White Water Rafting on the Rio Trancura...Pucon, Chile

So yesterday I took Andrew on his first white water rafting trip! :D What a hoot...
They unloaded us from the tourist bus and started handing out wetsuits, shorts, life jackets, and water booties. Before we knew what was happening we all started to look like some vague form of super hero going out to conquer the scary water! We were all quite a spectacle...
Once we reached the water though we were all glad to be decked head to toe with rubber as the water was FREEZING! So we piled in the raft and our tour guide started to go over the different comands that he would be shouting as we were in the rapids. Andrew and I ended up in a spanish speaking raft, so we had to learn to translate his yells into directions...Adelante (forward), Alto (stop), Bajo (backward), Dereche (right), and Izquierda (left). Andrew was in the front as well, so he was one of the navigators...and when someone is yelling at you in spanish to paddle a certain direction, and you forget what means what it can be kind of interesting, but he did very good for his first time... haha Anyways, the rapids were great! We had a fun time doing 360´s in the raft, navigating around rocks and cheering "CERVEZA (beer)" after we made it safely through each rapid! At one point they even let us cliff jump into the river, Andrew climbed up twice to take advantage of the opportunity...and we also got to swim in the rapids for a bit, the only problem was that I failed to take notice of a rock that was right by our boat when I jumped in and I landed squarely on my bum and now I have a big bruise because of it, ah well... it was worth it!
Our raft was full of first timers actually, we had 3 girls from spain that were having a hellofa time throwing themselves around the raft based on the guides orders...at first they were timid and scared, and by the end they were power house paddlers! We even met up for a beer last night to laugh about the day, and all of us were sore but in good spirits. :D I think Andrew is addicted now...so we will look for another trip in the future, maybe where we can camp overnight and do two days of rafting! Can our butts (and our arms) handle it? lol :D
...I think so!

Weirdness...

Words of wisdom from the flying dog hostel in lima - bonza..

Is fate trying to tell us something? Our last two days in Miraflores, Lima we ran into two of the other girls we had met in Cusco! The day we went to the Temple of the Moon with the shaman woman, we were a group of 5...and now we have run into ALL of the other girls in our group separately...one at Maccu Picchu, and two in Miraflores, staying at the same hostel as us! I think our shaman lady has placed some sort of crazy bonding hex on us all! haha lol If we see them again during our trip I will know something weird is up! :D

-H

Santiago de Chile

Hi it´s Bonza, we are in Santiago.. the Chileans speak wicked fast and with a crazy accent.. it´s like we don´t know any Spanish at all.. I hope we get used to it fast.. the city is big.. has a bit of a European flavor and we rode the metro today which was quite a novelty.. We made Pad Thai last night and tried some local wine both were good.. it´s expensive here so we see more cooking in our future.. off to Pucon in the lake district for a few days... adios.. Bonza.

Bus-cama or is it Karma?

Sadly our time in Cuzco had to come to an end, there is so much to see there and we left with a few things that we really would like to have seen if we had of had more time..

Another long bus back to Lima.. 20+ hours or something ridiculous... the last few days in Cuzco were really sunny and nice and we were wishing we had longer to soak it up.. needless to say neither of us slept that well on the bus, despite being able to put the seat waaaay back.. The downhill buses are always the worst as the bus driver brakes and weaves his way down from the mountains to the coast.. We fly to Santiago, Chile on the 27th of March so have a few days in Lima to enjoy some of the sites in central Lima that we didn´t get to last time we were here..

Sacsayhuaman

On our last morning in Qosqo (Cuzco) I visited Sacsayhuaman, you can see it from the city as the ruin sits on a hill above the city. It is of significance because the Inca´s had a final rebellion against the spanairds here in 1636, 3 years after Pizzarro invaded Cuzco.. however the Spanish attacked in the night and the Inca king was forced to retreat further up the sacred valley to Ollantaytambo. Only about 20% of the site remains as the spanish demolished 3 of the towers and rolled the stones down the hill for use in building the colonial Cuzco city. Some of the stones still remaining like the one above are absolutely massive and weigh a coupla tonnes.. no small feat to move when you have not invented the wheel and have no beasts of burden.. modern scholars cannot realistically quantify how many man hours would have gone into the building of Sacsayhuaman.

Ollantaytambo

I liked these ruins better than Pisaq, I thought it was really cool how they built everything right inside the mountain practically...it looked very dramatic!
It was so windy that day I had to hold my skirt down
for fear it would blow up around my head! :D

The Sun Temple...

Scary Incan warrior holding a menacing club with spikes...
I wouldn´t want to run into him in a dark alley!

Pisaq

View over Pisaq ruins... they use terracing for agriculture, creating an easier way to irrigate.
(I had to wear a head scarf because I scalded my head on the inca trail...ouch!...don´t worry I haven´t gone TOO hippie yet! lol)

Inside the priests´ temple at Pisaq ruin

Valle Segrado

Urubamba valley, the sacred valley of the Inca.

After M.P. we rested for a day and then hit the sites once more...man we were like ruin fiends in Cusco! haha
We spent the whole day touring around the sacred valley, spending the majority of our time on the bus with about 40 other tourists...packing on and off the bus like cattle, and walking around the different sites. It was a good and cheap way to see the sacred valley, and some other amazing incan ruins...but I think we both could have done without the group of 40 people trailing behind us all day. lol ...after all we had just gotten off the inca trail, and most of the other people looked like they had just gotten off the plane! haha :D

Machu Picchu

The final day...we made it! :D
Our happy group, aren´t we cute?...if you can´t tell Maccu Picchu is behind us, emerging from the clouds and fog!

The famous sun dial rock, centered in the valley between 4 peaks.

Like crazy people we decided to hike to the top of the highest peak behind the Maccu Picchu complex...but it was well worth the last bit of exursion, as the views were awesome! M.P. only looks like a small dot to the right of Andrew in this photo...

Well we woke up on day 4 at 3:30 am... and what do we discover?! Someone has STOLEN my hiking shoes...I mean, c´mon...how ya gonna steal someones hiking shoes on a freaking hike? I was in disbeliefe for atleast the first 15 minutes of the whole episode, wondering how I was gonna manage walking the last day in stocking feet. Andrew tried his best to talk to our porters, one of which was supposed to be in duty watching over our tents...but no luck! I must have been at the top of my game that day because I really didn´t loose my cool... I knew that I was never going to see my shoes again and proceeded to simply figure out how I was gonna finish out the rest of the hike... thankfully another girl in our group had a second pair of shoes with her (comparable to keds) AND she was the same size as me...the incan gods were def looking down on me that morning...so I tied up my shoes and my anger and off we went...
It felt like the amazing race...everyone had gotten up at the same hour as our group (approx 250 people) and we were all hitting the trail, heading to the sun gates. People were shoving, passing and practically pushing people off the side of the cliff to get to the sun gates by sunrise. It actually really pissed me off, and totally ruined the whole essence of what the whole trek was supposed to be about...but I s´pose there are people out there who just need to be first!
It was quite funny though when we arrived to the sun gate, because it was completely socked in by fog and you couldn´t see anything! I had a quiet smile to myself, thinking of all the people who had shoved past me in the past hour. Anyways, we desceneded into the complex halfheartedly a bit at first, having missed our first great view... but we were rewareded shortly because as we arrived just above the complex, the clouds parted and revealed Maccu Picchu as if out of a dream. The sun broke through the clouds and illuminated the ruins for us all to see! It was like reaching mecca or something after the past 4 days... haha lol
We spent the next few hours walking around the complex with our crappy guide Henry (a whole other story lol)..then our group decided to high tail it up the mountain behind the complex to see better views. Once we reached the top, it made up for the fogged in sun gates, the view was exhilarating, amazing, awesome (insert any superlative you want :D)... we sat up there for a good half an hour soaking it all in. After the drama of the past 4 days, we were all high on what we were looking at!
After a grueling hike down that mountain, we realized none of us had the money to take the bus down to Aguas Calientes (the town at the bottom of the hill) so we had to hike down...over 1000 steps down, then a 20 min walk. As Andrew said, it was the "sucker punch" of the trip since all of us were practically cripples at this point, hobbling down the stairs like a bunch of invalids...sore calves, knees, thighs, and just about every other important muscle group I can think of... but we did arrive down in once piece, ate a HUGE meal at a local cafe and then boarded our train back to Cusco! We were drained, sweaty, smelly and dirty..but our spirits were as high as the heavens!

Camino Inka dia 3

Our Lunch Spot... pretty cool that they hooked us up with a table and chairs...ah, the good life!
Each day for lunch we got two courses too, soup and a main. along with mate de coca (coca leaf tea to help with energy and altitude)...not to shabby for some smelly, dirty hikers! lol

Today we got a chance to see several other incan ruins on our way to the famous Maccu Picchu...to be totally honest after hiking like we had been, huffing puffing, sweat mixing with rain, I can´t say that I absorbed all that much history but it was still beautiful.

Camino Inka dia 2

We came from down there...it´s a LONG way down! The group at 4200 meters, feeling righteous and exhausted!

Heather on her way down...yeah for downhill!

5hr of uphill! We´re gonna make it, just one foot infront of the other babe...

Wow, day 2 was a hellofa day! We started off our day at 6:30 am in the morning...they had warned us that day 2 was the worst of all 4 days, but we were NOT prepared for just how bad it was! Imagine stairmaster for 5 hours straight! Ugh... ontop of that add, pouring rain, lack of oxygen and slippery trail... kind of paints a bleak picture eh? lol I think that is why we felt so triumphant when we reached the top, I swear I could have screamed to the heavens with how good it felt to reach the top! Andrew was my hero on this day in particular, since we had opted not to hire a personal porter, he lugged both of our supplies on his back the entire 4 days... so ontop of it all, he was carrying about 20 Kilos on his back... really I don´t know how he did it!

Camino Inka dia 1

Day one of the Inca Trail.

Well as you can see, I´m geared up and ready to hike! We got suckered into buying water holsters for the trek (which proved useless, and just gave me a sore neck) and a walking stick (which was actually useful)... but this was the starting point, KM 82 out of Ollytabamba...little did we know what we had ahead of us! lol

Temple of the moon

Today we spent the day with a shaman... she took us up to her mountain retreat, that overlooks the incan ruin "temple of the moon" which is still an active ceremonial site where locals come and make offerings to the moon god for fertility in life. It was a pretty amazing day, we sat in her garden on the grass, and as the sun shone down on us...she spoke of energy and spirituality. It was an amazing setting, you could almost feel the ancient history... so much you could cut it with a knife. It was a welcomed retreat from the days of buses and city walks, just a day to reflect on our paths in life, lay back and absorb it all.

Qosqo - Navel of the world

We have been enjoying our time in Cuzco, there is a lot to see and do here.. I uploaded some more pics from our wanders around the city..

We head out on the Inca trail tomorrow, I hope that the weather will be OK, it has rained everyday we have been here so far. Cuzco is really vibrant and we wish that we could go out and celebrate St Paddy´s day today, but we will have an early night in preparation for tomorrow..

the wheels on the bus go round and round

round and round,
round and round,
all day long...

we left Huaraz at 10pm on bus-cama to Lima.. the bus arrived early at like 5:30 am.. the flying dog hostel wanted to charge us a full day just to crash a few hours and shower.. forget that! so we hung at an after hours cafe that then closed on us at 7am.. nothing open but the internet cafe so you guessed it.. we sat online until something decent opened up for breaky.. a couple of good coffees later and finally 9:30 rolled around so we could go drop our gear at south american explorers, change clothes and take a sparrow bath in the sink.. although i think we still were maybe a bit on the nose... cruised around Miraflores a bit enjoying the sunshine and warm weather until it was time to jump on our 2pm bus to Cusco.. advertised as 20hrs.. direct. We splurged the $20 to upgrade to 1st class.. yes folks we travelled first class, honestly it was sooooooooo worth it.. we both slept well and the 23 hrs flew by it seemed (although we nearly got bogged in on spot.. ) a few movies.. a bit of reading and some sleep in our extremely reclined seats.. it was big time stylin´ for us after some of the buses we have endured on this adventure... we arrived feeling rather refreshed for a change.. rather than dragging our arses off the friggin bus as per usual. stopped by the south american explorers after eating the menu de dia at this vege place smack across from our hotel.. 4 soles.. $1.50 US for a salad bar, soup and main deal with drink.. a fuckin´ steal if you ask me... yes we went there again today :D
visited the south american explorers to get some leads on tour groups for the Inca trail and got that booked.. we leave on the 18th.. Cuzco is awesome reminds me a bit of a european city with all the squares, churches and grandeous architecture around the place.. we celebrated last night with a few beers at an Irish pub and it was nice to unwind after a hectic 2 days of travel..
-bonza

1000 meters downhill

Today I went Mountain Biking above Huaraz.. it was a guided ride with 1 other bloke.. we drove up mining roads for about an hour to get to 4000 meters then rode about 10kms on pretty flat road before beginning the 1000 meter descent to Huaraz.. It was cold, wet and muddy just like riding in Seattle but the views were amazing when the clouds lifted. We literally rode downhill for over 2hours.. the rental bike was a nice Specialized but I could have used disc brakes as once the rims got wet braking was a challenge.. the terrain varied all the way down making it a really interesting ride.. some of the locals yell "gringo" as you zip past which was pretty funny, most just look at you like your absolutely daft for riding a bike down a mountain in the pouring rain.. dodging pigs, sheep, dogs and donkeys as you weave past their houses and thru their back yards.

Four seasons in one day

The weather has been very variable up here in the mountains.. the visit to Chavin was quite wet in the morning.. and visibility was pretty low due to the clouds and fog.. we were starting to rethink our 3 day trek given how cold it was out.. later in the day while walking around the ruins the sun came out and it was absolutely stunning.. with the sun out our mood also lifted.. only to be dashed once more on the way home when it began to snow very lightly as we wound our way back up the windy mountain roads to Huaraz.. given we are going to be using rental gear (of dubious quality) and are not really mentally prepared for a 3 day hike in the rain with temps from 0 to 10 celcius we decided to cancel the hike.. we can hike in the rain and snow anytime we like it Seattle was our sentiment. Of course this morning we awoke to sunny blue skies but who knows what the afternoon will bring.. bonza

Chavin de Huantar

We visited the site of Chavin de Huantar, the principal site of the Chavin culture who are the oldest major culture in Peru and predate the Incas by 2000 years.. we had seen some of their artwork at the museum in Lima, they are most well known for their unique carvings.

The coolest part was seeing llamas roaming around the ruins and getting to go down into the underground chambers.. the tour was given in Spanish and we only comprehended about 1/10th of the information given by the guide. Reminding us that we really need to keep working on our Spanish.
http://www.huaraz.com/culturachavin/

Conchucos valley

We headed out of Huaraz bound for the ruins of Chavin de Huantar but stopped along the way and made some new friends! The road was pretty dodgy in parts but the scenery was amazing, well what we could see of it that was not covered in low fog/clouds.

photos are fun!

YAY! we finally got our arses in gear and uploaded some flippin´ piccies.. I added some to the blog entries and also on flickr.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/nimbinferal/sets/72157594560785600/

Huaraz

We left Chiclayo after another massive slice of lemon merange (sp?).. to head on a bus to Trijullio.. the bus was not semi-cama (less pimpin) which is fine for a short trip but we stopped at every chicken shack on the way (it felt like it anyay) and had to swerve to avoid a stray horse on the trans american highway no less.. chaos.. we got to Trujillo and we desperate for a feed.. so we told the driver to take us to chifa el dragon.. chifa is peruvian for chinese joint, i found one called chifa jackie chan in chiclayo that had me busting up for at least 5 mins photo to come soon .. well we ended up at chifa el dragon next to chifa el dragon but not the chifa el dragon we meant to go to.. lesson learnt.. never ask a taxi to take you to chifa el dragon.. apparently the most generic name for a chinese joint in peru... the night bus to Huaraz was much better but we could feel it getting colder as we climbed higher up and I greedily eyed the $7 blanket from REI that Heather was covetting and I was too cheap to fork out for in Santa Monica.. we arrived to a barage of touts for hostels, tours, taxis you name it.. made our escape to a really nice place with awesome mountan views.. it´s a really nice change being up in the mountains. We are actually enjoying the cooler weather and the air is so fresh..





The women are dressed in the traditional highland outfits which are really colourful, and we bought handmade alpaca beanies last night (yes its that cold) for 5 soles ($1.50).. as we were told today, it´s summer on the coast but winter in the highlands.. some weird weather pattern if you ask me.. then the seasons reverse.. totally bizarre.. the Cordillera Blanca (white mountains) is really really pretty from what we have seen so far. Today we took a local "colectivo" up the eL cALLEJON DE hUAYLS, a collectivo is a local mini van that should hold 8-10 peopkle but i believe on the way home we had 18 total.. so much for personal space.. not much to see in Caraz itself but it´s surronded by mountains and the drive up the valley from Huaraz was "spectacular" (as describe in lonely planet lol). So far we don´t feel too bad from the altitude but will give it another day before we head off on our hike. There are mixed reports as to the effectiveness (i.e. scientific basis) of coca tea but we have been drinking it and it seems to help.
http://huaraz.com/santacruz/english.html

Museo Tumbas Reales De Sipan

After visiting the site of Sipan the next day we went to the Museo Tumbas Reales de Sipan.. luckily they sell a book that will translate the plaques into english as all signs were in spanish.. we spent a few hours oohing and aaahing as we went through the displays.. they outlined the entire process from discovery of the tomb to the extreme lengths they go to to record every detail of the excavation and then recreate the tomb and other objects in the museum.. we felt pretty edumacated after that one lol.. -bonza.

lord of sipan
http://www.peruvianembassy.us/visiting-peru-destination-guide-sipan.php