Machu Picchu, Puno-Lake Titicaca, and the crazy adventure from Peru to Chile

Hey there. This is going to be a long entry due to my lack of time on the computer. Brace yourselves, this is a good one.

So I dont even know where to begin. I just arrived in Chile after forty hours on two different buses from Peru. I am going to go backwards and tell you first about the last week in Peru at Machu Picchu.

The last time I wrote, I was in Cusco which is an adorable town. We woke up early last Sunday morning to catch the three hour train to Aguas Calientes which is just down the hill from Machu Picchu. We spent the day at the hot springs which was more like a few semi warm kind of dirty pools. We laid out in the sun most of the time while strange Peruvian men took pictures of us, which we didnt realize until about two hours later. I really hope we dont end up on the internet. We then decided to leave after being attached by ridiculous amounts of mosquitos that left huge bleeding welts all over our arms and legs. As we were walking back from the hot springs, we got bombarded by restaurant hosts trying to get us to eat at their restaurant, one who tried to kiss me, which was just strange. We decided to go to a Peruvian restaurant. The food was good, but not exactly what we expected.

The next morning we woke up at 3:30 to begin our hike up the mountain to Machu Picchu. It was about an hour and a half up the hill. It was tough due to the altitude, lack of sleep,a nd the fact that the past 4 months in Buenos AIres practically killed our lung capacity and exercise ability. We finally reached the top to get in line to make sure we got tickets to the highest part of Machu Picchu called Waynapicchu which they only allow 400 people to enter per day. We finally got to enter the park and greeted by one of the locals as the Spice Girls like local celebrities. It is almost impossible to describe Machu Picchu. It is a city that was built by the Incans thousands of years ago on the side of a mountain and it is pretty much unknown as to how they did it. The view was absolutely incredible. I have tons of pictures that I will post when I get back to the states. Around 730 we went on a tour with a group and learned about the Incans and the city. Supposedly the king of the Incan tribe had 400 children. So basically his only job was making babies for the majority of his life. We learned about how they were able to predict the future and I think seasons as well. I cant exactly remember due to all the craziness that has happened over the last week. Around 10 am we started our hike up to Waynapicchu. It was a crazy/difficult hike up a mountain with a ton of other tourists. I understand why they only allow 400 people to climb per day because the mountain is steep and the stairs up are also very narrow. I bet people have been hurt maybe even killed in the past. We finally got to the top and were able to see an aerial view of Machu Picchu which is in the shape of some sort of eagle like bird. i cannot remember the name. It was so incredible pictures and words dont even do it justice. I am so lucky that I was able to see one of the Wonders of the World at such a young age.

After hiking back down Waynapicchu, which was pretty scary because I have a fear of steep stairs going down sometimes and also pretty bad knees that were already worn out, we decided to take the bus back down the mountain to our hostel. Unfortunately I arrived back at the hostel to an unfortunate email from my roommate in Charleston. One of our roommates from last summer past away last Saturday. He wasnt one of my closest friends, but I was definitely looking forward to seeing him when I got back to Charleston,a nd we had a lot of fun together last summer. It really made me appreciate my friends and family in my life and all the I have been able to do at such a young age. It made me sad that my friend will never be able to see what I have seen in South America over the past five months. My condolences go out to his family and friends.

The next morning, after a good nights rest the Spice Girls and I decided to do what we thought was going to be a ¨tranquilo¨(relaxing) hike up a recommended hill by the girl at our hostel called Punta Cuasi. All started out well until we came to a ladder, followed by several other ladders. At one point we were literally rock climbing without equipment. This would have definitely been a liability in the states. After about two hours, lots of water, and several breaks later we made it to the top of the ¨hill.¨ It was definitely ¨vale la pena¨(worth it). We were able to see Machu Picchu from another aerial view as well as Waynapicchu. It was a really hot beautiful day and we just laid at the top of the hill for awhile and chatted about our adventure. The climb back down wasnt too bad however my knees were pretty much done for. We ran into some other people from the states who had clearly showered and probably about 50. They werent even close and asked how it was. We told them there was quite a bit of climbing involved. I dont know if the made it to the top...most likely not. We were pretty dirty and sweaty afterwards.

After our hike/climb we stopped back at the hostel to shower and then made our way back to the train station to get back to Cusco. Once arriving in Cusco, our cab driver that brought us there two days eariler was supposed to pick us up to take us to the bus terminal so we could get to Puno (where we were going to Lake Titicaca), and claro he was not there. After waiting for twenty minutes, and anxious security guards trying to get us to leave we found another cab driver to take us to the bus terminal. We arrived at the bus terminal around 9:30 and wow did we look foreign. We were the only gringos among several Peruvians. We managed to purchase tickets to Puno for only 20 soles (about 6USD) a piece for a 9 hour bus ride. Of course this couldnt go perfectly. we get on the bus and a man was sitting in what was supposed to be Liz´s seat. After debating with the bus company Liz had to sit by herself at the front when the man refused to move because he bought his ticket first. Shortly after, I observed another woman from the U.S. get on the bus causing a scene because her huge backpacking bookbag would not fit under her feet in her seat. (Claro!) I politely made a suggestion that she could take of the sleeping bag that was attached and put that under her feet and then put her backpack above. She very rudely said ¨I appreciate that, but this bag stays with me¨ When the woman from the bus company told her she had to put it down below the bus, she was rude to her too. She must have been robbed, which I understand because I have been robbed as well but there is no reason to be rude to other people because of it. She later stormed down to the bottom of the bus and yelled at the bus drivers until she got a bigger seat to keep her bag. She is the kind of person that give people from the U.S. a bad name!

Anyways...After a long and miserable bus ride, Liz, Emily, Lizzy, and I (the Spice Girls) arrived in Puno at 5:30 am. We had previously seen our friends from ISA at our hostel in Aguas Calientes and were going to stay at the same hostel they were staying at with our tour group. We got to the hostel which was acutally a hotel that wanted to charge us $55 for two rooms with two people each. We were going to do it and charge it to a credit card out of pure exhaustion, but claro they didnt accept credit card in this ¨hotel¨. So we walked at 6 am to another hostel in a city we did not know. We actually found a way better hostel/hotel that was only 70 soles (25USD) per night for a four bed room with its own bathroom. We collapsed into bed shortly after arrival and slept a few hours. After waking up in a daze, we made our way through the town and had breakfast at a small restaurant. We then went to the port to buy tickets to see the floating islands of Lake Titicaca. The only one were able to see was Uros that day for 15 soles each (5 USD). We took a half hour boat ride to the island of Uros. We met the current president who I belive rotates yearly and he explained the isalnds to us. The floathing islands are built of this strawlike plant which they can also eat a part of. It is actually very dangerous to cook on the island considering it is basically made of highly flammable straw. So the ten families who lived on that particular part of the island were very careful when cooking. After learninga bout the island, the locals insisted that we each pay 5 soles to go to another part of the island by boat. We basically had no choice so we went. All we did was walk around for about 5 minutes while people tried to sell us stuff, and when I went to the bathroom I was greeted by a hen and a toilet with no seat or toilet paper and then was asked to pay 1 sole for using the facility. (It is very common to have to pay for toilet paper or the restroom in general throughout South America. Public restrooms are not as common except for restaurants and clubs) After another day of pure exhaustion we managed to walk to the bus terminal to purchase tickets for the next day where Liz was going back to Cusco to fly back to BA, and LIzzy, Emily, and I were continuing on to Tacna(Peru) to then get a taxi over the border to Arica, Chile where we would take another bus from there to Vina del Mar. Now this is where the adventure begins. Lizzy, Emily,a nd I just received a facebook message from Liz´s experience back to Cusco. Here is here story.

Liz:
Sooo, to tell you all about my day today: wait around the terminal until 7:50 for my 7:30 bus, finally the driver comes, when he goes to put my bag underneath the bus guess what rips...of course! the ONCE shoulder strap, que bueno! But, the wierdest thing was that there was already a bunch of misc. boxes and crap where all the bags should go, then I get to my seat and its full of locals..like straight off the moving reed islands and farms...I am literally the only gringa, rubia, tourist! So the bus finally gets on its way, about 30 minuts in we make a stop in some random town so the bus driver can get some snacks, fine by me but for 40 minutes?? The stop and go went on like this the entire 9 hours...mind you i said 9 not the 7 its supposed to be. People kept getting on and off and bags of shoes and backpacks and blankets kept being passed around like it was Navidad. The worst is yet to come...While stopped in some no-mans land town vendors would come on the bus, with either live chickens or cooked, the coked came in a not-so-spill proof plastic bag reaking like indian food in a diaper (speaking of indian food, Lizzy I heard of an amazing indian restaurant in BA you should take your parents to, its called Mumbai on Honduras st.) so of course the señora sitting next to me cant resists the tasty smell of this chicken and buys 3 bags of them, and of course the bags drip all over my and my iPod while the transaction was being mad...claro! So I decided to go straight to the airport after the bus ride from hell to try to switch my flight to an earlier day, I wasnt able to but everything worked out, guess which three awesome ISA people are staying st the SoCo conmigo...Aaron, tatiana and Stephanie! wooohoooo. Not all is bad, at least I know people here and tonight we went to this BOMB restaurant. I ate Beef hearts kebab it was actually amazingly good, Im full and this hostel is the shit, lots of fun people to chat with and have some fun girls sharing my room, theres even a cinco here! his name is Tigre...hes sooo cute h god. I hope your bus ride was better than mine and that Chile is absolutely amazing!! I know it will be, give me a call whenveer you{re back in BA, I cant wait to see you girls!

So if you think Liz´s experience on the bus was bad. Now here is the response Lizzy sent to Liz´s message
Lizzy:
Welllllllll, where did we leave you? Oh yes, Puno. So we get on the bus, which is basically deserted for the first hour of our voyage. Then, we start to get BOMBARDED by indigenous Peruvians and their big ass bags of produce and god knows what else....dead bodies maybe? We made at least 15 different stops during only the first 10 hour bus ride to Tacna. At every stop, Peruvians crowded their way into the aisles, pushing each other to get to their bags of raw dripping produce. Our bus driver almost got in three wrecks while also threatening the lives of many indigenous persons. Additionally, there was the man that got on the bus and talked for almost an hour about music and being single before prodceeding to wake Emily up, ask her if she had a boyfriend, and then throw candy at her. All the while, Peruvians were yelling ¨PELICULAS!¨and giving the man money. Oh, we almost forgot the three times police officers and customs officials with machine guns got on the bus and started looking through everyone´s shit/jacking some people´s stuff. They were nice to us, but the Peruvians were not happy about their presence. This was all on the SHORT 10 hour bus ride to Tacna (still in Peru).We arrive in Tacna, take a cab to another terminal to get into another cab with a Peruvian couple whose only luggage was 2 huge packages of toilet paper (apparently crossing the border for toilet paper is a common thing to do in South America?). The cab driver takes our passports, we freak out, then he drives us into the desert before we get to the border, where Elise doesn´t have her entrance/exit pass from Peru (the thing we got at the airport). She runs back to the car and finds it in a random envelope, meanwhile Emily and I are staring at each other wide eyed wondering how life will be in Peru if Elise isn´t allowed to leave. We get out of Peru and have to run to the cab with all of our luggage as our taxi driver yells for us to move ¨rapido!¨ We get to Chile and have to go through customs in the middle of the desert where Emily almost gets lost. Finally we get to the Arica bus terminal where we only owe the man who got us through all of this 18 soles a piece (about 6 dollars mind you!).We are expecting a 24 hours max full cama bus ride to Vina del Mar, before we find out that every bus company´s schedule is leaving at 11:00 PM Thursday and arriving at 7:00 AM SATURDAY MORNING!!! Count them, that equals 42 hours on a bus in total. Thank you, South America. Oh, forgot to mention, that´s SEMI-CAMA!!!! Then Emily and I think we´re taking out 100 US dollars from the ATM, but it turns out we took out 100,000 Chilean Pesos (about 200 US dollars) which means both of us probably overdrew our accounts, que bueno. We try to mentally prepare for the 30 hours facing us, little did we know there would be Chilean men hissing at us every time we went to the bathroom, a mom cooing at her baby, a creepy man leaning over our seats with sunglasses on staring at us the entire time, the flagellant Chilean man sitting next to Emily, the boxed snack we got for both lunch AND dinner consisting of pineapple juice, crackers, and a cookie BOTH times, American movies dubbed in Spanish (all about war and very depressing), AND being woken up at 6:00 AM the FIRST morning in the middle of the desert to take everybody´s luggage OFF of the bus and be searched again by Chilean customs officials who we´re pretty sure again had machine guns. Elise went to the bathroom at one of the stops and had to pay for a toliet with no seat. Que bueno.All in all, a grand adventure. We made it to Chile, and our hostel where 2 of us will have to share a bed tonight considering the entire thing is occupied by a Chilean dance team consisting of 7 year old glittered, curled girls and their crazy dance moms burniong us with curling irons to get breakfast seats for their precious little daughters.

So yes, this is our experience so far. I actually think I am going to spend a few extra days here i Chile to relax after Emily and Lizzy go back to BA to meet their families. By the way: The seven year old dancers remind of my days in competition dance where all the moms went crazy trying to get their daughters hair and makeup perfect to compete on stage.I totally felt for those poor girls getting their hair pulled and sprayed and getting yelled at to have more ënergia¨ (energy).

After a long journery, it shoud be agreat week. We are going to just lay at the beach. The sun is out and the water is beautiful. That´s all for now!