Having fairly easily convinced my friend Pam (stands for Paul-Adrien Martin, his full name) to visit me in South America for his first trip out of Europe, I had to slightly change my travel plans, and that's how I ended up on a flight from Santiago to Lima around the end of October.
Phil, an American/Peruvian friend I met in London last June, had introduced me to his cousins Alessandra and Talía, and following their advice, I had booked a few nights in hostels located in two of Lima's nicest areas, Barranco and Miraflores, the former being more Bohemian than the latter.
During my first day in Lima (Paul wasn't there yet), I met Alessandra in a gorgeous old house, a haven of peace in the middle of Miraflores, while she was working on a video advertisement for a luxury brand (she's an actress). So that's how I entered a world of fashion costumes, lightning engineers, and video director, which had been totally unknown to me until then. A good introduction to Lima, which brightened a lot the first impression I had of a busy, dirty and foggy city.
House in Miraflores where I met Alessandra
Alessandra working
Pam arrived later that day, and we decided to go out with other people from the hostel. At first, this sounded like a wise idea: being already tired and jetlagged, that would the occasion for Pam to disrupt his body rythm for good and to start afresh the following morning, and thus to get used faster to Peru's time and rythm. But after only two hours out (so that means after only four hours or so in Peru), Pam managed to twist his ankle walking in the street, which in fairness to him is actually quite easy to do in Lima, since pavement holes and potholes are omnipresent in Peru.
Another distinctive feature of Lima are the continuous horns in the street. Taxi even honk to indicate their availability and to ask if you need a ride. And if you waive a taxi in Peru, be sure to negotiate the fare in advance!
Another distinctive feature of Lima are the continuous horns in the street. Taxi even honk to indicate their availability and to ask if you need a ride. And if you waive a taxi in Peru, be sure to negotiate the fare in advance!
Pedestrian street in Barranco area, Lima
Dodgy bus in Lima
We spent two days visiting some parts of Lima, chilling in our really cool hostel in Barranco (The Point), eating Ceviche (one of their national prides) and Wantan (not so much), and going out with other backpackers. But on our last night in Lima, Talía had invited us to an arty/Bohemian event in Jesús María (another neighbourhood of Lima) featuring a nice exhibition of contemporary local artists, live music (her boyfriend was playing with his band), more or less captivating video projections, a guy reading poems, hipsters, tattoo artists and free chilcanos, a cocktail based on Peruvian pisco. Of course, we were the only two gringos there, escaping touristic routes for a night.We had a great time, before heading to San Isidro at Hugo's place, a friend of mine studying in Lima for a year.
(Photos soon !)
But enough with partying in Lima, next stop was Huacachina, an oasis in the middle of the Peruvian desert. The main activities there consist in chilling by the swimming pool, going for a buggy ride and sand-surfing in the dunes. Unfortunately, with my broken wrist, I couldn't realistically consider the last option, but at least I could enjoy some great landscapes, as you can see from the following pictures.
Peruvian desert, near Huacachina (1)
Pam sand-surfing
Our home-made buggy
Peruvian desert, near Huacachina (2)
Huacachina oasis
We then went to Arequipa, and only stayed there a few hours (I needed to buy trekking shoes) before heading to the Colca Canyon, one of Peru's most famous attractions. On our way to the bus terminal, we walked across a street market, enough to enjoy the delicate smell of meat drying in the sun, and the nice view (and smell) of a dead rotten cat in the middle of a pile of trash.
After a six hours ride in probably the worst bus of our Peruvian experience (I'm expecting even worse in Bolivia though), with Peruvians sitting on the floor in the alley and a very bumpy road that makes sleeping nearly impossible, we arrived in Cabanaconde, located 3300m above sea-level, a more remote (and less touristic) base from where you can start visiting the canyon. Colca canyon is said to be the second deepest in the world, after Cotahuasi canyon (that's a ten hours bus ride from Arequipa, probably more than any of us could stand, even if it is supposed to be less touristic, i.e. better).
After a six hours ride in probably the worst bus of our Peruvian experience (I'm expecting even worse in Bolivia though), with Peruvians sitting on the floor in the alley and a very bumpy road that makes sleeping nearly impossible, we arrived in Cabanaconde, located 3300m above sea-level, a more remote (and less touristic) base from where you can start visiting the canyon. Colca canyon is said to be the second deepest in the world, after Cotahuasi canyon (that's a ten hours bus ride from Arequipa, probably more than any of us could stand, even if it is supposed to be less touristic, i.e. better).
So after a good night sleep in our hostel and a great breakfast (but no hot shower), we started to walk. We were supposed to pay a tax of seventy Peruvian soles (about twenty five US dollars), but fortunately enough never met the tax collector. The precision of our map associated with our extremely developed sense of orientation enabled us to get lost ten minutes only after having left Cabanaconde. A condor passes nearby and indicated us the way, we're back on track.
After four or five kilometers descending steep and very dry slopes, surrounded by stunning panoramas, we were (and still are) a bit unsure on what exactly defines a "canyon". In two hours, we came across a dog, a local woman, and her two sheeps. I think I can bear that kind of touristic density!
Slightly ahead of our schedule, we arrived in the hot springs of Llahuar and stayed there an hour to chill in hot baths by the river. Life is good, sun is up, but this will probably be the only time in that day that I will see a smile lighting up Pam's face...
When we finally decided to start walking again, sun was higher in the sky, and we started a fast ascent to reach the small village of Llatica. We came across two Peruvians, who looked surprised by our quick pace, and Pam gave them an explanation in his best Spanish: "¡No mucho tiempo!". I do not remember much of this part of the walk, except that it was definitively one of the most demanding physical effort in my life.
When we arrived in Llatica, way earlier than planned, I was really suffering. The Andes, contrary to what Pam kept saying again and again, are not the same as French Massif Central. Sadly, the village had not much to offer, and no place to eat, and thus we decided to continue our rise to Fure, other backpackers we had met in Cabanaconde having told us it was a "nice place to see", and that we could stay there for the night. Theoretically two hours to get there, Pam was leading the way while I was seeing the end of my life approaching. Only driven by the hope of arriving in the great village of Fure, we managed to walk the all way up, even if I had to stop every 2 minutes.
We found a small place to eat, and while the food was being cooked and I was recovering laying flat on a bench, Pam decided to start visiting this charming and very remote village, like Christopher Colombus in his first days in America.
He came back after 20 minutes, having destroyed one of his shoes playing football with local kids, and told me quite scared: "Dude, we gotta go, this is the worst place I've seen so far: there's meat drying on steel roofs, and flies all around; rotting pieces of a horse scattered around; man, seriously I'm not sleeping here!"
And that's how he convinced me, despite the fact that I was terribly tired, to walk all the way back to Llahuar. At least it was (mostly) descending. We came across an abandoned church, which was shamelessly looted by Pam in order to repair his shoes (don't worry, he only took some steel wire lying on the floor).
Later, inspired by yet another of my brilliant ideas, we decided to take a shortcut and walk along a canal (which is by definition nearly flat) to avoid the endless ups and downs of the normal way. Two hundred meters later, after a bit of balancing at high altitude and some nice and obviously very safe rockslide climbing, we're back on the normal path. "Now you shut the fuck up and you follow me!" says Pam, a bit tense.
In the end, we didn't arrive soon enough in Llahuar to catch a truck back to Cabanaconde. But we were both so exhausted, physically and mentally, by this day trekking in the canyon that after having carefully weighted all the different options, we booked a private car to bring us back to Cabanaconde and take the late bus back to Arequipa. Our skilled chauffeur, a Peruvian version of Sebastien Loeb, picked us up in his 4x4, and surprised us by operating on this accidented and fairly dangerous road only in two-wheel drive. We arrived in Cabanaconde just in time to catch yet another great Peruvian bus to Arequipa. But being so tired, we managed to get a few hours sleep in the bus. After all, this seemed fairly normal, since we calculated that we walked the equivalent of a three day treck in only one day (that's a fifteen hours walk on paper, we did it in less than eight, and our bodies did not appreciate it). Checking in the hostel at 4:30am, we finally had a short but well deserved night in a proper bed.
Talía had given us a lot of advices to make the most of our trip, mostly concerning Peruvian food we had to try. Arequipa being one of the best places to eat real Peruvian food, and since we needed a special treat for our exhausted bodies, we decided to go for a good lunch at Chicha, a gourmet restaurant launched by well known Peruvian chef Gaston Acurio. Peruvian cuisine truly deserves some credit, it was amazingly good! Having tried alpaca and guinea pig, we could then wander around the city centre, and recharge our batteries thanks to the good vibes of this peaceful city.
Coming back to our hostel, we stumbled upon Yohan, a cool French guy we had met in Lima, who is traveling in South America and aiming to end up in Brazil for the world cup. But we couldn't stay long and took a taxi to the very same mall where I bought my trekking shoes a few days before to find some replacement shoes for Pam. If you need advices about malls in Arequipa, I think we got to a decent level of expertise in that subject. Our shopping done, we had a quick fast food, Pam being bold enough to try the infamous Inca Kola, Peru's favourite soft dfrink. It actually tastes like chewing gum, and we couldn't finish it, but believe it or not, Peruvians are so mad of it that Coca-Cola had to buy the whole company to enter the Peruvian soft drinks market.
Anyway, we left after that, and took a bus to Puno, a small and not so exciting town located on the Peruvian shore of Lake Titicaca. Again, we arrived in the middle of the night and woke up the poor sleepy receptionnist at our hostel. We were then forced to stay in Puno for half a day but finally managed to take an early afternoon bus to Copacabana, in Bolivia (not to be confused with the beach in Rio), which serves as a base to visit la Isla del Sol, the most famous island on the Bolivian side of Lake Titicaca.
One of the first thing that strikes you when you arrive in Bolivia are prices. Everything is so cheap! We stopped next to a big, good looking hotel facing the lake and thought it'd be offering expensive accomodation for more demanding clients, but we actually ended up staying there, with our own private double room for $6 per person. Of course, we also went on a shopping orgy, buying a huge stock of local outfits, perfect for a Peruvian/Bolivian-style winter wardrobe.
Our visit of the Isla del Sol resulted in mixed feelings. A two hour boat trip led us to the northern part of the island, from where we walked to the south and took a quicker boat back to Copacabana, and then a bus to Puno. In the morning, after the sun appeared, I must admit that the scenery was quite impressive, and the immensity of the lake truly breathtaking. But after three hours walking on a somewhat flat footpath, the sun had disappeared and the landscape started to become quite monotonic, dry and greyish. And since you're walking nearly 4000 meters above sea level, any small ascent seems like climbing a mountain, and our tiredness started to increase and prevented us from truly enjoying our surroundings. But anyways, I still have some pretty decent photos, so it wasn't all bad. And on the plus side, we also saw a lot of lamas, donkeys and local farmers wearing alpaca pull-overs which would be the dream of any east London hipster in winter.
Colca canyon (1)
Colca canyon (2)
Pam on the first wooden bridge of the day
A slightly Irish part of the Colca Canyon
Slightly ahead of our schedule, we arrived in the hot springs of Llahuar and stayed there an hour to chill in hot baths by the river. Life is good, sun is up, but this will probably be the only time in that day that I will see a smile lighting up Pam's face...
Chilling in the hot springs
When we finally decided to start walking again, sun was higher in the sky, and we started a fast ascent to reach the small village of Llatica. We came across two Peruvians, who looked surprised by our quick pace, and Pam gave them an explanation in his best Spanish: "¡No mucho tiempo!". I do not remember much of this part of the walk, except that it was definitively one of the most demanding physical effort in my life.
Third wooden bridge of the day, next to Llatica
When we arrived in Llatica, way earlier than planned, I was really suffering. The Andes, contrary to what Pam kept saying again and again, are not the same as French Massif Central. Sadly, the village had not much to offer, and no place to eat, and thus we decided to continue our rise to Fure, other backpackers we had met in Cabanaconde having told us it was a "nice place to see", and that we could stay there for the night. Theoretically two hours to get there, Pam was leading the way while I was seeing the end of my life approaching. Only driven by the hope of arriving in the great village of Fure, we managed to walk the all way up, even if I had to stop every 2 minutes.
We found a small place to eat, and while the food was being cooked and I was recovering laying flat on a bench, Pam decided to start visiting this charming and very remote village, like Christopher Colombus in his first days in America.
He came back after 20 minutes, having destroyed one of his shoes playing football with local kids, and told me quite scared: "Dude, we gotta go, this is the worst place I've seen so far: there's meat drying on steel roofs, and flies all around; rotting pieces of a horse scattered around; man, seriously I'm not sleeping here!"
And that's how he convinced me, despite the fact that I was terribly tired, to walk all the way back to Llahuar. At least it was (mostly) descending. We came across an abandoned church, which was shamelessly looted by Pam in order to repair his shoes (don't worry, he only took some steel wire lying on the floor).
Colca canyon (3)
Later, inspired by yet another of my brilliant ideas, we decided to take a shortcut and walk along a canal (which is by definition nearly flat) to avoid the endless ups and downs of the normal way. Two hundred meters later, after a bit of balancing at high altitude and some nice and obviously very safe rockslide climbing, we're back on the normal path. "Now you shut the fuck up and you follow me!" says Pam, a bit tense.
In the end, we didn't arrive soon enough in Llahuar to catch a truck back to Cabanaconde. But we were both so exhausted, physically and mentally, by this day trekking in the canyon that after having carefully weighted all the different options, we booked a private car to bring us back to Cabanaconde and take the late bus back to Arequipa. Our skilled chauffeur, a Peruvian version of Sebastien Loeb, picked us up in his 4x4, and surprised us by operating on this accidented and fairly dangerous road only in two-wheel drive. We arrived in Cabanaconde just in time to catch yet another great Peruvian bus to Arequipa. But being so tired, we managed to get a few hours sleep in the bus. After all, this seemed fairly normal, since we calculated that we walked the equivalent of a three day treck in only one day (that's a fifteen hours walk on paper, we did it in less than eight, and our bodies did not appreciate it). Checking in the hostel at 4:30am, we finally had a short but well deserved night in a proper bed.
Talía had given us a lot of advices to make the most of our trip, mostly concerning Peruvian food we had to try. Arequipa being one of the best places to eat real Peruvian food, and since we needed a special treat for our exhausted bodies, we decided to go for a good lunch at Chicha, a gourmet restaurant launched by well known Peruvian chef Gaston Acurio. Peruvian cuisine truly deserves some credit, it was amazingly good! Having tried alpaca and guinea pig, we could then wander around the city centre, and recharge our batteries thanks to the good vibes of this peaceful city.
Arequipa - Plaza de Armas
Arequipa - lunch at Chicha
Bank entrance in Arequipa
Old Jesuit school in Arequipa
Arequipa
Coming back to our hostel, we stumbled upon Yohan, a cool French guy we had met in Lima, who is traveling in South America and aiming to end up in Brazil for the world cup. But we couldn't stay long and took a taxi to the very same mall where I bought my trekking shoes a few days before to find some replacement shoes for Pam. If you need advices about malls in Arequipa, I think we got to a decent level of expertise in that subject. Our shopping done, we had a quick fast food, Pam being bold enough to try the infamous Inca Kola, Peru's favourite soft dfrink. It actually tastes like chewing gum, and we couldn't finish it, but believe it or not, Peruvians are so mad of it that Coca-Cola had to buy the whole company to enter the Peruvian soft drinks market.
Anyway, we left after that, and took a bus to Puno, a small and not so exciting town located on the Peruvian shore of Lake Titicaca. Again, we arrived in the middle of the night and woke up the poor sleepy receptionnist at our hostel. We were then forced to stay in Puno for half a day but finally managed to take an early afternoon bus to Copacabana, in Bolivia (not to be confused with the beach in Rio), which serves as a base to visit la Isla del Sol, the most famous island on the Bolivian side of Lake Titicaca.
Typical Peruvian women in Puno
Pam and his new friends in Puno
One of the first thing that strikes you when you arrive in Bolivia are prices. Everything is so cheap! We stopped next to a big, good looking hotel facing the lake and thought it'd be offering expensive accomodation for more demanding clients, but we actually ended up staying there, with our own private double room for $6 per person. Of course, we also went on a shopping orgy, buying a huge stock of local outfits, perfect for a Peruvian/Bolivian-style winter wardrobe.
Our hotel in copacabana
Our visit of the Isla del Sol resulted in mixed feelings. A two hour boat trip led us to the northern part of the island, from where we walked to the south and took a quicker boat back to Copacabana, and then a bus to Puno. In the morning, after the sun appeared, I must admit that the scenery was quite impressive, and the immensity of the lake truly breathtaking. But after three hours walking on a somewhat flat footpath, the sun had disappeared and the landscape started to become quite monotonic, dry and greyish. And since you're walking nearly 4000 meters above sea level, any small ascent seems like climbing a mountain, and our tiredness started to increase and prevented us from truly enjoying our surroundings. But anyways, I still have some pretty decent photos, so it wasn't all bad. And on the plus side, we also saw a lot of lamas, donkeys and local farmers wearing alpaca pull-overs which would be the dream of any east London hipster in winter.
Isla del Sol (1)
Isla del Sol (2)
Isla del Sol (3)
Isla del Sol (4)
Sunset on Lake Titicaca (1)
Sunset on Lake Titicaca (2)
Our next and final stop was Cusco, the historic capital of the fallen Inca Empire and our gate to world-class Machu Picchu. Cusco boasts some beautiful colonial architecture, a wonderful Plaza de Armas (the main square), decent restaurants where we could try Peruvian culinary specialities left on our list, and a lively nightlife, at least during weekends.
Arriving on a busy Saturday, it took us some time to find a hostel, but we ended up in a slightly more up-market one for our first two nights. There, people were on average older than in other hostels we had been staying at, and we spent an evening talking to a fifty years old French woman, who had come to Peru to work in the jungle with a charity taking care of abandoned apes. Sounds weird at first but it proved very interesting!
We spent a day rafting with a group of gringos, among them an Israelian family in top shape. We had a great time there, between rapids, zip-lining and Peruvian saunas. On the way back to Cusco, the Israelians taught us how to play Chinese poker (for our French readers, it's kind of an improved version of "le President", actually a really good improvement of that game), and in fairness we were pretty good at it! It may also have been easier just because we were playing with 12 years old kids...
On the following day, we started our two-days trip to Machu Picchu. Someone had stolen Pam's brand new shoes at the hostel, so he was going to do it only with half torn tennis shoes and still his slightly sprained ankle. We took a mini van and went on a seven hours trip on a sketchy road. A long and sometimes scary trip (we saw two accidents in maybe 5 minutes, and many crosses along the road), but we had a cheerful bunch of people with us. Among them, a Chilean guy who had brought Peruvian flutes with him to pass the time; a really cool Danish hippie, carrying a drum with her so that she could play on top of the Machu Picchu in synch with the good vibes emanating from the place (in the end, she sadly had to leave her drum at the entrance of the site); a Belgian kinesiologist, who was in Peru only for 10 days, had come all the way to Aguas Calientes (a Disneyland-like village at the feet of Machu Picchu mountain, in short it's the base camp before ascending to the citadel) but was still unsure if she would visit the Machu Picchu site or not (her excuses being that because it's so touristic, the mountain is suffering a slow erosion and the site needs to be protected, and she didn't want to be like all the tourists, plus how would that be different from just seeing a picture?); a Brit who had been living in the forest with Peruvian shamans for a while in order to write a book about alternative medicine and the role of Ayahuasca (a potent hallucinogenic brew used to cure some illnesses, have visions and access to "a hidden reality")... A good mix of people as you can see, but we had fascinating discussions in particular with the Danish lady and our English shaman expert about Ayahuasca and their experiences with it. Needless to say that Pam, who studies traditional medicine in Paris, was quite doubtfull about all this, but to be fair, we learned that it may be effective to treat some addictions, even if it seems very risky.
We then visited this mythical site for two hours and a half with an English speaking guide, and as you can probably imagine from the following pictures, it was a truly amazing experience. The weather was quite cloudy when we arrived, creating a kind of mystical atmosphere, giving the impression that the whole mountain was breathing around you. But slowly the sun started to appear and pushed the clouds away, so that we could benefit from great sights of the whole site.
There is so much to say about the history of this world-famous Inca construction, but I'll leave you to read wikipedia, or any other source. An important fact is that we actually don't know that much about the true reasons that pushed the Incas to build such an astonishing estate up in the mountains, and not so much either about their culture. Therefore, when you listen to different guides, the same thing is interpreted in so many different ways!
After our tour, we walked the all way up Machu Picchu mountain, from where you can enjoy a stunning view of the citadel and its surroundings. To be honest, I don't think I have seen anything that beautiful and powerful in my life. The combination of a fantastic natural landscape with the genius of these Incas constructions is absolutely breathtaking, and I hope the few photos below will capture that well enough.
Since we were a bit short on time, we rushed all the way down (that's about a 1000m difference in height running), and arrived just in time to eat something at Aguas Calientes French boulangerie, before taking the train back to Hydro-Electrica. Unfortunately, our van back to Cusco was full of Chilean girls singing without interruption, and clearly not as fun as the previous one...
In Cusco, we had a few days to chill (and the weekend to party), before Pam's departure. We visited the museum of sacred, magical and medicinal plants, where you understand that alternative medicine is really part of their culture, but we were still quite doubtful when some plants were described as curing all kind of illness at the same time, from headaches to erection problems, cancer and diarrhea.
We also visited the chocolate museum, owned by a French, and personnally I'm totally convinced that chocolate can cure many ills, at least that's my excuse.
But Cusco was mainly about meeting people.
In our first hostel, we came across some highly tattooed Swiss dudes we had met in a bar a few days before, and believe it or not these guys had partied too much in Cusco and thus could not afford a trip to Machu Picchu. World champions! We also met three really cool Peruvian girls from Lima, in Cusco for the weekend to celebrate one of their birthday, and saw them quite a lot over our last days in Peru. Silvia in particular told me so many things about Peru, and thanks to her, I discovered among many other things a new exotic fruit, Aguaymando. People working in the hostel were also really fun, coming from Argentina, Canada, New Zealand...
In our second hostel, the biggest one in Cusco, we came across two Dutch medicine students we had met in Huacachina, a South African girl I knew from Mendoza, and many, many more people.
In a very small and quite hidden restaurant, the owner asked us if he could take pictures of us for his website, since we were probably the first gringos ever to go there, and offered us a free beer. Why not?
We also managed to celebrate Ruby's birthday, a Dutch girl we had also met in Huacachina and who was following kind of the same itinerary as us.
This second hostel was managed by an Israelian guy, whose story I find quite interesting. In 2001, two of his friends had planned a two-month trip to Peru, but since it was right after 9/11, one of them decided to cancel. So he asked his boss if he could take a two month holidays, and went on traveling to Peru, not to let the other friend travel on her own. After two months, he asked an extension of two weeks, which he obtained. And at the end of the extension, he decided to quit his job and settled in Peru. That's probably part of the reason why you now find many Israelians working in that hostel!
After that, we sadly had to leave. I look a night bus to La Paz, Bolivia, while Pam left at around 6pm on Sunday... only to arrive on Wednesday morning in Paris, after 22 hours in a bus and about the same time in different planes!
Enough for today! If you managed to read until that point, well... congrats! I'll leave you with a last picture, for my lovely cousin Constance who's working hard somewhere in Manhattan.
A bientôt les cocos,
El Riton feat. Palmito
PS: I'll add a few more pictures as soon as Pam sends them to me, so come back in a few days !
Cusco (1)
Religious celebration in Cusco
Hiding the Plaza de Armas
Cusco (2)
Arriving on a busy Saturday, it took us some time to find a hostel, but we ended up in a slightly more up-market one for our first two nights. There, people were on average older than in other hostels we had been staying at, and we spent an evening talking to a fifty years old French woman, who had come to Peru to work in the jungle with a charity taking care of abandoned apes. Sounds weird at first but it proved very interesting!
We spent a day rafting with a group of gringos, among them an Israelian family in top shape. We had a great time there, between rapids, zip-lining and Peruvian saunas. On the way back to Cusco, the Israelians taught us how to play Chinese poker (for our French readers, it's kind of an improved version of "le President", actually a really good improvement of that game), and in fairness we were pretty good at it! It may also have been easier just because we were playing with 12 years old kids...
Rafting in the Andes
On the following day, we started our two-days trip to Machu Picchu. Someone had stolen Pam's brand new shoes at the hostel, so he was going to do it only with half torn tennis shoes and still his slightly sprained ankle. We took a mini van and went on a seven hours trip on a sketchy road. A long and sometimes scary trip (we saw two accidents in maybe 5 minutes, and many crosses along the road), but we had a cheerful bunch of people with us. Among them, a Chilean guy who had brought Peruvian flutes with him to pass the time; a really cool Danish hippie, carrying a drum with her so that she could play on top of the Machu Picchu in synch with the good vibes emanating from the place (in the end, she sadly had to leave her drum at the entrance of the site); a Belgian kinesiologist, who was in Peru only for 10 days, had come all the way to Aguas Calientes (a Disneyland-like village at the feet of Machu Picchu mountain, in short it's the base camp before ascending to the citadel) but was still unsure if she would visit the Machu Picchu site or not (her excuses being that because it's so touristic, the mountain is suffering a slow erosion and the site needs to be protected, and she didn't want to be like all the tourists, plus how would that be different from just seeing a picture?); a Brit who had been living in the forest with Peruvian shamans for a while in order to write a book about alternative medicine and the role of Ayahuasca (a potent hallucinogenic brew used to cure some illnesses, have visions and access to "a hidden reality")... A good mix of people as you can see, but we had fascinating discussions in particular with the Danish lady and our English shaman expert about Ayahuasca and their experiences with it. Needless to say that Pam, who studies traditional medicine in Paris, was quite doubtfull about all this, but to be fair, we learned that it may be effective to treat some addictions, even if it seems very risky.
Our van led us to Hydro-Electrica, from where we walked for two hours along a railroad until we arrived in Aguas Calientes. For the first time, we could actually see a dense vegetation, whereas we had been used to arid surroundings so far. On the following day, we started our ascent to the Machu Picchu. Contrary to what we thought, it is not as high as other places we had been to. We started at 2000m and reached the Machu Pichu estate, 2430m above sea-level, after maybe fourty minutes of huge steps. Since we had been to Lake Titicaca (3800 to 3900m above sea-level) and Cusco (3400m above sea-level) before, we suffered no altitude sickness, but it was still a significant physical effort. In the middle of the ascent, we came across half of the Israelian family we had gone rafting with two days before.
On our way to Aguas calientes (1)
On our way to Aguas calientes (2)
On our way to Aguas calientes (3)
We then visited this mythical site for two hours and a half with an English speaking guide, and as you can probably imagine from the following pictures, it was a truly amazing experience. The weather was quite cloudy when we arrived, creating a kind of mystical atmosphere, giving the impression that the whole mountain was breathing around you. But slowly the sun started to appear and pushed the clouds away, so that we could benefit from great sights of the whole site.
Machu Picchu (1)
Machu Picchu (2)
Machu Picchu (3)
Machu Picchu (4)
Machu Picchu (5)
Machu Picchu (6)
There is so much to say about the history of this world-famous Inca construction, but I'll leave you to read wikipedia, or any other source. An important fact is that we actually don't know that much about the true reasons that pushed the Incas to build such an astonishing estate up in the mountains, and not so much either about their culture. Therefore, when you listen to different guides, the same thing is interpreted in so many different ways!
Mirror, or place to prepare medicinal mixtures and potions, or astronomical tool, depending on your guide
Incas pipeline
After our tour, we walked the all way up Machu Picchu mountain, from where you can enjoy a stunning view of the citadel and its surroundings. To be honest, I don't think I have seen anything that beautiful and powerful in my life. The combination of a fantastic natural landscape with the genius of these Incas constructions is absolutely breathtaking, and I hope the few photos below will capture that well enough.
On our way up to Machu Picchu mountain
View of the whole Machu Picchu estate
Stunning view from the top
Since we were a bit short on time, we rushed all the way down (that's about a 1000m difference in height running), and arrived just in time to eat something at Aguas Calientes French boulangerie, before taking the train back to Hydro-Electrica. Unfortunately, our van back to Cusco was full of Chilean girls singing without interruption, and clearly not as fun as the previous one...
On our way back to Cusco
In Cusco, we had a few days to chill (and the weekend to party), before Pam's departure. We visited the museum of sacred, magical and medicinal plants, where you understand that alternative medicine is really part of their culture, but we were still quite doubtful when some plants were described as curing all kind of illness at the same time, from headaches to erection problems, cancer and diarrhea.
We also visited the chocolate museum, owned by a French, and personnally I'm totally convinced that chocolate can cure many ills, at least that's my excuse.
Chocolate museum
But Cusco was mainly about meeting people.
In our first hostel, we came across some highly tattooed Swiss dudes we had met in a bar a few days before, and believe it or not these guys had partied too much in Cusco and thus could not afford a trip to Machu Picchu. World champions! We also met three really cool Peruvian girls from Lima, in Cusco for the weekend to celebrate one of their birthday, and saw them quite a lot over our last days in Peru. Silvia in particular told me so many things about Peru, and thanks to her, I discovered among many other things a new exotic fruit, Aguaymando. People working in the hostel were also really fun, coming from Argentina, Canada, New Zealand...
In our second hostel, the biggest one in Cusco, we came across two Dutch medicine students we had met in Huacachina, a South African girl I knew from Mendoza, and many, many more people.
Street in Cusco, which led to our hostel
In a very small and quite hidden restaurant, the owner asked us if he could take pictures of us for his website, since we were probably the first gringos ever to go there, and offered us a free beer. Why not?
Plaza de Armas in Cusco (no, it's not the gay pride flag, but Cusco region's one)
Cusco, from the top
This second hostel was managed by an Israelian guy, whose story I find quite interesting. In 2001, two of his friends had planned a two-month trip to Peru, but since it was right after 9/11, one of them decided to cancel. So he asked his boss if he could take a two month holidays, and went on traveling to Peru, not to let the other friend travel on her own. After two months, he asked an extension of two weeks, which he obtained. And at the end of the extension, he decided to quit his job and settled in Peru. That's probably part of the reason why you now find many Israelians working in that hostel!
After that, we sadly had to leave. I look a night bus to La Paz, Bolivia, while Pam left at around 6pm on Sunday... only to arrive on Wednesday morning in Paris, after 22 hours in a bus and about the same time in different planes!
Enough for today! If you managed to read until that point, well... congrats! I'll leave you with a last picture, for my lovely cousin Constance who's working hard somewhere in Manhattan.
NYU student randomly met in Cusco's streets
A bientôt les cocos,
El Riton feat. Palmito
PS: I'll add a few more pictures as soon as Pam sends them to me, so come back in a few days !
