Lake Titicaca

Yesterday I travelled via Lake Titicaca to La Paz Bolivia. It was a loooooog day! And that after spending the whole night in the bus…

We arrived at Puno, on the shore of Lake Titicaca just in time to see the sunrise. We took a boat out to the Uros floating islands.

Speed boats they were not! In the boat we got an explanation about the lake, where the name came from, why the floating islands were built and how. We stopped at 2 of the islands. The first seemed to be where about 10 families were living. Here we got an explanation about life on the islands and how the families survive here.

Everything is made of reed of the island! The ground you walk on, the walls and the roofs if the houses and as such, everything has to be re-built on a regular basis! New reeds need to be added to the ground 3 times a month, while the houses need to be all but re-built 3 times a year! Then each island has something they call a “Mercedes Benz”, which, in reality, is a reed boat.

For 5 soles it was possible to hitch a ride in the Mercedes to the next island. Some of the group did this and much to the hilarity of the rest of use these reed boats are actually just pushed along by a speed boat!

The second island just seemed like a market. There were numerous stalls to buy souvenirs and it was possible to get a Lake Titicaca stamp in your passport.

Then it was back to dry land to continue, over the border into Bolivia, and onto a place called Copacabana. To be fair we didn´t do a whole let here, just had lunch and took another boat trip out to Isla del Sol (Sun Island). In hindsight, this wasn´t really worth the $10 I paid. Or maybe I was just too tired to appreciate it! I did get a cool Bolivian flag photo though!

Last day in Peru...

Tomorrow will be my last day in Peru. I am taking an overnight bus to Lake Titicaca where I will spend the day tomorrow. Some time in the afternoon I will cross the border and into Bolivia. Yet another new currency to get used to!

My time in Peru has been great! Really expensive but good fun! I'm glad I chose to travel around with Peru Hop. They have eased me into the whole backpacking gig and I am really gonna miss them organising everything for me! I met some really nice people in the Peru Hop buses, some of which I will undoubtedly bump into again. As it seems, I am not the only one travelling all the way from Peru to Brazil!

This weekend seems to be some kind of big celebration in Cusco. The main square is absolutely packed with brass bands, dancers, women and men in traditional clothing and lots of school children. Some of the dancers remind me of the Morris dancers that used to come to Barney when I was a child. Maybe it's something to do with the fact that it's 100 years this months since Machu Picchu was rediscovered? It's all very colourful!

What was my favourite thing I did in Peru? I've gotta say the dune buggy/sand boarding experience in Huacachina. I don't think I've ever laughed, screamed and cried so much in the space of a few hours! The train journey to Machu Picchu was also pretty awesome. I didn't expect the landscape of Peru to be anything like it ended up being. I guess that was the biggest surprise for me in Peru. The food hasn't been all that bad either... Especially the chicharrón with baked sweet potato I had alongside the motorway just outside of Lima. It came with 4 freshly baked pita breads, which only cost 1 Sol (€0.26) So far I haven't had any problems with the altitude (touch wood) other than just finding it generally harder to breath, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't scared about heading to La Paz and the salt plains in Bolivia... In Peru I've only been at the higher altitudes for a few hours before going back down. In Bolivia I will be at high altitudes for a week to 10 days!

Machu Picchu: Wonder of the World

Today I was up before the crack of dawn. I was awake a good hour before I heard the rooster crowing... It was still pitch black. And it was still outing down with rain. It had rained all night, since about 2pm yesterday. I hoped it would stop raining by the time I left the hotel, but it didn't. Sleepily I walked towards the bus stop, almost walking past it! It was only because I wondered why so many people were queueing out in the rain that I didn't walk past. At 5:00am the queue was already quite large. The first bus didn't leave until 5:30am but now I understood why the guide told me to be there in plenty of time. After a good 30 minutes of standing in the rain, which by this point had slowed to a drizzle, the queue was finally moving and not long after I was on the bus. Still pitch black. The bus wound up what I thought was a road. On the way back down I learnt it was actually just a dirt track up the side of the mountain! When we stopped it was light. Not sure when exactly the sun had risen as I had fallen asleep in the bus. It was still drizzling though and was still very misty. I had no idea what I was surrounded by. I had no clue where Machu Picchu was hiding. My guide Juan Carlos was waiting for me at the entrance. In 2 hours he told me everything I need to know about the ancient Inca city and more. Did you know that Machu Picchu is actually laid out in the form of a condor? Neither did I this morning... Before the city was abandoned about 500-600 people were living here. The 4,000-6,000 visitors everyday are causing the city to sink at a rate of 1cm per year. JC expects that in the coming years they will restrict the number of visitors as they already do to the 2 mountains within Machu Picchu. Those allow only 400 visitors per day and are currently fully booked for the next 3 months! I did not get to see the city in its full glory. The clouds never completely lifted, although that did make for some pretty stunning photos (if I do say so myself!).

In 2007 Machu Picchu was voted one of the 7 New Wonders of the World and it is pretty wonderful...

Cusco - the gateway to Machu Picchu

I had very low expectations for Cusco. I figured it was just a place people stopped over in before heading on to Machu Picchu. But I was wrong. First of all, the 12 hour bus journey from Arequipa to Cusco was beautiful! It was rugged, snow covered mountains, dotted with small villages and locals dressed in traditional clothing. It is what I expect Patagonia to look like. But it was definitely not what I expected to find in Peru!

Cusco is actually a very large, very beautiful city, offering much more than just a stop over place for Machu Picchu.

Due to the fact that it proved more difficult to get my tickets for Machu Picchu than I thought, I had a day to explore the city today. I decided to take one of those open-top double decker sightseeing buses. It headed out of the city and up into the surrounding hills (or are they mountains?), passing by numerous archaeological sites such as Saqsaywaman, Muyuq Marka and Puka Pukara.

Saqsaywaman in particular I thought was very beautiful. My photo doesn’t really do it justice at all! The final stop of the tour was at Christo Blanco (white Christ) statue. From here there were lovely views over the whole of Cusco city and the Cusconian valley.

Tomorrow I will leave Cusco for a couple of days to travel up to Aguas Calientes. The real stop over place for Machu Picchu. I will be traveling there by train. The Vistadome to be precise. A glass topped train for maximum views! And I am just a little bit excited about this! Will be spending tomorrow night in Aguas Calientes so that I can head to Machu Picchu as soon as it opens on Saturday. Hopefully beating the hordes of people and be able to get a few nice photos without tourists!

Arequipa and some big canyon

I have been in Arequipa now for a few days. The white city. Due to the fact that a lot of the building are made of a white volcanic rock called Sillar. Arequipa is a beautiful city. It has numerous old buildings and is great for just wandering around in. It reminds me a bit of Antigua, it is also surrounded by 3 volcanoes. They offer free walking tours so I was able to get a bit of the history of the city and the surrounding area. And of course the walking tour ended up in a bar for a Pisco sour tasting. I wonder whether it's possible to come to Peru as a tourist without tasting a Pisco sour at least every other day!

Sandwiched in the middle of my Arequipa stay I had a 2 day tour of Colca Canyon. Colca canyon is the 2nd deepest canyon in South America.

To get there we had to drive 3 hours, up to the highest point at approximately 5,000m above sea level and then back down to 3,600m where we would spend the night in Chivay. Here we went to some thermal swimming pools and saw a traditional dance performance during dinner.

Staying seated was not an option. By the time dessert came we were all up dancing! After a freezing night in a hotel (no heating, no hot water) we headed along the river and into the canyon itself. We stopped at various viewpoints which I felt were not the best places to stop at, we stopped at a couple of villages for a chance to get an alpaca selfie and then we stopped at something called Condors Cross. A view point in an area where approximately 20 condors are known to fly. What a spectacular sight! I decided against walking down to the main viewpoint, mainly because the altitude was quite high and breathing wasn't that easy. So walking up a hill didn't seem like a good idea. Instead I found a wall overlooking the cliff and sat on it. And I am glad I did! For a while I could only watch the condors flying close to the viewpoint and I doubted my decision to stay put. But then they came my way. And not just one or two. But 5 of them. And they were flying right over our heads! So close that you could hear the wind as they passed by. At one point one of the adult condors (adults are black, young are brown) tried to land on the rock behind my head. Much to the surprise of the lady that was sat on it! Four condors decided they'd had enough of flying too, and landed on a rock just beneath me. It was amazing to be so close to such a massive bird. A fully grown adult has a wingspan of 3m and the young aren't much smaller. So in hindsight, my decision to be lazy gave me the best vantage point for these incredible birds!

Poor mans Galapogas and lots of adrenaline!

Yesterday was a wild ride of adrenaline...!

The day started out in Paracas. A tiny fishing village south of Lima. And there isn't much to do here... Especially when the weather is not great and it wasn't yesterday. We were here for the Ballastas Islands. Also know as the "poor mans Galapogas islands". We went out on the first boot and after 2 minutes we stopped and the guide pointed to the front of the boot and said dolphins! There were loads of them, happily swimming around the boat. One even had a baby dolphin with her! The bar had been set high. We continued on to a place where some local fishermen were working. Their nets were out in a giant circle. And there were birds, millions of birds, lined up around the circle. Sat just outside of the nets, not inside.

Every now and then one would fly away and set off a domino effect which was amazing to see! And then a cheeky seal jumped over the nets, into the circle and disappeared underwater. Moments later coming back up to the surface and jumping back out of the net. Heading along the coast a bit we saw something that resembled the Nazca lines, a candelabra, engraved into the rock. Apparently this one is much younger than the Nazca lines and engraved much deeper. We then left the shore to head to the islands. There we were greeted by a group of hombolt penguins waddling their way along the cliff top. And there were more birds, hundreds of thousands of birds if not millions! And more seals, laying on the rocks.

And crabs and starfish and vultures! Sooo many animals! I have never been to the Galapogas islands so I can't compare, but this was beautiful!

From Paracas we headed to Huacachina.

An oasis in the desert surrounded by the largest sand dunes in South America. And these things were huge! If I had to guess I'd say 500m tall. We were here for the dune buggy tour and sand boarding. We had a crazy driver! It was like a rollercoaster, except you never knew what was coming next. He would accelerate full throttle towards nothingness, with this calm, poker face expression on his face. And then we'd drop over the edge of a dune and all of us would scream. And laugh! He repeated this over and over. Making sharp handbrake turn corners in the sand until we got to the top of the dune we'd be boarding down.

Out came the boards and wax and he briefly explained (in Spanish) how it worked. The first dune we had to lay on our tummies and he gave me a brief push and down i went. Sand flying into my face. About half way down my sunglasses went flying off! It was great! Next dune we could choose, tummy or sitting. The third dune we could even stand. We then went back up for another round. By this point some of the boys were (trying) to show off! And most of them failed miserably! Resulting in much laughter from us!

By this point the sun was close to setting so we headed up to one of the higher dunes for a good vantage point... Watching the sunset over the dunes was beautiful. It was so peaceful. Just watching the sun fall behind the huge dunes.

I could have stayed here all night... But we had to go back down to the village. The driver asked do you want slow or fast? A couple of the girls said slow but the rest of us screamed fast. In the end I don't think it mattered. The driver had no intention of driving slow and sensibly. What followed was a long, rollercoaster ride, for most of which I was not in contact with my seat. We got flung left and right and up out of our seats! The girl next to me had her eyes close and was holding on for dear life. I don't think I've ever screamed and laughed so much! So much adrenaline and just when we thought it was all over and we were safely back in town, he accelerated hard, roaring through the streets back to the hostel. I can highly recommend this place! It is not something I will be forgetting any time soon...

photos will follow later as it's taking ages to upload!!

Hello Lima!

Monday was a travel day. It was going to take all day to get from Guatemala City to Lima via a 4 hour lay-over in Atlanta. But then we got delayed. On the taxi to the runway in Atlanta we stopped. And waited. Until the captain told us that there was a mechanical problem with the plane that meant we most likely had to go back to the gate. So we did. And hour and a half later and whatever problem fixed we left, hoping to make up some of the time mid-air. But we didn't. 1:30am I landed in Lima. Thankfully I had organised a pick up from the hostel and within 20 minutes I was at my hostel.

Tuesday was my day to explore Lima. But first task for the day was to book my onward trip. I've heard numerous good things about Peru Hop and their office just happened to be right next to the hostel. So off I went. 30 minutes later and a lot of information richer I left the office with my trip booked. Lima - La Paz over the course of about 2 weeks and stopping at all the highlights of Peru along the way. Including a dessert oasis, Nazca lines, a large canyon, Cusco (for Machu Picchu), lake Titicaca to name but a few! All in the comfort of a big air-conditioned coach!

But first Lima. I didn't really have any plans for Lima. My expectations were that it would be a generic, big city, one that you could find anywhere in the world. And that's how it started out. I walked around a lot of an area called Miraflores. It's kinda the main tourist area. It all felt very safe, but cold! Not what I expected! In the afternoon I headed towards the beach. I didn't actually get to the beach because there is a shear cliff face all the way along the coast. And to be frank, I couldn't be bothered to climb back up it! So I didn't go down it... But dotted all along the cliff top were these parks.

Each one slightly different. Some only had the occasional bench to sit on, surrounds by many palm trees. Others had lots of art sculptures. One even had a skate park.

The majority had wifi. That was something I noticed about Lima. How many parks, squares and sometimes even just streets have free wifi spots. My walk ended at a shopping mall built into the cliff face and overlooking the ocean. I spent a bit of time people watching here and watching the surfers below. Seeing as today would be my only evening in Lima and with Lima having such a reputation for food, I wanted to try ceviche. A dish of raw fish (and/or seafood) marinated in lemon juice and garlic so it slightly cooks the fish. It was delicious! And I am not a big fish person!

I could probably have spent another day wandering around Lima, taking a closer look at what it has to offer and maybe exploring other neighbourhoods, but it was either one day or three days (bus schedule) and of those one day fitted into the rest of my plan better!

And now, I am waiting for the bus to pick me up so I can head out of Lima and see what the rest of Peru has to offer!

It's been a looooong week!

I haven't written anything on my blog this week and that is because of a very good reason. I have been exhausted. My week has consisted of sleeping, eating and working. And nothing else! Here is a quick summary of the week:

Monday

Monday's ride to work was not a smooth one. About half way. We got stopped by the police. 6 men and a gringa, in a beaten up, 30 year old pick up truck. I was expecting trouble. There was some discussion, some papers were required and I think they doubted ownership of the truck. Why anyone would steal such a vehicle is beyond me. But anyway, the police were not satisfied with the papers so the driver was asked to step out of the pick up. Now at this point I was completely expecting the police to shoot him at point blank range. But thankfully they didn't. As none of us would have been able to drive the pick up anywhere! After a while of discussion the driver was allowed to return and we were on our way. Once in Balanya, new week = new house and new family. And this family had, next to the usual amount of chickens, lots of dogs. And a very cute puppy called Rex!

Tuesday

Tuesday was hot! Full, blazing sun hot! And I was sat in it all day chipping blocks. I really quickly gave up on rubbing in my sun lotion. It was just spray on, wait 5 minutes for it to evaporate and then reapply. And I still got burnt!

Wednesday

Wednesday morning I went to Ciudad Viaje to help build an extra classroom for the Niños de Guatemala school. We were only there for the morning because in the afternoon we were going to visit 2 other projects that Constru Casa have worked on. The first was a cooperation that designs and builds ecological machinery to try and combat the pollution issues in Guatemala. They have created a compost creating toilet and an irrigation system powered by a tower with a kinda cross-trainer pumping thing.

They give lessons to locals on how to live in a more sustainable manner, in a classroom that was built by Constru Casa. They also grow a lot of fruit, vegetables and herbs all of which they sell and they have some free range chickens and bunny rabbits. The second project was Tess Unlimited, where we visited their educational centre. It's a place where kids can go, for free, in the afternoon. Here they get extra classes in English, computers and cooking. Twice a month there is something called Kids Restaurant where the kids cook a 3 course meal for the public. Not an easy feat, considering these kids are as young as 9 years old!

Thursday

How many guys does it take to mix a floors-worth of concrete?? 5 guys and a girl! And we made THE ultimate concrete mixing machine! Guy 1 mixing the semi-dry mixture into a slightly wetter mixture, guy 2 making the mixture even wetter and shovelling into buckets, guy 3 moving the filled buckets into the house, guy 4 pouring the concrete, guy 5 level if it out and then me, overseeing the whole operation (of course) and adding more water when it was all looking a bit too dry! I think we managed to mix, pour and level the whole room in 5 minutes tops!

Friday

The last day of building. House 4 was finished at lunch time. There was meant to be a small ceremony in the afternoon but due to the Constru Casa staff getting in a small car accident (no one as injured - just the car) on their way to Balanya we had to just kinda wing it! We took photos with the family and the house. The mason gave a speech and thanked me for helping and the father of the family also said some nice words to me. I had brought them some bags of crisps and a 3l bottle of Pepsi (this seemed to be the families favourite snack combination) to celebrate the completion of their new home! As I was leaving the mother came and gave me a hug. Obviously a very emotional time for the family! And me too.

This was repeated at the first house I helped with. Only there I had an extra gift for the little boy. I gave him his very own masons kit. Complete with hard hat and a tool belt with all the tools he could need to build his own house!

I got a thank you gift from Constru Casa. A volunteer t-shirt and a group photo from the first day. Oh and some banana bread and orange juice, that because of the accident, didn't make it to the celebrations in Balanya!