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Perha darling perha...
In two weeks in Peru we covered two of the main highlights, visiting Lake Titicaka and trekking to Machu Picchu!
Our first stop was Lake Titicaca, crazy to imagine a lake so vast would exist at 4700m above sea level! After a five hour boat journey across the stunning and very still lake we arrived at Taquile island, filled with people in traditional dress, dependent upon farming, in an environment not very well adapted for agriculture at all. The people here are very focused on worshipping the Pachamama , believing if the weather was bad, mother earth was angry and wanted offerings. We met a very enthusiastic guy who told us stories about the culture, our favourite being that men throw rocks at women they find attractive to ask them out, and a man's suitability as husband material is measured by his weaving skills - if he can weave a hat and make it waterproof, he´s onto a winner. Extremely different, and odd to think people actually live by these beliefs. We stayed the night with a local family on Amantani island, where we were paired with a very friendly lady called Faustina and her six year old son. This made for an interesting night, considering they only spoke Quechua, and we know approximately five words in said language, but at least there were a lot of please's and thank you's being said! We were dressed up in their traditional clothes, had our hair plaited and went and joined the rest of the village for a dance. A definite experience being flung around wildly, by very solemn faced Peruvians, wearing an exceptionally tight corset style waistband, to very repetitive panpipe music! In an attempt to make our experience more authentic, the next day our 'mama' took us potato picking. Several hours and a fair few potatoes later, Faustina was delighted to strap them to our backs and send us back down the hill, whilst all the locals laughed at the pitiful amount we were carrying compared to a woman more than twice our age. They bloody love their potatoes in Peru, served with every meal, as well as rice (they have no concept of double, or to be honest even triple carbs!) Next stop was an actual reed bed floating island, only 20m across, but with 40 full time inhabitants, completely dependent upon fishing (and now tourism). Talk about cabin fever. But the island itself, the boats and houses were all stunning, and you could tell they were very skilled.
We then spent a couple of days in Cuzco doing very little and preparing for our next adventure. Really nice city, and a lot less chaotic/ brown and grubby than others we could mention, but pretty much acts as a hub for people going to and from Machu Picchu, evidenced by the women on every street corner asking if you need a massage, and the amount of shops that specialised in snickers and powerade...
These of course turned out to be essential for our next big adventure, Machu Picchu and the 4 day Inca Trail trek, 42km long and 4200m at its highest point. We absolutely loved it, and the reward of seeing Machu Picchu at sunrise on the last day definitely made the millions of steps and 3am wake ups worth it! The scenery was stunning - almost vertical mountain ranges that don't look like they should be able to support the amount of lush vegetation they do, definitely not something we have experienced before, and walking above the cloud level seeing them settled around the steep cliffs was pretty amazing! Although we found the trek challenging, we couldn't exactly say the camping was. So far beyond our expectations, every night when we got to camp we were greeted by beautifully assembled tents, brought hot water and soap, and found a two course dinner on the table. The cooks produced incredible food considering they were carrying everything on their backs throughout, and to say the freshly baked cake that appeared on day 4 was well received would be an understatement! We have massive respect for all our porters, who would run past us numerous times a day, carrying four times as much, arrive at camp hours before to take care of all our stuff, and still wait happily at the gate to clap for you as you staggered in hours later! They ranged from 22 to 59 years old, often only wore rubber sandals, and would genuinely sprint and skip down the steps. A very friendly bunch, Mario the oldest porter took a particular shining to Sarah, giving her personal greetings along the way!
Talking about impressive characters, we need to mention Richard, the sweetest 77 year old man we met, who since losing his wife two years ago has been ticking off his bucket list, including skydiving, paragliding and diving. This guy had an infectious attitude, and stayed up clubbing with us till the early hours. So if anyone's debating doing something a bit daredevil-ish but is yet to take the plunge, if Richard can do it...!
We said our goodbyes to the friends we had been travelling with for nearly six weeks, and started our journey towards Chile. We made one last stop in Peru, in Huacachina, which is basically a desert oasis dedicated to sandboarding and buggying. We had a mental driver, jumping over the massive dunes, and getting as near to tipping us out as he could! Sandboarding was brilliant fun, or at least trying was fun. After a stylish fall, Jess and her bruised coccyx found the 15 hour night bus to the Chilean border really comfortable...
We now have a couple of weeks in Chile before our flight to New Zealand, so we'll update you when we've had a taste of Chilean life... Currently two hours into a 23 hour bus journey (turns out this country is fairly lengthy), so whilst we have plenty of time for blog writing, we're eager to get to these vineyards we've heard so much about!
Traveller's tip: don't buy cheap padlocks (they have a tendency to change their combination codes, which is a little more than inconvenient when they are locking away all your valuables!)
- comments
Jane Hirst Sounds brilliant, Sam still got bruises from having rocks thrown at her, she thinks she has same fatal attraction as you for older men!! Carry on trekking!! Lots of love xxx