Blog 5 - Copacabana (Bol) to Mancora (Per)

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Days 44 - 62: Copacabana (Bol), Puno (Per), Cusco (Per), Machu Picchu (Per), Arequipa (Per), Huacachina (Per), Lima (Per), Huanchaco (Per), Mancora (Per)

Executive Summary
• Status: Alive and back at sea level
• Current location: Mancora, Peru
• Notable incidents: Dodging stone throwing road blockers, visiting some floating islands, “Sexywoman”, Jack’s pancakes, hat shopping, Inca ruins (lots!), Inca Trail to Machu Picchu, Condors, dune buggying and sandboarding, erotic pots, missing a bus, finding the sun (eventually).
• Facial hair status: 2cm and decidedly bushy … until I trimmed it, and the rest of the hair on my head! Looking decidedly military at the moment!

Full Report
Jules: So, the last time we wrote, we were stuck in Copacabana cos some dudes in Peru were striking and constructing roadblocks - very inconsiderate when we’ve got such a time sensitive itinerary!

Anyway, we successfully negotiated our two extra days in Copacabana, did some laundry (phew!) and managed to get the last blog out - however, due to a technical hitch, we don’t think that a notification got sent out to all you loyal subscribers out there, which means that you probably missed it. So, the good news is that provided a notification gets sent out for this one, this blog is essentially a double feature and you can catch up on Blog 4 before continuing with this one.

So, freshly laundered, we left Copacabana on an overnight bus. The border crossing was very close to Copacabana and went very smoothly. The onward journey to Puno was slightly more exciting. The protests were due to end that night for a three day hiatus, so we were hoping the protesters would have gone home early and on the whole they had. However, the bus still stopped several times at various road blocks, we saw out of the windows of the bus that the road was strewn with rocks and boulders in many places, and we also saw masked men carrying stones and looking menacing as we drove by. Fortunately none of them took an active dislike to our bus and despite the ticket collector coming round on several occasions and telling us the bus would have to pay some bribes to get through some of the road blocks, we got through unscathed and without any financial penalty. My personal view is that the bribes were cooked up by the driver and the ticket collector as a means of getting extra money out of us, but everyone on the bus did a pretty good job of either a) pretending to be asleep or b) pretending we didn’t understand his Spanish and he eventually left us alone.

The total journey to Puno, which should have taken five hours, ended up taking seven but all in all we were just glad to have made it out of Bolivia and into Peru.

Puno is an unremarkable city at the opposite end of Lake Titikaka from Copacabana. It’s a regular stop on the Gringo Trail being the launching point for visiting the Peruvian side of the Lake and in particular the floating islands of the Uros people. We signed up for the half day tour of the floating islands during which we visited two of the 45 islands currently inhabited by the Uros people. They are made entirely of Tortora reeds and the villagers gave us an interesting talk on how the islands are constructed. They also showed us around and one of the kids even persuaded Sim and I to get dressed up in some local clothes - Sim was particularly taken with her outfit as you can see from the photos! One of the more interesting parts of the tour was when we were told how family feuds are resolved - they just cut away a piece of the island using a big saw and the feuding factions part ways - genius!

We couldn’t find any reason to stay any longer in Puno and with the 3-day strike hiatus due to end the following day and our Inca Trail trek booked for four days´ time, we decided to get out of dodge that afternoon and make our way to Cusco to make sure we didn’t miss our trek.

The journey to Cusco was thankfully extremely uneventful and we arrived late on Saturday night and checked into a hostel.

The next day we had a walk round Cusco and were very impressed with what we saw. It’s extremely touristy, being the launching pad for probably the most famous tourist attraction in South America (Machu Picchu) but we were both surprised by how pretty the city was. The city itself was the capital of the Inca Empire and so has a lot of history in itself. As evening approached we stumbled upon a very flashy hotel just behind the main square, called Casa Cartagena and decided we had earned a cocktail or two. The hotel was beautiful, like something straight out of an interior design magazine and something you’d expect to see in New York, not Cusco. I had one of the best Pisco Sours of the trip so far and Sim had a delicious lemon drop. We also got free chips and dips which we tried to take in our stride and not to look too grateful for - not sure if we succeeded!

Sim: Casa Cartagena was absolutely divine and I felt right at home! However, unlike our former well-dressed NY selves we certainly pulled off the riff-raff backpacker look successfully. At this point I was desperate for some cute clothes, feminine shoes, and a hair dryer.

Jules: Unfortunately, Cusco it is also infamous for travelers getting sick there and Sim was the unlucky one on this occasion - we suspect a dodgy chicken sandwich - and she spent a day and a half maneuvering nimbly from the bed to the bathroom (and on the whole she made it in time!).

This left me to explore the sights in and around Cusco by myself, but fortunately Toby and Belinda had caught up with us again, so at least I had some people to do the sights with. Cusco is surrounded by Inca ruins, the most famous of which is probably Sachsayhuaman (pronounced “Sexywoman” - I swear!), a structure that served as a temple, a fort, and a water distribution plant. It’s an impressive structure which was built, as many of the Incas more prestigious buildings were, without any form of cement or mortar. The stones were cut and chiseled so precisely that they fit together perfectly without the need for any bonding agent. This, by itself, is impressive but when you add to this that some of the stones they used in the structure weighed in excess of 100 tons, it makes it even more impressive! We asked the guide how they did it and he said “They used ramps” - aaah, of course they used ramps, now it all makes sense, give me a ramp and a few 100 ton stones and I’ll build you a temple in no time!

This stonework was also evident in Cusco itself. When the Spaniards first arrived in South America and conquered the Incas, they destroyed a lot of the Inca buildings they came upon but in the bigger cities they have often used the foundations of the Inca buildings as nthe foundations for their own buildings, mainly churches. One example is the Santa Domingo church in downtown Cusco, which is built literally on top of what used to be the Inca’s Sun Temple. It’s a slightly strange sight with the bottom half of the building constituting meticulous Inca walls and stone work and the top half a very Spanish looking Catholic church. Interestingly, the structure has been hit by a number of earthquakes, most recently in 1871 and on each occasion the top half of the structure has been destroyed while the Inca walls have remained completely in tact. Pretty impressive given the lack of cement or mortar I mentioned earlier!

One other thing you quickly learn about the Incas once you’ve been to a few of their ruins is how partial they were to a bit of gold - and by a bit, I mean a lot! Take the Santa Domingo/Sun temple structure as an example. From the Spaniards early written accounts of the original temple structure, we know that the temple was surrounded by a protective wall approximately 15 feet high and a couple of feet wide and as it surrounded the entire temple it was approximately 2km in length. The Incas, obviously with too much spare time on their hands and with a big pile of gold sitting around taking up space, decided to cover the whole thing in gold - pretty amazing!

Sim: Unfortunately, the hostel bathrooms in Cusco are not adorned in gold and thus all I got to appreciate that afternoon was the oval shaped porcelain bowl and the mid-seventies tile work on our bathroom floor. However, after an enormous amount of sleep I was feeling better and looking forward to our excursion to Pisac. We had heard about the fantastic artesian market and Pisac’s famous ruins and I thought it would be good to take it easy the day before the Inca Trail.

Jules: Sim claims that I mis-sold this trip to her as she thought I told her that the ruins were in the town itself when in fact the ruins lie in the hills surrounding Pisac a “fairly strenuous” trek (as described by Lonely Planet) up from the town centre. It’s safe to say that Sim’s mood as we climbed up to the ruins wasn’t good but fortunately we’d met two Americans on the bus to Pisac, Stacy and EJ, who had decided to accompany us. This was good for me as it provided witnesses which reduced the chances of Sim pushing me off the edge of a cliff!

Sim: So I don’t think I was quite the monster that Jules protrayed, but I will admit I was less than pleased to be hiking up the mountain after spending the previous 36 hours with my head in the toilet. Thankfully, both Stacy and EJ took turns being perfect Southern gentlemen and waited for me as I made my way slowly up the hill. Jules on the other hand did receive several death stares because I blamed him for my exhausted legs and complete lack of energy.

Jules: Anyway, once “Team Totally Awesome” (as Sim named us once her mood improved) got to the top, the ruins were actually pretty cool and we spent a good few hours walking round them before heading back down and getting the bus back to Cusco. Stacy actually did an excellent videoblog of the trip which you should check out.

That evening we made a return trip to Casa Cartagena (and got more free chips and dips 😊) with Stacy and EJ while Toby and Belinda also joined us. Interestingly during the two evenings we spent at the bar in Casa Cartagena we did not see one hotel guest. This led us to believe that the hotel wasn’t very busy so on the way out Toby inquired as to the price of a room. The answer - $670 a night!! We politely declined!

The next day we started the Inca trail which meant a 6.30am pick up and a three hour bus ride out to the start of the trek. There were seven in our group which included me and Sim, the Irish Murphy brothers (Gordy and Sam - possibly the gingerest people I’ve ever met), Les Bleus (Bruno and Sebastien from France), the French-Canadian (Marie-Eva from Quebec) and the sisters (Winnie and Nina from Toronto). The age range was from 19 to “50+” so we were a pretty eclectic bunch. Our guides were Leito and Javier and then we had a chef and about eight porters - all of whom were less than five feet tall and kitted out in the latest in flip flops (made from old car tyres) and nylon football tops. No Gore-Tex for these boys!

The first day was pretty easy. We started the trek about 2 hours outside Cusco (2,700m above sea level) and covered about 12km before getting to our camp site for the first night at Wayllabamba (at 3,000m a.s.l.). The Porters had arrived well ahead of us and had set up camp. Dinner was good and we slept pretty well that first night.

Day 2 was the one we were all worried about. We were only due to cover 12km but this included the climb up to Dead Woman’s Pass at 4,200m. We started at 7am, and I’m not going to lie, it was hard work! After we’d climbed Huayna Potosi in La Paz, I was under the naïve impression that the Inca Trail would be a walk in the park, but it wasn’t and that climb up to Dead Woman’s Pass was a tough slog! However, the younger part of the group (and I include myself and Sim in that category) made pretty good time and after three hours of hard work we got to the top. After a well earned rest we then headed down to our next campsite at Paqaymayu at 3,500m, and like on Huayna Potosi, the downhill was no breeze either - really hard work on the knees and quads. We got to the campsite just after midday and spent the afternoon lying in the sun. The porters had obviously arrived before us and set up camp even though they had had to wait till we’d left camp so they could pack up, put it all on their backs (they carry about 40kg each) and then make their way to the next campsite, overtaking us on the way. Once the sun went down however, it got pretty cold and that second night was a shivery one and the lack of any showers was beginning to become evident - so much so that everyone except for me decided that a cold shower was in order. I was more sensible (and hence more smelly!).

Sim: At the end of day two I felt so accomplished! At the beginning of the day the boys left me in the dust. I couldn’t keep up with those 20 year olds. Quite content to make the days trek a solo mission, I put in the earphones turned up the Red Hot Chili Peppers and was off! I had several hours to contemplate life and before I knew it I had caught up to the young-ens. As they rested I continued on with a bit of Cher and made it to the top in great time (about 15 minutes before Jules)! I can’t seem to shake that competitive attitude.

Jules: Day three was another early start and a longer day of walking but less strenuous. We covered 18km, successfully negotiated the second and third passes at 3,900m and 3,500m and also saw our first Inca ruins of the trek at Runkurakay, Phuyupatamarca and Sayacmarca before getting to our campsite at Winay Wayna (2,650m). All the sites were interesting, although Leito’s explanations were extremely long-winded on occasion and you definitely had to make sure you were sitting comfortably before he started! Once again, camp was all set up by the time we arrived and dinner was excellent again. Also, as an added bonus, we found out that not only did the Winay Wayna camp site offer hot showers (for 5 soles - just under $2), it also sold cold beers. This made us very happy and we enjoyed a couple while sitting in our tents and admiring the view out over the valley.

Day four was the earliest start of all with a 4.30am breakfast before we joined the queue to get through the final checkpoint which opened at 5.30am. To get all the way to Machu Picchu takes about an hour and a half to two hours from the checkpoint and once you get there most people immediately join the queue for Wayna Picchu, the mountain that famously towers over Machu Picchu. It doesn’t cost any extra money to climb Wayna Picchu, it’s included in your ticket, but for preservation reasons, only the first 400 people each day are allowed to climb it (that’s 400 of the approx 4,000 daily visitors Machu Picchu receives). This would be fine except that the actual Machu Picchu site opens to the public at 5.30am so if you get the train, rather than do the Inca Trail, you can get there an hour and a half before the Inca Trail people. This means that, as an Inca Trailer, by the time you get to Machu Picchu all the Wayna Picchu tickets might be gone. This is a pretty well know fact so as a result, as soon as the tourist checkpoint opens at 5.30am it’s a mad scramble as the Inca Trailers try and make their way as quickly as possible to Machu Picchu. The first hour is in the dark but with Sim leading the way and using her NYC shopping skills to maximum effect (elbows out!) we made good progress and by the time the sun came up we were almost at Inti Punku (the Sun Gate). Unfortunately, as the sun came up, it confirmed the fear we’d had all morning - it was cloudy … really cloudy!

Sim: I’m not sure how old I thought I was or what sort of shape, but sprinting up the trek was a bad idea! Once we had pushed several other tourists out of the way, we were in the clear. However, this also meant I was completely knackered and didn’t want to move any further…we soldiered on after a few moments, but I was more than happy to let Gordy (the youngest brother) take the lead from there.

Jules: So, when we arrived at the Sun Gate, where you usually get your first glimpse of Machu Picchu, we saw nothing but cloud. We were all disappointed but we didn’t have much time to wallow as we had to get down to Machu Picchu as quickly as possible. We eventually arrived at about 7am and felt pretty pleased with how quickly we’d made it. We joined the queue and were extremely relieved when we got our tickets stamped. I was number 367 so if we’d taken much longer we wouldn’t have been able to climb Wayna Picchu!

Anyway, about five seconds after this feeling of jubilation of actually getting the ticket we were brought back down to earth with a bump … it was still very cloudy 😞. Well, as we had nothing much else to do, we stood in the queue for Wayna Picchu. For some reason the queue took ages but this was actually good news because by the time we began the climb, the clouds were clearing and by the time we got to the top, the clouds had cleared and we had our first proper sight of Machu Picchu - and it looked pretty amazing!

It was much bigger than I thought it would be and much more like a proper little city than just a temple or two. The famous view of Machu Picchu that you see in all the post cards is in fact only about a third of the total site with large parts of the site covered by terraces dedicated to agriculture. The setting really is quite breathtaking with the whole city literally perched on a saddle between Machu Picchu mountain and Wayna Picchu mountain with sheer drops off each side. Like the salt flats, Machu Picchu had lived up to the hype and now that the sun was out we had a whole day to explore. But first thing was first, it was noon and we hadn’t eaten since 4.30am - we needed some food so we went to the café.

Now I’m not sure how much of the Peruvian government’s total annual revenues come from visitors to Machu Picchu but I would say the percentage is comfortably in double figures. The place is a rip off! Our Inca Trail trek cost $450 of which a decent chunk was the cost of the park entrance fee. If you just want a ticket to Machu Picchu itself that’s $40. The return bus trip to Aguas Calientes the town at the bottom of Machu Picchu mountain is $14 and our meal of two sandwiches and two drinks cost us $25. There is talk from one of the presidential hopefuls for the next election that if he gets elected he will close Machu Picchu to visitors to maintain its sanctity - I hope he runs the numbers first!

Anyway, after our $25 meal we went and explored the rest of the site. The particular exploring technique we chose mainly consisted of finding a nice patch of grass and lying in the sun for a few hours. I still hadn’t showered (for some reason, which I attribute to pure laziness, I had turned down the hot showers at Winay Wayna) and was beginning to get funny looks from the other visitors. So after we’d got our fill of Machu Picchu we headed down to Aguas Calientes to get the train back to Cusco.

All in all a fantastic trip with great food (surprisingly!) and great company!

Sim: I couldn’t agree more! This was an amazing experience! I might even do it again…anyone interested? Girl bonding trip for 2011?

Jules: After a day back in Cusco, we got another bus down to Arequipa. We’d heard good things about Arequipa and we weren’t disappointed. We were only there a couple of days but really liked it. We spent the first day going round some of the city’s colonial buildings, including the fascinating Santa Catalina monastery (I never thought I’d say that about a monastery!), and then took in sunset over the main square from one of the surrounding rooftop bars. Arequipa is surrounded by three volcanoes, the biggest of which is El Misti at 5,884m. We had discussed climbing it, but with our legs still not fully recovered after the Inca Trail we decided against it. We then got an excellent dinner at El Turk - chicken kebab yummmmmm! While in El Turk we also had our first celebrity spot of the trip. We’d heard Hugh Jackman was in town shooting his new film but we never expected him to be at the table next to us - he even had his Wolverine beard going on and happily posed for a quick photo 😊

The next day we planned to take a day trip out to Colca Canyon, about three hours north west of Arequipa. We knew there were more strikes and roadblocks planned so we were worried we wouldn’t be able to do it, but the tour companies had a solution - just leave early, before the strikes start. So at 2am the next day (yes folks, that’s 2am!) we were picked up and headed out to the canyon.

If it wasn’t for the Cotahuasi Canyon a couple of miles further west, Colca Canyon would be the deepest canyon in the world - at it’s deepest point it is 3,400m from top to bottom. But I wasn’t there for that, I was there to see its most famous inhabitants - Andean Condors.

With a wingspan of up to 3m, the Andean Condor is one of the biggest birds in the world and the Colca Canyon is one of the best places to see them. My expectations were mixed. On the one hand, all the literature I’d read suggested that sightings were rare whereas everyone we’d met who had been to the canyon had seen condors so I didn’t really know what to expect. So after a three hour trip out to the canyon and another two hours along the canyon to Condor Cross - the deepest point and best place to see the condors - we got off the bus and headed to the lookout point which was already chock full of people. This raised my hopes as I assumed they were all there cos they’d seen something, but when we got out there everyone looked very glum - no condors to be seen. I stood thee expectantly for 20 minutes but gradually my hope and optimism began to fade. But then people started pointing down into the canyon. I followed the pointing fingers and saw it, my first condor. Then another one came out, then another and before you could say “f@*k me look at all the Condors” there were nine of them circling above us. It was an amazing sight, particularly when a couple of them swooped right over our heads, literally a few metres above us. We spent about an hour watching them which was plenty of time for me to take about 700 photos (!) and it made the (very) early start and the long bus ride fully worthwhile.

The rest of the day was a slight anticlimax. I didn’t think that the canyon itself was that impressive - apparently you need to hike down into it to really get a sense for its magnitude but we didn’t have time - and although we were taken to some pretty viewpoints it wasn’t nearly as breathtaking as the Grand Canyon or other canyons I’ve been to. We didn’t get back to Arequipa till nearly 7pm which made for a very long day but I’d seen Condors so I was happy.

Back in Arequipa, disaster struck. My computer was dead. The power light came on, but nothing else happened. I assumed the worst - a fried hard drive. All my photos were on it and although I still had some of them on my memory cards, I had not been very diligent with backing them up to the external hard drive I’d brought with me. However, it was 7pm and we had a bus to catch so there wasn’t much I could do so we headed to the bus stop and got an overnight bus to Huacachina, 12 hours north of Arequipa, on the way to Lima.

Huacachina is a funny place. It’s very small (only about a kilometre square), and is situated around a lagoon surrounded by big sand dunes. It’s only about 10km from Ica, a pretty big city, but because it’s surrounded by the dunes it feels like you’re in the middle of nowhere. We were there cos we’d heard that it was a great place to go sandboarding and dune buggy riding. We arrived at about 8am and so after checking into a hostel we signed up for the 4pm dune buggy trip. This gave us the best part of a day to kill but fortunately the sun was out, our ipods were fully charged and our hostel had a very nice pool so we were set for the day .

The dune buggying was great fun. Sim and I got the front seats and although I took a video of part of the ride, it doesn’t really do justice to the adrenaline rush of the ride. The scenery was also breathtaking with dunes as far as the eye could see! After half an hour of hooning around in the buggy, driven expertly by our driver Luis, we stopped and tried our hand at sandboarding. We had mixed success but one thing we did both manage to achieve was to get sand in every possible bodily orifice after both wiping out several times!

The next day we decided to chill for another day in Huacachina as the sun was out and the pool looked very inviting! As sunset approached I managed to drag Sim (reluctantly) off her lounger and convinced her to climb the dunes with me. The climb up was tough - sand is not the easiest medium to walk and climb non - and once again I felt fortunate there were no cliffs around for me to be pushed off as Sim’s mood was not the best. However, when we got to the top it was definitely worth it (as I’m sure Sim will reluctantly agree). We spent an hour or so taking photos of each other jumping around on the dunes and then sat down to watch sunset before going back down to our hostel - going down was much more fun than going up!

Sim: Again I was ready to push Jules down the hill or at least I wanted to verbally moan and groan, but in this case he was right. I was really glad he dragged me up there as we had a terrific time jumping off the dunes and taking pics.

Jules: The next day we got the bus four hours further north to Lima, Peru’s capital and home to nearly nine million people (this compares to Peru’s second biggest city, Arequipa, which has only 1.2 million people). Neither of us had heard anything good about Lima from any fellow travelers so we planned to only spend a day there but I wanted to give it a chance so after roaming round Miraflores for a couple of hours (the wealthiest part of Lima) we sat down for dinner and planned a full day the next day. We started at the National Museum (shamefully our first proper museum of the trip) where our very informative guide spent nearly two hours talking us through all the cultures that have inhabited Peru since the Moche in 4,000BC. It was all pretty confusing but by the end we had a vague appreciation for just how long Peru has been inhabited - along with the Eqyptians, the Aztecs/Mayans, and the ancient Chinese, Peruvian civilization is one of the oldest in the world.

Next up was central Lima. We’ve unfailingly been impressed by the centres of pretty much all the cities we’ve been to so far, from Santiago, up through Bolivia (Potosi, Sucre, Cochabamba), and into Peru (Cusco’s central square really is quite impressive), but Lima’s was by far the most disappointing. The central square itself was ok, with the Presidential palace on one side and few other pseudo-impressive buildings on the other sides, but the area around the main square was very shabby, with the streets being lined with discount stores and fast food restaurants. So after an hour we got a taxi down to another museum (two in one day!) - the Museo Larco.

A lot of the museum had similar content to the stuff we’d seen at the National Museum - ceramics and other artefacts from the various Peruvian civilizations - although the exhibits were much better curated. We were pleased with how much of what we’d learnt in the morning we remembered and could apply to the stuff we saw at the Larco. We spent a lot of time making loud remarks to each other such as “My gosh Simone, look at the stirrup handle on that ceremonial water vessel - how very Moche that is!” and “Jules - Oh My God, have you seen the double-spout-and-bridge style handle on that ceremonial water vessel - that just wreaks Nazcar influence”. Unfortunately noone who overheard us looked very impressed!

However, to sound like experts in Pre-Inca civilization was not the primary reason for our trip to the Larco, we … well, to be more precise I, was more interested in the Salar Erotico - the collection of erotic ceramics that the Lonely Planet described as “remarkably explicit”. I guess it was the 14 year old boy coming out in me but I was enthralled - I mean how explicit could ceramic pots from thousands of years ago be??

Well, the answer is very! If the museum hadn’t seemed quite so legit, I would have assumed that all the “pieces” were a joke just to fool tourists and get them to part with the $10 entrance fee. Hopefully the few photos we’ve included go some way to showing just how explicit the pieces were. They showed sexual activity between humans, skeletons and animals - in all combinations. The descriptions next to each piece added to the humour in their matter-of-factness. Captions such as “Male skeleton having anal sex with female human” just had to be seen to be believed. One of the more memorable quotes came as Sim and I looked at one particular piece which had the caption “Male skeleton having intercourse with female skeleton while another female skeleton stimulates herself”, to which Sim said “ Well, at least they’re all dead!”.

We thought we’d seen it all when we got to the last section which had a whole display of ceremonial pots depicting naked people with venereal disease - I mean why on earth would you want to memorialise that in ceramic!?

When you are looking at these photos it’s also worth remembering that all of the pieces on display are ceremonial water pots - i.e. people used to drink water from them!

Sim: This was a side of Jules I hadn’t seen yet, adolescent, fourteen year old-school boy, who laughed at each new statue. Needless to say when another group walked in he quieted down, but continued to have a huge smirk on his face.

When we first arrived at the museum we had seen an Aussie, Karen, who we had previously met that morning at our hostel. We later asked if she wanted to share a taxi back to the city with us, as a way to save a few extra dollars. So on our way out of the gates a taxi driver approaches us and offers us the ride for 20 soles (about $7), a reasonable price split between three people. To our surprise Karen waved off the driver claiming it was far too expensive. Long story short we ended up on a bus that the driver maintained would drop us on the main drag right above the hostel. It didn’t!! We ended up heading west and then north (when we really wanted to head east). After 45 minutes and several reassurances from the driver later, we were in the Lima ghetto. With our map in hand we were trying to track the route and were simply praying that we would make it back in time for our 9pm bus (it was 7pm at the time). Finally we ended up at a bridge along the freeway, where the driver motioned for us to get off. Then with all the confidence in the world he said “walk down the path and catch a taxi”. So only two hours later and having saved $3 between us all we were back at the hostel.

Jules: So after getting back to our hostel we freshened up in time for another bus further north to Huanchaco - 24 hours was indeed enough time in Lima!

Huanchaco is another 10 hours north of Lima, on the coast of Northern Peru, and is known as one of the premier surf resorts in South America - it has one of the longest “left hand breaks” in the world. However, I have a theory that all beach resorts are crap when it’s cloudy and Huanchaco was another fine example of this theory. The first two days we were there it was cloudy the whole time and there wasn’t much to do. We did manage to fill a few hours by visiting the nearby archaeological site of Chan Chan which was at the centre of the Chimu empire and at one time was the biggest city in the world. It’s fame comes from the fact that the entire city is made from adobe - a mixture of sand, water and mud which may very well be amazing, but adobe is not know for its longevity so most of the eleven hectares we visited were nothing more than ignominious looking piles of sand - once again, as with some of the Inca ruins we had seen, imagination was paramount. A few parts of the city are currently being restored/rebuilt to show what they used to look like, complete with carvings in the adobe walls, but overall it was an uninspiring place - although it was better than sitting on the beach in a fleece and wooly hat!

So we planned to leave at the end of day two but due to some lackluster planning on my behalf we ended up missing the bus and ended up stuck there another day - and guess what, it was another cloudy day!

We did however meet some cool people (Charlotte, Sian and Sherrie) and also bumped into Freddie and Kirstie, who we climbed Huayna Potosi with, so all was not lost. I also had time to have a self-administered hair cut and beard trim - which had been in order for a couple of weeks!

So after three fruitless days in Huanchaco, we headed eight hours further north to Mancora, another beach resort right next to the Ecuadorian border. It prides itself on 350 days of sun a year but we weren’t counting our chickens. The only bus we could find from Huanchaco to Mancora arrived in Mancora at 4.30am - a pretty unpleasant time to arrive anywhere. On arrival, there were a couple of touts and we grabbed the closest one who took us to a very cheap hostel on the beach. It was gross but we didn’t care, we just wanted to go to bed. One added bonus that came with the room was a small kitten who was cute until he started crying. Neither of us could quite be bothered to get out of bed to kick him out so we just put our pillows over our heads and sucked it up.

Sim: I wasn’t too lazy to get up, instead I thought after listening to the kitten that if I tried to pick it up it would either attack me (like you see in the movies) or would run away and then urinate all over our bags. One can instantly see I am a dog lover and not a fan of cats.

Jules: At about 10am, we got up and went for an explore down the beach. Most importantly the sun was out 😊. We had agreed that for our three days in Mancora we would treat ourselves to somewhere a bit nicer than normal so as we strolled down the beach, we popped into a few of the mid-range hotels we saw. Eventually, we came to the Casa Del Playa which, at $65 a night, was at the high end of our range, but we bumped into Avigyle and Seth there, a Canadian couple we’d met sandboarding in Huacachina and they gave it a rave review, so after collecting our bags from the gross ($5) hostel and waving the kitten goodbye, we checked in.

We’ve spent three days here in Mancora and it’s been lovely. The weather has been great. It’s been really nice to stay somewhere a bit more flash than normal - the shower is hot immediately and has good pressure, the bath towels are white and fluffy, our room gets cleaned every day, there’s a pool, the loungers are padded and an hour long massage is only $13 - bliss!

However, Mancora also signaled a new low for me - I ended up one evening vigorously defending some doubts over the legality of the US Declaration Of Independence made by French philosopher Descartes (according to one of the Philosophy modules Seth took at Uni) - I think I’ve been in New York too long, or maybe I just underestimated how intrinsic it is to hate the French as a Brit. Anyway, the others round the table got bored of the conversation very quickly which thankfully meant it was a mercifully short conversation!

Anyway, all good things must come to an end and our time in Peru is up. Later today we head up into Ecuador where white water rafting, horse riding and a Galapagos cruise are top of the to-do list.

It’s great to hear from you all so keep the emails coming.

Love Jules & Sim

This week’s likes
• The food on the Inca Trail
• Cocktails at Casa Cartagena
• Comfort food at Jack’s in Cusco
• The additions to the hat collection we made in Cusco
• Inca stonework - amazing
• Dune jumping in Huacachina - Paul & Mike, it brought back some great memories from New Zealand in 1999 - although I don’t seem to be able to get as much air as I used to!
• iPod scrabble - a god save on long bus journeys!
• The Oceano hostel in Huanchaco (20 soles ($7) for a double room with private bathroom) and also the “My Friend” restaurant which does a delicious spaghetti Bolognese, garlic bread and coke for 8 soles ($2.60).
• Fluffy white towels
• Sacha, Casa Del Playa’s resident Labrador puppy
• The continued abundance of Coke - everywhere!

This week’s dislikes
• Road blocks - although to be fair we have escaped lightly so far!
• Dodgy chicken sandwiches in Cusco
• Sunless Huanchaco
• Lima (except for the dollar jewellery Sim found in Kennedy Park)
• Incompetent service in bars and restaurants - it’s certainly not New York!
• Adobe as a building product - it certainly won’t be featuring in my dream house!
• Inca writing - non existent - come on guys, throw us a bone here! Why didn’t you write any of this shit down!
• The chronic lack of change - the final straw was when we tried to pay a three sole ($1) tuk-tuk fair with a five sole coin, and the guy didn’t have change - seriously people!
• The continued absence of Diet Coke in most restaurants and shops

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