Okay, for all of you faithful readers of my rarely updated blog, I’ve decided to satisfy your curiosity. Yes, I am in fact still alive. And yes, I have been doing things. A great many things, actually, and yet sometimes it seems like I do nothing at all… But that’s entirely beside the point because this blog is all about my fantastic, one-of-a-kind, entirely-indescribable-by-a-simple-list-of-adjectives SPRING BREAK IN PERU.
The week was jam-packed full of activity, so I’ll give you a quick rundown with some commentary on the way.
Fourteen of us left Montevideo for a series of airplane rides that would eventually take us to Peru. The group of intrepid travelers included me (of course), the Cukrowskis, Sarah Boyd, Colter Lane, Mark Foster, Mallory Kornegay, Alan Barr, Logan Braaten, Kelsey Nikolaus, Branson Blackburn, and Nick Perkins. The trip there had two major highlights:
1. We were picked up from Casa ACU in black Mercedes Benz’s driven by men in black suites and dark sunglasses who drove very fast and talked on walky-talkies. Why the special cars? According to Sandra (Casa ACU’s Montevideo expert), they had bigger trunks than normal taxis and weren’t much more expensive…. All in all, it was very exciting and I felt like a VIP.
Note: You might want to ask one of the Cukrowskis (or me) about their driver. He was an interesting fellow indeed.
2. The airline was overbooked and so the Cukrowskis took them up on a voucher offer and arrived in Peru a day later then the rest of us. Not really exciting or anything, but it did give us a few confusing moments at the airport when everyone was trying to figure out what was going on. We flew from Montevideo to Sangtiago, Chile and then to Lima, Peru.
Mark, Colter, Sarah B. and I spent day two of spring break wandering around Peru together. After collapsing in our hostel (called Samay Wasi, in case you care) the night before, we got to a fairly early start the next morning (I actually got up at 8…..). We went to the city center where we saw a park, catacombs, a Franciscan monastery, the cathedral, and an art museum that contained only works by Peruvian artists. We also got to dine at Chili’s that night, which was horribly exciting because it was the first truly American food any of us had had all semester. (Even McDonalds has a distinctly Uruguayan flair in Montevideo). Mark and I were also really excited to go to Starbucks and get Grande White Chocolate Mocha Frappuchinos, which we sorely miss.
The next morning we went to the Lima airport (which had Dr. Pepper, to the excitement and surprise of the group) and flew to Cuzco. Just so you know, Cuzco is a breathtaking city, both literally and figuratively. Almost as soon as you step off the plane, you’re offered coca leaves, teas, and candies to relieve altitude sickness. I managed to avoid that, but I must admit that walking around the city was hard; I had to stop quite a bit to catch my breath. While I’ll be the first to admit that I’m out of shape, even Colter (who climbs mountains for fun) had a little trouble breathing. In addition to the literally breathtaking elements, Cuzco is an absolutely beautiful city. The mountain air is crisp and clean and our hostel was pretty high up, giving us a wonderful view of the city and surrounding mountains and making it possible to enjoy some awe-inspiring sunsets. Cuzco was also an exciting city of firsts. Here’s a list of some of the things I discovered there:
- Incan stonemasons were geniuses. Their walls are built by cutting stones to fight together perfectly so that they don’t have to use any sort of mortar.
- Tea made from coca leaves (yes, coca meaning raw ingredient of cocaine) is really good
- Incan Kola (made by the Coke company and only available in Peru) is a weird yellow color but still tastes good.
- Cuy (also known as guinea pig) is a disgusting dish
- Alpaca is a surprisingly tasty dish
- Peru has something like 1000 different types of potatoes
- I have absolutely no desire to bungee jump (even after watching 6 people in our group do it just outside of Cuzco)
- White water rafting is actually a lot of fun (especially on a river called the Orubamba)
- Speaking French is an effective way to deter aggressive Peruvian sales-people in plazas
- Early to bed, early(er than usual) to rise actually works for me in the mountains. 10:30 seems obscenely late in Cuzco.
Karen and I decided after our first day in Cuzco that we would be perfectly happy with our spring break even if we never went to Machu Picchu. Fortunately, we didn’t have to test that statement because we spent the middle of the week in Machu Picchu/Aguas Calientes (the village in the “valley” beneath Machu Picchu and its immediate neighbors). Machu Picchu was everything I had ever dreamed of: an ancient, mysterious Incan site in remarkably good condition on a beautiful mountain. The tour of Machu Picchu was a lot of fun, despite the lack of answers. According to our guide, there are a number of theories as to the nature of Machu Picchu. My favorite is that it was an Incan university. It has terraces for agricultural studies, temples for religious studies, astronomical observatories, “dorms”, enough stonework to train any aspiring engineer, and remnants of counting cords which were used by, among other groups, scholars to convey information in a society that had no written language. If you want to know more, I’d be happy to share with you, but I think this is enough info for the entry. Anywho, my point was that I really enjoyed the ruins. I have the pictures to prove it. :D Aguas Calientes was also a lot of fun; I especially enjoyed the craft fair that’s right outside the train station (with the intention of trapping tourists in a maze of pretties).
All in all, it was the most amazing spring break I’ve ever had, despite the fact that I had to spend it with people.
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