Cuzco or Bust

Hey friends,



Last time you heard from me we were waiting in Arequipa for word on when roads to Cuzco (Machu Picchu) would open up. Here is a summary on our adventure to Cuzco (keep in mind that we´ve arrived safely)...



First some background information: People throughout the southern part of Peru have banded together to fight for rights and against things the government is doing. I´ve heard a number of reasons they´re fighting...the most common of which is protecting their land from government takeover. Anyway, their way of negotiating with the government is blocking all roads to Cuzco (main destination of most tourists). I support their efforts, but sucks for us. Seriously. So certain towns between Arequipa and Cuzco and between Arequipa and Puno block roads with logs, boulders, glass, etc. If a bus dares to pass, the town people gather around the blockade and slingshot rocks at it. So, we wait until the town and the government come to some kind of agreement and they open the roads.



After waiting 5 or 6 days in Arequipa we woke up early Thursday morning to head to the bus station upon hearing the night before that roads might open up the next day. We got there around 6:30 and asked several companies if they were bringing people to Cuzco. Most said no, and one said they were bringing people to Sicuani (a smaller town on the way) where you would then catch a combi (minibus) to Cuzco. It was a daytime bus, so we said sure...let´s give it a shot. They told us 10 hours ´til Cuzco. 38 hours, we pulled into the Cuzco bus terminal. Here´s what happened:

8:30 AM- leave from Arequipa on bus. The idea is that we get to Sicuani by 3:30

3:30 PM- get to Juliaca where the roads are blocked. We wait around for an hour or so and they let us through. Their deal was that they let four vehicles through per hour. We made it through...no problem. Keep on trucking to Sicuani.

4:15 PM- Get to a second road block in Ayaviri. They tell us that they may open it up tonight or they may not...probably not.

4:30 PM- Bus is still there. Options: 1. sit and hope it opens and potentially sleep in the bus or 2. walk into Ayaviri, look for a hostel, and hope to get a bus they next day.

4:45 PM- Went with option 2...grabbed our packs, and walked maybe a mile into this town with a little girl and a señora that told me about Jesus the whole way in :)

5:30 PM- Found a hostel that cost 6 dollars for a room for four of us! Crazy cheap. We got what we paid for...beds that were so sunken in the middle that they practically touched the floor, no windows, and no water in the morning. Ha.

6:30 PM- Walked around town looking for dinner. Since the whole town was on strike, finding a restaurant was difficult. We found one...the meal cost like 70 cents and was soup, rice, meat, and coffee. Dirt cheap and tasty enough.

7:30 PM- back to hostel, fell asleep at 8:00...LONG day...

FRIDAY
8:30 AM- wake up and proceed on a wild goose chase throughout this town searching for answers about when A bus MIGHT leave. We eventually find our same bus from last night at a different location waiting for the block to open...they said it would at noon.

9:30 AM- Quickly get our packs, some food, and take a guy with a bike takes me and another girl we met along the way up to the bus...i thought he might die of a heart attack on the way.

10:30 AM- Arrive at bus to wait for the block to open. We walk up to see the process...probably 500 people standing around with logs, rocks, and glass in the road. Lots of men and women standing in a circle discussing what they will do. They decide to open it and march back to the town.

12:00 PM- BUS LEAVES Ayaviri!

12:15 PM- Bus drives by a man on the side of the road fallen off a motorcycle. Bus stops to help the man and bring him on the bus. He apparently had an accident, the person he hit took his motorcycle and left him on the side of the road hurt...our good samaritan bus drivers took him in and took care of him.

1:00 PM- Hit another road block in Santa Rosa--bigger than before...tons of people.

4:00 PM- Santa Rosa opens the block and we get through. Amen, Hallelujah. Feeling optimistic that we´ll someday make it to Cuzco...still not sure it´ll be today.

6:00- Make it to Sicuani...one more town down. They switch us buses and we´re off to Cuzco.

10:00- Pull into Cuzco...it feels like the promised land by now. Awesome.

38 hours later, we made it! It was exhausting and a little stressful, but so fascinating. Others we´ve talked to had to walk up to 30 km during the whole thing...turns out we got lucky. Seeing everything we saw was priceless.

Another long post...I´ll try not to make this a habit :)

So, plans change...

Second post in a day...whew. Trying to catch up a little bit. So, when planning (i use that term very loosely) our trip we didn´t plan on spending more than a night in Arequipa and weren´t even sure we´d venture to the Colca Canyon. We´re now going into our sixth day here. A few days in Arequipa, some time in Chivay getting to the Canyon, and a little town called Cabanaconde to see the endangered Condors flying in the canyon. There´s too much to tell, but here´s a glimpse into Chivay:

• population of 4600 people
• stuck in the mountains...cold, cold moutains
• there were no cars, what we think of as restaurants, or buses until 20 years ago
• women wear these traditional, colorful dresses, skirts, and hats everyday. I´m still amazed that it´s daily dress for them...it´s really like the guide books.

Our experience in Chivay:

• got there Saturday night to an empty bus station.
• find out that it´s empty because the ENTIRE town is at a party in the center for the town´s 184th anniversary.
• find a hostel and put on every single piece of clothing i brought with me to the town--seriously, so cold.
• walk down to the center to the party: traditional dances going on in the plaza, probably 5 bonfires in the middle of the streets burnuing evergreen-like trees, people passing around homemade bottles of pisco (traditional Peruvian alcohol- like Mexico´s tequila), and people literally wrapped in wool blankets because it´s so cold (did i say it was cold?).
• dance for awhile still wearing 17 layers and chacos with wool socks
• meet a tour guide who offers to bring us on a tour to the canyon the next day--we agree on a price and to meet him at 7:00 the next morning to leave.
• Sleep...it´s loud, and cold.
• wake up at 6:30 to meet said tour guide dude.
• the dude never shows...shouldn´t be shocked.
• Meet a better tour guide who will go with us on the public bus and will prove to be reliable and SO helpful.
• He says we´ll meet at 2:00 to take the 2:30 bus to the canyon.
• We meet him to find out the the 2:30 bus was cancelled because the driver apparently had too much fun at the fiesta the night before...we´re in Latin America, folks.
• With the extra time, we go to a bull fight which was basically a bunch of normal guys teasing some bulls in a ring...too funny.
• Finally get to the bus station around 5 to go to the canyon...

Okay, I´m getting long winded...sorry. One more thing though. This bus experience was amazing:

We got to the bus station a half hour early, and our guide (thank God we had him...) told us we were going to have to stand in line. Everyone was just chilling waiting for the bus and all of sudden everyone stood up and ran to make a line. Everyone just knew to do it at a certain time. We then stood in this line for maybe 20 minutes. The bus came, practically plowed into the line and everyone literally rushed the bus. We were pushed so tight and this crowd literally pushed us into the bus. At one point, I realized that I was pushed against a BABY on her mother´s back...poor thing. Once on the bus the pushing continued...we stood for the couple of hours it took to get to the canyon town. Crazy, but so amazing...

I´ll stop for now. If you made it to the end of that, I appreciate your perseverance :)

Right now we´re back in Arequipa waiting for roads to open up to Cuzco/Machu Picchu...there´s some unrest and a whole bunch of travelers waiting around to get where they want to go. There are definitely worst places than Arequipa, so no complaints here.

Hasta pronto.

Peruvian Jonas Brothers

So, I´m seriously back tracking here, but internet has been less than fast or reliable lately. This was a moment that sticks out so far, so I´ve been waiting to blog about it. Transport yourself back to last Friday evening...

We´re in Arequipa--a pretty city with fountains, moutains, adorable little courtyards, and quite a few tourists. We arrive in Arequipa Friday morning, wander the city during the day and go out for Mexican food that night. Walking back to our hostel, we notice a group of maybe 75 hysterical pubescent girls screaming at a second story window. Our dialogue goes something like this.. ¨should we see what´s going on? It´s probably nothing... oh well, let´s just see.¨ We walk down toward the increasingly animated group and see them throwing anything that they have up at four guys standing at the second story window. We learn that the guys are part of a boy band called Adammo and these girls are serious fans throwing stuff up at them to get autographed.

We stand on the other side of the street observing with amusement and curiousity and start waving up at them too just because it seemed normal and acceptable :) Before we know it, a guy comes over and introduces himself as the group´s manager. Apparently this group is getting pretty big in Peru...the week before they opened for the Backstreet Boys in Lima and have made appearances on Latin MTV. In conversation with the manager, he invites us up to meet this group of boys who we´ve grown accustomed to calling the Jonas Brothers.

We follow him up and hang out with these guys who are so star-struck and humble. We stayed for maybe 15 minutes, got a CD, became facebook friends with one of them, and moved on. But seriously...so funny. We hung out with the Jonas Brothers of Peru. Ha. I´m still laughing about it.

First Bus ride down

Hey friends,

My consistency so far is surprising even to me :) The 16 hour bus last night was amazing. Let me give you an idea. Imagine this...

You arrive at the bus station, which they warned you about as being dirty and unsafe. I would have eaten off those floors and felt so safe. You go to BAGGAGE check...yep, they don´t just throw it under the bus. It´s like a freaking airport. Then you get on this double decker bus with seats that lean back to be practically beds. As you settle in thinking you´ve got it pretty good, the intro video comes on and explains that you get blankets, pillows, two meals, and Wi Fi. Seriously. Amazing. To top it all off, after dinner and before the movie, the steward of sorts hands you a BINGO card and whole top half of the bus plays BINGO for a free return ticket. You don´t win, but who really cares. You played BINGO on a bus in Peru. They then put on a violent French movie and you wake up with breakfast (ham and cheese sandwich and a brownie...double ha.) and watched Marley and Me and Step Up. Overall, you had a pretty posh ride.

We´re in Arequipa now...more to come later, but it´s a beautiful city surrounded by volcanoes. I just sat on the hostel roof and read while looking at the volcano in the distant. Life is good :)

Hasta luego friends,
Michelle

We conquered Lima :)

Lima was fun, but we´re ready to move on. Yesterday we enjoyed sleeping in, getting ready slowly in our super comfy hostel, exploring downtown Lima, eating, and some dancing. Thoughts and observations...

a. Pollution...seriously. It almost feels worst than Mexico City. Not so much where we´re staying, but downtown. The air feels super heavy.

b. I´ve been a little frustrated with the amount of American influence. I don´t know if it´s more than other places that I´ve been or if i´m just ultra sensitive to it right now for some reason, but the amount of US music, tv, movies, products is crazy. The amount of American influence and how much people know about the US is overwhelming...the world really does seem to revolve around us. It seems to me a bit of a sad reality that´s taken something away from the culture thta is/was.

c. The ongoing activity and changes on the streets is so invigorating. The newness and seemingly random nature of things is so fun to observe, question, and hypothesize over.

d. Yesterday while in central Lima, we met a Mexican woman who, while living in Mexico had met a Polish man who was a Polish embassador. They married and are know both living in Lima with their children...I think that´s utterly fascinating. People have cool lives...

e. Taxis...pray that I come back alive ;) Kidding, mom and dad, I´m kidding. :) But really, the rules of driving are beyond my understanding.


We´re boarding a bus this afternoon and going to Arequipa, a city in the south known for beautiful landscapes, volcanoes and Colca Canyon (similar to the Grand Canyon). We more than likely won´t spend much time there, but is a stopping point on the way to Lake Titicaca. Think of me as I attempt to occupy myself for 16 hours on a bus. If I´m lucky, we´ll get some obnoxious Latin American tv :)

M

New York and Lima

After 24 hours of travel (phew...) Breanna and I made it to Lima. With an 8 hour layover in NYC, we had time to take the train into the city wander around time square, eat some thai food, and see Central Park. Both of us slept like rocks on the overnight plane to Lima and met our third travel companion in the Lima airport at 6:30 am.

It was whirlwind of planes, trains, and taxis, but we made it to our hostel and had a chill day in Miraflores (a sweet, posh part of Lima on the coast). It´s a great feeling to walk down the streets of South America...music, food, Spanish, the ocean. Love it.

Ready for bed. Thanks for following, friends :) Hasta pronto.
Michelle

Day 1

We fly out this morning from Minneapolis, head to Detroit, an 8 hour layover in New York and get to Lima tomorrow morning at 6:30 am.  Not sure why we thought this was a reasonable flight to choose...there has to be easier.  But, I'm tired enough that sleep should come easy on the plane :)  The adventure begins...Lima here we come! Woot woot!

Almost Off!

Hey Everyone, 

The adventure is getting closer.  I've got few days left of packing, buying, and hangin' in Minnesota.  Taking advantage of water straight out of the faucet, warm showers, my car, blending in...  Looking forward to mountains, Spanish, beaches, Machu Picchu, newness, getting my passport stamped, living out of a backpack, food...  

I'm going to do my best to keep ya'll in the loop, and thanks in advance if you actually check this. I'm not promising consistency, but I will promise good intentions.

¡Hasta pronto!

Michelle