On the move again!!

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Up early to continue back to Cusco. Once again, we had to take a taxi from Santa Teresa to Santa Maria. Once in Santa Maria, I wanted to take a bus to Cusco instead of taking a private car like we did last time. That ended up being a big mistake. The private car was leaving shortly after we arrived but I wanted to instead take a bus that was 2 hours away. Trying to keep costs low since I changed our plane tickets to come home early. Anyway, the bus finally arrived after a 3 hour wait. Surprised that I expected it to be on time. We were on the bus for about an hour when it broke down on top of a mountain, literally! The worst part was that we had to find our own way back to Cusco. Everyone was flagging down whatever vehicle they saw coming. A few people here and there were getting rides. I was speaking to a couple of people that spoke English of course about what to do and they said that we would just have to keep flagging down people. Finally, a work truck stopped, much like a dump truck. Many people piled into that but without a top I thought we would get very cold since we had no sleeping bags to keep us warm. There were very few people left and I started getting nervous about being the last two standing there in the dark. I became much more active about trying to wave someone down. We did get a bus to Cusco that came about a half hour later and we were on our way again. This bus did get a flat tire but that was fixable and we made it to Cusco around 10 pm. It was a crazy long day. Had to stay in Cusco; no buses to Lima in longer.

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Photos

On top of the Peruvian mountain.
In the clouds with a broken bus.

Stranded
Trying to hail another ride.

Peruvian mountain top.
The edge is not so far away.