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The 'Lobster' has been boiled alive and devoured. It was ours for just a little bit.
Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end and this particular travelling adventure is sadly nearing completion. Excitingly, after negotiating the wild goose chase that Qantas presented us via telephone, internet and offices, we've managed to bring our flights forward to tonight. This means we won't have time to explore Lima but then I'm not sure we really want to anyway! Instead I think we'll prepare ourselves for the xmas movie season by sitting in our 'flying dog' hostel by watching movies.
It's great that so many happy faces will be waiting for us back home. Also, methinks to go 8 months without Match of the Day is too much for one man to take. This has to be balanced by the realisation that I'll soon be back amongst the bureaucrats getting RSI in my pinkies by tapping a government keyboard instead of tapping one in some random internet cafe in indo-china for example. Overall though, we're happy that we've had this privilege whilst you lot have been doing the commute. It's taught us so much that we could never have learned in a book or at school for example and it feels like we came away at the right time for us. I'm not sure it gets anything out of your system though. It probably only whets the appetite. We're certainly looking forward to our next holiday, though might try and build in a litte more luxury next time.
So far, it feels like the worst thing that's happened has been the odd dodgy stomach or being given a slighty too hefty tourist price for something - touch wood. In spite of the pervasive fear culture, the world has turned out to be a surprisingly friendly and safe place to be. We've not seen any of the Shining Path here in Peru for example. Maybe Romford on Saturday nights is more dangerous? Overlooking the current lack of a home, we certainly feel lucky to live in London, which I think will be a good place to land when we parachute back into everyday life.
I'm going to resist the temptation for some Bryce-esq farewell awards, though will say that Asia has to be our favourite continent, although it seems that whenever we've spent more time somewhere it follows that we've enjoyed it more.
So what of Peru? Well, we picked a superb place to finish in Machu Picchu, the quintessentially romatic 'lost' city once overrun by jungle but now overrun by tourists. Instead of turning up and ticking it off as we have done with other big draw cards, we had it placed in superb context by hauling our weary bodies along the Inca Trail for 4 days where our guide brought the Inca Empire to life, as we encountered other less famous crumbling ruins and a lot of trail. We were especially humbled by the strength and friendliness of the Porters who each carried around 30kgs on their backs as they sped past us on the trail to ensure that when we crawled into the campsites our tents and a three course meal was waiting! Beth surprised herself by "completing the bloody thing" whilst ibuprofen helped me avoid my knee locking up although I hope the NHS can fix what I suspect is torn cartilage from that marathon 'attempt' I was undertaking an age ago.
Apart from the Inca trail, our time in Arequpia and Cuzco has involved the predictable last town shopping syndrome, so if anyone complains about Christmas presents, then it's Peru they need to accuse! Overall, we've only scratched the surface here and the Amazon must wait (if it can?) but the Inca trail and Colca Canyon tour - conducted by a jolly Peruvian called Percy - turned out to be superb.
So that's it. Another traveller is waiting to use the computer and so we must leave the blogosphere for now and this little internet footprint. At least we should be google-able now! Get ready for us people! Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
to be continued...
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