Sep 06

Ah, so I´m in a new land yet again. Same city, different hostel. And it`s all good. Still chillin, listening to Nirvana and The Cure and THe Smashing Pumpkins in the bar where there`s a pool table, free tea and coffee and buns, free internet... It`s a good life and since I`m only paying the couple extra dollars for 2 nights I don`t feel bad for treating myself. Once Monday comes around I`ll be camping in the high Andes on the way to Machu Picchu, so it all balances out. I`m in a dorm room with bunk beds and 12 people, but I have yet to sleep in it so I can`t say what it`s like. So far everyone seems pretty friendly.

Anyway the one disadvantage to free internet and only 2 computers in the hostel is that other people in the bar I´m sure are waiting in line, so I should keep this brief. I`ll write one more entry tomorrow, but Monday morning (between 6.30 and 7am) I get picked up by the Llama Path crew, the sustainable tourism operator with whom I chose to do the Inca trail.

I hope all is well back home! I hear the leaves on the trees up north (in Canada) are gorgeous right about now.

I haven`t done a whole lot the last couple days so there`s not much to write home about. Jen (from Birmingham, England, by the way, for Mum who asked) is leaving for Bolivia later today, so I`ve decided to spend tomorrow night and the next at a different hostel that I think I`ll like more. It`s a bit pricier, but is worth it because it includes breakfast, free coffee, tea, and buns all day, and free internet. And it`s more social, with lots of different people, and I just think I`ll like the environment better once I`m on my own again.

I had a conversation with a Peruvian woman today who was selling her paintings. I started off by saying I couldn`t buy them cuz I was travelling for so long, but she stayed anyway and I enjoyed talking to her. She has 6 young kids, her husband doesn`t work, she gets by on her paintings alone, has friends in Montreal and other parts of Québec, and has been able to visit them once or twice. Her name is Julia. It was nice to talk to her, up till the point when I asked to see her work (even though I wasn`t buying), and she ended up pressing me to buy something. Gah! I don`t think I`ll ever get used to people asking me for money here. She said at one point, ¨But US$7 is nothing for you!¨ How could I explain that I didn`t have the money for something like that? It`s not fair.

Anyway not much else is going on right now. I`m just wandering the city, sending the odd postcard, taking some pictures... In just 3 days I start my trek for Machu Picchu though! I´m so so excited for that. I`ll write one more blog entry before then just so everyone knows what`s going on, but after that I`ll be internet-less for about 5 days.

Hey all you Canada-lubbers, students, workers, lovers, brothers, sisters, friends, all. I was in a bad mood last night, but today is a new day and I love this city!

Jen and I are sharing a room in a new hostel now where a lot of Israelis stay. Apparently the reason for so many Israeli travellers is that everyone is forced to serve time in the army for 3 years (2 for girls) after school, so by the time they´re out of it they just wanna get away and see the world. So in almost every city there is a hostel at which huge groups of Israelis stay, and certain cafes and restaurants that Israelis eat, and for group tours (ex. Inca trail, river rafting, jungle treks), they even get an Israeli discount because so much of the local business comes from them. Crazy! I wish I were Israeli just so I could travel more cheaply.

Anyway, this hostel we´ve landed in has a lot of Israelis, the odd British traveller, and me. It`s very backpackery though, which is why I chose it, and is open, populated, and social. We have use of the kitchen so we don´t have to eat out all the time, but although cooking for once was pretty fun, Jen and I learned quickly that it´s cheaper to eat out than to dine in.

I think the central market would be cheaper, but we just went to some general stores, picked up some pasta, veggies, and tomato sauce, and ended up paying twice what we would normally in a cheap restaurant. Ah well, lesson learned. It was actually a pretty disgusting meal, but it was nice to make it ourselves.

Anyway today I`ve been wandering around on my own more. Spend too much time with someone who has altitude sickness and is therefore always tired and rough, you run the risk of resenting the fact that you can`t explore at your own pace or get really excited about some of the things you are seeing. We get on really well, so it`s no affront to her personality or her friendhsip; it´s just that I have more energy than she does at the moment.

So after a nice breakfast of little buns, butter and jam, anís tea, and pineapple juice, I wandered down to another artesan corner of the city called San Blas. It`s quaint and cute and has a sort of European feel to it. The shops were pretty touristy, but the walk there was great because there´s this alley where you can find old Inca stones. There`s a place in the wall in which you can see the shape of a puma: the stones (I presume on purpose) are carved in such a way that you can make out the shape of a big cat. I took a picture but will have to trace the outline for anyone to see it properly.

There I bumped into this guy Danny from London, England, and we got talking about our travels. He`s been in South America for 7 months so far, through some of the places I have yet to go, and it was really good to talk to him. Colombia apparently is so so beautiful and, despite what guide books and the media say, is super friendly and warm as well. We exchanged advice and stories and email addresses in case I happened to travel to England sometime. I´ve collected so many email addresses so far I wonder who I´m going to keep in touch with!

I´m a bit peckish so I´m gonna finish up here and find something to eat. In South America most restaurants have a set breakfast, lunch, and dinner which are very cheap and are what the locals tend to order. There are also extras, which, unless you know better, is what tourists tend to order, and you get less food for a steeper price. The guidebooks tell you this, but it helps to have a little grasp on the language to make ordering easier.

¡Adios amigos!

I´m too tired to think up any new thoughts so, once again, here are parts of my journal:

¨5.49pm Monday 25 September 2006
¨Well! I´ve had quite a day. After visiting churches and my Inca trail tour agencies with Jen and Berndt yesterday, we finished off the day with dinner at a wonderful little restaurant by my hostel. The Italian section of the rather vast menu (it had Italian, Peruvian, Andean, Touristica, and Special sections) was the cheapest, so I went for the asparagus soup and pesto spaghetti. It was delish.

¨Today...I met up with Jen again around noon. I happened to meet a guy from Seattle just before she showed up at the Plaza, so the three of us sojourned to some ancient Inca ruins. The first was called Saqsaywaman. According to the pamphlet I have, it was

probably a religious centre, although it also might have served as an important military fortress. The temple of Hanan Qosqo of upper Cusco is located here and was dedicated to the adoration of the Sul (sun), Luna (moon), Estrellas (stars), and Rayo (lightening). Saqsawaman means ´satisfied hawk´ or ´marbled head´. It was constructed in Cyclopean style, including many monolithic stones, some weighing between 90 and 125 tons.

¨The walk up to the ruins was stunning, as you go up tons of stone steps out of the city and into the strange nature of Perú, some of the first I´ve seen up close. The ruins themselves are very, very impressive. It´s amazing how big some of the stones are, and to wonder at how the Incas could possibly have built what they did. Mis amigos were both rather tired, I think a lot had to do with the altitude, and they decided to head back to Cuzco without seeing the next 3 sites. This was good in a way because I could move at my own faster pace, but it didn`t turn out as I planned.

¨I walked to the second site, Q´enqo, with no troubles except that my camera batteries ran out of power, therefore I was pictureless ... The third site was much farther than I anticipated. I started walking and after 2 or 3 kms I saw it would be dark by the time I got there and back. In my frustration...I turned around and took a different road back to the city. I was grumbling to myself for a bit, but then I got looking around and couldn´t help but appreciate how lucky I was even to see such a fantastic countryside.

¨I passed farmhouses, horses, locals playing soccer, and eventually made my way to a sort of back entrance to the first Inca site. I found a way to enter without paying (but of course only after I´d paid), and was go glad because it was gorgeous and definitely off the tourist beat.

¨I noticed a local woman in traditional clothing taking a path just off the road, and saw that it was a shortcut to the ruins, so I followed suit. As a result, I came across a local woman and 5 or 6 young kids, resting and playing by some ruins a ways off from the crowds of the main site. She called me over to her, asking if I wanted some coca leaves. I asked how much and she just beckoned me over, saying ´no! amiga!´, meaning she was offering them to me for free.

¨Her family was charming, asking questions and telling me how to chew the coca leaf properly. They, with their rotten teeth and rugged clothes, were the happiest group in the world.

¨The mother gave me some coca leaves wrapped around a bit of ash, and between words and hand gestures I learned to hold it in the side of my mouth like chewing tobacco. It made my mouth kinda numb and was very nice.

¨At one point one of the boys offered me a necklace with the Andean cross, and I was happy to oblige him for 2 soles.

¨I left with a smile on my face for the remainder of the trek, and decided it was worth the unexpected change of plans just for that.

...

¨12.54pm Tuesday 26 September 2006

¨Jen and I arrived in Pisac (a small town with a big market an hour away from Cuzco) on a rickety old bus, for S/2.20, early enough that there were no tourists. We looked around a bit then climbed up a hill as far as the ticket booth allowed me to: she continued on to check out some more ruins (to see many of these things you have to buy an expensive tourist ticket and I didn`t want to fork out the dough); I returned to the market, which by then was all set up and the tourists were arriving in droves.

¨The market is so huge that it takes hours to browse. I started off slowly, but when I realized how vast it was I picked up the pace. After 2.5hrs I´m pretty sure I didn´t see everything. It´s touristy, of course, but everything is so bright light beautiful various rich (and cheap). It´s amazing to walk through. I only brought x-amount of soles so I wouldn´t be tempted too much, and succeeded in buying just 2 necklaces, each for about $5 ... The guy who sold me the second necklace was from Colombia, and travelled around South America collecting materials and selling his jewellery all over the continent. He looked like a hippie version of Orlando Bloom in elf form, except with long brown hair instead of blonde. Jen Wainberg, you would have loved him.¨

And now I´m over my internet time! Time to go. Adios.

P.S. The weather here is very weird. Today it has rained, been sunny and hot, rained while the sun was shining, was freezing and windy... it can´t make up it´s mind.

Whooowee that was one long bus ride. Typical of long distance travel in South America, I was resting oh so nicely when a bang and a pop jolted everyone awake and the bus came to a sudden stop. (Haha I made an unintentional rhyme.) Good thing they have mechanics on all the buses - it took an hour to repair whatever the problem was before we could go on our way again. It was a good thing, in a way, cuz it meant I had one bathroom break on a 12 hour ride.

So now I´m in Cuzco and man it´s a great city. It`s very touristy, but after beeing all by my lonesome for over a week I welcome all the gringos, the Enlish speakers, the camera flashers, and the many many trekking/hiking/adventuring shops. Cuzco is also the archaeological capital of Perù, so it`s gorgeous and walking down the streets you can find old walls from the Inca period. Beautiful architecture and landscape + many friendly English and Spanish speakers I can talk to = I could live here quite happily.

I`m now at I think 3 999m altitude, so I find myself out of breath walking some of these steep streets, and though it`s pretty nice during the day, it get frickin cold at night. When I was writing in my journal last night I was under 4 layers of wool blankets and still needed my alpaco wool hat to keep me warm.

Yesterday I ran into Jen, a girl I met previously at the hostel in Lima. She was talking to Berndt, a guy from Germany, and we three spent the day together, seeing the sights and talking about our travels. Yay for friends!

Today Jen and I are going to take a mini trek a couple kms away from the city to see some old Inca ruins. I can`t wait! It should be good practice for the Inka trail next Tuesday.

I´ll write more later but for now I´m out of time. By request I´ve gotta write about the food here! Next time...