http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/El-Gringo-de-la-Bachata/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from El Gringo de la Bachata en-us Mon, 09 Nov 2009 09:16:27 +0000 Mon, 09 Nov 2009 09:16:27 +0000 So tom randomly met up with us at the Ballivian hostel the peace corps hostel in Santa Cruz and we soon were on our way to hike around and camp in the nearby Ambor National Park.Once arriving in Buena Vista a small town near the entrance to the park we got to work figuring out the logistics of our hike. it was a pain in the ass. after asking everyone and with nearly nobody being helpful w http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Bolivia/blog-4892.html After a wonderful week with Becca in Mendoza it was off to Buenos Aires. I decided to treat myself not that I hadn't already been treating myself every day to Andesmar's Primera Clase bus service to the capital. For 125 pesos about 40 bucks I would ride in style into the big city. Thats right fully reclining leather seats champagne all the mendozan red wine you can drink mediocre meals http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Argentina/Buenos-Aires/blog-7410.html If you don't get that title dont worry its a stupid joke anyway.So Becca and I got on our clean polished Andesmar double decker bus for the 15 hour ride to Mendoza. The busride was fabulous. They had a stewardess though he was a man so i don't exactly know what you call them who served us tea and dinners and even organized a game of bingo for us. It was quite a treat. Then we reclined on http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Argentina/Mendoza/Mendoza/blog-7348.html After 4 weeks in Santa Cruz it was time for me to leave. It was a wild crazy time there and i met a lot of people but i wanted to get on the move again. So it was off to salta argentina back into the semideveloped world.Or so i thought. After an uneventful 12 hour busride from santa cruz to the southern border town of yacuiba i arrived groggy and disheveled to the aduanas integradas http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Argentina/blog-7339.html Well I'm all packed up and about ready to take off. I have packed fairly light though if i find i need something down in SA i'll just get it then. Wildman Chrissy and I meet at Dulles on Thursday afternoon for our long flight out. Jason meets us there. We'll get into Cuzco on Friday morning and from there we'll figure out what to do. Our Inca Trail hike doesn't begin until the 12th so we'll http://www.travelblog.org/North-America/United-States/Virginia/blog-2914.html After our little detour to Queens we finally arrived a day later than expected to Cuzco. The flight from JFK to Lima was long and i ddint get much sleep. LAN does have good service though the food was good and there were plenty of movies and video games to keep me occupied during the long night of little sleep. Lima was hot but we only had a 3 hour layover there thank god. we were accost http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Cusco/Cusco/blog-3024.html We woke up after a rather poor nights sleep at the hostel. we had drank a few glasses of pisco sour and the altitude didnt help.a side note on the altitude. now after a day and a half of acclimatization i am feeling better but it was rough yesterday. the slightest exertion of energy left me short of breath and a nagging headache didnt help matters. cuzco is at 10600 feet or so which is http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Cusco/Cusco/blog-3025.html cuzco is a beautiful town. it reminds me of the old beauty of prague only cheaper and with a latin twist. all the streets are paved with cobblestones and it just has this great energy which has made the first few days of our trip wonderful. they cuzqueos people from cuzco have treated us very well even though it is a tourist town swimming in gringos. the only annoyance are the swarms of ch http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Cusco/Cusco/blog-3219.html So i got my student id card with a little trickeration and was on the trail on the 12th.Day 1 was pretty tranquilo. we got picked up at our hostel at 6am and saw a bunch of other gringos on the bus. i am a little weary of talking to and meeting gringos but they were cool. once we stopped for breakfast we met a british couple who is here travelling and then will be off to belize. there were al http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Cusco/Inca-Trail/blog-3221.html Day 2 is known as challenge day. you actually only hike about 8 km less than the 11 km of day 1 but you go from around 10000 ft at the campsite up to 14000 ft at the dead womans pass. it was a lot of climbing. we took it slow chewed a lot of coca and got through it.this was in my opinion the most beautiful day. the scenery on the entire hike is very dramatic but day 2 really was n http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Cusco/Inca-Trail/blog-3222.html Day 3 is supposed to be the most beautiful on the trek and in part it was great. but it wasnt all shits and giggles.we began the day with a climb from camp at 11000 feet up to the second pass at about 13000 feet. on the way we passed the first inca ruins of our trek. it was apparently some guard station on the way to machu picchu situated on a very steep section of the trail. it is in http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Cusco/Inca-Trail/blog-3223.html We awoke at 4am to get an early start on machu picchu day. on previous days we had woken at 5 so this wasnt supposed to be too terrible. well i felt like shit. chrissy did as well after her night of 6 trips to the woods to unload gallons of liquid excrement. it is incredible that she was able to push through all 42 km of the hike feeling as terrible as she did.anyway we were ready by 445 http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Cusco/Inca-Trail/blog-3224.html we took a 17 hour busride its actually not as bad as it sounds from cuzco to pisco where we were to visit the poor mans galapagos islands aka the islas ballestas. so cramped and tired we emerged from our night bus to swarms of taxi drivers offering us rides into the town of pisco. a 4 sol cab ride and we were there. pisco is a shithole as the title indicates. we fell into a terrible h http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Ica/Pisco/blog-3358.html We left the inca trail and machu picchu very tired. we crashed in the hostel early.strangely i awoke the next day with a lot of energy and not terribly sore. we didnt get anything of substance accomplished besides meeting up with the british couple james and susan whom we met on the inca trail. we got lunch with them and that night went out for some drinking at the bars. again we took adva http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Cusco/Cusco/blog-3360.html we arrived in arequipa perus second largest city on gwbs inauguration day. just to let all of you know he is a total douchebag and is a terrible representative for our country. those who believe the contrary are simply wrong. now to continue arequipa is a beautiful city. the plaza de armas is one of the prettiest central squares i have ever seen in my life. all the buildings are made of http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Arequipa/blog-3573.html Colca canyon is the 2nd deepest canyon in the world at 3400m at its deepestthe 1st is cotahuasi canyon which is also in southern peru. its about a 5 hour busride from arequipa. we went to a small pueblo named cabanaconde to begin the trek. our original plan was to go it alone and camp wherever we found a suitable spot. however once we arrived in the town and sat down for some almuerzo ou http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Peru/Arequipa/Colca-Canyon/blog-3574.html After a tiring but beautiful hike of the colca canyon tom and i shared some large beers together atop an arequipa bar and pondered life. ill go off on a tangent here so if you dont want to read my meanderings continue on to the next paragraph. I really dig latin america and moreover latin culture. i just feel so at home here. the people of peru and chile have been incredibly kind and help http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Chile/blog-3820.html We took the 2000 peso it sounds expensive but the chilean peso is 575 to the dollar ride from arica to putre at the entrance to lauca national park. this park is a unesco world heritage site and it is entirely over 4000m about 13000ft. above sea level. the pictures looked really beautiful so we had to give it a try. we were glad we did.its cooler than a polar bears toenail there. we t http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Chile/blog-3822.html We descended from our 2 night visit to the absolutely frigid Parinacota on a 5 hour bus to La Paz. It isnt often that people actually descend into La Paz as it is the worlds highest capital at 3500m about 12000ft.. But we did indeed come down from Parinacota at 4300m though I still had some problems breathing. I soon found myself in a bad mood and needed to get out of the city to find so http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Bolivia/La-Paz-Department/La-Paz/blog-4015.html Chrissy and I took the 4 hour bus from La Paz to Copacabana to catch the big party they throw there on February 2. We were worried that there wouldnt be any hotels with room for us as feb 2 is a big tourist day in Copacabana but we easily found a hellhole to crash in for only 10Bs a little more than a buck.Me being in a bad mood we decided to finish off the gin we had purchased way back in ar http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Bolivia/La-Paz-Department/Copacabana/blog-4016.html