old folks”, were leaving to hike the Inca Trail or the Lourdes Trek the following morning. Robby and I had decided to skip the three-day trek for an extra couple of days to explore the archaeological sites surrounding Cusco. It was a slightly hard decision, as I had always wanted to hike the Inca Trail to say I had, but then I didn’t know the next time I would be in Cusco and there was so much I wanted to see. Jamie had missed the cut off to join the hike and so she was in Cusco like the rest of us.

As the hikers set out to trek, Jamie, Robby, Joyce, Gary and myself hopped on a river rafting tour. So I can’t say that I’ve hiked Manchu Picchu, but I can say that I river rafted through the river at the base of the mountain. We were in a group of 15, but us five got a raft to ourselves. There were three rafts in total. One raft we named Switzerland because they wanted to remain innocent in the water battles and mind their own business. Their rafting guide even threw up a white flag. The other raft was the evil raft. Their guide was intent on war. He would steer them towards our boats in hast. We were soaked within 5 minutes of being in the water. At least we had on skintight wetsuits that made everyone look like fat seals. They were also kind enough to supply us with red, blue and yellow designed water jackets that added to the illusion of us being seal parachutes. We didn’t look at all flattering and it didn’t help that my wetsuit had two big holes in the butt. Grrr.

We drifted down the river for a bit waiting for some rapids. We had thought the rapids would be class 3’s and 4’s (class one being still water, 2 – little bumps, 3 – we now have some white water, 4- avoid the rocks and try not to fall out, 5- always wear a helmet and hold on, and 6 – did he survive?) but they turned out to be 2’s and 3’s. The rapids were disappointing, but it was fun to be out on the water with other people and to try and avoid kamikaze rafters jumping into our raft from the evil raft and trying to pull us into the water.

After rafting ended at an abandoned looking house, we all scouted out spots to change back into our normal clothes. Robby unfortunately chose a spot right off the main road. Some random guy decided to walk extremely slow up the road that I went to find a new hiding spot. When we were all dressed and set to go, the guides told us we would have to hike up a 500-meter driveway because the bus couldn’t make it up the hill weighed down with people and gear. While waiting at the main road for the bus, Robby managed to capture a brilliant jumping photo of Gary, Joyce, Jamie and I in mid-flight between the rest of the rafters who were all stationary. Jamie did a Gene Kelly tap jump for me and then we were headed back to Cusco.

For dinner we had convinced Gary, Joyce and Jamie to come to a Vegetarian Japanese place. The place was cute, but I’m not sure Gary liked it. Since we were a group of five, the waitress told us to sit upstairs. Of course upstairs didn’t have chairs. We sat on pillows on the floor. Gary, all 6’2” of him, was not exactly comfortable. It didn’t help that our waitress had forgotten about us and I had to call down to her and say we were ready to order. I think it took us 45 minutes to get silverware and an hour to get drinks, but the food was good and I was entertained by the absurdity of the situations. After dinner, Jamie, Robby and I went to find desert and hot chocolate up the street. If you’re willing to eat in an off the wall local place, the food is cheap and usually delicious. For half the price of one of our meals that night, all three of us had cake and coffee.

Robby and I had organized a trip to see the Sacred Valley. Pisaq, and Ollanyantambo for the morning. Some tour lady brought us to a tour bus at 8:30 am and then proceeded to instruct the bus driver to drive in circles while she periodically jumped out to pick up more passengers. I think we passed our pick up spot four times. We wished we would have know so we could have slept in for an extra hour. As the tour bus started to fill up, we noticed that everyone was Spanish speaking. I really didn’t want to be on another all Spanish speaking tour. Three times was enough. Eventually the bus was filled and our tour guide started to talk. He was extremely happy that everyone spoke Spanish, that was until a couple of people pointed at us, and then he alternated between rapid Spanish that went on forever and a few sentences of English that if I wasn’t listening closely I would have missed.

As we drove out of town I learned about the height of Cusco and the basic animals that lived throughout the countryside. Our guide had a tendency to say the same thing over again, that by the time we came to Pisaq I could have been the tour leader in saying it’s 1 city within close proximity to three others all built on the side of a hill. We were going to spend an hour and a half walking to and around Pisaq before heading back to the bus.

Now I feel I should said that Peru is beautiful and filled with many amazing archaeological wonders, but it is a little irksome that because Cusco is the main city next to Peru’s largest tourist attraction, Manchu Picchu, it has the balls to charge a fortune to see said sites. Everywhere else in Peru, you just have to pay an entrance fee to the archaeological sites and museums, but in Cusco and the surrounding areas, you have to pay for a 1 day or 10 day tourist visa. So on top of the pricy entrance tickets to all the entrance sites, we had to pay 70 sols. If we wanted to see more of a particular site another day, we would have to pay another 70 sols, unless we brought the 10-day pass for 130 sols.

Now this fee wouldn’t have been too much of a problem had our tour actually allowed us to see the entirety of the sites we went to. Pisaq covers a good 1/2 mile of land and we saw about 1/4 of it’s town, not to mention, none of the surround ruins. When we went to Ollanyantambo, the city that I had planned to see instead of going on the Inca trail, we got to climb the giant steps to one of it plateaus so we could see a tall wall built by some indigenous group other than the Inca’s, who build Ollanyantambo, before climbing back down.

Ollanyantambo stretches pretty far up the hillside and then some on the opposite hillside. Practically halfway up the other hill’s side there is a two-story building that archaeologist believe was either a Church, school, hospital, jail, or storage unit. Hell, I don’t think anyone would go to a hospital that took a good 1/2 hour to hike to and most of the prisoners captured by the Inca’s were sacrificed to the Gods, so I’m pretty sure they didn’t need a jail. They might have stored food there as it was a good location with pristine climate control and maybe the children needed a little exercise before their lessons, but I doubt we’ll ever know for sure.

Last stop on the tour was supposed to be the ruins of Chinchero, a circular group of tiers, but it was actually the town of Chinchero where Quechua women made alpacka sweaters. We all crammed into a small hut where a group of Quechua woman showed us how they spun the alpacka wool into string and then used variously plants and even a bug, to dye the string. It was not a ruin, but interesting none the same. When it was over we were offered 15 minutes to look around the small room at their wares for sale. I would have bought something if the prices weren’t jacked up exceedingly high.

We ended the long day disappointed in not being able to see much of the ruins and having a vague idea of what we had seen. About a 3rd of the way through the day our tour guide had given up on relaying most of his information in English. There would be very long bouts of Spanish and a few sentences of English to accompany it that I strained to hear what other English speaking tour guides that were nearby had to say. Yeah, no more tours. Next time Robby and I are going to do the ruin thing on our own and maybe hire a local guide at the entrance,

We met up with Jamie for dinner and then a massage. Jamie had gotten one earlier and had found it extremely refreshing that I felt compelled to get one and I really don’t like to be touched much. We all ended up in one room together with three beds. We each had our own masseuse and an hour to be pampered. I had really wanted my back and shoulders worked on because they hurt the most from carrying my backpacking backpack, but for some reason the masseuse felt it necessary to pulverize my right calf for 15 minutes and then work her way up my thigh. I think by the time she was done with my legs, she had 10 minutes left for my upper body. It wouldn’t have mattered anyhow as her version of “strong massage” felt like a trickling stream – very soft and smooth. I wanted her to dig for fingers in and work out the knots, but that wasn’t going to happen. I ended the massage feeling just as tight as I started, excepted for a few added burses on my calves. Yep, I definitely hate massages.

Ok, I’m sure by now you’re exhausted from reading so much and on your second cup of coffee, so I will end here. Until next time, the Manchu Picchu adventure, take care.

still around

Sorry, I haven´t written in a while. Robby and I are fine. We´ve been busy traveling around and enjoying ourselves, so wanting to write mini novellas has not been at the top of our list of things to do. we will however continue the blog when we get back to the States or in Bolivia. Hope everyone is well and if anyone knows of a job for me, please let me know. Thanks.

A long Journey to explore... and read

Hi Folks,
Sorry for taking so long to write back. We've been traveling on buses for the better part of five days and when we finally get somewhere all we want to do is relax. So, i left off on the bus to Trujillo. The bus turned out to be really nice considering the price we paid for it. We were on the upper level of a double decker and our seats reclined about 120 degrees with leg rest. The bus had an attendant who passed out bread and some kind of roll thing and coffee before turning on the Inside Man in Spanish and disappearing until 8 am the next morning. I slept as well as one can on a bus where the seat goes back only so far and then has a tendency to spring forward for no apparent reason. But it beats paying for an extra night in a hotel and driving during the day when you could be out exploring the sites.

So, once in Trujillo we stood in the bus terminal looking like total tourist with our Peru Guide book out trying to figure out where we should spend the night. We decided on Casa de Clara because someone said it was good. The hostel was more like someones home with a lot of bedrooms. The owner is named Clara, but we only saw a Peruvian girl at the counter and a British guy named Michael that runs the place. Michael was really nice, but i think he's been in Peru too long and so he's started to maintain the Peruvian attitude of wearing the same clothes days on end and not understanding English anymore. When we went on a tour with him the following day one of the tourist asked if the Moche people had built something or other and he mistook this for, "our we destroying the ruins". very odd.

We ditched our backpacks and headed into town. The first thing we noticed was that no one was really about and everything looked relatively closed. It turns out that Trujillo is a nice little town that doesn't like to be open on Sundays. Kind of like most little towns in America. Opps. We had about two days in Trujillo and we were wasting one on a Sunday. We ended up at the main square, Plaza de Armas, and watched tons of soldiers marching about. I think it was a little boyscout commencement ceremony ro something. At least it gave us something to look at while we figure out how to spend the day.

Robby managed to attract some Tourist guy trying to get us to go on a tour with him and then come back to the Plaza around 2 pm and he would take us to a fiesta. It's funny that in America I get all the crazy people who come and talk to me, but in Peru, they all find Robby. It could be because I stare at them blankly when they start talking to me in Spanish and occasionally say, "Si" or "no gracias" or it could be because Robby actually understands their gibberish. America's education system sucks. Everyone we meet in Peru from other countries all know at least two languages, most know three or four. Americans pretty much know one with the few exceptions of the smarter Americans that pick up one other language in the four years of jr. high and high school they're taught.

I was starting to fade on Robby in the Plaza and desperately wanted to find some real Peruvian coffee. We looked in the guide book to find a place, but our guide book kind of lacks in helpful; information, mostly good for misinformation, and so we wandered the streets. We ended up in a cute alley way with seats. My coffee arrived and I starred at it. It was one cup of hot water, one small cup of black stuff and one small cup of milk. The waitress told me to pour the black stuff, which was the coffee, into the water until i liked the taste and then add the milk. The milk in Peru tastes like odd butter, so it's black coffee all the way. Peruvian coffee isn't very strong, but it is pleasant, not too burnt tasting like Starbucks and no bitter after taste. I was happy.

There was a museum of archaeology somewhere around where we were, but i told Robby that we should go to the Beach (the Peruvian girl at our Hostel said since it was a sunny day and they don't have many sunny days in Trujillo that we should visit the beach. It was where all the other people were)and come back to the museum later, after siesta. She reluctantly agreed and we set out to find a Colectivo - a 12 person van that the Peruvians have converted into small transportation vehicles that they will fill to the brim (one of the Colectivos that we went in had 22 people in it) and are extremely cheap. It paid 1.2 sols to go 12 kms. Huanchaco is the city of the beach and of the reed boats. it's know for its 15 foot boats that are two long poles of reeds wrapped in twine and tied together. People sit on their knees and paddle out to fish or relax. We didn't want to get soaked since we were in normal clothes, so we chose to watch people try to navigate the boats rather than try it our selves.

We stayed in Huanchaco for about two hours wandering the small inhabited strip of land along the beach and then taking pictures of the interesting mud brick houses in town. Most of the houses in Peru are built like they were 2000 years ago. With mud and water and hay. It is effective and cheap. I really like the doors of the houses. They are the only tings with character that separate all the houses. Some are colors, some have bars, some have designs. Very interesting. We took the Colectivo back to town, but jumped out early because we saw the Coca Cola sign that someone said the Archaeology museum was next to. We ended up walking around in the hot sun for the next hour going back and forth looking for a street that didn't exist. Our guide book said that the museum was in the middle of an intersection next to a gas station. We asked a gas station attendant if he knew where the museum was and he sent us in the wrong direction. Eventually we found it, across the street from where we jumped out of the Colectivo and in back of the gas station where we'd asked for directions. After all out effort to find the damn thing it had the audacity to be closed. Stupid guide book saying it was open on a Sunday. We started walking back to the hostel, but ended up the wrong direction and hopped in a cab. I was sick of aimless wandering.

We walked through Trujillo at night, but discovered that there are a lot of people wandering about, but none of them seem to go anywhere. a lot of the dance clubs were closed and the restaurants were closing by 10 pm. We had some Chinese food, which turned out to be chicken and rice, but at least the rice was fried. Robby and I have discovered that Peruvian food consist of Chicken, rice, french fries, and random meats that we wont eat including guinea pig - the Peruvian speciality. EWWWWW. someones pet went bye bye.

The following day we went on a Tour of the Sun and Moon Pyramids, the Dragon Pyramid and the City of Chan Chan. Michael from the Hostel was our tour guide and we were accompanied by a girl from Zimbabwe and a couple, one Canadian and one Dutch. Michael turned out to be a great Tour Guide. he knew millions of little facts about each of the places and could talk for hours. The Temples of the Sun and Moon are two pyramids opposite each other and of the Moche culture. We were allowed in only the Temple of the Moon. The Sun was being fixed to allow for Tourist. The Moche people made beautiful wall paintings of gods and animals and then decided block the painted walls with other, plain mud brick walls. It's a wonder the archaeologist even found the paintings in the first place as they had to remove about three other walls covering them. Michael said that the Moche covering their drawings was equivalent to us changing our wall paper - if you don't like it, cover it. Their pyramids were also built from the ground up with different decades of the society adding on to the last level, building upwards. The Temple of the Moon had 6 different levels or floors to the pyramid.

After a brief lunch of rice and lettuce (Michael made us lunch at teh Hostel, but didn't realize that 4 of the 6 people on the tour didn't eat meat) we set out to teh Dragon Pyramid. The Pyramid was a storage unit for the Moche. A triangle with walls around several incave spaces. Small and not very exciting. Chan Chan was much better. Archaeologist don't know how big it was because of the current Trujillo people living on part of Chan Chan land, but there were about 20 big and small pyramids spread across several KMs. We walked around the biggest of the Temples. It must have been 1.5 kms squared. There were ceremonial squares where they used to sacrifice people to the gods and where they threw parties and then a ceremonial lake that they bathed in and did rituals.

After the tour ended we said bye to Michael and the rest of the Tour group and hitched a bus to Chiclayo. We realized that we don't have to see anymore movies in Peru if we want a day to relax because we will See a ton on the buses. We ended up watching True LIes in Spanish with Spanish Subtitles. I have to tell you that i really don't like Turue Lies, but there is something entertaining about it when watching it in Spanish. The Spanish dubbed voice even differed from the subtitles. It was awesome. We made three stops on the 3 1/2 hour trip. During the first stop half the bus got off. After the second stop RObby and I were the only people left on the bus. We looked around wondering if we should have got off. One of the two bus drivers ended up talking with us and said that most people don't go to Chiclayo after 7pm. We went at 8 pm. I was starting to think that Chiclayo had to suck since no one wanted to go there, but we were wrong.

Chicolayo turned out to be our favorite city thus far. First we ended up arriving at about 11:30pm and our new bus driver friend organized a taxi for us to Lambayque where we had accidentally booked our hostel for the night. Lambayque is about 12 kms from Chicolayo and completely dead at midnight. Even our hostel was locked up for the night. We had to wake up some poor guy sleeping on the couch to let us in. In the morning we realized that it was a small, semi-shit hole town, and i told Robby we would be moving to Chiclayo for the remainder of the two days we had in Chiclayo. Before we moved though we decided to visit the Museum of Sican. It was a across the street from the Hostel and told of the Sican culture, but for all Robby and I knew it was a bunch of pots and a few poor souls that had the misfortune of their skeletons being put on display. All the signs were in Spanish dn I stopped trying to read them after the third sign. What should have taken us at least an hour to go through, took us twenty minutes. We were standing in the sunshine by 11:30am wondering what to do next.

We of course wandered in circlexs looking for anything that resembled an editable place to eat and ended up in a hole in the wall cafe between two big touristy restaurants that were expensive. The hole in the wall place had daily specials that we didn't understand. We just ate what they brought. First course was chicken soup that tasted yummy until Robby foudn a chicken claw in hers. I told her to suck it up and keep eating. After she found the chicken heart, i lost my appetite for the soup as well. I'd ordered chicken and rice again because you can't mess that up too much, but RObby got fried rice that happened to come with mystery meat. Now, i wouldn't normally eat miserty meat rice, but the owner of the three tabled restaurant seemed to be so happy we chose his place ratter than the more touristy places that i ate about half of the plate before getting truly freak out and wanting something normal to eat. We ended up paying 8 sols total and eating about 45% of the food. But the owner just smiled and gave us his business card.

Amazingly RObby and I found a Hotel about two blocks from the center of town. We didn't realize how lucky we were until we met some other people and tried to find them a hotel for under 30 sol a person a night. Since we didn't speak good SPanish and the hotel people wanted customers they agreed to our 20 sol a person a night deal instead of the normal 50 sols a person. We were damn lucky. That afternoon we caught a Colectivo to Ferrenate, a small place in the middle of nowhere that was suppose to have a museum on Sipan. The Colectivo dropped us off on the out skirts of a small dusty road and told us to walk. We walked for ten minutes before i told Robby to ask someone where we were. The next person said to keep walking as well. 20 minutes later we came upon the most modern building we'd seen here, complete with air conditioning. They just randomly decided to build this ratter nice museum on the outskirts of a town that no ones heard of and that people usually come to on tours only. Of course the museum was in Spanish again, but it was nice to get out in the day and do something.

We needed to take a small ricksaw type motorcycle thing with two seats attacted in the back to the Colectivo station and then we were back in Chiclayo. Earlier in the day we had booked a tour for the following day to The Temple of Sipan, Tucume Temple and the Museum of Sipan in Lambayque. We spent the night relaxing and watching Tv.

Our Tour consisted of 6 tourist and a guide. We made friends with Daniel, A Portuguese working in Peru and Harold, whom the tour leader called Tom because he couldn't pronounce his German name correctly. First stop was the Temple of Sipan. It was a group of pyramid-like ruins that had errated with time and what once was a step-like looking pyramid now looks like a large lump of dirt with rain rivets. The Peruvian people had found four tombs on the site of Sipan. They'd removed the bodies, pots and jewelry they'd found in the tombs and replaced them with replicas so that visitors could see how it looked when the archaeologist discovered it. It was a cool idea because most of the ruins that we see are big holes in the ground contain lots of dirt. The interesting thing about the replicas is that they'd removed the real skeletons that they'd found, but replaced them with other real skeletons. I guess since the replacement skeletons weren't 1700 years old, they would last a bit in the open weather and with people gawking at them.

The People of Sipan buried Two kings, a priest and some soldiers at the site. Most of the people where buried with sacrificed people. The new king, as there was an Old King found as well (2000 years old), was buried with a soldier- who's feet were cut off as not to be able to run away from his master in the after life, a couple women, a child, dog, and llama with it's head cut off. Most of the graves had the feetless soldiers and the headless llamas. They were all buried with copper pots and gold statues. The kings had all their golden jewelry and beaded necklaces. I have to give the archaeologist credit for the necklaces because the string holding the beads together disintegrated after 1700 years and so there were millimeter sized beads everywhere and in the museum the necklaces were put back together as they once were, minus a bead or two. Brilliant.

Next stop was one of the expensive touristy restaurants we had avoided the otehr day when Robby got chicken feet soup. This place was expensive, slow, and touristy with the smake tasting food as one of the 5 sol shops on the street. I wanted to go to one of teh little shops, but we felt if would be rude to leave. An hour later we were on the road to Tucume. A city built by the Lambayque people about 1500 years ago. The pyramids looked just like Sipan, with the rain riveted mud, but there were at least 26 pyramids spread out for about 30 kms. The only thing that we were allowed to see at Tucume was the view from atop one of teh smaller pyramids that I wheezed to the top climbing. It was a great view, but it would have been a better trip if we could have got to See one of the tombs that they'd discovered. OUr tour guide said that if we wanted to come back in about five years he thinks one of the tombs would be available to the public. Ahh, i don't think so.

The last stop of the Tour was the Museum of Sipan which was fascinating. It could be because the Tour was in Englisbh so we had an idea of what we were looking at or it could be the fact that we got to see the original pots, jewelry and skeletons from the Temple of Sipan. Both of the kings and all the feetless soldiers were there. The New Kings bones were almost disintegrated in parts because he was buried under lots of copper that eats away at bone. The Old King was in the great shape since he was buried under a ton of gold. All in all, the tour was interesting and we got to see a part of the all Peruvian cultures.

After the Tour, Daniel, Harold, Robby, and I wandered from tour office to Tour office trying to book a tour for the following day to Chaparri, a nature preserve that the tour guide from Sipan told us to visit. Since the perserve was on private property we needed to go with a local guide. Originally they wanted 85 sols a person, with was a rip off and no one wanted to pay. We ended up finding Julie, a French girl, in one of the tour offices and bargaining our tour to Chaparri down to 60 sols a person. The tour would be from 7am to about 5pm. We wanted to catch a night bus to Huaraz the following night.

We all agreed to get dinner after RObby and I booked our bus to Huaraz. What we discovered was a little worrisome. Only one bus company went from Chiclayo to Trujillo to Huaraz and that bus left at 4pm. We didn't want to waste another day in Chiclayo, but we really wanted to go to Chaparri. decisions, decisions. We asked our new friends if they could find replacements for us on the tour for the following day, but instead they managed to get our tour an hour earlier and made if so we would be back by 3:30pm to catch our bus. We were greatly relieved. We spent the rest of the night finding Daniel and Julie a hostel and getting food from a restaurant that was still open.

At the butt crack of dawn we hopped in the van that drove us to Chaparri. I managed to catch a few zzz's, but ended up mesmerized by the beautiful scenery of mountains, ca taus, and birds on the small dirt road we were driving. 2 hours later we hopped out of the van and sat down for the intro to the hike talk. Unfortunately it was all in Spanish, so i zoned out. Good thing that Harold, Julie, and Daniel spoke Spanish and could interpret. As the Guide droned on, I spotted a deer. She came right up to our group and started to look for food. The guide said that all the animals at the preserve were rescued and that when they'd released Marie, the deer, she decided to stay. She let us take pictures with her and pet her, but became annoying when she tried to constantly each my backpack. Everyone occasionally feed her pieces of their lunch. She also because sort of our tour leader, leading us up the path to the other animals.

We saw a few cages were there used to be animals and then a giant boacontrictor. The tour guide asked us what we wanted to see and we all said "bears", because that is the reason that we came. We spotted one from a few 100 yards away in a tree and I thought that was the closest that we would get to see of them, but we walked a little further and the tree was next to us. The preserve rescued 8 bears and was nursing them back to health before releasing them back into the wild. They were very odd bears because they liked to walk on two feet and looked like a cross between bears and meerkats. They were about 3 1/2 feet standing on two feet and the small ones weighed 60 kilos while the male weighed 90 kilos. Our guide chopped down a piece of sugar cane plant and gave us pieces of it to feed to the bears. There's nothing like offering a hungry bear sugar and your hand. Luckily it knew the difference.

We spent the better part of an hour walking through the perserve looking at the nature around us. They'd built the preserve in the ravine of a mountain. Green cataus and other lush plants surrounded us. The Tour ended at the Voltures cage. Voltures are pretty ugly. They look like giant turkeys with a very large wing span. They also like to keep company with smelly, descreated cow heads. Yum. They can have Robby's chicken heart soup.

We made it back to Chiclayo with and hour and half to kill. We found a cute desert shop to swap email addresses with everyone before hopping on our first of two buses to Huaraz. The first bus took us back to Trujillo, but instead of taking 3 1/2 hours like the previous one, it took almost 5 hours. No wonder the bus people wouldn't let us take a later bus when we'd asked the day before. We stopped at every two bit town along the way becasue getting to Trujillo 45 minutes until our next bus. Since we decided to save a bit of money, we decided to take the Economy bus. We spent the next 10 1/2 hours freezing and covered in dust because most of the windows on the bus were broken and let in all the crap in from outside. It was miserable and now we've learned our leasson... pay five dollars more and ride in comfort.

We arrived in Huaraz at 6:30 am and with no clue on where we were going to spend the night. We meet an Israeli at the bus terminal and he asked if we would like to share a taxi to Hostel Caroline. We said sure. The hostel was a ways from town (about 1/2 mile), but it was a real hostel. We were put in a four person dorm and told to go upstairs and grab breakfast. We met a bunch of people at breakfast, most of them Israeli. Apparently there are a lot of Jews in Huaraz. We ended up talking to a couple, Matthew and Sarah, who said that they were going on a tour to Chavin in about 30 minute. We had wanted to go to Chavin as well, so we decided to join them.

In America you have to reserve a spot on a tour at least a few days in advance, but here in Peru, you can hop on last minute. The only problem was that the tour was in Spanish again. The guy from our hostel said that it would probabaly be in English, but no such luck. We ended up talking with a two girls traveling together from Germany and a solo Austrilan guy.

First stop on the tour was a small lake at the base of rather large, snow capped mountains. The local Quechua people were out at the water with their Alpackas, offering them up for pictures. Robby and I decided to take a picture with them because really, when else do you think we'll ever get a chance to pet an alpacka. They are very soft and placid creatures. I want one. I'll let with hang out with the baby elephant I'm going to own one day.

We drove for another hour along very whindy and steep mountain switchbacks before coming to a stop at a restaurant at the bottom. The ordered Coco tea, with is made from leaves of the Coco plant, or cocaine plant. The tea is suppose to be able to relieve headaches, stomach aches, colds, and breathing problems. RObby and i both seem to think it makes us loopy. I didn't feel the effects as much as RObby did, but yeah, i want to be clear headed for this trip, not feeling all foggy like I've had some bad allergy medicine. And for all those people saying, "you took Cocanie?" Um, no, it's just a lite tea. You'd have to drink about 50 gallons of the stuff to equal one sniff of Coke.

By midafternoon we finally made it to Chavin, the old ruins of the Chavin people. There was a main Temple with a large courtyard in front of it and small maze like walkways under the ground between the two. Teh Chavin people where into echos and sounds. Sound/voice could travel through all the passageways that they built and they made a ground flute near the temple that when wind blew over the holes in the ground, it made pretty noise. The Temple had an alter built on top of some steps. teh interesting thing about the steps is that one side was black and one side was white, as well as the walls on each side. The tour guide says that the black stone represented night and the white side was day. She thought that the women of the culture entered the alter via the black steps and the men via the white steps.

We got to go underground and walk around in the labrynth of tunnels the Chavin people built. Most of the passageways ended after a few feet. There were numerous holes built into the walls, windows into other rooms. No one really knows what the tunnels were used for, but they think to house goods and maybe have soldiers stay there to protect stuff. The whole thing had low ceilings, so either the Chavin people were really small or they didn't want a lot of people to go underground.

we saw a small museum on the ruins before returning back to the hostel. I wanted to explore the town a bit, but Robby was starting to feel the effects of altitude sickness, so we went to take showers and talk with the other people at the hostel.

The following morning we woke up early because we wanted to walk to Wilkawain, which the guy at the hostel said was an easy 8 km hike. We had wanted to go to the Monterey hot springs, but after talking with the german kids the previous day, we realized that sitting in a dirty swimming pool of pumped in sulfur water was not going to be really relaxing and so we settled for the closest hike from town. Huaraz is know for it's outdoorsiness. People come here to spend weeks hiking, mountain climbing, camping, and skiing. We came for two days. :(

Since Robby didn't want to get sick again we decided to take a Colectivo to teh top of the small hill where the ruins of Wilkawain were and then hike back to town. Using our trusty guide book we aimless searched for teh two streets that teh colectivo drove past. We found it 50 minutes later, but not where the book said it would be. It was a 20 minute ride up a steep hill in a very cramped bus before we breathed fresh air. The hostel guy must have been drinking too much Coco if he thought Wilkawain was an "easy" hike. my ass, but whatever, down is better than up.

The ruin was a large burial chamber that contained two skeletons. The small one outside at about 1/3 the size contained 5 bodies. I guess they weren't important. Wilkawain was similar to Chavin because of the underground passages, but much smaller. We made our way through the two tombs in 15 mins. A 10 year old boy appointed himself our tour guide adn told us about the tomb in Spanglish. We gave him cookies and 1 sol.

We spent the next hour and a half walking down the mountain, following a man made river that supplied the passing houses with water. All the Peruvians said hi to us, some even stopping to ask where we came from. Even though we were on a hiking path, i don't think many non Peruvians walk it. Wilkawain is not on most peoples "things to do in Huaraz" list. The path also split in two about 6 times on our way downa dn we decided that as long as we continued down the mountain and towards the left we were good. We would have died hiking up the hill, but it was very pleasant to walk down. We past numerous wheat and other vegetable feilds and by peoples mud brick houses. The Peruvians live simply, but they know how to use all the resources of the land and most of them seem content.

When we finally made it to the bottom of the hill we ended up on a main, high traffic road. This was clearly not the same road that we had traveled to Wilkawain in the Colectivo, but there wasn't really any other towns around, so we assumed we were in Huaraz. We assumed correctly, but we had somehow come down from the mountain about 1.5 miles from the center of town. We troughed onwards and made it to a quaint coffeeshop just before the rain poured across the town. The water made everything look beautiful and smell great. It was awesome until we realized we had laundry drying outside. I wonder how well drench clothes will do couped up in a backpack under a bus for 9 hours. hum...What are you going to do when you travel? life's life.

So i will end this long as hell blog and let your eyes relaxs and give my fingers a break. I also apologizes for the many grammar errors this blog probabaly has becasue i think my computer time is about to run out and i don't think i'll have much time to reread it before posting. So, until next time...leave me a comment. I want to know someone made it to the end of this thing.