Well just over one month now…

We’ve been a bit lapse in updating the blog but hopefully this post fills you in on what we’ve been up to!

The Real Travelling Begins

After a lengthy layover in Madrid airport we endured the 11 hour transatlantic flight into Lima, Peru aboard a painfully uncomfortable Iberia Airbus A340 with way too many seats crammed inside. We made it through immigration control without issue, made our way to baggage claim and waited for our backpacks. Alex’s bag arrived after a few minutes but after what felt like an eternity mine was still a no show. While I got dizzy watching the revolving carousel Alex left to fetch our first batch of Peruvian Nuevo Soles. Eventually my backpack showed up allaying my fears of lost gear.

A driver from the hotel we booked for our first night was waiting for us with a sign with my name on it. A first for me. We decided to pay a bit more for a decent hotel (part of the arrival tax) for the first night and sure enough the place was quite nice. Nothing special, but comfortable. So far, so good. We settled into the room quickly but it didn’t take long before we discovered something was awry.

An Unwelcome Discovery

While the wad of crisp Soles was present the debit card used to extract them from the ATM was nowhere to be found. We emptied pockets and bags to no avail – it was gone! We’d been in the country for no more than 2 hours and already we’d lost a vital bit of kit. An expensive mobile phone call to the bank cancelled the card which was fortunately part of a pair we received only a week earlier for our joint Nationwide current account (the best deal for travellers by far!). Not a disaster, but not a welcome start to the trip either! Further investigation revealed that some of the cash machines work in reverse here: back in the UK your card is always returned before the cash is received. Out of habit and caution Alex grabbed the cash and wandered away, leaving her card to be gobbled by the machine. Doh! Lesson learnt though and better than being the victim of opportunistic crime I guess!

Limeys in Lima

The view from our hotel, Miraflores, Lima, Peru

We didn’t have high expectations for Lima after being warned by everyone we spoke to before we left that it was a bit of a dump, so we weren’t surprised to find it quite a dirty, polluted place. We spent two fairly uneventful days getting on Peru time, wandering the Miraflores area, sampling some cuisine and exploring a bit of the Indian market but it didn’t take us long to decide to move on. We booked bus tickets to Cusco making one night stops in both Nazca and Arequipa en route.

"The Monkey" - Nazca, Peru

Nazca and the Lines

Nazca was a pleasant enough little town but with nothing much to see or do other than the flight over the famed Nazca lines (see our photos) which were easily worth the visit. I’ve wanted to see the lines since I was a boy and I wasn’t disappointed. After a slightly disconcerting false start down the runway we swapped planes and were soon airborne, twisting and turning through the sky over the desert with the wings often at right angles to the ground! It was a great experience and something I’d definitely recommend if you have the chance. (Take off video on YouTube).

Quickly through Arequipa

La Plaza in Arequipa

Arequipa is Peru’s second largest city and had a much more pleasant vibe about it than the capital. The hostel we stayed in had memory foam mattresses which might have put us in a slightly more favourable mood but the city was definitely cleaner than Lima. I sampled some Alpaca steak in a restaurant overlooking the plaza and we caught a lot of sun with Mount Ampato as a back drop. We drank a lot of coffee, ate some amazing cake and visited the Juanita museum.

Mountains at Arequipa

Juanita was a young Incan girl barely into her teens who was sacrificed over 500 years ago. Her remains were frozen atop Mount Ampato and incredibly well preserved. She was discovered in 1995 when the volcano erupted melting the ice and sending Juanita tumbling down the mountain where anthropologist Johan Reinhard stumbled across her. The museum, while small, is filled with intricately designed human and animal figures sculpted out of gold and silver, incredible woven clothing and other fascinating objects. Our private guided tour (we were the only English speakers to arrive at the museum at that time) culminated with the frozen remains of Juanita herself, impressively preserved by the mountain ice. We were left with a real sense of the tradition and spiritual significance of the sacrifice, believed to have been a very important part of Incan life.

Climbing to Cusco: Our home for 2 months

La Plaza de Armas at Night

Another 10 hour night bus brought us to our resting place of Cusco, 11,200 ft up in the Andes mountains. This was the fanciest bus yet, with extra wide seats that almost fully reclined. A very dodgy Russian horror film was shown but fortunately the sound was low and there were headphones for those who chose to watch it. I opted for falling asleep to my iPod.

We plan to stay in Cusco until after the first week of August when we’ll be hiking the Salkantay trail up to Machu Picchu before heading south into Bolivia and beyond.

The 7am taxi ride to our reserved hostel room began with our backpacks tumbling out of the accelerating Fiat onto the dusty road behind us. We gathered them up and set off again. A quick shower and some snacks later and we headed out into the city that would be our new home. We soon found the Plaza de Armas. It’s a beautiful city and we immediately felt good about being here. As our first real taste of South American life Cusco has an interesting blend of tradition and tourism that has eased us in slowly. There are a lot of tourists here and it’s true that a lot of local life revolves around catering to those visitors but it’s clear the people here haven’t lost sight of their roots.

Party Town

Traditional Costume Parade

The month of June is party month in Cusco. The Inti Raymi Festival of the Sun on the Winter Solstice quickly follows Cusco day and sees hundreds of indigenous peoples from the Cusco mountain region visiting the city to perform traditional dances and processions. For more than a week the central Plaza was completely packed with marching bands, dance troupes and a festival atmosphere.

Settling In

During the last month here we’ve done 3 weeks of Spanish lessons with the legendary Jose Carlos at the Mundo Antiguo Escuela de Espanol. They gave us a great discount for taking private classes as a pair. We’ve come a long way from complete beginners but there’s still a long way to go. We’ve found ourselves a cosy apartment to stay in and met some interesting people along the way. We’ve also started a tradition of heading to The Real McCoy (a British restaurant and bar – the slogan for which is “…a taste of home”) for a Sunday roast and a glass of wine while we finish our Spanish homework.

What’s Next?

This week we’re going horseback riding through the mountains, doing a mini trek via some of the ruins in the nearby area, learning verb lists and practicing our Spanish as much as possible.

Next week we’ll be taking more lessons and I’ll be buckling down to some web development work while Alex begins a 3 week stint as a volunteer for a locally run and supported children’s school.

So much more has happened than I can remember but essentially we’ve just been enjoying living in a new and exciting place. I think we’re both very happy to have picked Cusco as our first destination which is lucky because when we finally move on we’ll have been here for over 2 months!

That’s all for now… I promise not to leave it so long next time. Hasta luego!