Inca Trail

We hiked the Inca Trail to Macchu Picchu with Llama Path on a 4 day 3 night trip. This hike was the most luxury hike I probably will ever take part in. For the 13 hikers there were 19 porters and a cook along with a guide and an assistant guide. We would not have saved money by taking our own tent, so the porters carried a llama path tent and set it up for us. By the time we arrived to our campsite the tent was ready to go each evening. Also warm water, soap and individual hand towels were provided before every meal to clean up with. They served us hot tea in the morning inside of our tents. Literally they carried a kitchen table and chairs that they set up for each meal for us to eat from. Dinner and lunch were always 3 coarse meals- a professionally done appetizer, followed by a mouth watering soup, topped off with more food than would feed an army sized entree. We were pampered, and it was nice!
The Inca trail is very busy, thus urinating or otherwise outside of the ´peruvian´squat toilets is prohibited. This made for one of the big negatives for the trail. These peruvian toilets are porcelin bowls flush with the baño floor. Usually they don´t flush and most often the room didn´t have a trash can. You can´t put toilet paper in the toilet so dirty toilet paper would pile up in the corner...gross. As you can imagine the squat pots got pretty nasty. Girls don´t have aim, lot´s of people get diahrea and the smell is enough to blind you.
The hike was challenging due to the elevation changes, however the trail was not too tough comparing it to our last hike in Venezuela. The second day we had to reach our highest elevations and unfortunately Joshua came down with a stomach bug. He couldn´t eat and could barely keep down water, but somehow he pushed through and made it to camp. Well done Josh!
The fourth morning we awoke before the sunrise, ate a very rich cake for breakast-not a good choice llama path, then scrambled to get our bags ready to head to Macchu Picchu. The previos night we had camped on a somewhat narrow ledge, all of the tents in a line. After going to the bathroom I was heading back toward my bag and I fell off the 10foot ledge. Physically I only had a few bruises and scrapes but emotionally I was quite hurt. After the fall I stood up and appologized to the porters as I had landed on a bag of trash. I asked for a towel to wipe off and no one could help me. I just stood there appologizing and Josh yelled, ¨Get up here¨ I was pissed and hurt! Why didn´t any one care that I had fallen 10 feet onto my back on a pile of trash?! Josh and Llama path definetely got a talking to for their seemingly uncaring reactions!
I carried my bad attitude along with a bruised wrist and but the final 3 hours to Macchu Picchu. The old Incan city was impressive. I have a hard time getting excited about rocks, even if they are so nicely cut and placed, but it was still nice to see. We started on a tour with our guide and left at about 10am to meet Josh´s parents.
Sometime in that early morning I was starting to feel a little sick. About midday I had to separate from Josh and his parents and head toward the exit. Uggh, here I got trapped in this huge maze of rocks. Frustrated, overheated and sick to the stomach I got sick over a pile of rocks, hidden by another pile. I made it to the bathroom before I got sick again.
The twisty-turny bus ride down to Aquas Callientes didn´t help my uneasy stomach, I spent the rest of the day in the hotel room, while Josh and his parents explored Aquas.

Cusco

I'm sorry that this update has taken so long...I've been hesitant to write it because I feel only negative things toward Cusco, but am perplexed when looking back at our lovely pictures and I just can't understand how I couldn't like the city...here it is:

Cusco, Peru is a beautiful city, full of Incan architecture and beautiful Spanish cathedrals as well. Plaza de Armas is tended very carefully full of lush green grass and lovely flowers. Narrow cobblestone streets take you to numerous restraunts and shops. Whatever you need, you can probably buy in in Cusco.

The thing that made it miserable for me was the constantly badgering touts. From sun up till' into the night they try their hardest to sell you anything they can. They are relentless! Once told 'no', they continue on with 'why not my friend' and offer varios other things you have no interest in. They sell everything from massages, manicures, 'maybe alpaca' hats, scarves and whatever else you might not want. The vending never ends. We had to sneak into the hostal at times to escape the noise and hoards of people.

You might be reading this thinking how coarse and mean of me to think these things. Peruvians overall are very poor, this is their only way of making money. It's true have become hardened to these unfortunate circumstances. But I challenge you to spend a week amidst the chaos and not feel similarly!

Needless to say the town is beautiful, but a horrible tourist trap. And you can buy all of the authentic 'baby' alpaca clothing you want, and then the 'maybe' alpaca stuff for much less.

Fat kid

I forgot to mention a vital detail that occured in Loja, Ecuador: A few blocks from the bus station in Quito, maybe 15 minutes after take off the bus pulled over to pick up large blue barrels covered with a blanket and rope of mystery substance destined for Loja. We were too lucky to find out that this mystery substance was indeed pounds and pounds of Lard. How did we find out you ask? Well, upon arrival at 6am in Loja after yet another restless ride on the night bus my formerly green pack now had a thick white frosted shell.

Josh and I would sometimes joke that my bag always ended up looking like a fat kid after I pack it. For some reason I can never get those bulges in line. Now the pack looks and smells the part.

Loja-Piura-Lima

Bus. Bus. Bus.
From Quito we caught a supposedly 12-14 hour bus ride that actually took 16 hours to Loja, Ecuador. The city is known for it´s musicians, so we thought we´d check it out. We popped into a nice cheap hotel, only 10$ a night and slept until after 1 in the afternoon. Josh of course didn´t want to miss out on seeing any sights, so we walked up and down the town to catch every park and church within the city limits. Heaven forbid a statue go bye without it´s picture on our camera! We also checked out the Loja Zoo and reluctantly were unable to free any of the thristy sad looking inmates. One half hairless Andean Speckled bear still tears at my heart. We heard no musicians, but Josh claims some guys were carrying guitars.

1pm the next day we caught the border-crossing bus to Piura, Peru. Another longer than expected bus, but tolerably 8 or 9 hours. From Piura we found a helpful taxi driver that took us to a bus terminal that had night buses to Lima.

Peru´s bus system is a bit more difficult to use as there is not a central terminal, thus you have to buz up and down little streets and down allies to find the bus you want. Fortunately we´ve had some helpful taxi drivers direct us in the right direction, sure they expect a little extra money but they deserve it for the help.

At half past 10 pm the bus left from Piura to Lima. This was to be a 16hour bus, so we grabbed a quick chicken and rice dinner from a local street vendor before hopping on the bus. The bus was long and cramped. The seats in this one were NOT made for tall or (I like to say big-boned) persons. Anyway at about 9 am they stopped for breakfast in a big wharehouse on the side of the road in what seemed to be a barren desert. We were looking for a nice cup of coffee and something small for breakfast. Unfortunately this hot spot didn´t have coffee today, only chicken soup and a full course chicken dinner if that´s what you´re hungry for at 9am. We went with the chicken soup and 2 bottles of water. Low and behold I was the lucky girl of the day getting 3 chicken feet in my soup. Three! Moral of the story- when there isn´t coffee don´t bother ordering breakfast.

Finally we arrived in Lima at about 2pm yesterday, another helpful taxi driver carted us to 3 different bus terminals where we finally found a bus that would take us to Cuzco the next day. Some of the other companies are not currently running buses because the Peruvian people between Lima and Cuzco have shut down the road as a way to protest the government.

This morning the receptionist at our hotel alerted us that our bus company had called and our bus to Cuzco was cancelled...sure enough the road that the other buses wouldn´t sell us a ticket to, was in fact closed down today. However, we are taking a bus yet this afternoon to Ariquipe, 16 hours from Lima and another 14 hours from Cuzco. It will be a longer route around, but hopefully it will get us there. We are signed up to hike the Inca Trail on the 27th of this month, we need to pay the rest of the deposit by the 25th. Also taking some time in Cuzco is essential to help us get acclimated. Hopefully we´ll be there in a day or two...I guess we´ll see.

Quito

We didn't have much Ecuador, but hope to come back someday. There is some good hiking that we'd like to do and of course it would be quite wonderful to visit the Galapagos Islands. Josh and I are planning to venture back someday, so keeping this in mind we were able to push through, heading south to Peru.

We seemed to agree that Quito was a bit nicer of a city than Bogota in our opinion. Perhaps it was simply that they used a trolly system running on electricity, cutting down on exhaust fumes.

There were also quite a few more travelers which was kind of fun. At the same time, each traveler had a story to instill fear in us about the surrounding city. Everyone said that Quito was incredibly unsafe with stories of gunshots and robberies occuring daily. We never felt unsafe but the stories that we were told over diner everynight stuck in my mind and hindered me from being able to relax and fully enjoy the city. Hopefully next time in Quito I won´t feel so limited by fear.

Chocolate cake and a Coctail

We spent an extra day in Salento as it was my birthday and we found some good looking chocolate cake at Jesus's Cafe the day before. The sky´s downpoured rain that afternoon, so it was good that we weren't awaiting a bus on the streetside anyway. The cake was lovely, they also had a tasty strawberry daquiri that went very well with it.

Dusty, Josh´s good buddy ended up showing up to Salento the night before my birthday. He gave me a small clutch with a pattern on it made by the Kuna indians. That was another nice surpise to end a good day.

After a final cup of coffee at Jesus´s Cafe we headed to the bus station in Armenia. We arrived at the bus station later than we had hoped, the curvy ride...causing quite a bit of nasea took longer than expected. There was only 1 seat available for the bus that we were hoping to catch to the border town between Colombia and Ecuador. Thus we went with the next best option and bought a ticket to Pasto, a town 2 hours or so north of the border. The time was 6pm, We waited 8 or 9 hours for the bus to Pasto to arrive, which sadly happened to be running 3 hours late...uggh.

Eventually we caught the bus to Pasto, followed by a mini bus another couple hours to Ipiales, then finally a taxi across the border. Another taxi took us to the next most immediate town in Ecuador where we literally ran onto a moving bus bound for Quito. We arrived in Quito after midnight and thankfully caught an honest cab driver who took us safely to The Secret Garden Hostel for a reasonable fee. We made it into bed and crashed.

Salento, Colombia

Thank heavens! A fresh breath of air in Salento. Fed up with the pollution and noise of Bogota, Salento was an oasis in our travels.

In every direction lush green hills span as far as the eye can see. Coffee plants and banana trees pepper the hills. The air is fresh and refreshing to the body and sole. The elevation is high, climbing the hills take your breath away like I said, everywhere you go there is another hill. You need the coffee just to get you through a day around town.

The second day we took a hike to see the Wax Palms in the Valle de Cocora a short jeep ride away from the town of Salento. The jeep ride itself, should not be underestimated. Josh and I were apparantly not pushy enough so ended up standing on the back of the jeep hanging on for our lives! Up and down hills on dirt road the jeep drove, my arms ached and a few blisters popped up on my hands by the time we arrived at the valley. The hike took about 5 hours consisting of many river crossings and quite a lot of climbing, not to mention lots of mud. But like every hike, even though I curse it in the beginning it's quite gratifying to finish. The cloud forest around the palms was quite beautiful as well. We were able to hike with a French guy and a German couple. It was a good day. Best of all, we got a seat for the jeep ride back.

Bogota still.

After 6 days, Bogota had lost it's thrill for me. The weather was still pleasant and cool, but the combination of a gray overcast sky and smoggy air had started to wear on me. The city is big, lots of traffic, lots of exhaust, lots of noise.

After a long day of traversing the town my eyes would burn from the air, contacts were a bad idea amid air thick with pollution. Also, the hostel had started to lose it's cool at this point as well. The guests seemed to be staying up later, being noisier and smoking more. Josh and I found ourselves waking up after little sleep in a smoke filled room, sometimes the frosted flakes weren't even out...It was time to leave.

From here we head south to coffee county.

Bogota

We made it into Bogota, Colombia after dark. Cranky Crock, the hostel we were hoping to stay in was booked, but graciously the receptionist directed us to another small hostel around the block. We were expecting the place to be a dump, but were pleasantly surprised and ended up staying in that location for a week. They had free breakfast and a clean bathroom, no reason to leave!

The first night in after finding a spot to sleep we hit up a lovely Italian restaurant in the old town district, just a couple blocks from our hostel. The eatery had a glowing fireplace in the corner and interesting elves painted on the walls...it seemed fitting for Halloween Night. We enjoyed some fancy pasta plates and shortly after headed back to the hostel for some sleep.

To comment on Halloween in Colombia, surprisingly enough it is quite celebrated there. The city was filled with little one dressed as the usual princesses, farm animals, what have you...hand in hand with their parents parading around in search of treats.