To visit Machu Picchu (MP) you have two options, walk the Inca Trail, which is booked up anything up to 5 months in advance, or take a train to Aguas Calientes, aka Machu Picchu pueblo, then a short bus up to the ruins. The jumping off point for both is Cuzco or Ollantaytambo in the Sacred Valley half way there (separate blog entries on Cuzco & Sacred Valley will follow). Since the only thing we have fixed on this trip are the flights into and out of South America the train it was. The majority of people tend to day trip it from Cuzco, this involves an early start and more time spent on the train than at the site (it gets most visitors between 10am & 2pm). The other option is staying overnight in Aguas ... read more

The journey from Puno to Arequipa only took 5 1/2 hours through some cool scenery (the Peruvian altiplano). You'd think that such a short amount of time would fly by, but the toilet on the bus was locked and we didn't make a single toilet stop. When we finally arrived in Arequipa the whole bus piled off pretty quick! Arequipa feels like we have entered civilisation for the first time in a long time, there are clothes shops, a supermarket and proper chemists, all with recognisable brands in pristine packaging. A policeman even stopped traffic to help Emma to cross the road! It's also full of tourists, reminding us that we are firmly on the Peruvian gringo trail. The first afternoon we spend getting our bearings, finding the essentials and assessing our options for a trip ... read more

Saying goodbye to Bolivia after 3 1/2 weeks was actually quite sad because we have loved it but we were also excited to be heading to Peru. The border for Peru runs across the lake (which explains the presence of a Bolivian Navy in Copacabana - although it was very comical to see what they sailed around in) and is only 9km from Copacabana. The bus drivers were very organised and efficient in getting all of the gringos organised with passports and immigration slips and we were on our way. No sooner had we set off and we were getting off again into a shed like building to get stamped out of Bolivia, a swift non-event. We then walked across the border, a few hundred metres into Peru under a stone arch. What a different place ... read more

We left our hotel room in Cochabamba at 8am to catch one of the many buses to La Paz only to discover that the road to La Paz was... that' s right... blocked by protests. So instead we hopped on a bus to Oruro as it is basically on the way and would be 4 hours of the 7 hour journey under our belts and put us with striking distance as soon as the blockade lifted. By 9am we were on a bus and by 1pm arrived at Oruro - a familiar sight. We checked and the road to La Paz was still blocked and no one knew if it would be open the next morning or not. Thinking that this would be like the Potosi blockade that went on for days we checked into a ... read more

So we've gone down in the world - literally. Cochabamba is only at a height of 2558m, so only just at high altitude. It's the lowest we've been since San Pedro and its so warm! The shorts are back out (1st time since Puerto Igazua and only the 2nd time this trip), it doesn't even go cold at night. Cochambamba sits in a 'bowl' surrounded by big mountains and the views on the way here were amazing, very similar to the mountains that you see in the typical tourist photo of Macchu Picchu. Sadly something that Marie ate on Monday didn't agree with her so we were on a later bus than we'd planned and she wasn't hanging out the window with the camera as she would normally have been doing, so no photos. We found ... read more