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Published: December 2nd 2010
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Cusco
Righto. So sorry the last thing i posted was "i hope i get through the violent road blockade tomorrow morning" and then i failed to post anything for about two weeks.
For the last week or so i've been hanging out in Cusco and going to spanish school to attempt to improve my communication skills and mostly just relaxing and burning large swathes of my itinery. The trip from puno to Cusco was mostly uneventful, except that i'd miscalculated the amount of time the trip would take, and we arrived in Cusco at 3am and i had no hostel booked. I got adopted on the bus by a canadian guy named Bruce, and we split a seriously seedy hostel that night that a guy at the bus terminal was handing out flyers for. The following morning was spent strolling around Cusco to locate a better hostel, and a place called "Home Sweet Home Mirador" was eventually settled on, largely because of Adolfo, the perpetually smiling old hostel owner, and the AMAZING view from the top floor (which comes at the price of having to climb an epic staircase to get to the hostel).
I visited Saqsaywaman (possibly misspelt) ruins that afternoon at the top of a large hill overlooking cusco. At the time they were pretty amazing, but i have since visited Macchu Piccu and they now seem far less impressive. Cusco itself was a pretty interesting town to stroll around. Tons of narrow, cobbled streets and resteraunts in the gringo sector and some interesting markets to be found in the less gringo sector (where the spanish schools and pizzerias make way for english schools and piles of exposed meat). Some parts are so touristy it's impossible to walk ten meters without being stopped for a massage, painting, finger puppet, or getting physically dragged into a nightclub (this happened more than once). In general, Cuqueñas are very friendly, though, and i found it a great place to practice conversational spanish. My days were spent strolling down to the coffee shop/patisserie for breakfast, going to school for about six hours, were i shared a class with an interesting young left-wing israeli fellow whose brother is currently in jail for not wanting to do his mandatory service. Evenings were spent with an amazing group of people i met at the hostel sharing laughs
Parade
LOVES it over dinner and pisco. I ate cuy (guinea pig) one night, which came served as a whole animal (head, eyes, little claws and all) and was grisley and had hardly any meat on it. Fun though.
There were a few cool parades that i encounted one afternoon for the festival of mother earth (Pachamama), where people got kitted up in traditional andean costumes, or costumes representing their professions (e.g. pharmacists wearing gigantic foam pill suits with drug names written on them). Fireworks were thrown in the plaza. Much cheering and hysteria.
The end of the week rolled around, and it came time to head northish to Cusco's main tourist attraction. I had originally planned to go to Macchu Piccu via train because of the ridiculously high costs of the inca trail, but found out that the extortionate prices they now charge for train tickets means that a three day guided tour through the jungle (an alternate route to Macchu Piccu that avoids the traditional inca trail) ends out roughly the same price as a train trip, accomodation for one night, entry to the ruins, etc. So i booked the tour
for saturday, said an emotioinal farewell to Adolfo and my hostelmates (it was strange staying in one place for so long), and headed off at 7am. It was raining.
More later. I'm Currently in Arequipa and heading to Colca Canyon with some friends tomorrow at 3am.
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