Adios Peru - Hola Bolivia!!!

After a fine lunch in Puno (most people had fantastic fresh trout) we headed south along Lake Titicaca and got to our first land border crossing into Bolivia. Everything seemed to go quite smoothly so on we went with our 30 day Bolivian visas. Wohooooooo our third South American country stamps!!!

We were heading for Copacabana on the southern shore of lake Titicaca (which you can see just west of La Paz on the map!!) with lots of warnings that we were now in Bolivia (the poorest of the SA countries) and so we should be prepared for standards to drop. In fact, compared to Puno in Peru, Copacabana was a nice little town with a kind of hippy/arty feel. The hotel was nice and had hot running water, a comfortable bed and a tv…ok there was a bit of a smell but we were expecting worse!! When we arrived we climbed a hill on the north of the town which had the stations of the cross built on the way up and had a beautiful view of Lake Titicaca to watch the sunset.

                          
The next morning we headed to Isla del Sol. In Inca mythology it is believed to be the birthplace of the sun. The island had some ruins, which were tiny in comparison to the ruins we had seen over the previous weeks and to be honest we are kind of ‘ruined out’!! But the trek across the ridge of the island, which took a couple of hours, was nice and the views of the lake on either side. The little kids we met on the way were lovely!! We bumped into two kids after our lunch stop and I gave them the remains of my lunch, a couple of pieces of fruit and a cheese sandwich but then they spotted my sweets!! I gave them the rest of my packet of Tangtastic Haribo and you should have seen their faces when they put them in their mouths!!

The floating islands of Puno

After fully recovering in Cusco, it was time to move on again. We headed south to Puno which is a tiny port on Lake Titicaca. Lake Titicaca is the world’s largest high altitude lake. The lake was so vast it really felt like you were by the coastline but really you were at 3800m above sea level in land locked Bolivia!!

From Puno we headed out to the floating islands of the Uros people on Lake Titicaca. The floating islands (62 in all) were very unusual. They were built by the Uros people who wanted to escape the Inca/Spanish rules of the mainland. Apparently they are very lazy people and don’t like to be forced to work and it did feel like they did things at their own pace on the island. The islands were built using layers of buoyant totora reeds. The people used the reeds for pretty much everything; building their houses and boats, food, firewood and handicrafts. They were very friendly people and had a great sense of humour. They had a competition with our group to see who could guess the depth of water below their island. The prize was a mini reed boat and Tom came the closest at 15m. We got on one of the reed boats for a quick trip to the next island and 2 of the girls sang us off to row row row your boat!! Very weird in a Peruvian accent!!

Cusco - NO GRACIAS!!

After our long trek in Machu Picchu it was nice to make it back to the city; to the comfort of a hotel room and a hot shower :o) But with the luxury of being in a big city comes the knowledge for locals that the Gringos (tourists) are around!! So from the second you walk out of the hotel door the offers begin and the words ‘No Gracias’ become your friend for the day!!

- Massage - No Gracias
- Magical Musical Instruments, special price - No Gracias!
- Massage - No Gracias!!
- Picture with a Llama - No Gracias!!!
- Massage - No Gracias!!!!
- Manicure, Pedicure - No Gracias!!!!!
- Massage - NO GRACIAS!!!!!!

The local Irish bar - Paddy’s even had their t-shirt for sale with their logo on the back and NO GRACIAS on the front!!!

So when we weren’t being mobbed by locals we managed to celebrate completing the Inca trail, visit a few museums and eat some really nice food…if you’re ever in Cusco your first stop for food has to be Jacks Café. It’s a small café run by Irish/English owners. The food is really good and the strawberry milkshake is divine!! It was really nice to get a taste of home food having been away for 2 months and trekked for 4 days to Machu Picchu :o)

MACHU PICCHU and Wayna Picchu!!!

After we had got our stamps in our passports for making it to the end of the trail our guide, Yamiel give us a tour of Machu Picchu. The site is huge and it is just so hard to imagine how they could have made all these structures ...yrs ago!! The views were breathtaking and magical.

As we strolled around Machu Picchu enjoying the sunshine and the stunning views we were constantly in the shadow of  Wayna Picchu. Lots of people had recommended that if we had any energy left that we should climb this mountain for its spectacular views of Machu Picchu - AS IF WE HAD ANY ENERGY LEFT!!! I mean who wants to climb ANOTHER few 1000 steps after 3 days of trekking just to get there!!!

...TOM!!!! He managed to convince 4 of us (for me I couldnt let him go home bragging that he had done it and I hadn't!!) from a group of about 25 to climb it with him and it was TORTURE!!! But well worth it - infact the highlight of the trek once we got to the top!! The views were outstanding and it really gave you a sense of just how big Machu Picchu is and just how unbelievable it is that it could have been built by the Inca's 100's of years ago without any of the technology that we have today!!

The four of us about half way up Wayna Picchu...it was such a steep trek up and my legs were killing before I even started!!

...some of the cliff edges on the way up were pretty hairy!!

All of us chilling out at the top...absolutely shattered!!!

Me taking in the view over the cliff at the top of Wayna Picchu..

Me and Tom at the top of Wayna Picchu...amazing view of Machu Picchu and the highlight of the trek!!

Walking in the footsteps of the Inca's...

DAY 1

This is us looking very energetic at the beginning of the trail...here we were swamped by people selling us walking sticks, plastic ponchos and coca leaves for the altitude!!

 

The group at the entrance to the trail...don't we all look nice and clean and fresh...that wasn't going to last!!!

Map at the beginning of the trail showing where we would trek and the altitudes.We peaked at 4200m at Warmiwanuscca...

 

We got our passes into Machu Picchu and our stamps in our passports to show we started the trail...lets hope we get the end stamp!!!

The group with our 13 porters at the end of day 1. These guys were unbelievable. Each day they would carry all of our camp equipment and rucksacks -  20kilos each!! They would leave camp after us as they would have to pack everything away and always arrive to the next camp before us with enough time to set up the new camp!! The oldest porter was Rafael (back left) who was 70yrs old and still going strong - UNBELIEVABLE!!

 

The view from our tent after our first days hiking...we arrived at the site in about  6hrs (which was apparently a very good time!) and the porters had our tents pitched, a bowl of hot water outside our tents to wash with and dinner on the way!!!

DAY 2

We were warned that Day 2 was going to be hard!! It was 8 hours hiking all together - 6 hrs uphill and 2 hrs down. We would climb from about 3000m to a peak of 4200m. The altitude really affects your breathing and as you climb you are constantly out of breath!! It is weird to feel out of breath after just a few steps but you get used to it. Some people chewed the Coco leaves to help but they were really disgusting and I just couldnt eat them!!The pace is slow but steady and you just have to keep going. It was tough mentally and physically!!

Along the way there was lots of opportunities for group pictures (good excuse for a break!!) and to stop and admire the amazing scenery!!

And lunch was always a welcome break...the food was always unbelievably good considering these guys were sprinting passed us with 20 kilos on their back in time to get to the lunch spot, set up the tent and cooking equipment and cook us lunch!!!

 The last section of steps up to the peak Warmiwanuscca. It was so unbelievably hard to do these last few steps at such a high altitude...I thought I was going to collapse when I got up there!! Tom of course found it a piece of cake ;o)

It was nice to sit up there for a while & enjoy the view. The mountains are amazing & the pictures really don’t do it justice...its hard to describe how vast & powerful the mountains feel when you are in the middle of them & the sense of how small you are in comparison to the world!!

...but off course everything that goes up must go down!! I found going down way easier - skipping down the steps like the porters was good fun and really got the adrenaline going...tom suffered with his knees but still ploughed on!!

DAY 3

After a bit of partying at the campsite the night before we got up really early on the final morning to make our way to the famous Sun Gate. This is the main gate way into Machu Picchu built by the Inca's in line with the rising of the Sun. From here there is an amazing view of Machu Picchu itself however...

...looking for the sun rising through the famous gate or a glimpse of Machu Picchu!!

...as we left the sun gate and made our way down to Machu Picchu the clouds parted for a second and we caught a glimpse of the ruins...

On the last step of our trek!! The feeling of getting to the end was amazing and Machu Picchu was so impressive in front of us!! The clouds had cleared and the sun was shining FINALLY!! Karen did really well to get to the end on her own...she was really ill on the last day ;o(

Everyone made it to the end in one piece wohoooooooooooooo!!!!

...and our guides, looking as fresh as they did on Day 1, got a massive
Suipayki Wayky from the group!! This is thank-you friend in
Quechua - the local language of the porters and guides.  

Peru - the Highlands, the Lowlands, the Deserts and the Coast!!!

So its been about 10 days since our last post and I feel like we've been everywhere!! We have been travelling through the vast country of Peru and although this has meant alot of time sitting down on our new home "Dragoman Truck Amber" we have seen alot!! Again the country has so many completely different landscapes and totally changeable weather which we were completely unprepared for!!! In 10 days we have seen beautiful coastline, vast deserts, high altitudes (the highest we've been is 4500m above sea level), amazing volcanoes, deep canyons, sunshine, snow, hail, torrential rain and temperatures getting close to 0'C!!!

It was intially a shock to try and switch from being at the volunteer house in Pisco to being back on an organised tour. In Pisco we felt part of a family and got to know the locals really well, we were obviously staying in the one place so we didnt have to unpack and repack our bag everyday and our spanish was beginning to come along as we were being forced to use it with Jose and his family. We were really sad to leave Jose's shop unfinished and if we had not booked the tour in advance we certainly would have stayed for longer. But the tour started with a bang and the first day in the desert was amazing!!

The Desert

On day one on our Dragoman Overlander we made our way from Lima to Huacachina in 4.5hrs. Huacachina is a very small village built around a beautiful oasis in the middle of the desert. When we (a group of about 35 of us) got there we picked up some sand boards (which are basically snowboards) and also some flat sandboards that we just lay on to come down the dunes!! We jumped onto some Sand Buggies who had some pretty mad drivers and headed off into the desert where the fun was about to start!! The sand buggying was mad!! The drivers would take you up and down the dunes and it pretty much felt like a roller coaster!! Then we would stop at the top of the biggest dunes and get the boards out to either sand board down them standing up (it was much harder than snow boarding as the sand was so heavy!!) or you could just lie on the board and fly down!! Both ways were pretty cool but definitely the speed was when you lay down!!! Then they would collect you at the bottom of the dune and head to the next one so no trekking up massive dunes wohooooo!!



Huacachina
Beautiful oasis in the middle of the desert



Dragoman goes Sand Buggying!!!



Sun Set in the Desert



Everyone getting their beds ready - roll out your sleeping bag!!



At the end of the days buggying and boarding we stopped in a little dune valley and set up camp!! Which basically meant roll out your sleeping bag!!! The guides set up an amazing BBQ and made us some Pisco sours!! The food and drink was AMAZING and the partying was cool. Then we headed to our sleeping bags and snuggled up in all layers of our clothing under the stars of the desert!! Definitely an experience we won't forget!!

Nazca Lines and Chauchilla Cemetery

Then we headed for Nazca to check out the famous Nazca lines. We travelled along the Panamericana Highway and stopped on the side of the road north of Nazca town. It is unbelieveable that the main highway has been built directly through such a famous historical site! We climbed a small observation tower and saw three of the figures, a lizard, a tree and a pair of hands. I must say it was a little bit of a let down and some people say you can only really appreciate it from the air but from the look out we could see the mini tornadoes so it didnt look like a great place for flying!! We decided to leave the Nazca lines a mystery and check them out on google earth!!

The next day we travelled onwards to a nearby cemetery called Chauchilla cemetery. Not very many people bother to go to this site and actually we found it much more interesting than the Nazca lines. We travelled across the barren desert in true overland style [sitting with the roof boxes open] to the cemetery.

The tour was given by a local archaeologist [who had an article published in National Geographic]. He was extremely interesting and passionate about his job and his tour of the cemetery was amazing. There were lots of mummies located in the various graves dating back to the Nazca era, pre-Inca times. The mummies were buried in the foetal position facing east towards the rising sun. They were buried with food and some belongings which they would need in the afterlife. Many of them still had very long hair, teeth and finger nails and one guy was buried with his pet parrot, which was so preserved as you could still see the feathers. Grave robbers have taken many of the treasures from theses graves over the years. It was definitely worth a visit and one of the most under advertised visitor attractions we have seen.

Mummy buried with his Pet Parrot on the left!



Baby mummy buried wrapped in cotton. This one had been beheaded with a cotton head in its place. It was probably a child sacrifice to the gods.

Camping on the Beach

Next stop was Puerto Inca where we camped out on the beach!! It was a really cool beach with huge waves, cliff faces and more inca ruins. It was nice just to chill out, sun bathe, listen to the waves, watch the fisher men (who didnt catch much!!), check out the ruins and watch the sun set!!

Arequipa

After a night on the beach it was great to head on to the 'white city' of Arequipa, to a nice hotel and a big city!! After a nice hot shower we headed to the see the famous 'Ice Princess' - Juanita. She was yet another mummy but a very special one!! The story goes that she is a 14yr old Inca maiden who was sacrificed on the summit of Mt Ampato over 500 yrs ago. She is so well preserved because she was found under the glacier at the top of the mountain. She still had her hair and you could clearly see her facial features. The story of how she got there was amazing and unbelievable how a child of that age could have hiked from Cusco to Arequipa and then to the summit of the mountain to be sacrificed!! We couldn't take any pictures as obviously she is being preserved in cold, dark conditions but im sure you can google her!!!

We also visited a really nice Convent in the centre of Arequipa. Its probably the most picturesque place we have visited and clearly the nuns were some of the richest people in Peruvian society. It was like a city inside a city...it was full of quaint little streets with beautiful flowers, fountains and statues. Different parts were painted orange or blue...orange represented earth and all the novices could go in those areas but blue represented the passage to heaven and only the ordained nuns could go there. It was a cool place to spend a sunny afternoon with Russell and Lisa (2 friends from the tour - Russell is from London and Lisa is from NZ)

 

Andean mountains - Wildcamp and Homestay Raqchi

So off we headed again!! This time high into the Andean mountains and we were totally ill prepared!!! We thought we were coming to South America for the sun and clearly did not pack enough winter clothes!!

As we got higher and higher into the mountains the roads got bumpier and the weather got worse. It started to snow and it was so cold on the truck that we were wearing everything that we had on the truck and were tucked up inside our sleeping bags!!! We thought the guides were crazy even thinking about camping in these conditions but as we dropped in altitude on the other side of the mountain the weather started to get a bit better!!! We found a spot and quickly pitched the tents before it started to rain or snow again!! We had dinner and pretty much jumped back into the sleeping bags for bed - it was Baltic!! When we got up the next morning a little old lady with a large bull, who looked like she had been walking for miles, arrived to tell us that we had camped on her land and so we needed to pay up!! We gave her all of our bread and milk and $20 but she still tried to get us to buy some socks (which she just happened to have with her on her trek in the middle of nowhere!!) for 25soles - these socks are usually about 10soles max anywhere else!!!! So we packed up quickly and got the flock outa there!!

The scenery along the way was amazing, the mountains were majestic and the wildlife was cool. We saw llamas, alpacas and flamingos. We also saw a lot of people in their traditional dress herding their cows and sheep.

After a night wild camping the homestay seemed positively luxurious!! We were back in beds with sheets and blankets staying with the most welcoming local Andean families. The village, Raqchi, we stayed in was really cool. It is a small village of 80 families and they have worked hard as a community to develop the skills and services necessary to attract tourists. The government funded 20% of the start up costs for the village families to adapt their houses for tourist homestays, learn a little bit of english, learn about health and hygiene etc. The community pulled together then to fund the other 80% collectively. It is a village well know for their traditional pottery making skills and they showed us how to do it!! Clearly I wasnt that talented!! They also dressed us up in traditional clothing (which made you look about 10stone heavier but was very warm!!) and showed us a traditional ceremony of making offerings to the Pacha Mama (Mother Earth).

Me trying to learn how to make the pottery - honestly the finished product
will sell for millions unfortunately I dont have a picture of it!!

The whole gang dressed up in traditional costumes for the night. Tom danced with the locals and we all took part in the ceremony to offer some coca leaves to Pacha Mama.



Our host families kids doing their homework - the whole community are so hard working - kids with school work, men and women in the fields tending their crops, women making the pottery and selling it in the market and they honestly look after the tourists so well!! When we left each host family gave their guests a small piece of their pottery to take home...it really felt humbling to stay with them.