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Caught a flight out of Lima this morning and am now in Cusco. More on that in a min.
After yesterday´s update I took off for the old colonial part of Lima which I hadn´t seen yet. It was a more characterful place than Miraflores and I arrived just in time to see the changing of the guard at the presidential palace. I wish I had a better recall for music because the band were definitely playing some off the wall tunes. I´m sure one was either an old rock classic or the theme from a film. As soon as they started all the tourists started smirking and looking at each other knowingly. Then again, the have some odd musical choices anyway as I was in a monastery yesterday which had the pan pipes version of Celine Dion´s Titanic song playing.
So I wandered round the old town looking at some impressive old buildings. After I while I got sick of being pestered by people trying to sell me things so I went to have a look around the San Francisco Monastery. The only tours were in Spanish so I just went off for a very peaceful wander round
on my own. I later regretted this when I ended up under the monastery in the Catacombs, filled with several thousand skulls and assorted bones, all by myself. Spooky!
I then found Parque de la Muralla and went in for a wander, thinking again this would be more peaceful than being harrassed around the shopping area. Not quite true, but this time it was the local school kids who hassled me. One of them called ´Hello´as I passed so I stopped to try out my very poor Spanish on them and ended up with a huge gang surrounding me firing questions at me. They were only around 9 or 10 years old and not remotely threatening, but at one point there must have been at least 40 of them. Fortunately one boy nominated himself as security and made them all stay behind a line (while filming and photographing me on their mobile phones!). Again I found myself wishing my Spanish was better as I´m sure I could have had more fun with them if I could communicate better. Still, it was all quite amusing and they all decided they wanted my email address so I had to write that
out over and over again for them. I do have some photos so I´ll upload them when I can. I would have had photos of me with them but I´m not sure I would have trusted the little blighters not to run off with my camera.
Spent the rest of the afternoon just sightseeing then headed back to my hotel which was lovely, probably the equivalent of a UK 4 star but not like anywhere I had stayed so far out here. I decided to just have a relaxing night, soak in the tub and watch some trashy tv. Although I had recovered from the day before, I was conscious of getting plenty of rest before Cusco.
So this morning I was picked up from my hotel at 7 to go and catch my 1 hour flight up here. I say úp´literally - Cusco is at an altitude of 11000 feet. I´ve no experience of being at this kind of height, the closest comparison was working for a summer at 7500 sq ft where I do remember being more breathless and having to take time to adjust. At 11000 feet altitude sickness is a real risk. Other than
getting lots of rest and drinking lots of water, the recommendation is coca. I have some coca sweets and the hotel made me some coca tea. So far I feel fine but I only landed around an hour or so ago so let´s see how it goes. The city is beautiful and after Lima´s smog it´s lovely to see some blue sky.
The plan for the rest of the day is to take things slow, do a bit of exploring of the city and pick up my train tickets (fingers crossed) for my trip from here down to Puno after my trek. I think I have managed to book them via email and they are holding them for me at the station. Other than that the afternoon is mine to explore. Tomorrow I have to meet my tour group for a briefing in the morning then again I have the rest of the day, then the day after that we leave for our trek to Machu Piccu. I´m already getting excited!
Heading off out now to explore...
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Rachel Porter
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The kids must have mistaken you for CZJ! Very impressed by how much you're packing into your trip and adapting well to the changing plans. Sorry for felt poorly, this is perhaps when the kendal mint cake might have been useful?! Take care honey and thanks for keeping us all posted xxx