Hey Everyone, After 8 nights of camping, temperatures ranging from 0-80 degrees, no showers (yes...we didn't shower for 8 days), some minor vomiting occurrences and headaches, we summitted Kilimanjaro on January 1st at 6:00 am as the sun rose over the mountain. It was truly amazing and the pictures will not due it justice but--it is something we will never forget. The journey getting there was great adventure that we enjoyed (most of the time). We had a great group of 7 that we summitted with, two of which were 59 (Mom and Dad you are under 59 aren't you?). Also [View Full Entry]

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Well, after 16+ hours in a plane or three, we finally made it to Arusha. No issues/problems on the trip here, except for the 90 minutes that we sat on the tarmac in Chicago, because it was too cold to close the cargo doors on the plane (did I mention its in the 80's here....awesome). We spent last night in Nairobi and were able to catch up on some sleep. We are still a bit weary, however, we feel a lot better than we did yesterday. This morning's flight from Nairobi to Kilimanjaro was pretty easy. We were able to see [View Full Entry]

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Okay, we made it back from the jungle alive--although covered in insect bites. Nonetheless, we had a really good time and saw so much in the last four days. It was amazing. We saw over eighty species of animals including 3 speices of monkeys, and five giant otters (only 300 in the world). Some of our favorite highlights were the otters, the monkeys, several toucans, macaws, tarantulas (Nate's not mine), capybara (world´s largest rodent), and tayra (tree otter). We also had the really cool experience of catching a baby camian and holding it. (Don´t worry we have pictures). We also went [View Full Entry]

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The third day of the trek is fairly easy--compared to the past two days. We only hiked about 4 hours total and then reached our campsite where we could shower and had some free time. It was a fairly relaxing day. Our last day however started at 4:30. We were the second group in line and our fabulous guide Victor was disappointed we were not first. As soon as the gate opened at 5:30, he had us sprinting the last 1 1/2 mountain climb so that we were the first at the sun gate. Who know he had a competitive side? [View Full Entry]

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We made it! After four days of hiking the Incan Trail, which included hiking 40km, sleeping on the ground in tents (we are not big campers), toilets that are literally holes in the ground (and smell delicious), stomach issues and hiking up to a height of 4200m (14,000+ feet) and dealing with slightly thinner air then Chicago has to offer, we loved almost every minute of it. This was truely a great experience that even though there were some unpleasant things, we would recommend it to anyone that could handle the above. We do not have much time to go into [View Full Entry]

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The second day of the Incan Trail is billed as "challenging". That is an understatement to say the very least. We started walking straight up hill at 6:30 AM. Nate was not well and neither were several others in our group. But everyone perservered and no llama assistance was necessary (although we learned that they have the right of way on the trail, when we were almost run over by two early on that day). Our morning consisted of walking up large stone steps put in place by the incans. My theory was that they were an ancient torture devise or [View Full Entry]

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Okay, this blog is a rewind to describe our Incan Trail trip and to post pictures. On Sunday night, we met our tour group. There was 13 of us in total: 2 Austrialians, 3 Brits, 2 Dutch and 6 Yankees. Hind sight is great in doing blogs because it gives you some perspective and Nate and I both agree that we had as great a time as we did in substantial part because we had such an great, funny group to share this experience so thanks to them all. We had a blast. We used tour agency SAS for our trip [View Full Entry]

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Today is another gorgous sunny day in Cusco. I am doing much better so we decide to go see the city´s sites. The main squares (there are three connected) plazas are bounded by massive churches. Which brings us to lesson number one, Peru is a Catholic country. Therefore, on Sunday, all churches are open for services not tourists. This generally leaves you with limited things to see in Cusco on a Sunday. We sat down on a bench in one of the squares and tried to figure out what we would do instead. As a tourist, you stick out like a [View Full Entry]

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Hello All, After 16 hours of travelling, we finally made it to Cusco, Peru at about 11:00AM on Saturday with no major glitches. Our first leg from Chicago to Miami was delayed about an hour (the joys of flying out of O´hare) and we were a little concerned (or at least I was) that we would miss our connection to Lima, but we made it with plenty of time. We each had about two hours of sleep on the plane from Miami to Lima. I could not stop reading Into Thin Air and Nate just cannot sleep on planes. We arrived [View Full Entry]

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This is just a trial entry to get started. We are heading out for Peru on Friday and are very excited. We are starting out in Cusco, going to hike the Incan Trail to Machu Picchu and then travel to Manu for a jungle tour. Our last couple days will be hanging out in Cusco and the Sared Valley. We are suprisingly looking forward to the no showering/camping aspects and even more importantly the lack of cell phone reception. Despite our best efforts to get prepared and in shape for this trip, we have both managed to hurt ourselves or get [View Full Entry]

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