6 Lessons From The First 6 Weeks

18 Dec

Traveling is perhaps the best teaching tool there is.  Here’s a smattering of some of things we’ve learned, or re-learned, since the start of our journey.

We took this room after a full day of hiking and only after we'd had a chance to rest did we realize there was a dirt floor...

1) Don’t settle for a bad room/bad price just because you are tired.  This is a lesson we’ve had many times before, but it can be a difficult one to remember in the moment.  After an 18 hour bus ride, a grueling hike, or 45 minutes looking at possible hostels, it’s tempting to just give in and take whatever you are offered – be that a rip-off taxi fare, or a room with questionable bed sheets.  It’s easy to beat yourself up later with “should have” or “could have” scenarios, so to avoid those altogether just give yourself a break, literally.  Take 5 minutes to sit down somewhere and regroup before you delve back into the negotiations.  Do you really not have the energy to go any further or to play the haggling game?  If not, then take what you can get, and chalk it up to necessity.

2) Find the local markets.  If you’ll be in one spot for a few days, it’s a great idea to find the local produce markets.  Typically you’ll be able to get a huge variety of fresh fruits, breads, cheeses and meat at a huge discount compared to most grocery stores.  In addition to general supplies, most markets have food stalls where you can get a meal or snack for only a few dollars.  It’s a great way to save some cash and interact with the locals.

By Orin Zebest on Flickr

3) Organize your photos regularly.  It’s easier than you think to rack up thousands of photos over the course of a few weeks.  If left unattended it can take hours of tediously going through pictures, deleting the ones you don’t want, and trying to figure out where each one was taken.  Sitting down to organize them regularly will help you tame this beast of a chore.

4) Starbucks and KFC always have clean, free bathrooms. It may be abrasive to see so many chain businesses popping up abroad, but there are a few positives to this phenomenon.  Not only does Starbucks always have free, clean bathrooms, but you can also wait around for your night bus in a much more comfortable spot than the floor of the local station.  As a bonus you don’t even have to buy anything to while away the evening on one of their couches.

By javajoba on Flickr

5) “Travel Size” doesn’t always cut it.  When we started making our packing lists,  we had to focus a lot on how to save space or weight in our packs.  The first inclination was to bring all our toiletries in travel size.  This has worked out well for some things (the miniature brush for example) but not for others.  Tiny containers might be fine for a few weeks, but for long-term travel it just doesn’t make sense to have everything in such small quantities.  That doesn’t mean you need to buy in bulk either, but for our daily use items like sunscreen and toothpaste, we just carry around a normal size container and they don’t add enough bulk or weight to our bags to be a problem.

By Spec-ta-cles on Flickr

6) Make time for “normal”.  Long term travel is not just a huge extended vacation.  Ok, maybe it is, but it’s also your life.  You need things like shampoo and kleenex, or a day to just run errands or have some down time.  Make a point to take a day to rest here and there.  Get your laundry done.  Restock your personal supplies.  Sometimes it’s the little things that make you feel like a regular person again, instead of like a manic tourist.

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Feeling the Love in Ollantaytambo

13 Dec

Ollantaytambo, Peru

We intended to spend just one, or maybe two days in Ollantaytambo.

The thing about intentions is that you never really know where you might end up if you let them run off course.

On our way back from Machu Picchu we decided to stop over in this little village – there are more ruins there and I have a vague recollection about it being one of the places where the Inca really held out on a battle against the Spanish.  In any case, those ruins are included in the tourist boleto and we were hell-bent to get our money’s worth on that particular purchase.

"I can haz snuggles?"

We chose our hostel based entirely on the fact that the write-up said they had cats, and we really miss our own kitties.  It was as simple as that.

We arrived exhausted after getting up at 5 am and tromping around in the scorching heat all day, so we were a little disoriented when we walked into the common area and found a group of people popping champagne and the hostel owner scurrying around with bags of groceries and packages of flowers.

We had walked into a pre-wedding celebration.  The hostel owner’s sister was to be married the next day, and she was frantically trying to finish preparing for the festivities.

Recalling the insanity that was the night before our own wedding, we asked if there was anything we could do to help.  It didn’t take long before we found ourselves chopping carrots, peeling garlic, arranging flowers, hanging garland and moving tables and chairs around.

Flowers dry in the sun

By the next morning, we had been invited to attend the two-day celebration.  We were told to be ready to go at 9.

Good thing the groom has a sense of humor...

Apparently the bride has a long history of being late, and this day was no exception.  As we waited, we got the opportunity to get to know the groom and his family (from Germany) and receive our traditional decoration to wear to the first ceremony, which was really a two-for-one with a civil service and the traditional shaman ceremony.

Justin gets some traditional flair

To begin the traditional ceremony, the wedding party and guests paraded through town, following the Shaman who spent the better part of the 20 minute walk blowing on a conch shell to alert our presence to everyone in the area.

We wound our way through town, over a fence, into a horse meadow, past some crops, over an irrigation ditch and into a cornfield.

There are small ruins scattered all through the Sacred Valley, many of which are never seen by tourists as they are too small or are located in someone’s field.  I can’t think of a more stunning place to be married.

The ceremony was long (3 hours), and at times, intense.  We didn’t understand most of what the shaman was saying, but overall we got the gist of what was happening.

Unlike most weddings we’ve been to, the ceremony involved a lot of guest participation, especially with the parents.

At one point the men and women were separated and sent into different areas.  We gathered in our circles, the women with the bride and the men with the groom.  We were given some kind of herbs to smoke (not those kind of herbs…) and as we each took a puff, we were asked to give some words of wisdom, advice, or support to the bride and groom.  It was an interesting mix of thoughts, given in German, Spanish, and English and was mostly about marriage and love, but also about staying true to yourself and finding support when you need it.

Mom and sister give advice to the bride.

Something we found very interesting was that during the “I do” part of the ceremony, the bride and groom told each other not only what they liked about their partner, but also what they didn’t like.  People we have spoken to about this ceremony are often confused as to why we would be so drawn to this part since the general consensus seems to be that you shouldn’t be telling your loved one what you don’t like about them, especially at your wedding.

Let’s be real here.  People don’t typically love everything about their partners.  The thing about marriage is that if you go into it thinking everything is going to be perfect and that love conquers all, well, you’re in for a hell of a surprise.  Marriage is a partnership and, like all partnerships, there will be times when the partners don’t agree.  Love, in and of itself, doesn’t solve problems.  People solve problems.  What drew me to that portion in the ceremony was the fact that it was so honest.  They were saying that they loved each other for all the ways that the other person is so wonderful AND that they loved each other in spite of whatever imperfections they might have.   They were really committing, openly and clearly, to their partner as a whole person.

Near then end of the ceremony a young girl came running up with a plastic bag filled with fresh milk.  The parents of both the bride and the groom took turns tossing cups of wine, and this milk, to the four directions.  Afterwards, the bride and groom took turns pouring the rest of the wine and each guest drank from the same cup.

Justin partakes of some ceremonial wine

After it was all said and done, we headed back to the hostel for the first night of the fiesta and a huge homemade meal.

The next day was the traditional Christian ceremony and large reception.  It was held a few kilometers outside of town at Tulupa, a restaurant in yet another stunning little valley.

Tunupa Restaurant in the Sacred Valley

The ceremony was lovely, the food was excellent, and the pisco never stopped flowing.

Like most events where people have been drinking and dancing for 6+ hours, there came a point when the crowd started to get tired and began to take a break from the dancing.  There is a way to stop this.  It’s called “Crazy Hour” and it involves scary clowns with balloons, masks, bizarre hats, confetti, foam (yes, foam) and a serious dose of dance music.  Within seconds everyone, and I mean EVERYONE was back on the floor whooping it back up.  Amazing.

Exhausted, happy, and very drunk we finally piled into a minivan, with the groom’s family and friends, to be carted home sometime in the wee hours of the morning.   The journey may or may not have included rambunctious group singing of various American rock classics, and a rousing chorus of Mein Hut Der Hat Drei Ecken…the only German song I know all the words to.

When we started out on our adventure around the globe we left our itinerary wide open, knowing that we wanted to be available to take advantage of whatever the universe might present for us…for example, a random invite to an incredible wedding.

For more pictures, check out the slide show:

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The Ancient Marvels of Monasterio de San Francisco

10 Dec

Monasterio de San Francisco

We’ve seen a lot of churches, temples, monasteries and other places of religious importance throughout our travels.  They make great tourist spots for a number of obvious reasons (art, architectural beauty, cultural significance  historical significance, I could go on and on here…).  The thing about churches is that after a while, if you’ve been travelling and seeing dozens of them in a very short time period, they all start to blur together.

If you find that happening to you in Lima, but you still want to go out and see the sights, I highly recommend the Monasterio de San Francisco.  It’s included in every guidebook’s section about downtown Lima, but if you have only a day or two in the city I could see this one getting lost in the shuffle.

The structure in and of itself is nice, there are many rooms that hold lovely pieces of art, or very old furnishings, but there are two things that make this place stand out above some of the other smaller sites we’ve visited.

1 – The Library

Now, I have to admit to having an affinity for books and other old things (I was a history teacher…old things are awesome), but this was truly amazing.  The monastery has a library collection that contains 25,000 ancient texts, most of which are handwritten, and some of which date back to before the Spanish conquest!  The room itself is beautiful, and they have a few enormous books on display right up next to the ropes that keep you from actually entering the room.   You can really feel that you are in the presence of something magnificent here, and I would have stayed for hours if we had been allowed.

Library at the Monaserio de San Francisco. Photo by Andre Gunther Photography.

 2 – The Catacombs

Catacombs aren’t for everyone.  Before we entered we were told by our guide that if we felt nauseous, or uncomfortable that we should leave and wait by the exit for the rest of the group to join back up.  We’ve seen some smaller catacombs, but we were simply not prepared for how massive this site is.  Apparently, it was the general burial area for hundreds of years, for everyone in Lima.  Our guide estimated that there were more than 70,000 skeletons that had been unearthed so far.  That’s right, only so far. They had rearranged the bones into separate earthen bins, which were open and just inches away from the walkway.  We passed bin, after bin, after bin, after bin until we finally came to the end of the tour, where a giant well of sorts had been used to arrange skulls and more bones into a morbid circular display.  It was both extremely unsettling, yet completely fascinating.  I find myself wondering who these people were?  Is this how they are to be remembered?

Catacombs of Monastario de San Francisco taken by Ray_from_LA on Flickr

It’s only a few blocks away from the Plaza de Armas, so it’s quite easy to get to if you are already in the center.  You  must pay a small entrance fee of 7 Soles, but this includes a guided tour of about an hour in Spanish or English.  Most people we’ve met along the way have skipped this particular site, so we’re here to encourage you to go!

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The Moving Box Bet – Chile

5 Dec

Justin’s first Moving Box Bet challenge in Peru was pretty easy.   So easy that even I participated.  We decided to crank it up a notch for the Chilean challenge, and crank it up we did.

Take a look:

Video not showing up?  Try this –  Moving Box Bet – Chile

Justin’s next Moving Box Bet challenge will take place in Argentina.  Contact us if you have a suggestion for what he should eat!

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30 Days

2 Dec

We’ve been on the road for 30 days.

I sort of can’t even believe it.  On one hand, it still feels like we’re just on “vacation”.  On the other hand, it feels like we’ve been gone for a lifetime.

Peru was a whirlwind, we were so busy doing things because we knew we had only a short time to be there and we didn’t want to waste a single minute.  After nearly three weeks of moving at the speed of light, we felt like we had been on the road for months.

Chile has so far been extremely mellow by comparison.  We have some great friends here who we’ve been staying with and we’ve had the chance to slow down and just be ‘normal’ for the past week.  We’ve done laundry, gone grocery shopping, started running again, and haven’t felt much like tourists at all…except for that whole not being able to communicate very well in Spanish bit.

It’s OK though, we have plenty of time for sightseeing because we’ll be staying in Santiago for another month.  We start an intensive Spanish class on Monday, Justin may complete his next Moving Box Bet Challenge as early as this weekend (it’s a good one, stay tuned!), and there are loads of little day and weekend trips in the works…hello wine tours!

(Inexplicably, the slideshow isn’t working for everyone.  Go ahead and click the link instead if you can’t see the embedded version.  If you hover over the slide show, you can expand it to full screen using the link at the very bottom of the black border.  To see the captions once in full-screen mode you can click “show info” in the upper right corner.  Hate this slide show format? I do.  Have a better one in mind?  Let me know!)

http://www.flickr.com//photos/theparallellife/sets/72157628247374035/show/

Even after 30 days it’s clear that we’ve only just begun, and we can’t wait to see what’s in store for us this month.

How To Hike Colca Canyon, Without A Guide

28 Nov

**UPDATE (March 2018) – We still get loads of hits on this particular post, which leads me to believe that guidebooks still aren’t giving great directions on how to do this (get it together guidebooks!).  There are a number of readers who have written posts of their own with updated pricing etc – you can find links to those in the comments, or the section below the comments (Trackbacks/Pingbacks).  We would highly encourage you to check those out as well to see what’s changed since this was originally posted.**

Really, the only reason we went to Arequipa was to hike the Colca Canyon.  Originally it was going to be our test hike to see how well Justin’s leg might hold up on the Inca Trail (he had a muscle tear, no fun), but even after we decided not to trek to Machu Picchu, we still wanted to take this hike.  Why?  Well, partly because it’s billed as the world’s second deepest canyon, and partly because we didn’t hike the Inca Trail, so I was bound and determined to hike SOMETHING for more than one day in Peru.

Colca Canyon is a big tourist destination, and as such, there are about a million different tours or trekking packages available from every single “travel agency” or hostel in Arequipa.

Lonely Planet suggests that you can do the trip yourself.  Unfortunately, the edition we have doesn’t give a whole lot of info about how exactly you do that, and I am not the kind of person who feels comfortable setting out on 3 day hiking trip without some fairly solid details, or at least a decent map.  After searching around quite a bit online (tons of people have done the trek alone and posted basic itineraries), and pestering the moderatly helpful agents at the tourist info booth in Arequipa, and then asking around a bit at Cabanaconde, we managed to figure it out.  However, it would have saved a whole lot of time and quite a bit of stress to have found some detailed instructions somewhere.  To that effect, I present –

How To Hike Colca Canyon Without A Guide.

This is long…if you don’t plan on hiking the Colca Canyon, you could just stop here and check out the slideshow:

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

*Disclaimer – I am just a regular person, writing about MY experience.  I hope you find this helpful, but it certainly shouldn’t be your only source of info.  Please ask around before you head out to make sure things haven’t changed, and obviously, use your own common sense.*
 

1)      You need to get yourself to Cabanaconde, where the hike begins.  This is about a 6 hour bus ride away from Arequipa.  There are a number of bus companies that go there including Andalucia, Milagros, and Transjesa.  The booths seem to be clustered on an island in the center of the central bus station rather than around the edge like the long-distance companies.  You can buy tickets from a travel agent, but they will charge you an outrageous commission. We opted to take a combi to the main bus station (Terrestre) and just buy one way tickets the day before we left.   Most combis seems to go there, ask around as to where to catch one near where you are staying.

Cost: 16 soles one way.

2)      If you want to avoid spending a night in Chivay or Cabanaconde you can take an early morning bus to Cabanaconde – they seem to go around 1am, 3am, 5am, 6am and hike all the way down the same day.  We took the 6 am, which got us in around noon.  We had time for lunch, and then had no problems hiking down to our first destination that same day.  Taking the 1 or 3 am bus seems masochistic.  The reason people do it is to stop at the Condor viewing overlook when the birds are supposedly most active.  We aren’t really into birds, so we didn’t care about that, but I will say we saw one from the bus, and many while hiking so unless you are REALLY a birder, choose sleep and go with the 5 or 6 am bus.  It also seemed like if you got off the bus at the viewing spot, you’d be stuck there for at least another hour until the next bus came along.  If you’d rather hike in the morning, you can stay at either Chivay (about 3 or 4 hours into the bus ride from Arequipa there is a stop at this town, they apparently have a hot springs and places to stay) or at Cabanaconde.  If you go during high season it might be worth making reservations somewhere in advance, but it seemed utterly dead mid-November.

3)      At some point you will have to buy the tourist boleto.  People in the past have argued that this is a scam, but you really do need to buy one, just like you do in the Cuzco area.  We got ours in Chivay while the bus was reloading, but we could have bought one in Cabanaconde as well.  Officials with green or beige vests and clipboards have them for sale, and you have to buy one, there is no way around this.  They are square, and MAKE SURE they have a rectangular tear-off section attached for “control” at the end of the hike.  Ours got lost along the way and we nearly had to pay again.

Cost: 35 Soles per ticket.

4)      We tried with diligence to find a trail map.  We could not.  We found a few rough maps online that people had scanned, and those turned out to be the same at ones that were given to us by hostel touts upon exiting the bus at Cabanaconde.  There seems to not be anything better, and we did just fine with these, so I imagine unless you really get off track, you should be ok.  There are two different basic maps, with estimated times, but they are NOT to scale and NOT technical.  Here is one, and here is another.

5)      To get to the trail depends on which route you take.  We wanted to hike down to San Juan de Chuccho the first night, then onto Sangalle the second day, and then back up to Cabanaconde.  If you want, you can just head straight down to Sangelle one day, and back up the next.  If you are in good shape you could do it all in one day as it apparently only takes about 2 hours to get down that trail, and it took us 4 hours to hike back up.

This sign shows the way to Sangalle, but it marked the finale of our journey as we headed back into the main Plaza.

To Sangalle – follow the gigantic sign just off the main plaza by the Hostel Valle Del Fuego.  It points you in the correct direction, which leads down a street (no turns, just stay on that road) and eventually into a cornfield where you follow a rough path that ends up on a trail that really looks like a ditch, where you will turn left.  The ditch leads you directly to the proper trailhead and a control checkpoint where you will have to show your boletto.  You will likely doubt that you are on the right path, but we saw a number of hiker groups on that path on our way out, and you can always stop and ask a local if you’re headed the right direction.

The trailhead to get to San Juan de Chuccho

To San Juan de Chuccho– Facing the church in the main plaza, go down the road that runs along the left side of the church.  After about 3 blocks you need to turn left onto a street that is ‘more’ paved with stones than with dirt, and after a few more blocks you will end up on an actual paved road, which is the one the bus comes in on.  After about 10-15 minutes you should pass a large football stadium on your left, and shortly after you will be at the overlook Mirador de San Miguel where there is an actual trailhead sign.

Hiker footprints *generally* mean you are on the right path.

6)       Stay on the main path.  Do not take shortcuts.  Shortcuts increase erosion, and the place is slippery and rocky as is, so don’t encourage any more small landslides!  When you come to a fork, take the bigger path.  If you see a lot of hiker footprints, you are probably on the correct path.  There are not many forks, and when there was, there was always a very obvious ‘main’ path.

7)      It took us about 2.5 hours to get all the way down to the bottom where there is a little bridge you have to cross.  We had to show our boletos here as well.

Justin outside our Rivelino house accommodations.

8)      There was a woman waiting at the bridge who took us to the Rivelino’s House in San Juan de Chuccho where we spent our first night.  There is another place to stay in this village, Roy’s House.  If nobody is at the bridge waiting to take you somewhere, you can take either path leading to the village (there are two, apparently they go to the same place, the lower path is very steep for a short bit, but is quicker.  The upper path meanders a little, and thus takes a little longer).  There were directional arrows and signs painted on big rocks along the trail that would lead you to either Roy’s or the Rivelino’s house.

We thoroughly enjoyed staying at the Rivelino’s House.  They had a number of huts/rooms that were basic, but clean.  There were hot water showers, flushing toilets, and a little store with beer, water, tp, some candy, etc.  They also served a basic but filling dinner (I believe we had beef, some veggies and rice, if you are vegetarian you might just get pasta). The next day we had a lovely breakfast of banana crepes drizzled with caramel.

We were the only people there without a guide, and we seemed to get the exact same service/meals that everyone else did, with the exception of dinner.  We were the only people to get meat.  I can’t imagine that everyone else (maybe 15 people) were vegetarians, so I suspect it’s just what the guided groups either carried in or contracted to pay for since it’s easier to serve a batch of spaghetti than to cook 15 steaks.

Cost : room was 8 soles per person

           dinner was 8 soles per person

           breakfast was 5 soles per person.

Did you get to this bridge? Then you are going the right way!

9)      The next day we were up early and on the trail by around 8.  To get to Sangalle you have to go through two small villages – Cosnirhua and Malata.  You can alternatively head out to Tapay, which we didn’t do, and then loop back around.  The locals pointed us in the right direction, and we just followed the path around the side of the canyon, and eventually down to the bottom again where we had to cross another small bridge.  I was worried we would accidentally take the turn-off to Tapay but we didn’t, and in fact I’m not really sure where the turn off is so if you want to go that route, I suggest you just ask before you are out of San Juan de Chuccho.  It took us around 30 minutes to reach the bridge, and then it’s uphill for around 45 minutes to the town of Cosnirhua.

10)   Once at the edge of the town of Cosnirhua there are two paths you can take.  The one headed left will take you on the edge of town, the one leading the right will take you through the town, but they meet up again at the end of the village.

11)   It takes about 20 minutes to walk between Cosnirhua and Malata, and it was flat and easy.

Justin is excited that we can find beer in this little village.

12)   In Malata there is a hostel with a little store and a museum.  All the tourist groups stop here and are served the fermented corn beer (which seemed warm and terrible) and are given a little red smudge on their faces from the cactus.  As we had already played with the cactus smudges on the trail, I didn’t really feel like we were missing out.  The store has all the basics, pasta, soup packets, rice, soda, water and beer.  The beer apparently used to be only 5 soles, but it’s now 10, so you’d be better off just waiting until Sangalle.

13)   From Malata the trail continues very obviously down to Sangalle, it took a little less than an hour for us to get down there.

The pool at our hostel in Sangalle

14)   Sangalle is odd because it’s not really a town, just a series of little resorts.  There are at least 4, and I strongly suggest you look around before you accept a room.  We made the mistake of being lazy and just saying yes at the first place we came across in Sangalle, Oasis Parisio, which apparently used to be quite nice, but is now a total shithole a bit rundown.  Our hut was tolerable, but had dirt floors, and we heard afterwards that the two places beyond it are newer and have tile.  The whole ‘resort’ is in a bit of shambles, and I wish we had just sucked it up and found our way to the next place.  Unfortunately it rained most of the afternoon that we arrived so we only got to enjoy the pool for a little while.

Cost: 10 soles per person for a room, unless you get a matrimonial       (double bed) and then it’s 25.

10 soles per person for dinner – soup and pasta.

They also serve breakfast (7 soles) and lunch (10 soles) but we didn’t partake.  We just bought a few bananas the next morning to supplement the bread and granola bars we brought with us.

15)   To hike back up was very obvious…you just go straight up. It’s mostly switchbacks, and there were no real splits to confuse you.  Hiking times vary greatly…we did it in four hours.  Some English guys that were also staying at the Oasis made it in about 3hrs 15 min, and there were a few other guys who claimed to have done it in just over 2.  If you are in great shape and acclimated to the altitude I’d say between 2-3 hours is reasonable.  If you are in terrible shape, give yourself 5+ hours.  The average seems to be 3-4 hours.

A much needed rest about halfway up.

We started around 6:30am to try to avoid some sun, which was a good idea as there are no trees or shade other than the sides of the canyon before the sun is up. After about 2 hours we had reached this little overlook with a little hut and a place to sit.

If you just can’t (or don’t want to ) hike back up, you can hire a mule from every hostel in Sangalle.  We didn’t do this so I can’t speak to the actual cost, but Lonely Planet puts it at around 60 Soles.

16)   At the top there was a control guard who needed the tear off pieces from our boletos that we didn’t have.  We got lucky and he eventually let us pass without it, but we were a bit nervous that we were going to have to pay a fine or something.

I swear this is the trail. Ok, it might ALSO be a ditch, but it really is the trail.

17)    Once at the very top you follow the path into something that looks like a ditch (you will probably be thinking “no way is this the right way…”), then when you see the cornfields you go over the small wall to your right onto the path through the corn and follow that into the town and right onto the road that has the Hostel Valle Del Fuego and onto the main plaza.

18)   You can buy your bus tickets when you get back (might be a good idea in high season to do this before you hike down, just make sure to be back up in time!).  The bus times change frequently, but we caught one at 11:30 headed back to Arequipa.

Cost: 16 soles one way

Our total cost per person for the whole three days (including all water, some beer, food that we brought as well as meals in the canyon, lodging, transportation and entrance tickets): 140 soles per person

Did we save a ton over the tours? 

No, but most tours didn’t include the boleto though, so without that we did cut the cost by at least 1/3. Prices seemed to land around 150 Soles for some type of 3 day package, though what you get for that 150 varies.  Some tours offer no hiking at all, they merely cart you to a number of spots on the rim of the canyon to see the condors and to marvel at the depth of the valley, others take you to scenic overlooks, spend the night in Cabanoconde or Chivay and then have you trek down to Sangalle (the oasis) on the second day, and trek you out on the third.  Yet others offer a solid three days of hiking where you get to spend 2 nights in the valley, usually one in a village and the other in Sangalle.  If you’re looking at a tour, make sure you know exactly what the itinerary is as well as what’s included – will they provide all the meals?  Snacks?  All the water? One thing most companies don’t include in the cost of their trip is the tourist boletto that MUST be purchased in order to enter most villages in the area, including Cabanaconde.  As of November 2011, it was 35 Soles, but rumor has it that price is about to double.

Incidentally, Lonely Planet’s suggestion of the company Colca Trek, seems totally out of whack for the otherwise budget friendly guide.  Colca Trek quoted us 690 soles for a 3 day tour that included one night of camping at the oasis, and one night at the top of the canyon.  The stopped at a number of places along the way to look at the vicuña and some natural landscapes as well.   It may well be one of the better tours in the area, but the price just about blew us out of the water.

Would we have rather taken a tour considering how close the cost was?

No.  It was nice to be able to do things at our leisure, and not feel like we were being rushed, or having to wait on people. It also was really easy to do on our own.  If you don’t hike much in your day-to-day life, or just want to have the added comfort of going with someone experienced, then I’d recommend a tour.  Just make sure you shop around and are very sure what exactly is included before you put any money down.

What did we bring with us?

One outfit to hike in – we wore it each day for 3 days (with new socks and personals each day)

One outfit to sleep in

Sleep sacks (which we didn’t need)

Swimsuit for Sangalle

Lightweight towel

Two giant (2L, heavy but necessary) bottles of water (bought a third in the canyon)

A few bananas, 6 granola bars, 2 chocolate bars, and 4 rolls.  The rest of our meals we bought at the hostels or had en route in Cabanaconde

Headlamps – a must, most places in the canyon do not have electricity.

Flip flops

Warm fleece for night, it gets COLD.

Hats with brims

Sunscreen and bug spray.  There is no shade, you will get fried.  There are also these little flies that bite in Sangalle, highly irritating.

Basic first aid kit with advil, band-aids, sports tape, dehydration salts, anti-bac, immodium and water treatment tablets.

Rain jackets

All the money we needed for the whole time as there are no ATMs in the canyon.  Bring small bills.

With, or without, a guide, we’d definitely recommend this trek if you’re in Arequipa and have at least 2 days to spare.

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Being Thankful in Santiago

24 Nov

This Thanksgiving is the first of many holidays that we will spend abroad and away from our families on this journey.   It’s not, however, the very first holiday I’ve spent abroad (Thanksgiving in Florence, 1999 springs to mind…what a feast that was, and a story for another time), so one thing we know already is that the holiday is about your own acknowledgement and celebration in whatever way works for you.

I happen to LOVE Thanksgiving, in fact it might even be my favorite holiday.  The food is a huge part of it, but the other part is about really taking time to reflect on your blessings, and to acknowledge the gifts that the universe has granted us in this life.

Before we left we celebrated an early Thanksgiving (on Halloween), and tomorrow will we celebrate again with friends in Santiago, Chile.

Thanksgiving on Halloween 2011

At this moment I am grateful for two turkey feasts in one month!

In all seriousness though, we are thankful for so many things.

We have loving and supportive families.  

We have incredible friends.

We have the opportunity to travel and follow our dreams.

We have each other to share this journey with.

What are you thankful for today?

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Bugging Out In Peru

17 Nov

Bugs of Cuzco

A few months ago Justin and I started up an old school game of ‘punch-buggy’.  You know, the one where you punch the other person when you see a Volkswagen Bug.  Yeah, we’re very mature like that.

In the States we had an intricate set of rules that included double punches whenever one of us spotted an original bug, and triple punches for a VW van because of the rarity of these particular icons.

Within two or three days of arriving in Peru it was clear our game structure was going to need to change, or we would both be walking around with black and blue arms.  You see, there are original bugs and vans EVERYWHERE.  It’s like all the classic bugs migrated down past the equator and are just kicking it here, enjoying their retirement.

It’s gotten to the point that if we are really paying attention, we’ll see one every few minutes, and sometimes we see 4 or 5 parked on the same block.  It’s remarkable how great of shape most of them are in, and I’d be lying if I said that the idea to buy one and drive through South America hasn’t crossed my mind more than once.

In any case, the amusement factor of punch-buggy has worn off, and it’s time for us to move on to a more challenging game.  Any suggestions?

The Moving Box Bet – Peru

13 Nov

When we were packing up to leave NYC we decided that since everything would be in storage for more than a year, it would be a good idea to number the boxes and create a list that had the numbers, and a basic idea of what was in each box.  If we can manage to remember where we put that list, it should be helpful in terms of unpacking when we return.

Packing sucks.  In an attempt to make it suck a little less, Justin and I made a little wager about the number of boxes we thought we’d end up with when it was all said and done.  We wrote our numbers down, and sealed them in an envelope.

At the time, we couldn’t think of what the winner would get.  Money would be pointless since we share that.  A nice dinner cooked for the winner didn’t seem big enough.

Eventually we decided that it wouldn’t be so much what the winner got, but what the loser had to do.  We threw around a bunch of ideas, but finally settled on one that seemed perfect…

The loser has to eat one strange or unusual item of the winner’s choice in ever country we visit. 

Justin lost.

I’ve been researching all the interesting food items available in Peru – cuy (guinea pig), was high on the list, but so was anticuchos (beef heart on a skewer). Having not run across anything more fascinating, I decided that whatever we came across first would be what he would eat.

The other day we were wandering around Ollantaytambo when we came across a vendor with meat skewers.  We asked the woman tending the grill what each skewer was.

Pollo, carne, anticuchos.

So it was settled.

Justin takes the plunge!

As it turns out, anticuchos is very tender, and rather tasty.  So tasty in fact that we went back for a second skewer for me.

Delicious!

Justin is convinced that I’m going to be trying all these interesting foods along with him, and for now that’s fine, but I suspect that when we get to Southeast Asia he’ll be on his own…

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Taking The Long Way in Lima, Peru

7 Nov

Lima bus tickets

We’re not huge museum people, but when we read Jack and Jill’s post about the naughty pottery exhibit at the Museo Larco in Lima, we knew this was something we needed to see.

We’d had a successful venture on public transportation to the Plaza de Armas on Friday, and Lonely Planet gives a good description of the bus we needed to take the Museo Larco, so we set out feeling very confident about our navigational skills.

We should have known better.

The bus system in Lima is…chaotic.  The buses are everywhere, and while there are actual stops, you can also just flag one down and jump on, often it seems they don’t even stop completely.  Some appear to have route maps, others, not so much.  Some are big, like city buses we are used to seeing, and others are just small mini-vans.  The most prominent feature is the man, or woman, who hangs out the door of the bus shouting street names as the driver rockets down the road.

After about a half hour of bus hunting, we couldn’t find the one described in Lonely Planet.  Shocking, I know.  Plan B was to just ask the person screaming out street names if the bus went past the Museo Larco.  Sure enough, we were picked up by a driver who assured us he would go right past it.

As we wound our way through Miraflores, I could tell that we weren’t going in the right direction.  Justin asked the driver again if we would pass the museum, and he assured us that we would, and he would let us know when to get of.  30 minutes later the bus came to a screeching halt and we were told we had arrived.

Um…no. We had arrived in front of a museum, just not the museum.  Apparently there is a street named ‘Larco’ and there is a museum on it, so that’s where we ended up.

Ok then, onto plan C. Try to get another bus, this time asking for both the museum AND the street name (Bolivar).  Once again, we managed to find a bus who said yes, he would be going past there.

30 minutes later we again came to a screeching halt. We were indeed on Bolivar, but not the block we needed.  We started walking, and very quickly came to a dead-end. Turns out, we were on a totally different Bolivar.

At this point, we were nearly ready to just give up and go eat some more arroz con leche, but we really wanted to see these pots.

Our final attempt found us on the correct bus, and at last, nearly 2 1/2 hours after we set out, we arrived at the Museo Larco.

The regular exhibits were lovely, the naughty pottery was as entertaining as promised, and we made sure to get explicit directions, including a bus number, for the way home.

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