Cusco and the Never Ending Journey

Wednesday the 9th
That evening Oscar decided to tag along on my trip for a while. A real peruvian (with a canadian accent in english). He thinks he might come as far as bolivia and maybe even argentina. Handy enough as he is a walking talking english spanish dictionary. I need to get him pissed some night to see how much craic he is on a night out.

Met two few Kerry girls in the hostel bar that night. They had been drinking for about 7 hours and were rightly bolloxed (arent we irish mighty craic). However After I had a few beers I had a fierce long and meaningless conversation with one of them about the Lisbon treaty. Apparently a no vote was the right one even though nobody knew what they were voting for. Most the hostel went to a club that night but i went for an early night getting ready for the crazy bus journey.

Thursday the 10th and Friday the 11th (to be known from now on as Hell)
Got up, checked out, went and ate some breakfast and left the hostel at 12.15pm to go to the bus terminal with another, as always in lima, crazy taxi driver. The rosary beads hanging from his rear view mirror did little to comfort me. Got to the bus terminal, checked our bags in and after an hour wait boarded the bus. We had bought 1st class tickets costing about 33euro, and the seat in the buss was lovely and comfy and went right back. Off we went south for about seven hours watching Shaolin soccer, the Happening along the way (both crap). Picked up a few passengers along the way and when we hit Nazca we started to head inland up into the mountains.

A half an hour at about 9pm inland the bus broke down. The messed around with it for about 1 hour, got it going again, but 100m up the road it broke down again. Tried a few more times then decided it was the battery. One of the drivers (there are two since it goes for 20 hours non stop) flagged down a local farmer and got a lift back into town. I didnt have a good feeling about it. Everyone was standing around on the side of the road depressed. One Peruvian guy started chatting to me in poor english as my spanish is zero and asked me if i liked the music "Willa Farrelly". I told him i didnt know who Willa Farrelly was but he said "no no the song" and began singing Will-a-Fa-Re-ly to the tune of We are family. Cracked me up and cheered me up for about ten minutes. But then realised i was still stuck in the middle of no where and i didnt speak the lingo (well oscar is still knocking around so not to worry). About 2am the driver had come back, put in a new battery and got the bus working again. Off we went, for about 200m until we broke down again. Battery my Arsehole. After another hour or two the managed to get the buss running again, turned around and let it freewheel back to Nazca so it wouldnt break down again. When we got back to Nazca they told us another bus was on the way. Great. But it had to come all the way form Lima. Shit. The lady said it would be here for us at 8am. i pointed out that it took us 7 hours to get to Nazca and hence the bus would arrive about 11am. She said, no, it would be here at 8am.

The rescue bus arrived at 11am. We loaded our gear and off again we went in the knowledge that we were 14 hours late and had about 14 hours of the journey left.

The journey was kinda pretty with nice scenery etc blah blah. 14 hour late kinda spoiled it a little bit. So at 1am on saturday morning the 12th we got to Cusco. Straight to the hostel and straight to bed.

Saturday the 12th
You can really feel the altitude here. its about 4000m. Walking up a few steps really takes it out of me today. They advise to relax here a few days before trying any treks. Think ill try and find a trek on tuesday for four or five days. Its cold here at night (like ireland) and sunny and warm during the day (unlike ireland).

Took a stroll around the town of cusco. At first I thought everyone was gay in cusco as there are rianbow flags everywhere. But as it turns out the Incas flag is the same as the gay flag hence cusco has just your average amount of gay people, i assume. Cusco is much smaller and more relaxed than Lima and immediately i prefer it. Sat in the sun at an old square for about an hour just looking at the mountains in the distance. Lunch, which was soup for starters with rice, beans and Lamb for the main course, cost 2.50 soles which is about 70cents euro. Popped into some museum and saw inca materials, pots and weapons but the most interesting thing was some of the human skulls. They were long in shape, kind of like the shape of a lemon. The crazy incas used to deform their children by placing lemon shaped helmets on them just after they were born. After a few months the effects were irreversible. Apperently these lemon heads were then revered in adult life despite having an IQ similar to that of an actual lemon.

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