Thursday, November 30, 2006

Rurrenabaque - Pampas and Community Tours

In Rurrenabaque

We arrived in Rurre (as Rurrenabaque is often called) at 3:30 in the morning and were happy that to find that the hotel still agreed to honor our reservation. The next day, we had a chance to get a sense of the town and what services were available. The town, although remote, turned out to have many tourist friendly services. It was a nice change. Usually, I (Jeremy) don´t prefer hanging out in tourist spots, but even I needed some of the comforts of `home´ after the last couple of weeks of having little. I managed to scope out some restaurants, cafe, internet spots, tour agencies, as well as, onward travel options all before Sarah woke for the day. Upon arrival to new places, I like to survey the scene, where as Sarah feels a bit overstimulated. So it works out well for both of us. I get the scoop and help get Sarah oriented. Anyway, that day we mostly relaxed. Our hotel was very clean and friendly and also it had a nice hammock area where we spent some time. Later we went to a cafe run by a British woman where we had mochas and homemade chocolate cake and cookies! It was a slice of heaven.

We did manage to make one practical decision during our day of relaxation; we signed up for a pampas (grasslands) tour. The tour was a three day/two night tour. In Rurre, the main tourist attractions are their pampas and jungle tours. We chose to go on a pampas tour as opposed to a jungle tour because we felt we would see many more animals in the open environment of the pampas. Plus we had just spent a week in the jungle before coming to Bolivia. We were to head out on a three-hour bumpy land rover ride toward a river called Rio Yacuma where we would then head up the river to our camping base. From the campamiento we would explore each day before returning for the night. It really was more of a river tour as you will see.


Pampas Tour

On the first day of the tour, we met the others who would join us for the 3 days. They included our guide Roberto, our cook Claudio, an Australian cyclist named Sean, his Canadian/Romanian/Hungarian girlfriend Ramona who wants to be an event designer when she moves to Australia, a French high-class hairdresser named Sam, and French insect exterminator Cyril. We were quite the group!

We had assumed that the ride to the river was just a means of getting to where we were going so we slept most of the way. Suddenly, I saw a toucan and excitedly pointed him out to everyone in the group. It was very cool - even better than the one on the Fruit Loops box! Actually, we managed without great effort to see many types of birds including toucans, eagles, and storks/pelicans among others. Right before we reached the river port area, the driver spotted a cobra crossing the road. Our guide Roberto jumped out, ran up, grabbed the cobra by the tail and started swinging the cobra around his head. The cobra kept trying to bite him and, in fact, came as close as getting his fangs in his T-shirt, but couldn´t because the guide kept swinging it around. I presume that by swinging the snake it kept its head as far away from his body as possible and possibly it disoriented the snake. That was my understanding at least. Anyway, the guide put the cobra on the ground after a minute or so. The cobra struck at the guide once as if to say ¨leave me alone¨ and slithering off. Kind of mean, but really cool!

The river ride was a long, hot ride and we didn´t see a whole lot. We were happy to get to the camp and relax. We weren´t actually camping because we had private cabins with two beds. Plus we had good mosquito netting and our cabins were fumigated. We relaxed a bit, had a snack and then headed out in the boat to a bar along the river called `Sunset Bar´. Not surprisingly, we watched the sunset from here and then headed back toward the camp after dark. As we went we used our flashlights to find black caiman and alligators. The color of their eyes are reflected by the flashlights. The caimans´ eyes look exactly like red LED lights and alligators´ eyes are bright yellow. They are difficult to find, but we did ¨see¨ a few alligators and a couple of black caiman. It seems bizarre to ¨go looking for giant carnivores in the river in the dark¨, but it was actually pretty cool. For Sarah, it was one of the highlights of the tour.

The next morning, we had a nice breakfast. By the way, the food on these tours has been great - a lot of it and really nicely presented. it´s amazing that they can do so much with so little. We headed to a pampas (grassland) area and went walking throught the tall grass. It was extremely hot and to honest not very interesting until we ran into another group who had found a baby anaconda. Then we walked a bit further and the same group had found another anaconda hidden in the base of a tree. This anaconda was of a different variety from the first. Whereas the first was a black and brown constrictor, this one was bright green and venomous. Although very cool, that was the extent of our tour in the actual grasslands. it lasted about an hour and then we headed back to camp. I was expecting to see much more birdlife and maybe even some mammals. It was really stinking hot because we went out mid-day plus there were a hell of a lot of mosquitoes and we were getting eaten alive. I think it was probably their lunch time. Our guide definitely wasn´t the most enthusiastic or inspiring of guides. Other groups, we discovered later, went looking for anacondas out in lagoon areas and went swimming with the pink dolphins. We did neither mostly because we were a bit afraid to go in the water (it was completely black due to the decomposition of plant life from the river's recent quick rise) and our guide didn´t seem willing to take the lead. However, that night we did see many pink dolphins swimming which was also cool. As they came up to breathe we could see that they have some pink on them. They have a hump on their back and we were told that their snouts are longer than sea dolphins. They supposedly have a similar personality to sea dolphins in that they are curious and not afraid of people. They also scare off the pirahna because they eat them making it safe to get in the water around them. For some reason, which I didn´t quite get, caiman and alligators also avoid them.

The third and final day we woke and took a slow, motor-free ride down river towards port. This way we could listen to the bird life. We saw and heard many. Also, I should mention (mostly because I forgot to say it before) that we saw two types of monkeys on the two previous days and on this day along the river (Howler Monkeys and Chinchillo Monkeys) plus two camping areas each had a resident alligator. Ours was blind, had a maimed leg, and was likely very old. Although, not completely domesticated, they both seemed to coexist and somewhat depend on the guides as caretakers. Okay, back to our journey back to port...The most exciting sightings on our journey back to port were a couple of caiman (this time in the daylight). One out of the water and one in the water. Caiman are similar to alligators except in coloring and size. They have brown heads and they are generally much larger than alligators. These, however, were small - about six feet long.

Overall, the pampas tour was worth it. The wildlife we saw was very fascinating to see and hear. This is the first time in both our lives that we´ve seen so much wildlife in one area.




Day for the Communities Tour

Another tour we took from Rurre was called "Day for the Communities Tour". This tour highlighted various community sustainable development initiatives that demonstrated harmonious living with nature.

Our first stop on the tour was Playa Ancha. Here, a man named Don Eusebio Porco (originally from another area of Bolivia called Potosi) has implemented different agroforestry systems including timber species, reforestation projects, fish farming, bee keeping, and cattle ranching. He has been working on this project for more than 20 years and is extremely knowledgeable about the trees, and medicinal plants. Throughout the tour, he said he´d give us a quiz on the trees he told us about. We were thankful he didn´t because there were too many to remember! All in all, his project is inspirational and shows what committed families can accomplish when they put their minds to it.




Our second stop on the tour was Nuevos Horizontes. In this small village, women artisans from a variety of communities meet to transform natural materials into beautiful handicrafts. Their initiative is called Tres Palmas because they make their crafts out of 3 locally-grown palms. Some of their crafts include bowls, hats, ornaments, fans, birds, mobiles, and boxes. We even had the opportunity to try out some of the techniques! Initially, the men in the communities served were not enthusiastic about this project. Now, they are thrilled because the women are now contributing financially to their families. The women we met at Tres Palmas were talented artisans, confident and proud of their work. It was fun to see.




Our third and final stop was at El Cebu. At this location, local women traditionally transform local forest fruits into unique wines and marmelades. The wines included chocolate (which is supposedly delicious), asai, and majo. We were lucky enough to taste-test a bit of their pineapple-papaya marmelade and their delicious honey. In addition to these efforts, they are working on developing their animal farming with the assistance of Veternarians Without Borders. They had chickens, ducks, and guinea pigs for that purpose.




All in all, we enjoyed our time in Rurre. However, we were also happy to leave the heat and mosquitos behind us when we left for Coroico on November 28th.

posted by Sarah and Jeremy @ 11:29 AM   0 comments

Wednesday, November 22, 2006

Bolivia or Bust!

This is the second entry we´ve written in a very short time. So, if you haven´t already, be sure to check out our entry on our time at Pica Flor Research Center!

After leaving Pica Flor on November 17th, we headed for Bolivia. What we didn´t anticipate was just how challenging the trip would be... We knew that it wasn´t the usual tourist trek and therefore not the easiest or surest way to go, but we knew that we would eventually (hopefully, more like it) get to Bolivia with a enough stick-to-it-iveness, patience and determination.

Along the way we went by boat, then by car, then by motorcycle and finally by bus. First, in Puerto Maldonado, we crossed a river by boat, which took longer than planned because the motor kept cutting out and we kept drifting further down stream. Once on the other side, we crammed into a collective car and headed north, parallel to the Bolivian Border. From a small town, we hopped on the back on mototaxis and headed toward the Bolivian border. We had previously gathered that it was a quick jaunt to the Bolivian border, but after an hour and a half of riding through the jungle on narrow, muddy trails we finally arrived at the border. There was no fanfare. In fact, I hadn´t even realized that we had crossed into Bolivia except that Sarah said she saw a sign indicating we were. There was no formal (or informal) border control in this border town. This small community, called Soberania, consisted of just a few ´homes´ and a modest school. There were no tourist services i.e. a place to sleep.

Sarah and I had planned to continue on in hopes of reaching our final destination (Cobija, where there was a formal border control office) that same day. However, in planning our trip to cross the border, we had misjudged how long the entire trip would take and didn´t leave Puerto Maldonado until about noon. That was a mistake. From this small, border town, we would´ve needed to go a ways further to get to a major road which would then take us to Cobija. Unfortunately, by the time we arrived across the border, there were no more transports to Cobija. So we had either the choice of staying in this small town (with no services, no tent, no hammocks, and no sleeping bags) or traveling onward by motorcycle to the major road leading to Cobija in hopes of catching something. Also, the people from Soberania said that there was a town there similar to theirs. We decided to take our chances so we rode off at high speed down a jungle road, only slightly better than the one we had just been on. We arrived at a small community called Espiritu that consisted of just a small store surrounded by a few ramshackle dwellings. After talking to people there about wanting to continue on to Cobija, we realized that indeed there was little or no hope of getting transport to Cobija until morning, as we were told in the previous town. We had made it a bit further, but now were in a village with even less sleeping accomodations than the former. In other words, there wasn´t even a table to sleep on. Even though it wasn´t in the thick of the jungle (because people had cut down much of it), there still were plenty of mosquitos. We weren´t inclined to sleep on the ground so we found a small wooden ledge attached to the community store, applied a whole lot of insect repellent, and laid down for the night using our not-so-soft backpacks as pillows. Needless to say, we did not sleep much that night, but we both agreed the stars were very nice to look at.

The next morning, after waiting a couple of hours for a ride, we caught a cheap but rather luxurious bus to Cobija where we did immigration entry paperwork.



We actually had a small immigration problem. In Peru, we technically exited the country (for immigration purposes, we got the exit stamp) in Puerto Maldonado before we went to Pica Flor. Our guidebook said that this was the right thing to do because we thought we were going to go directly to Bolivia from Pica Flor via boat (even though we weren't going directly to Bolivia). We even talked with the Peruvian officals about it.

After thinking about how to get to Bolivia from Peru, we had a change of heart (due to many factors) and decided to go by road. Anyway, our exit stamps from Peru were dated Nov 9th, but we arrived at Bolivia's immigration (this one is incidentally is maybe 5 feet from the Brazillian border) November 18th. According to our passports, for about 10 days, we were legally not in any country. We had to pay a small "fine" (quite frankly, others might call it a bribe) to legally be allowed in Bolivia. We really didn't have a choice unless we wanted to head back to Peru (a 2 day trip). It all worked out in the end, but next time we know to get a permission slip from the exiting country if such an issue should arise again.

Cobija is a fairly urban area, but in remote location. We knew we wanted to head for Rurrenabaque, but transportation options are limited between Cobija and Rurrenabaque. As a result, we needed to go through Riberalta, a supposedly 12-hour bus ride that took 16 hours. That bus ride was very different from others we´ve taken. The bus was fairly comfortable and we´d been on extremely bumpy roads before, but this bus got stuck in the mud twice, its battery died a couple times, and we needed to get out of the bus at least 5 times for river crossings by ferry. We arrived in Riberalta with no reservation at midnight and had to do a fair amount of door knocking (and hotel-owner-waking) before finally finding a place at 2 a.m. to sleep for the night.

Like I just wrote, we didn´t plan to stay in Riberalta, but that´s what ended up happening. Turns out that we arrived during the week of the the department of Beni´s anniversary (note: a department is a state). Lots of people were traveling and the transportation options were not all that plentiful to begin with! So we rested in Riberalta a day before catching a bus to Rurre (as Rurrenabaque is often called). This bus ride didn´t involve any ferries, getting stuck or the like, but it was 2 hours late in leaving and a total of 4 hours late in arriving. Now we think we´ve been doing pretty well with these long bumpy bus rides... but towards the end of that one, we were ready to be done!

posted by Sarah and Jeremy @ 2:25 PM   0 comments

Tuesday, November 21, 2006

Pica Flor Research Center

Like we predicted, it took us awhile to get another entry up... We're hoping to get new ones up about once a week, but as we travel, sometimes that might not be possible. That said, because it's been so long, we have lots to say. This is the first of a few entries that will be posted in a relatively short time (we've recently arrived in Bolivia), so keep checking back!

"Pica Flor" means hummingbird in Spanish (so does "colibri"). The Research Center is in the rainforest about 30 kilometers down the Tambopata River from the port city of Puerto Maldonado. We headed to the Pica Flor on Nov. 9th and ended staying until Nov. 17th. Because of the remote location and the unique jungle atmosphere, many people pay as much as a couple of thousand dollars for a short three or four day stay in lodges in the jungle. Pica Flor offers a different experience than the tourist lodges. Travelers work on a voluntary basis for four hours a day, helping maintain the area, and pay just $10 a day. For the remaining part of the day we were free to explore the jungle trails and relax in the lodge. It was a unique opportunity to spend some time in the jungle without spending an arm and a leg.



Pica Flor Research Center is part research center, part jungle-lodge home, and entirely focused on sustainable ways of living. It´s located in a bamboo-filled rainforest and surrounded by an amazing diversity of wildlife and vegetation. Some of the animals we saw included macaws, agouti, pacas, capybara, guans, frogs, beautiful butterflies, termites, a tarantula, grasshoppers, crickets, vultures, praying mantis, lots of different types of ants, lizards and birds, and the rarely seen japiru stork. We also heard monkeys, bambu rats, and a pom rat, but never saw them. Some of the plants they had included passion fruit vines, banana trees, cocona trees, lemon trees, papapa trees, guava trees, pineapples, and mangos. It was really quite tropical!



A small, dream-chasing family owns the place: Laurel, Pico, and their 2-year-old son Picito. A hard-working jack-of-many-trades named Larry also works and lives there, helping the family to work on their many projects. The family also has Campiona (a cat whose main job is to keep the rodents at bay) and a somewhat aggressive pet guan named Chick-Chick who was adopted by the family just after hatching from his shell.



One thing that struck both Jeremy and I about our time at Pica Flor was the glimpse we received of a sustainable way of living in the rainforest. They have so many projects going on and many more that they have planned for the future. For example, they use as much of their own produce as possible. This includes the variety of fruits mentioned above plus protein sources that they cultivate including chickens, eggs, and rabbits. They are close to adding cuy (guinea pig), turkeys, and native fish to their list as well. They also use their waste very efficiently. Any leftovers from meals goes to feed the chickens and rabbits. They compost or burn anything that those animals won´t eat. In addition, the home is energy efficient in that it uses solar power and water-wise because they pump all the water they use each day. The research center has an orchid house, a library with lots of guidebooks as references for looking up wildlife and plantlife, trails, and harvests brazil nut trees. Plus, they are currently protecting their land from illegal loggers. They do this by talking with the illegal loggers, and when that doesn´t work, they hammer tons of nails in the trees that the loggers have fell so that it is difficult to process them. All in all, Pica Flor Research Center is doing a ton!

While we were there, Jeremy and I helped the family to construct a chicken fence to separate their breeding free-range chickens from their egg-generating ones, added a trellis for future passionfruit vines, pumped water (and lots of it!), hiked to a nearby rainforest stream and a cliff overlooking the Tambopata River, read books, completed crucigrams (Peru's take on the crossword puzzle), relaxed in hammocks, and took naps. Most days we woke up at 4:45am so that we could finish with our volunteer work by 9am before the sun started really beating down. Then, the rest of the day, we´d practice the fine art of relaxation, eat and fall asleep by 8:30pm. It was hot and sticky the whole time, but it was wonderful.



Overall, some of the highlights for Jeremy and I were seeing a strong model of sustainable living in action, an introductory tour of the rainforest trails with Laurel (she knows so much!), late night animal sightings with Pico (a tarantula, a capybara, and a paca), and the beautiful surroundings in the lush diverse rainforest. Picture a backdrop of a dark rainforest lit up by fireflies with an accompanying symphony of insects, mammals, and amphibians as you fall asleep... It was exquisite!

posted by Sarah and Jeremy @ 8:02 AM   0 comments

Tuesday, November 07, 2006

The Salkantay Trek to Machu Picchu

Another amazing week! Jeremy and I returned from a 5-day/4-night Salkantay trek to Machu Picchu that lasted from Thursday 11/2 until Monday 11/6. It was fantastic. Then this morning, we caught a plane to the jungle city of Puerto Maldonado near the Bolivian border.

This blog entry is another long one (actually the longest yet) with lots and lots of pictures, so prepare yourself! In fact, we´ll give you a couple of weeks to look it over before writing another entry... More on that later.


SALKANTAY TREK - DAY ONE

Our Salkantay trip began when our alarm rang to wake us up at 4:00am on Thursday morning. The day before we had packed up our apartment, but we didn´t leave it until the morning. Now, we are officially apartment-less. Anyway, our travel agency arranged for a taxi to pick us up at 4:30am near our apartment.

Then we drove to meet our fellow trekkers (James & Steve) and our guide (Hugo). James is a 28-year-old guy from London who is traveling through Peru and Bolivia at a breakneck pace for a month. In the 8 days before we met him, he had already seen most of the major tourist sites in Peru (and certainly more than we have yet)! He has just finished his qualifications to become an accountant and is on a month-long break between school and starting his new career. Steve is a 31-year-old guy from Arizona who is on a long-term world-traveling jaunt following the winters for snowboarding. Soon, he plans to become a certified scuba diving instructor so he can follow the summers around the world as well. Both guys were very well-traveled and it was incredibly interesting hearing their travel stories! Our guide, Hugo, is a 21-year-old guide who has 2 years of guiding experience and a university education in that area. He does a number of different types of tours (trekking, mountain biking, jungle tours, etc.) We really enjoyed learning more about Peru from him. After his career as a guide, he eventually wants to take over his family´s cheese-producing business. We also had an incredible cook (Faustino) and a horseman who loaded up our horses and led them through the trek to carry our supplies. It was a small group, but a great group. As some of you may have noticed, I was the only woman on the trip!



After gathering everyone, we took a 3-hour taxi ride to a town called Mollepata to have breakfast and begin our trek. The first day included 6 hours of hiking before arriving at our camp. We saw the Salkantay mountain range from a distance, followed the Salkantay river rapids, and had a candlelight dinner with Red Hot Chili Peppers from a cell phone as background music in an adobe shelter covered by a rain tarp. It was a good thing it was covered by the tarp because it started to rain while we were in there. Another somewhat bizzare highlight was a brand-new fully-functioning toilet that was outside with a view of Salkantay under the almost-full moon. Beautiful! As we had been warned, that first night was extremely cold. Here´s a photo of the first camp.




SALKANTAY TREK - DAY TWO

The second day we "slept-in" until 5am. Instead of an alarm waking us up, it was our horseman knocking on our tent and bringing us cups of hot tea. What a nice way to start the day!

Just before we left, two of our horses escaped from the camp and the horseman and cook went chasing them. After they found them and tied them up again, one of them got loose AGAIN. This time, Jeremy decided to retrieve the horse.



Day 2 was the most difficult day of the trek. Not only was it technically the most difficult, but also at the highest altitude and the most hours hiking. In addition, that day the rain POURED most of the day! That day we hiked from 7:00am until 6:00pm with some breaks to add up to about 10 hours of hiking. During the first 4 hours we climbed uphill through switchbacks in the clouds, surrounded by grazing horses and cows. The goal was to arrive at an overlook of Salkantay that was supposed to be breathtaking. Unfortunately, the weather didn´t cooperate. When we reached the top, the view of Salkantay was a white background just beyond the ground underneath our feet due to the clouds, but it was still an incredible experience. At the top, our group constructed a pile of rocks (as many others have done before us) to pay homage to the mountain for letting us pass through. But unlike the others, who mostly just piled a couple rocks on top of each other, our group spent a lot of time on this project and got quite creative. When looking at the photos, pay special attention to the horseshoe at the top. We found that on our path. After our project, we decended for 6 hours through farmland, shallow rocky streams, and cloud forest. By the end of the day we were soaked through and through, sore, and MUDDY. We felt good though because we had completed the most difficult day!



SALKANTAY TREK - DAY THREE

Day 3 was a "lazy day" with only 4 hours of hiking. The highlight of the day was the hot springs we visited in the morning. Right along a river, the pool for the hot springs was scenic, warm, and extremely refreshing. It was a welcome way to start our day.



That day we hiked through the cloud forest, through waterfalls (which cleaned our muddy boots and pants a bit), and over log bridges. Because we had been at such a high altitude the day before, the oxygen from the lush vegetation was invigorating. We took an easy pace that day, stopping to rest with soft drinks and cookies at tiendas (small stores) along the way. At one of the tiendas, there were numerous animals (dogs, cats, chickens, roosters, pigs, horses) there. All of us were astounded at how well they all got along. At times, the cats and dogs were cuddling with each other. If only people from different backgrounds could co-exist in harmony like that! When we arrived at our camp for the evening (in a small village called La Playa), there was a relatively-good foosball table that made for hours of entertainment.




SALKANTAY TREK - DAY FOUR

The fourth day was the 2nd most difficult day, but it was also incredible. We started hiking just after 6am and within a half hour, we arrived at an Inka Trail. This isn´t the same Inka Trail as many trek along, but another one as there are many.

The Inka Trails are historically significant because they provided the means for a messenger system in the Inka times. A boy who worked as "chaski" would carry a rope (that was knotted to in a way to communicate a message), running along the Inka trail until he reached a place where another chaski would carry on the message (similar to a relay race). Just before he reached a place where another chaski would be, he would sound a horn to alert the next chaski of his duty. It was amazing to be walking along this path knowing that was used for such a purpose.

Not only was it historically interesting, but we were walking through a beautifully lush rainforest. Groups of parrots sang as they flew above us. We passed coffee, banana, avocado, and tropical fruit plants and trees. Overall, the hike was quite meditative.

The Inka Trail was also mostly uphill for the first 3 hours until we reached an overlook where we could see Machu Picchu from a distance. We needed to wait a bit for the clouds to part, but we did end up catching our first glimpse of this amazing site with the help of our binoculars. Then, we began our descent taking in 2 more overlooks before descending completely.



After this, we hiked towards a town called Hydro Electrica where there is a hydroelectric plant and had lunch there at a restaurant. Our cook wasn´t able to make it in time due to transportation difficulties.



The hike after lunch was possibly the most uninteresting of the trek. We walked along the railroad tracks from Hydroelectrica to Aguas Calientes. We followed the Urubamba River, but weren´t able to see it because we were so focused on staying on the railroad ties. The most exciting thing that happened on that part of the hike was that a single rail car (not a train) came to switch the tracks when we were on them, so we had to jump off. We were ready to arrive at Aguas Calientes. When we did, we checked into a Hostal and had a real bed and a shower for the first time in days. It was wonderful. We had dinner, then headed to bed because we had a big day the next day!




SALKANTAY TREK - DAY FIVE

The day we had all been waiting for finally arrived on Monday - MACHU PICCHU! We started the grueling hike up the stairs to Machu Picchu from Aguas Calientes at 4:45am. Our goal was to see the sunrise over the site.

One would think that after 4 days of hiking, an hour and 15 minute hike would seem short, but it didn´t. We were ready to be there. We arrived at Machu Picchu just after it officially opened to the public at 6:00am. At that time, the clouds obstructed our view a bit, but it was still a sight to behold. Because we were distracted looking at the site and walking around, we ended up missing the sunrise, but because of the clouds, it sounds like we didn´t miss much.

Our guided tour of the site began at 6:45am and lasted until about 9:00am. It was interesting and the timing was just right. I won´t go into details about it because I know some of you may visit it in the future. But for now, I´ll say that I really enjoyed learning about more about Incan culture.



The highlight of the visit for both Jeremy and I was the overlook at the top of Waynapicchu. If you have seen some of the photos of Machu Picchu before, Waynapicchu is the tallest mountain in the picture. It took us about 45 minutes to climb to the top of the mountain, then we sat for a couple hours just enjoying the breathtaking view. Pictures really don´t do this justice because you don´t see the whole view at once. We also met our trekking partners (James and Steve) up there. From the top of Waynapicchu, we could trace the last days of our trek in the distance and fully appreciate just how far we had hiked in a short period of time. It was truly an incredible and humbly experience.



Just as we finished our gazing from the top of Waynapicchu, it began to sprinkle. So, we descended and decided that we had satisfactorily completed our trek to Machu Picchu. With that, we took the bus back to Aguas Calientes, ate lunch, took the train to Ollantaytambo, and caught a bus to Cusco.

We stayed in Cusco until this morning (Wednesday) when we caught a 32-minute flight to the jungle city of Puerto Maldonado. We´re here so we can take a boat tomorrow morning (Thursday) to our next destination: Pica Flor Research Center. We´ll be at Pica Flor doing volunteer work for a week or two, then head to Bolivia and Brazil before returning to Peru.

As a result, our next blog entry will likely be in late November or even early December. Pica Flor doesn´t have internet access and we´re not sure how long it will take us to be in an area with internet access afterwards.

If we don´t write before then, we hope everyone has a wonderful THANKSGIVING!

posted by Sarah and Jeremy @ 5:56 PM   0 comments