Machu Picchu - Nature Girl - Day 2!

Jaime woke Natasha and I up by coming to our tent with his standard wake up call - "buenos dias señoritas - are you naked?" It didn´t matter if we were or not, he and Martin were bringing us our morning drink. We had our choice of coffe, tea or hot coco. I chose an Inca Mocha! I needed the caffine. I didn´t sleep very well that night. My feet were cold and I had a breathing panic attack during the night. I don´t know what happened, all of a sudden, I woke up and I couldn´t breathe. I had to concentrate on every breath and kept telling myself "it´s fine, just breath" - I had to talk myself off the ledge there for second. I did not like it, at all! I can´t imagine what someone with asthma must feel. Come to find out, Michaela had the same thing that night. She woke up in the middle of the night, freaked out about not being able to breathe. I guess it´s quite common at that altitude when you are not used to it.

We had breakfast and were off trekking 8 a.m. Day 2 was not going to be as hard as day one and we would be treking through the cloud forest. We were heading down with some inclines thrown in for good measure, but were going to be finished trekking by 2 p.m. or so. It was raining most of the day so our ponchos were out. It was muddy and you had to be really careful walking because it was really easy to slip in the mud. Lewis showed off his sliding in the mud style once. After I saw that, I was really careful, watching every step! I had a few near slides myself - gives a new meaning to slip and slide! This was the worst weather day we would see. Cold, wet, muddy and slippery.

We are getting good at "harmonizing" with nature. This is our expression for you know...being at one with nature and squatting to do you business. "Jaime, I need to harmonize, where should I go?"

We reached our campsite around lunch time. Our campsite was on Julian´s property and talk about beautiful views! We ate lunch and then walked down to a natural hot spring where we soaked in the hot thermal water...ahhh! We were surrounded by the gorgeous Andes mountains and the sound of the river below. It was great.

We hiked back up to our campsite and had dinner. At dinner, Jaime told us the story of the magic man or Chupa Cabra. Apparently, he had been seen in this area. We don´t know if he´s alive or dead but he wanders the mountains. There was a graveyard right next to the location that our tents were pitched. Jaime told us that the dead had woken campers up in the middle of the night. The dead would scratch their backs from under the ground. Halloween is almost here...eeeeooowwww!

Julian´s property is basically a farm with pigs, mules, guinea pigs (i think they eat them...cuy!), and one loud ass rooster that doesn´t know that it´s supposed to be quiet when it´s dark out!

Nature girl is gettin it done!

The quest for Machu Picchu - I am nature girl!

I woke up at, what I thought was, 2:45ish a.m. so that I could shower and finish my last minute packing. I have been using my phone as my alarm clock and since I don´t turn it on, I didn´t update the time when I arrived in Perú. What I thought was 2:45 a.m was really 3:45 a.m. The night desk guy pointed that out to me when I went to ask "What happended to the water"? Apparently the entire town didn´t have water that morning. My pick up was in 15 minutes - holy crap. I kicked it in gear with a baby wipe shower, a quick brush through my hair and a quick brush of my teeth with the standard bottled water. I was ready in 20 minutes! Whew! I wasn´t so happy about starting out with dirty hair, but oh well, soon I´d be at one with nature and it wouldn´t matter anyway.

Once our "family" was all loaded in the mini van, we had a 3 hour ride to Mollepata for breakfast, which was a complete rip off. The breakfast was way overpriced as compared to what you can get elsewhere and it was puny. You have to buy breakfast where they take you so, we were stuck. And the frustrating thing was that when we were walking out, we saw what the "locals" were eating - heaps of rice, beans, eggs, etc. What´s that all about? After the puny breakfast, we drove another hour or so to the trail head at Sorya Pampa which is at an elevation of 3800m, about 400 meters higher than Cusco. Here is where we met Julian, our horseman. He and Martin loaded our main packs and camping gear onto the mules for the trek.

Jaime had given us a heads up that the 1st day of the trek was one of the hardest. We would reach our highest elevation point on the 1st day. We started walking. I took about 50 steps and was already breathing hard. I thought "how on earth am I going to do this"? I was trying to get into a walking rythm. Up, up and up we went. It was tough. I found myself counting, counting steps. I would take about 100 steps and then look up and take in the view. The good thing was that we had a clear day. We could see the top of the snow-covered Salkantay mountain at 6,264m and the Huamantay mountain at 5,810m. We heard a few thunderous avalaches on the Salkantay mountain - very powerful!

Poor Natasha, she had just arrived to Cusco the day before and was struggling with altitude sickness. It was tough without having a pounding headache, I can´t imagine climbing with one!

We made out way to Soyrococha where Martin and Julian had our lunch tent set up. It was perfect timing because just as we got there, it started to rain. It was pretty cold when we stopped moving. Lunch was awesome. We all agreed that we wanted to bring Martin home with us! He made amazing soups, chicken and other side dishes...yum! I continued to drink mate de coca to help with the altitude. Jaime had also given us a lesson on the healing properties of the coca leaf. The coca leaf is not a drug - have you seen the t-shirt? He gave us some to chew. I am not of fan of chewing the leaves, but the tea was doable.

After lunch, out came the ponchos. We treked for about an hour in the rain, to our hightest point - Abra Huamntay at 4,600m. On the way there, we each picked up a quartz rock and left it at Abra Huamntay. We said a prayer to Pachemama (mother earth) and left the rock as thanks. We didn´t stop for too long, there was still a lot of treking to do. Later, we saw Chinchilas in the rocks. At first they were hard to see, but when we stopped to focus on the rocks, there were lots of them.

Finally, we made it to our campsite, Huayracmachay at 3,800m. I am so happy that I didn´t have to use the "long drop" when we got there. The Aussies and Kiwis call the "outhouse" a long drop. Funny! I guess it does make more sense since these didn´t have a seat - just a hole in the gound and 2 boards for your feet and then pop a squat! Ay yi yi!

Dinner was amazing. I ate alot! Natasha was feeling better by the end of the day. For a while there, she wasn´t looking too good.

Day one was tough...keep going nature girl!

Getting ready for the big hike...!

I spent Monday organizing my bag, buying last minute supplies, getting my laundry done, resting and worrying about being cold on the trek. That evening, I attended the hike orientation meeting where I met my fellow hikers, our guide and our cook. We were a small group of 4 - Michaela and Lewis from New Zealand via the UK and Natasha from Australia. Jaime was our guide and Martin was our cook. We were now a family!

Jaime gave us the low down on the hike. We would be hiking on the Salkantay trail to, Aguas Calientes, the small town below the Machu Picchu site. The entire trek would be 5 days and would cover approximately 70 km reaching the highest elevation of 4600m or 15,000 feet - holy moly!

After the meeting, Natasha and I grabbed dinner and we both decided that since we were going to be camping for the next 3 nights, we were going to shower at the very last minute - 3:30 a.m. since our pick up time was 4 a.m. the next morning!!!! Sooooo early! The decision to wait on the shower turned out to be a bust...

Finally...some air!

On my 3rd day in Cuzco, I finally felt more like myself. I woke up early and walked around the town. This time, I actually saw the town. I walked to the traditional market and WOW, they have everything under the sun there. The market is so different as compared to anything we have at home. The only thing I can think of that comes close is the San Jose/Berryessa flea market although I am not sure if it still exists. I was trying not to be the obvious tourist with my camera out snapping pictures, but I did get a picture of the butcher hacking away at a huge pig - bacon anyone? Most of the vendors of fruits, veggies, flowers, baskets and such are Peruvian woman with a very distinct look. They are very round, robust ladies with long braids and very indiginous features. One thing that I was thrilled with was the "sewing" section. They still make clothes by hand using the footpedal sewing machines. My grandmother had one in her house when I was growing up. I hadn´t seen one in years! So much for technology.

I grabbed lunch at a small cafe. The food is cheap here if you stay off the main drag. I was served a large bowl of soup, potatoe salad, spaghetti and tea for a whopping $2. Sometimes, the combination of food you get is a little weird but it´s pretty good nonetheless.

In hind sight, I am glad that I didn´t go to Puno or Lake Titicaca. I was feeing so bad when I got here that I never would have enjoyed it and would have had to leave right when I was starting to feel better. Also, there had been some blockades on the roads and several tourist buses were stranded because local people were striking/protesting several government issues. I believe a couple issues were the privitization of the water companies and taxes that are imposed on businesses. From what I gather, there is a lot of corruption in goverment here and this was a way for the people to try and be heard.

That afternoon, Cristian and I decided to go on the city tour. We were on the bus and he decided he didn´t want to go because it was raining and I think he was suffering from a bit of altitude sickness. I think he wanted me to not go too, but I knew this was my only day to go on the tour so, I stayed on the bus. Bu bye to Cristian.

We visited 4 local Inca ruin sites - Sacsayhuamán (pronounced Sexy Woman), Q´engo, Tombomachay and PucaPucara. It was freezing and rained most of the tour, but I felt like I had been such a dud for 2 days that I wanted to get out there and sightsee.

That night, I went salsa dancing with Luis, a local guy I met. OK, now this has happended to me before...HOW can someone born and raised here, listening to this music 24/7, claim to know how to dance and they can´t dance? It was almost embarrasing. I escaped to dance with someone else who actually could dance and this became and issue so, I left. Not a good night out dancing but interesting to hear some different types of music - kind of like cumbia but with a more indigenous beat.

Cuzco - Can someone please give back the air?

The next day, I woke up with the worst headache ever, NO appetite all day (can you believe that?) and had NO energy. Geez - what is going on here? I think I would have been fine with ONE issue but having to deal with both the altitude and my stomach well, it was just a little too much. This second day in Cuzco was a very lazy day. I had planned to go on a city tour with Cristian, but it had started to rain and I really didn´t feel up to it so we hung out in a cafe for quite a while and drank mate de coca. Mate de coca is the tea from coca leaves that helps with altitude sickness. Later, I went to my tour office, United Mice, to check in for my Machu Picchu trek. I was given a list of things I would need for the trek and the time for my orientation/briefing with my group.

I did a little shopping that afternoon. I bought an alpaca (actually, I believe it´s a blend - not 100% alpaca) sweater, as I was anticipating freezing my buns off on the trek and I bought a bathing suit for the thermal pools we would be visiting. I left my suit in the hotel in Baños, Ecuador...oops! The one I bought in Cuzco cost me $8 and was made in China - funny!

That night, Cristian and I went to Quesqo Centro to watch a show with traditional Peruvian dances. It was fun to watch. The traditional dress is so colorful and unique. I called it an early night since I was still struggling to breathe!

Travel Day/s from H·E· Double L...

The next morning, Daniel and I woke up early to pack our bags. We were on the same flight back to Quito. We said goodbye to Natalie and Myriam and headed to the Baltra Airport and flew back to mainland Ecuador. When we arrived in Quito, I had a few hours to kill before my flight to Peru so we took a taxi into town and hung out for a while before I had to return to the airport. I said goodbye to Daniel and away I went!

My flight to Lima landed at around midnight and this is when the fiasco started. I went to the LAN (airline) ticket counter to see about a flight to Juliaca. My plan was to fly to Juliaca and bus to Puno so that I could visit Lake Titicaca and from there bus to Cuzco to get ready for my big Machu Picchu hike. At this point, I am exhausted and my stomach is a mess (I was trying to avoid pulling a "Charlotte"- TMI right?). I purchased a ticket to Juliaca for what I thought was 6:00 a.m. (a mere 6 hours later) and decided to stay awake and high-tail it out of Lima, which I have heard is, for lack of a better word, the armpit of Peru. When you enter through security at the Lima airport, you have to have a scanable sticker that proves that you´ve paid the airport tax. I paid and scanned through, but then realized that my flight was for 6 p.m....what??? Crap-damn military time-I didn´t pay attention. I knew there was a flight at 6 a.m. so I tried to go standby and couldn´t get on. Double crap. Now, I am stuck inside the security area and they can´t change my ticket at the gate - LAME LAN! I had to exit to change my flight AND pay a change fee AND pay the tax again. Triple crap = SHXX! I was so over it at this point that I decided to go straight to Cuzco. Very shortly thereafter, I was on the plane and was in Cuzco by 7 a.m.

When I arrived in Cuzco, I was a zombie - exhaused, stomach was going crazy and the plane dropped me into the heavens as Cuzco´s elevation is 3400m or 11,150 feet - my head ached. I was bombarded by the taxi drivers and ended up getting ripped off by some taxi driver that charged me $5 USD to get to the center when it should cost more like $1.50 USD - jerk - it´s about the principal, not the amount. I was so tired, I couldn´t think to do the conversion to soles.

I had the taxi drop me off at a hotel that was recommended in my handy little lonley planet book. The hotel was full...WHAT? Are you kidding me? Agrrrr! The lady in the office was nice enough to let me leave my bag while I walked around to find a room. I asked around at about 4 places and finally found one. This was a brutal process because I would literally take 10 steps and I had to rest - Who took away the air??? I went back to get my bag and left it at the hotel. Unfortunately, my room wasn´t ready yet. I did the zombie walk around the town and saw a massage place. I treated myself to a 1 hour, $16 massage - so cheap and so worth it!

I went to a little cafe for lunch and there I met Cristian from Chile. We ended up hanging out and how I managed the strength to go on a horseback riding tour is beyond me. We went to the Inca ruins, Templo de la Luna. I don´t really even remember it. We ate dinner, I went back to my room and took my emergency perscription of Cipro (I finally gave in to the stomach monster - it got me...) and went to bed. I slept 10 hours that night. What a process. I get exhausted just writing about it - I am going to take a nap now!

Galapagos Islands - Dia numero cinco - on land!

Based on a recommendation from a fellow traveler, we decided to walk to Tortuga Bay. Jean Luke (I think that was his name...Natalie and Myriam met him earlier in their travels), made a very strong comment about the beaches at Tortuga Bay. He said, he's been to Hawaii and many other beaches all over the world and Tortuga Bay was more beautiful then all of them. We just had to see for ourselves so, we headed out in the morning for the long walk (about and hour) to the beach. The walk there was very unique - desert landscape with many cacti. The 1st beach you come to is too rough to swim but the water is gorgeous with crashing waves and marine iguanas along the way. The super fine white sand is so inviting. It really was beautiful! As we continued up the, what seemed to be, desolate beach we came to an area with an abundance of marine iguanas. When I say abundance, I mean WOW, a ton of them! They were all over the walking path and we had to tip toe through them. It was a little creepy but awesome at the same time. The two beaches are separated by a headland of mangroves, it was like a cactus forest...amazing! I grew up in the desert, Phoenix, and we had cactus everywhere, but these are more like cactus trees, tree trunk with cactus for leaves. THEN, we made it to the 2nd beach...calm, blue and just gorgeous! I can definitely understand Jean Luke's comment about the beach here. We laid out on the beach and just relaxed. The sun was pretty intense at times. We saw one turtle swimming just off the shore and, apparently, there were some sharks (the friendly kind), at the other end of the beach. I cut out a little early and met up with the others later for lunch. At this point, I am not feeling so well. Myriam, my French Canadian nurse, supplied me with some imodium...yikes! I was trying to ignore my stomach...if you ignore it, maybe it will go away!

That night was my last night at the islands. We, the 4 of us, had dinner together then watched a kids concert in the main plaza of Puerto Ayora.