I have returned from South America and have started school in Colorado Springs, but I never blogged about the last bit of my trip which was a short week in Argentina. I left Sucre, Bolivia on a Bolivian bus (cold, uncomfortable, old) to the border town and walked across the border where I boarded an Argentine bus (super recliner, movies, heat, and no broken windows) down to Salta. Argentina is very obviously different from Peru and Bolivia. You really notice the lack of infrastructure in Peru and Bolivia while in Argentina. In Salta I ate lots of meat and took a [View Full Entry]

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I'm sitting here in Sucre, Bolivia stuffing my mouth with bon bons. They are tasty. Apparently Sucre is the chocolate capitol of Bolivia. It's probably also the bon bon capitol of the world. Just before the bon bons I was eating the first dinner I've prepared for myself on this whole trip. I made an egg and cheese sandwich with tomatoes. It was kinda bomb. This I think is officially my worst blog ever. Sucre is nice by the way. Where did all my writing inspiration go? I probably keep going on about food because since I've been in Bolivia I [View Full Entry]

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From Puno I visited some islands in the middle of Lake Titicaca. We left in the morning to these crazy islands made out of reeds. It was really neat but some of us didn't believe that the islands were real. It did almost feel like Disneyland but apparently these people had been living like this since Inca time when they sought isolation and retreated to the lake. After the Floating Islands of the Uros, we went to another island called Amantaní where everyone on the boat tour was assigned to a different family for the night. My family (who was really [View Full Entry]

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Today I arrived in Puno after a twenty-three hour bus ride from Lima. That was pretty tough...especially considering the particularly hard fall (probably fracturing my tail bone for the 14th time) I had while visiting some nice jungle waterfalls in Puerto Ocopa. I left the jungle on uh, Sunday night? with the hopes of reaching Arequipa (via Lima) by Tuesday morning. I never did get to Arequipa, and its now Thursday. All of Peru is on vacation right now for Fiestas Patrias, the independence celebrations. Mass transit. So when I tried to get to Lima that Sunday night I found them [View Full Entry]

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I left Cusco after my trip to Machu Picchu for a city called Andahuaylas enroute to Ayacucho. Arriving at 5:30 in the morning I waited a bit for the sun to rise then wandered out into the town. Once again I found myself tired (from the bumpy busride) disoriented in an unfamiliar place. There were no tourists in sight and I couldn't find a hotel to rest in because I was headed to Ayacucho the next night. Eventually I found my bearings and bought a bus ticket to Ayacucho, leaving my backpack at the bus station. I took a combi (minibus) [View Full Entry]

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I didn't pay for a crazy excursion into the jungle. Instead, I met a kid named Michael. Michael is a guy who lives to travel, making jewelry and selling it pretty much all around Peru and South America. We met in Cusco and I practiced my Spanish with him a few times. The first thing I knew about him was that he was from the jungle. When he left Cusco he told me to email him and that we could go to the jungle and eat some fruit. Sounded like a plan to me! Entonces, I am now in a town [View Full Entry]

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I just came back from Machu Picchu last night. I took the easiest of the alternative treks (the official Inca Trail was booked up in February or something like that) called the Inka Jungle trek. On Saturday I met up with a group of other tourists from France and Holland and we left Cusco for bike ride down a large mountain. After several hours of a bumpy road and sore ass, we arrived to the small town of Santa Maria where we stayed in a hostel for the night. The next morning we woke up to hike about 20 km some [View Full Entry]

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I went paragliding over the Sacred Valley today. I felt like I was floating rather than flying and it was some crazy cool views. It was a little nauseating towards the end but all and all it was worth the 75 bucks I paid. I don't have too much to say in this entry but Cusco has been really nice. Last weekend I took a little trip to the Sacred Valley and saw some Inca ruins and some markets. This week is my last for Spanish lessons and I'm hoping to learn a lot. I tried a bit of salsa dancing [View Full Entry]

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So far I've been in Cusco a week. I already feel my Spanish getting better which is really pretty damn sweet. I've met a few other people at my Spanish school who have been in Cusco for three or four weeks and haven't learned much because they hang out with solely Dutch, German, or English speaking people. I sure hope that this doesn't happen to me! I need to make friends with some Cusqueños! I've been exploring the area a bit. Seeing some Inca things... Ayer, I went to the Inca Museum and saw a lot of old clay jars. Hoy, [View Full Entry]

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Today was Inti Raymi, the Inca Sun Festival, here in Cusco. I don't exactly know how to describe Inti Raymi except that there were a lot of people dressed in colorful Incan costumes dancing around all day long up a hill then back down. Everyone (locals, Gringos, Peruvians) followed the procession up to the sacred mountain of Sasaqwaman and watched the ceremonious simulated sacrifice of a llama. We all (thousands of us) sat on the hills and stone Inca ruins of Sasaqwaman for a few hours. There were picnics, ice cream venders, and a break in the barrier which resulted in [View Full Entry]

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