2 Months To Go!

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*******Edit - Just for ref this blog was written on 13th Jan 2018. I had to mark it as 6th March so it would fall under the South America "Trip" otherwise it wouldn't be linked****** Follow on instagram k8e37 for photos of the trip whilst we are away and for prep photos!



Here we are again just under two months out from another fantastic trip. This time we are heading to South America, visiting Brazil, Peru & Argentina. Hotels are reserved, flights have been booked for a few months and we are now in the final planning stages so thought it was the best time to start the blog as things are ramping up! I'll put our itinerary on another blog post so everything is altogether but the gist of the trip is London Heathrow to Lisbon in Portugal where we will be for one night before flying from Lisbon to Rio. Flying this route via Lisbon was an absolute bargain £230 from London to Rio total pp including check in bags. It added an extra day but for the money saved its well worth it. We'll be in Rio for 3 nights staying at Copacabana Beach (need to download the song! ha), then we fly to Lima and stay in a hotel at the airport for a few hours rest before flying to Cusco. We will have 3 nights in Cusco to try and aclimatise before heading off on a 5 day, 4 night trek on the Salkantay Trek culminating in Machu Pichu. Then we head back to Cusco for a night before flying out back to Lima for 2 nights. Then we fly to Buenos Aires for 3 nights visiting friends before flying back to London Gatwick.



So once Christmas was out of the way the real planning has started in terms of vaccinations, continuing to try and get fit for the trek and trying to sort out what we are going to pack for the journey and how we are going to pack it. We've decided to get backpacks and treat this a little bit like a backpacking holiday, mainly due to the travelling around without our own transport and because we need some backpacking type stuff for the trek anyway. Both myself and my travelling buddy Steph are known for being overpackers so this is going to be very interesting. We went to a couple of shops last weekend to look what size the 60l backpacks are like in person as I think this is the sort of size we'll be looking to take. Any bigger and I know if there is space we would fill it but with added space and added clothes = added weight! We were both shocked at the size of them as the volume seems pretty small and bearing in mind we will be packing hiking boots which are pretty large then this is going to be a challenge. We've been checking out a few you tube videos of how to pack and rolling and packing cubes seems to be the way to go. Also been looking at some reviews of backpacks. Luckily whilst we will obviously be carrying our stuff on our back, we aren't planning on doing any long walks like this fully loaded so it will just be getting from airports to hotels etc fully loaded. On the trek we get given a duffle bag the night before which we can fill with 7kg to go on the horse for the journey. The horse goes ahead from camp to camp so you get access to this stuff every evening. Anything you need in the day you have to carry yourself in a daypack. The 7kg allowance has to include a sleeping bag which we are going to rent over there from the trekking company. Hopefully we can get most stuff in the duffle and just carry the stuff we need in the day and not be carrying things in our daypacks that we dont need in the day but wont fit in the duffle due to weight. To some people this will sound really easy but we are the type who normally take a 20kg roller case plus a 8-10kg cabin backpack each on a 7 day holiday! My estimate is hopefully about 12-15kg in my backpack and maybe a cabin backpack no more than 5kg. My plan is to cut things down a lot and pack as much as possible in my backpack thats manageable and fits and then literally just the necessities and electronic stuff in my cabin bag. I don't want a huge weight on my back and then another big backpack on my front - not a good look!

I think I need to start a list of what will be required on the trek and figure out weights of how I'm going to split that on the trek and then work out a separate list of clothes I will need for the actual holiday time in Rio, Buenos Aires, Lima and Cusco. The Cusco trail is prime backpacking territory so I'm planning on getting some laundry done in Cusco before the trek so that will cut down on the amount of clothes we need. As we are visiting friends in Buenos Aires, hopefully the facility to wash some stuff there will be available if we need it. I'm also not taking hair dryer, straightners and will only take minimal toilteries. My plan is to take the minimum, if i absolutely need something out there I can buy it. I've been thinking I need to plan what I'm taking and get a backpack to match it but I think I'm just going to get the backpack and tailor what I take! Plenty of others do it, its not impossible! The backpack I'm looking at is the Quechua Trekking Symbium 50l+10L. Its actually 52l + 12l in the small print! It has a section at the top that can be pulled over your head and clipped down in front of you which I like the idea of to put my valuables in whilst walking around, it also unclips to become a small backpack giving me a small bag to use at any point during the trip. It also opens at the top with a drawstring but also a zip down the front so you can access all of the inside which in my thoughts will mean I can utilise every bit of space when packing and you can lock it using this feature also. My day pack which will be my cabin bag I think I will buy closer to the time once I've probably done a test pack and see what I have left over that needs to fit in and once I've figured out what I'll have to carry myself on the trek. Anyway thats enough about packing and bags although you can tell its been a major part of my thoughts in terms of this trip so far!



Onto the vaccinations.... I naively knew I would probably need some but hadn't really looked into it or thought about it much, which I guess is strange considering I don't like needles but then again who does?! I can only remember having one jab ever which was at secondary school, I must have been too young to remember the rest and two blood tests in my life! So fast forward to 3rd Jan when I thought I should probably follow the NHS advice online to get jabs sorted 6-8 weeks before travel. I phoned up my GP surgery to be put through to the sister who seems to be the designated travel jab queen who started reeling off lots of names of jabs and vaccines she thought I might need! She asked me a few questions about my trip and then booked me in to go see her that afternoon for my first ones and to sort out a plan. By the end of the day I had been told by the sister that my GP has no records of any childhood vaccinations! sent away with strict instructions to find out from my parents if I had, had all my MMR jabs when younger which it turns out neither they or me can confirm or deny (great!). I had also been given the typhoid jab in my left arm and a combined Hep A & B in my right arm. I needed the Hep A definately for where I was travelling and Hep B was advised but you had to pay for. But there is currently a worldwide shortage of Hep B, and I'm pretty sure she had run out of Hep A so nicely gave me the combined one for free so I've managed to get covered for Hep B for free. As I left she informed me to go back in a month for another Hep A & B jab along with a polio, diptheria and tetanus shot. So in my head that totalled 4 jabs. I gave myself a pat on the back for being so brave knowing I was half done.

Then... Steph who I'm travelling with went for her jabs at the same doctors and was given the same and was told by the nurse she definately needed a yellow fever jab and that you had to pay for it and get it done at a travel clinic. She swore she had told me about this (she hadn't!) so this started a panic that not only did I need to arrange to get it done but it was another jab in the arm to look forward to! Got myself booked in at Boots for a travel consultation and did some further research before I went about whether I should also pay and get the Rabies Vaccine. This is a course of 3 jabs given over 21 days that doesn't mean you are completely covered but means in the unfortunately instance of getting bit or scratched by a rabid dog or cat etc I would only need a further two shots at a hospital within 1-3 days instead of the five plus an extra nasty one in the stomach witin 24hours and being classed as a medical emergency. The nurse had talked me through the risks with this and gave me the impression I wouldn't need it but the choice is obviously yours. The only thing that bothered me was the trek, I know there are a lot of stray dogs in Cusco and a few along the trek, the thought of being at day 2-3 and something happening meaning I had 24 hours to get to a reputable hospital as a medical emergency and have all those other jabs (if they had them available) was playing on my mind despite the risk being small. I'd probably be giving the stray dogs a wild berth anyway but the thought that it would be typical that it would be me who would be trying to avoid them to get bit was also on my mind.



So a few days later off I traipse on my trip to Boots to have my consultation. I have to say the guy was very nice, we went through my trip in more detail, going over what jabs I had, had at the doctors and the risk of Yellow Fever which turns out is more in Rio than in Peru for the areas I'm going. He took me through what Yellow Fever was that on the system whilst its not a definite requirement for visiting Rio that there are areas in Rio state where it has been found. It didn't drill down any further. So I decided to just crack on and have it.... then he starts telling me the risks of actually having it! 1 in 300,000 that you can get severe side effects and need to be managed by a doctor if this happens as its a live vaccine, they actually put a tiny bit of the disease in you! and there is an outside risk you can die from it. So I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place and just decide to have it done. With the possibility of me requiring an MMR Booster as well which you can't have within 28 days of the Yellow Fever one suddenly time was looking short. So I had the Yellow Fever one done and then decided to get the Rabies one too. When going through my consultation, the guy was very shocked to hear I had been given the Hep A & B one the week before. He confirmed the worldwide shortage and said I was extremely lucky as they couldn't get it for love nor money and that he actually had some clients who really should have it for their trips. He then proceeded to explain I should go and buy a lottery ticket because he couldn't believe how lucky I had been. Not that I'm that superstitious but that made my mind up, have the rabies one just in case my luck runs out! So I'm back in a week to have another Rabies one. My original 4 jabs has now turned into 9 possibly 10 if I have to have an MMR booster. The cost of my jabs is now more than the cost of my flight to Brazil but hey ho hopefully I'll be a walking antibody when I'm finished. Oh one last thing, he knew about my fear of needles and told me the yellow fever would be the easiest and painless jab I would ever have as apparently all other jabs go into your muscle which is why you can feel the stuff being pushed in once they've stabbed you, where as the yellow fever one doesn't go into the muscle. He said he's do the easy one first... so needle goes in, done in two seconds, he was right it wasn't that bad. Then 2mins later my upper arm starts tingling and then starts actually hurting. He could tell I was in discomfort and I told him my arm was actually hurting. He was saying it shouldn't, you can't have a reaction to it that quickly, if you get any side effects it will be day 10-14 afterwards. He then jabbed my other arm with the rabies one and turned back to look at my yellow fever arm which was red and hot above the needle mark. He says hmm it is red but it can't be the jab as its above where the needle went in. At this point I convince myself in my head I'm the 1 in 300,000 case thats going to get yellow fever and potentially die whilst trying to stay cool and calm on the outside and not concerned! After a few mins I tried to forget about it, went and paid for my jabs and treated myself to a well done Costa coffee and went home. Luckily the redness and hotness went down after a couple of hours and all seems good now although I have to admit I will feel better once the 14 days are up! Incidentally I only felt the "small prick" of the rabies one and didn't feel any of the "stuff" being pushed in, to the point that I thought he hadn't done it properly. He's either overestimated the amount of muscle in my arm or I was so busy stressing about my yellow fever arm I just didn't feel it at all. Time will tell when I go for my next rabies one next week oh joy!



Last thing before I save and publish this humungous first blog entry for this trip - fitness!! The 5 day trek is known to be challenging not just to the distances involved but also because of the altitude. Luckily I started running last May to try and lose some weight and put some focus on my health. I've managed to keep this up although I slacked a bit over winter. I've now completed 20 x 5k park runs on a Saturday morning and managed to do an additional two runs in the week at least up until the end of November, and I'm starting to fit these back in again now. Whilst it's not a lot I feel better with the thought that I've done some prep beforehand. Plus I've lost 1st in weight and 6% body fat so it can only be a good thing. My last bit of prep that I've decided to do is to try and tackle my fear of heights. Steph wanted to do the Inca Trail to Machu Pichu but after some research and more you tube vids I point blank refused to do it. There are some paths with huge steep cliff edges you walk along and I know for a fact I just wouldn't be able to do it. Which is why we've ended up booking the Salkantay Trek instead. Whilst its billed as almost twice as long as the Inca Trail and higher, from what I've researched there are only a few sections where I think I will struggle with. The closer we get to travelling the more obsessed I've been with trying to find a dodgy looking bridge or path thats part of the trek that scares me. The more I know about what I'll face the better I am, I hate the thought of hiking round a corner to face a horrifying drop etc. So I've got a session booked next week to have some hypnotherapy and mindfulness therapy. The therapist thinks I'll probably only need 2-3 sessions. Whether it will work I don't know but I want to set off on the trek knowing I've done all the prep I can to prepare me. Sounds dramatic but the blogs of some people who have done the trek range from it being amazing with no issues or altitude sickness at all to feeling like they were going to die and having to put strapped onto the "emergency horse". I'm aiming for somewhere in between!

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