patiomae

Since the last posting, we hiked the historic Inca trail. We had heard that the government allows 500 people a day to enter the trail, but we found this included hikers, porters and guides. We had 16 hikers, 21 porters, 1 chef, and 2 guides for a total of 30 people. The hike is a 4 day, 26 mile hike through the Peruvian mountains. Patty and I are in shape so we figured the hike wouldn't be too stressful. The more we talked with others about their experiences, the more scared we became. We heard horror stories of groups getting sick from altitude and food. Numerous people have had to either be carried down by porters or flown out by helicoptor. Last week, a girl fell off a narrow portion of the trail and her head ... read more

5/18 At last check, we left off at San Cristobal Island...one of the smallest populated of the 3 habitable Galapagos islands with a whopping 6,000 residents. While trying to find a restaurant still open at 8pm we stumbled back by the pier where we heard the lovely cries of the sea lions. There were at least a couple hundred of them who had crawled onto the beach for a safe night´s sleep away from the sharks. It was quite endearing to see the little pups scramble up from the water in search of their mom´s teets. We also witnessed the elusive blue spandexed camel toe often seen on mainland, but not photographed in person. Will continue to hunt. We dined on some local food, polished off an ice cream cone like the rest of the locals ... read more

Overall the flight down wasn't too bad. That is if you expected to get a re-heated cheeseburger as your meal while sitting in the middle seat next to a woman too short to turn on or off her overhead light who asks you every 10 minutes to turn on or off her overhead light. Oh...and I forgot to mention that as we approached our landing it was too foggy to see anything until we were about 500 feet off the ground and then the pilot realizes he was overshooting the runway and had to pull up and take a second go at it. I mean other than that it was smooth sailing. Oh, my suitcase was 2 lbs overweight so at KCI I had to shove a bunch of stuff in Stu's carry on. He was ... read more

This will be the last and final blog. Sad. Friday, Feb 22 Today was spent lazying around the condo. We walked next door for the best pork satay and noodle soup in town. These noodles may be the food that I will miss most besides Mango and sticky coconut rice. After we returned from lunch, Stu swam and read while I got my nails (hands and feet) done at the clubhouse. $8. In case you haven't noticed, prices here are good. Mom came back from the hairdresser after that and we taxied our way to the closest subway station to head downtown. Next stop foot massage. $8 also. I think I fell asleep with my mouth open. The guy on the other side of Stu was snoring loudly so I didn't feel too bad. Our final ... read more

Monday, Feb 11 Jason’s last full day was spent being lazy by the pool all morning. We celebrated his pre-departure with more noodles and pork satay next door. We then headed downtown for a foot massage and dinner that evening. For dinner we met my aunts, uncle, and grandma and had dinner in Chinatown. The meal was multiple courses starting with Chinese style sushi and a main course of roasted pig. Jason ate an ear, Stu the tongue, and I tried but spit out the burnt tail. We also had wine with dinner although their pours were not quite what we’re used to in the US. Instead of 4 oz’s it was closer to 1 so that every time we’d take a sip the waitress had to walk back over to refill our ounce. Of course ... read more