T Travels: Day 5, 6, and 7: Lima to Cusco and Cusco Town

Day 5 and 6: The Bus Trip

Right now Megan, Tim M., Chels, and our new friend Ronnie, whose house we’re staying at, are doing some cultural exchange and playing the Guyanese card game “Rap/Romey”. We arrived in Cusco Monday afternoon after a 23 hour bus ride from Lima (though it should have been about 18-20, but those landslides keep slowing things up!). The ride showed us a plethora of different landscapes, from wondrous beaches and coastline to green highlands and corn fields. Neighborhoods blurred by. We saw small square shanties pocking the desert sands outside Lima and green tilled hills outside of Cusco. The ride was long but worth it, Cusco is a pretty magical place, and in a day we’re off to Machu Picchu! We’re really excited!

The deserts near the coast

The highlands near Cusco

Today we met a new friend Ronnie, from Couch Surfing, who picked us up at the airport and took us to his house, where we are staying for the next few nights. He took us out to lunch (food here is SO cheap, we got a soup, entre and drink for 7 soles, or 2.50US) then he helped us book our tour to Machu Picchu! After wandering around the town and trying a cup of coca tea (don’t worry Mom, it is legal here is healthy and has no psychoactive properties) to help with the altitude, we made our way back to Ronnie’s house and started playing cards and chatting in a fun mix of English and Spanish. Tomorrow we plan on exploring Cusco a little more, acclimating and then repacking our bags to head out on our four day trek to Machu Picchu! Hasta Pronto!

Cusco from the Bus

Day 7: Cusco

Exploring Cusco was the mission today, that and getting acclimated to the altitude before our trek. Today we had breakfast at a touristy brunch place by the Plaza de Armas, which no one really enjoyed much (except Tim, because he got the buffet and was able to eat as many fried eggs and cups of coffee as we wanted!). After breakfast we decided to walk off the heavy food so we took our friend Ronnie’s advice and took the free self-guided walk up, up and up to the Jesus statue presiding over Cusco for the amazing view of the city. Anyone could tell by our huffing and puffing that we weren’t accustomed to the altitude yet and we started getting a little nervous for our trek tomorrow. The air is so thin here, but the vistas are worth it. As we hiked up to the “white Jesus” as Ronnie calls the statue, we passed the most famous ruins in Cusco, Sacsayhuaman. Unfortunately, you have to buy a super expensive tourist ticket to get into the ruins, however, the temple was so huge that we could see the ancient stones from the hike up to “white Jesus”. Yay for free touring! After the hike we stopped in at the Inca museum to learn a little more about the culture of the amazing people whose ruins we have been, and will be ogling. At the museum we got a demonstration of Inca, and pre-Inca musical instruments. Chelsea even got to try to play this odd flute that is filled with water and played by turning the water from one side to another, making a noise like a parrot.

It has been very cold, especially for us Guyanese PCVs (eek, RPCVs!) so we stopped in at some artisan markets and bought wool and alpaca hats, scarves, gloves and sweaters to keep us warm and fashionable. After a brief picnic on the floor in Ronnie’s house (termed a floornic by Megan J.) we did some last minute shopping to equip ourselves for our trek (jackets for Annie and Megan, towel for Tim Mills, duct tape for my blisters and warm socks for Tim). Then we ended the evening sharing a beer with Ronnie at a pub and sharing wonderful folklore stories. We told Ronnie all about Guyanese jumbies and canaimas, and Ronnie told us about a disgruntled tour guide ghost and his fire breathing mule that haunt the campsite we are about to stay at and some really scary half-man, half-beast creatures that will lure you out into the jungle alone by stealing your stuff and then placing it back in your path to create a trail to his lair, where he will then eat you. It was fun to share cultures and stories and wild to realize how similar legends tend to be across language and geographic barriers. Tonight we are going to bed early since we have a 4am wakeup call to start our 5 day, 4 night trek to Salkantay mountain, the hot springs of Santa Teresa and ultimately Machu Picchu!

We won’t be posting until after the Trek, but worry not family and friends we’ll be in very capable hands! Next post on Monday!