On our last few days in Arequipa we trawled through the local cheap eateries with Shane and Tom, demolishing massive hamburgers for $2 and other grease laden goodies for not much pocket change. The boys left for Bolivia and we headed north to Paracas, on the coast just up fom Ica. We had bought tickets for a mid-priced bus, which we will never do again. The overnight bus left 30 min late and this must have been enough of a reason for the driver to thrash the bus down the mountain, with the bus lurching from side to side as we weaved down the mountain towards to sea level. The better buses here are fitted with an alarm that is triggered off when the bus goes over 90km. The ear piercing alarm did not stop the ... read more

On our last night in Cusco we caught up with Matt and Tasha, an English couple we met in La Paz about a month ago, and introduced them to Paddy's Shepherds Pie. They are a nice couple, similar age to us, and we shared recent travel stories and lamented over the fact that most of the date of births registered on our recent tour groups are in the 90's. It was nice to catch up with them, and we will probably do so again in a few weeks when our paths cross again. The next day, we had 12 hours to kill before our overnight bus to Arequipa, so we thought we would kill some of the time by visiting the Moray Inca ruins and the Salinas de Maras (Maras Salt Mines) around an hour out ... read more

Day 1 of our 4 day Inca Trail trek saw us rise at 3.30am, as we were being picked up at 4am for the 2.5 hour drive to the registration point and the beginning of the trail at Piscacucho. At 2600m it was the first time in nearly 2 weeks that we were below 3000m. This did not last long though as soon we climbed up to 3000m as the trail weaved through the Sacred Valley floor. It was quite warm, and Humming Birds were furiously beating their wings everywhere. By 1.30pm, we had reached our lunch spot and tucked into a delicious 3 course meal stacked full of carbs, as after we lunch we had to ascend to 3800m to our campsite for the nigh at Llulluchapampa. It was 4 hours of straight ascending mostly ... read more

After a slightly scary flight from Rurrenabaque that was completely in the clouds we landed in La Paz on a cold and wet day. The flight was as i say slightly scary as we were completely covered in cloud flying through mountain passes, some of which we did not get higher then on the previous flight. It was made worse by the fact that co-pilot kept falling asleep! I didn't think La Paz got any rain at this time of year, and it painted a very different picture. Not only could you not see the glacial capped mountains, but we could not see the top of the valley. It was a bit miserable after sunny Rurre. We had made plans with Paul and Sharon to go to Restaurant Gustu on our second night back. Gustu opened ... read more

So what do you do on a chilly Sunday afternoon in La Paz, go watch Bolivian women wrestle of course! No joke. We were told about this by some fellow travellers a month or two back, so we thought we would give it a go. It sounded like it could be a bit of a backpacker tourist trap, but we were pleasantly surprised. Yes there are a few bus loads of backpackers there, but there is a lot more locals who really get into it. It looked like some of the crowd really lived in anticipation all week waiting for Sunday to roll around, when they could yell abuse at the wrestlers and referees and throw all sorts of food into the ring. It was straight out of Nacho Libre, and good fun, considering it was ... read more