Tommy Battley

After arriving in Cusco and looking around the city, i met a friend called Patty with whom we had a great time. On Thursday i began the Inca Trail. I packed a full backpack that weighed around 15kgs along with a sleeping bag and travel matress. I hooked up with a group of 20. However as i booked with a different company i had my own tour guide, Rossi. She was fantastic and we got to walk at our own pace without having to wait for the others. When we arrived at particular camp sites for lunch, dinner and over night i re-united with the big group, it was great fun. The walk Thursday was fairly easy, we started at what is called Km82 with only 6 hours walking in the afternoon and seeing some great ... read more

Today i landed safely in Cusco with a very light head. I met melquiades at the airport who took me to the Santa Rosa hotel. A beautiful hotel in the middle of inca stoned building. It was important to sleep for two hours to get used to the altitude. After this i was shown around a wonderful town of Cusco, it is like going back in time with llamas patrolling the street and little old ladies selling finger puppets, inca hats and keepsakes. It is surrounded by green mountains and inca stone, as the whole town is in what effectively is a hole in the earth, a valley. Proper tomb raider stuff!! I was also taken to Sagssaywaman, on top of the mountain where you could see the whole of the town, it was amazing. I ... read more

After spending over a week roughing it out in Casma, we returned to the refuge Friday night. Much to the thanks of the local Father (Vicar) who put us up in his church hall for our time there, it was nice to come back for personal space. Father Fernando has supported PP for 12 years so the children have a lot of admiration for him, he goes really out of his way to give everyone a good time. Thursday was probably the best day we had there, for me anyway. In the morning we climbed the mountain of Casma, was bloody hard and took forever. Was so much fun but was funny to see how scared i was compared to the children. It was so so so dangerous but no one seems to care here lol. ... read more

For the past week i have been in Camsa. A downtown village 5 hours from lima. Ive come here with everyone from the refuge as their holiday. Coaching internittently while having fun with the children at the beach and participating in various recreation. I have no access to internet here, so escaped for a few minutes to update. It been a great week but very tough. It is deserted here. A beautiful beach with fantastic scenery but minimal people. In a few years it will be a massive tourist attraction which will infact ruin the peace and quiet of a lovely place to go and relax. Apart from the beach, there are a few homes, a church and simply desert. Nothingness, but sand, for miles. Yet a wonderful secluded destination. As much as we are away ... read more

Sunday, i was invited back to Lucys house. The head of the house mothers.I´ve been told by many people that she only takes to a small minority of the volunteers and rarely people are invited to her home, let alone going twice. So i feel privileged and happy about that. So myself and kike (one of the boys here) went to her house where we went to play football with her husband and four sons for the same local team as week previous where we drew 1-1.It was good fun. Followed by the best meal ive had since coming here. Lunch is the main meal here as opposed to dinner. It was this spicy nandos like chicken cooked in beer.... read more

What an exciting moment to see all the equipment arrive in a huge container. So many children extremely happy and amazed at the amount Project Peru has shipped over. Will post some pictures tomorrow of some of the equipment put to use... Day out to the swimming pool tomorrow, can´t wait.... read more

Still no Cargo, looking forward to it arrving, has 6 months worth of donations as well as my own. So will be great to see it arrive. Hopefully not long now...Once it arrives i can begin coaching outside the refuge in Las Laderas. Went to the swimming pool yesterday, was odd to find random people asking me for pictures with their babies. Aparently its due to the fact it is rare they see ´tourists´and grateful for any voluntary work. Everyone had such a great time, i baught everyone an ice cream, about 50 of them, which came to no more than 8 quid. I was in awe of how much i could get, could of purchased the whole stand. Today looks like it will be Volleyball for most of the people in our refuge. I´ve also ... read more