Arequipa, Day 1 (Nov 27th)

James and I arrived in Arequipa at 6am on Sunday morning and headed straight for our hostel, the Wild Rover Backpackers. The person at the desk said that our room and breakfast would be ready at 8am, so we went to the lounge to take a nap. Unfortunately, the lounge proved rather disgusting, and half of the furniture had been overturned by the previous night's revelers. Thank god for my travel pillow because I did not want to put my head down on that couch. After a futile attempt at a nap, we decided to venture out into the city and have a tea and coffee in a shop on the Plaza de Armas, which was the prettiest I'd seen so far.


As we sat looking out over the plaza, several truckloads of soldiers pulled up for what we discovered was to be a parade in celebration of the liberation of the city.


We ventured down a side street to stop into a pharmacy, and as we were leaving, I spotted a band preparing for the parade.


Some of the band members noticed me watching them tune their instruments, and they sweetly waved me over for a photograph.


The parade wasn't due to start until 9am, so we returned to the hostel, only to discover that we had been misinformed and that our room would not be ready until 2pm, which meant no showers for us until then. Feeling a bit irritated and a bit ripe, we returned to the Plaza to watch the ceremony and parade.


There we saw my sweet military band members again...


... followed by an adorable procession of children dressed in full military and medical garb.


When the parade finished, we headed to the Museo Andinos where a lovely guide took us through the exhibit on the discovery of the "Ice Princess", Juanita, the mummy of an Incan child sacrifice from over 500 years ago. At the end of the exhibit, we saw Juanita herself, refrigerated and encased in glass, with her hair and some of her skin little changed from her own lifetime.

Afterward, we went exploring and booked our Colca Canyon tour. And took a goofy photo or two.


We settled on having lunch in a small alley off the Plaza de Armas.


After lunch, we returned once again to the Wild Rover, at which point they were unable to find the key to our room. When they finally found it and took us there, we discovered that the room was dirty, that it did not have a bathroom at all, and that the barbecue for the bar stood so close to our door, that we had to squeeze by to enter. We took five minutes to call another hostel that had been recommended by someone else at Pariwana, collected our things, and left.

The Wayna River Hostel proved far more pleasant, with private bathrooms, a truly friendly and accommodating staff...


... and a makeshift veranda with excellent views of the sunset over El Misti and the other mountains surrounding Arequipa.





As a unexpected bonus, a fireworks display took place later that night as we prepared for dinner.


Going by a TripAdvisor recommendation, we dined at ZigZag and were not disappointed. James had the Alpaca steak, while I chose a quinoa gnocchi in pesto, and we each sampled each other's meal.





The food was savory, the cocktails heaven, and the setting perfect. All in all, an excellent end to a day that had started off rather poorly.


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Location:Arequipa, Peru

Thanksgiving & Two Extra Days in Cusco (Nov 24-26th)

Thanksgiving in Cuzco didn't come with turkey and stuffing, but rather with laundry, a lot of phone calls to the family over Skype, resting up after three days of the Sacred Valley, and a fun night of karaoke with Liz, James (who had just returned from the Inca Trail, Marcelo, and Ryan, a fellow American from Oregon who had many a story to tell despite his young 22 years. Oh, I also nursed my first sunburn of the trip, acquired atop Waynu Picchu. Apparently, after interrupting my sunscreen application in order to take a picture for a group of Italians, I neglected to finish and got my just desserts: a U-shaped slash of crimson across my upper back. Oh, well. Not too bad.

I had originally intended to head out to Arequipa that evening, but what was supposed to be a quick follow-up with a doctor about haven been ill the week prior turned into a three-hour wait, and I missed my bus. Fortunately, I was more than happy to stay on with the crew I had met in Cuzco.

The following day, Ryan, James, and I hung out in the courtyard and ate lunch at Jack's with Kaisha and Rachel, two Yorkshire lasses who dubbed me the only American they'd ever liked.





Again, my intention was to leave Cuzco that evening, but James and I had decided to travel to Arequipa together, and he had turned in a load of laundry that morning, which wouldn't be be ready until that evening. So I postponed again. Yes, I postponed my departure for my friend's laundry. ;)

That night we started off at the Pariwana bar before heading out to the bar of the Wild Rover Hostel, a big party hostel down the street. (That's James and Liz.)


That's Ryan, going all Lawrence of Arabia in is newly purchased alpaca scarf.


The Wild Rover definitely packed in the people...


... but James and I were hungry, so we headed to Fallen Angel, a quirky spot in the bohemian San Blas neighborhood where the tables basically consist of glass panels atop bathtubs filled with fish.


On what would be my final day in Cuzco, I got a massage and manicure. The streets of Cuzco are quite literally packed with women shouting out to passersby, "Massage, lady? Pedicure? Massage, lady!" I had politely said no to each proffer, until finding out the cost from Kaisha, who had taken advantage of said services the day prior. Basically, for a pedicure and an hour-long massage, I paid $15. Fifteen dollars!! It was fantastic. One girl administered the massage, literally climbing onto the table to work on my back at the right angles because she was too tiny to reach them otherwise, and her sister worked on my feet afterward. The massage room looked like any other I had been in, but for the pedicure, I simply sat on a couch, while the second sister brought out a towel, a stool, and a basin of hot water with which to work.

Afterward, I had lunch with James at a charming organic restaurant called Green's, where I had a much-needed salad. The cuisine in Peru is excellent, but very rich, typically made with much butter, salt, sugar, or a combination of the three, and often fried. I was seriously craving some greens.

We returned to the hostel, hung out in the lounge, sent some emails, said our goodbyes, and caught a taxi to the Cruz del Sur station. James, who had elected to take the bus despite forebodings as to its safety, fell asleep almost immediately, which proved fortunate, as our driver navigated many a sharp turn without slowing down despite rains throughout the night. But have no fear, we arrived safely in Arequipa at 6am the following morning.

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Location:Meson De La Estrella,Cuzco,Peru

Machu Picchu (Nov 23rd): Warning, this is a long one. ;)

Wednesday started with a 4:30am wake-up call, a pancake breakfast, and a mad scurry to the first fleet of buses departing for Machu Picchu at 5:30am. The twisting in my stomach, brought on by nervous excitement, was exacerbated by the serpentine path to our destination.


But in less than half an hour, the journey ended and I got my first glimpse of the ancient citadel of Machu Picchu.


Marcelo decided to take a tour with a Spanish-speaking guide, and so I decided to explore the ruins on my own, taking the route opposite of that usually taken by the guides and starting in the Urban Section.



Exploring on my own proved unexpectedly and exceptionally rewarding. Unencumbered by a large group, I was able to duck in and out of the many alcoves, terraces, nooks and crannies within the Incan houses with impunity.















The profound effect of solitude in such a place is overwhelming. At one point, I realized with awe and satisfaction, that despite being in one of the most oft-visited tourist sites in the world, I had not seen another person for nearly half an hour.


But enough of my waxing philosophic. After running wild in the maze of the Prisoner's Area, the Industrial Zone, and the Factory houses and emerging onto the main square, I beheld a spectacular view of the terrazas, where I had begun.


Then it was on to the Main Temple, which had lovely views of the main square and the area beyond.


Then up to the Royal Palace and all that lies above, from which point I took my favorite photo of my trip so far.


(And Mom, here's one with me in it, just for you.)



A quick aside: One phenomenon I am still getting used to is the mild and curious form of celebrity afforded by my red hair, pale skin and freckles. On three different occasions while at Machu Picchu, groups of Peruvian teenagers asked to have their pictures taken with me, in both groups and individually. I literally took 15 individual pictures with the boys in the first group! And I saw the same thing happen to an extremely pale Swedish girl I kept running into. By the time I was approached for the final time, I had the good sense to ask for a group photo in return.


Anyway, I ambled around the terraces for a while, and took more photos than I have ever taken of one place in my life. I was able to cull them down to three, including one with me.








After nearly three hours of wandering through the city proper, I headed up and out along the winding path to the Inca Bridge.





And made a friend along the way.


The route to the bridge afforded stunning views of the valley and river below, but...


..when I finally reached the bridge itself, I decided not to cross. Why, you might ask? See that tiny little bridge just to the left of my knee? Yeah, that's why.


Besides, the time had come to climb Waynu Picchu, the steep mountain looming over in Machu Picchu in most photos of the site. Only 400 people are permitted to hike this mountain each day, in two groups of 200, and Marcelo and I were in the second group.




We met at the entrance point, where we also ran into a lovely family of Americans from our hostel, who began the hike just ahead of us. (That's them at the bottommost point on the first staircase up the mountain.)


Our destination: the ruins at the summit, where the Incans had quite ingeniously and quite madly built a small temple.


The ascent consisted of perilous stairways at the best points, and a brief shower soon provided the additional challenge of slick surfaces.


The hour's journey was spent huffing and puffing upward, passing and being passed by the same groups of people back and forth, and taking breathers at the few but very welcome flat bits. (This is me at one of them, in a pose suitable to what Marcelo called my Tomb Raider outfit.)








Atop the ruins, 20 or so travelers sat upon a collection of large stones jutting out slapdash into the air, providing spectacular views of Machu Picchu below.





Fortunately, I met an awesome Alaskan couple, Cedric and Erin, who made the descent with me, and kept me from thinking too much about how very very steep it was and how very very clumsy I usually am. And after an hour we reached the bottom!


After one more pass through the citadel, Marcelo and I boarded the bus back to Aguas Calientes, had dinner, and took a bath in the local hot springs .


From there it was just one peaceful train ride and one crazy trip in a colectivo to get back to Cuzco by 1am.

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Location:Meson De La Estrella,Cuzco,Peru