725 Calle Hospital, Level 3, Apt. A, Cusco Peru

(Pics: 1st, View from our living room. 2nd, Tyler and guests in our entry foyer/patio. 3rd, Our street--walk through that archway and our place is 5 minutes along. 4th and 5th, Plaza de Armas. 6th, At work.)

April 14, 2009...
DON’T SEND MAIL HERE!!! It won’t make it. My mom tried and the mail she sent will remain forever and mysteriously lost. Maybe there is a paper graveyard, for letters and packages that never reach their destinations and never get returned to their senders. I don’t want any young letters, full of life and potential, reaching an early grave. So, if you just so happen to want to be a nice U.S citizen and send me a letter, here’s where to send it to:

Alanna Brown
c/o Juan Carlos
Urb
Quispicanchi
Av. Nicaragua
H-9
Cusco, Peru

This address is tried and true (thanks Mommy!).
So life has been like a tornado since we got home from Bolivia. Our bus from Puno was painfully slow and wretchedly pee-smelling to have to sit on for eight hours. The potency of ammonia may have permanently singed my nose hairs. We got in past midnight, unpacked a bit. I was sleeping by 2:00am. Up the next morning, and every morning thereafter for the following six weeks, by 5:40am. I have to eat breakfast, shower, get dressed, and be out by 6:30am to walk the fifteen minute walk to the bus station. I arrive in Urubamba at 7:50am, with just enough time to walk the ten minutes from that bus station to the office by 8:00am, which is when I start work. I really enjoy my job and the people I work with. I just don’t enjoy the distance.
So, the Peru Projects Abroad is the top program of all of them as far as volunteer satisfaction and productivity go. And they have programs in several countries...Ghana, India, Cambodia, Argentina, Mexico, Costa Rica, just to name a few. Many of these countries don’t have the resource supply that the Peru volunteers are provided with. So my job over the next month and a half is scanning and/or recreating the games, flashcards, worksheets, posters, and various other supplemental learning material to put in PDF format and put online so that they are printable and therefore accessible worldwide. It feels like a really important job and I have fun doing it. For example, a lot of the games have their gameboards in tact to be scanned, but are missing game pieces. So I spent all of Wednesday drawing up game pieces in Paint!
Back to the apartment…I enjoy it so much. Bad news first though: the building is pretty shabby. It houses a gross, second floor hostel and bottom floor restaurant that I wouldn’t dare to try while I value my life. The hall outside often reeks of pee (though I've now complained to our landlord about strangers using our doorstep for a toilet and the smell has vastly improved), and there are always other UFOs (Unidentified Foul Odors) while venturing out of the building and into the street. However, I find these things livable in comparison to the perks: Our apartment is only a ten minute walk to the Plaza de Armas. It's also a really nice size; three bedrooms, one bath, fully furnished with all the towels, bedsheets, blankets, kitchen utensils, and appliances you could ask for. We have a nice flatscreen television with cable, a telephone line, and we’re working on getting wireless internet. The place is $250 per month including all utilities, so we each pay $125. It has an amazing view, too. From the entry foyer and kitchen and living room windows you can see the mountain that reads “Viva el Peru Glorioso.”
One thing we didn't have that we really wanted was a DVD player, so we went to Molino (the black market where I bought my awesome hiking boots) and found one for $40. Then, of course, we needed movies...each DVD costs $1, and since there's no cinema in Cusco, they pirate all the new movies. So far, our comprehensive list includes: Australia, Seven Pounds (a beautiful story of atonement which comes highly recommended by yours truly), Marley and Me, the Emperor's New Groove, Slumdog Millionaire, Bride Wars, The Wrestler, Revolutionary Road, The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, and all five seasons of The Office, which was $3 per season. (If you think you sense a tone of braggyness here, you're right. This is my consolation for dealing with the UFOs.)
It's been really fun living here. I'm getting in touch with my inner baker/chef. I've made a few big breakfasts, a nice Easter dinner (which was deferred to Monday because, just when I'd seasoned the Lamb and had everything ready, the stove/oven ran out of gas), and I've baked a couple of pies, crust and all from scratch (still bragging).
I can say though, that despite the great view and all the cheap DVDs, I will never again take the small things for granted (okay, there's a little bit more bad news)...Like hot water. Or running water at all, for that matter. At first, only Tyler was getting hot showers and I would only get them when he turned on the water for me and I swore he had magical shower powers, or that the shower hated me. But eventually, after many days, the shower warmed up to me (no pun intended). Still, most days from about 10:00am to 6:00pm and 9:00pm to 5:00am the water shuts off completely. Some days it doesn't work at all. The thought of turning a left knob at an untimed moment and getting hot water, or warm if you give a nudge to the right knob, has become like an apparition or a hallucination, or a thing I dreamed of once that has yet to be invented. The dishwasher, too, has slipped into some synapse in my brain where all the unfathomable things go, or things that are seperate from reality; dishwashers and easy hot water now share a synapse with cartoons, Michael Jackson, and dinosaurs making a come-back (but only the nice ones, like the Bronchiasaurus, Steggasaurus, and Triceratops). On a miraculous and mystical day like today when I'm able to do dishes and fill the kettle from the faucet at 11:30am, I feel much like a caveman handed a lighter to play with. Oh, the joy!
But I'm really at home here. I think even more so than Nacho (nickname for Ignacio), the tiny gray mouse we found living in Tyler's room.
So, we store reserve water in a big plastic container and set up trails of Doritos to lead Nacho to his demise (he was really fast and smart, just not enough for cheese-wrapped, sprite-soaked poison). And we cook and clean and work or study Spanish and host overnight guests and watch DVDs and go out dancing, and that's life!

Bolivia

(Pics: 1st, A street in Copacabana, Bolivia. 2nd, View from Isla del Sol. 3rd, Ruins on the island. 4th, View of the Andes. 5th, Inside the hostel. 6th, Sunset.)

April 2, 2009…
It’s already April. I can’t believe how quickly the time here is flying by. It’s not August yet. I haven’t left yet, but I miss being here already. I feel fortunate and yet spoiled and selfish, like a person shouldn’t be allowed to feel happy for this long. Like there should be some kind of penalty.
I have a choice to make. A big one. Sometimes I’m on one side and sometimes I’m on the other; but those occurrences are usually by a toe and then I’m back on the fence. Like right now…should I become TEFL certified and stay in South America, or move to Spain? Or should I go home, go back to school, get my M.A. at San Francisco State and teach creative writing? I am so torn. I feel wracked and yet blessed by being caught between two things I would love.
This beauty that I am surrounded by, even though it is too often blotched with poverty and corruptness, even though it is accompanied too usually by a wind of pee-smell, feels like home to me and has yet to be tainted or ruined by its flaws. Simply, I love it here. In my heart and mind, though California is also threaded through with beautiful landscapes and has what-more-could-you-ask-for amenities, all that I desire and miss there are the people who are dear to me. Oh, if only I could bring you with me. And we could live a storybook life together and home could be wherever we make it. Think about it…the rest of the world is only a matter of hours from here and there is so much yet to be discovered. Do I sound idealistic? You could become the same way…sans skepticism…it’s so close.
I am on an island in Bolivia, sitting on the terrace of our hostel, looking out at the blue water. I am on La Isla del Sol, an hour’s boat ride into Lake Titicaca –which now seems more the size of an ocean than a lake. I can see a vast stretch of the snow-peaked Andes to the east, just below the risen sun. Dark wavelets of this small sea ripple along, cut in the middle by a bright white path of reflection which snakes its way to the horizon, to the base of those great mountains. I hear birds chirping, the wavelets lapping against the shore 300 steep feet below. I hear men laughing while they work, the occasional click-clock of donkeys’ hooves hitting the stone stairway as they climb past, the distant hum of motorboats going to collect more tourists from the mainland.
We arrived in Bolivia two days ago. As you know, the trip was due…Tyler and I had to renew our visas. It seemed a sketchy dealing, arriving at the border. It was a three-hour bus ride there from Puno and I kept feeling this sense of paranoia, like some police officer would invent a bullshit reason to confiscate my money (I read in my guide book that this has been rumoured to happen) so I kept it in my bra. The bus stops 200 meters from the border so you can change your Peruvian Nuevos Soles, or whatever currency, into Bolivian Pesos. It’s seven pesos to the American dollar. I changed two twenty dollar bills and felt like a rich woman.
After the currency exchange you walk those 200 meters, under a stone archway, into Bolivia. On this side you immediately enter the border patrol office, where you get to fill out some paperwork, and then, if you’re from the United States, some more paperwork and if you’re from the United States (or Japan) you get to pay a $135 reparation fee to enter their country. But…I think the consolation for this is that they keep announcing the two “Americanos” while escorting you to a special table with all kinds of flamboyant arm gestures so that you feel like a celebrity. At least I know I did. And not like a celebrity with a drug problem, but like one at the height of her career. Because all their shouting about and pointing at and directing us two “Americanos” wasn’t at all obnoxious.
After we each paid the $135 fee, Tyler was fined an extra ten for not having his vaccination card with him and I was fined an extra ten for not having…ummm, um, uhh…a picture of my face handy. (Oops, I left my picture of me that I regularly carry at home today…wait, isn’t that what the passport is for???) But the officer didn’t have change for my extra twenty dollar bill, so he just took $140 from me, graciously lowering my fine to only five dollars, and let me pass. (In case I haven’t been clear enough, this is my way of describing a gross principle: they can “fine” you for whatever they want and there is nothing you can do about it. My indignation was the immediate result.) We got stamps, visas, and lectures about our entrance rights, got onto another bus, and arrived in Copacabana twenty minutes later.
Copacabana is a tiny lake town with a crappy square, cheap hostels, and trout dinner for $3. And that includes soup, salad, and fries. We stayed one night there, bought some cool bracelets, and I finally found the “Che” shirt I’d been looking for in my size (now aptly coming apart at the seams). The next day we’d head to the famous Isla del Sol, where we’d stay one night in an even cheaper hostel (I think the most expensive things for their value in South America are Snickers Bars and peanut butter), visit some ruins, and stare in wonder at the vistas.
Today it’s back to Cusco. Gotta go back through all the border hassle. Thank goodness Peru welcomes celebrities for free. Due to arrive home at 11:00pm.

Las Islas Flotantes

(Pics: 1st, On the boat tour of Lake Titicaca. 2nd, One of the Floating Islands. 3rd, Getting a taste of lake reed. 4th, Islanders singing us a song in Quechua. 5th, Me in a reed hut. 6th, Ready for school--waiting at the boat stop.)

March 30, 2009...
The weekend after Machu Picchu was crowded with things to do: laundry, blogging, unpacking, cleaning, running errands, dancing salsa, calling home, checking email, booking bus tickets to Puno. Half of these things did not get done. But I did catch up on my salsa, talked to Mom, got my laundry done, booked those tickets, began to settle into the apartment. I saw Renato out dancing Saturday night. It had been far too long; really nice to see him. Sunday night, Tyler and I met Jodi and Terry at the Trattoria during dinner. They were the sweet couple in their 50’s sitting at the table next to us who are from Florida and treated us to a steak dinner out of pure kindness and told us to be safe and call our parents.
Tyler and I have to renew our visas by the 10^th of April. We left at 7:00am today to catch an eight-hour bus to Puno that should have only taken six. Upon arriving, we immediately booked an overnight tour of the Floating Islands on Lake Titicaca and now here we are, sleeping in a reed hut.
Titicaca means, in Quechua, Great Puma. The condor, the Puma, and the snake are the praised animals of Peru. They are believed to be the protectors of sky and land. And Lake Titicaca just so happens to resemble the shape of a puma catching a rabbit when looked at upside-down on a map.
We’re in the midst of an amazing culture. So different from anything I’ve ever seen. A different world. It’s hard to imagine life at home carrying on. People going to school and work, traffic on the freeway. The freeway. Here, the sky is black at night and the stars are specks of lightning. Here, they make land, boats, houses, everything, from lake reed. Here, three little children put on their uniforms in the morning and paddle themselves in a boat to school. Here, they catch fish in their backyard and anchor town at night because of the strong winds. Here, it smells like earth and water and you journal at night by the light of a candle because there is no electricity. Here, it is peaceful and silent and still.

A Powerful Journey to the Old Mountain

(Pics: 1st, Beginning of the trail. 2nd, Taking a break. 3rd, Oh, the mud! 4th, Lunchtime. 5th, The Salkantay Glacier. 6th, Campsite, night 1.)

March 23, 2009...
The following is straight from my journal, so please forgive the randomness or non-fluidity…

Day 1:
Awesome. We ascended 400 meters today. Tough hike with our packs, but worth every wearied step. The first two days are supposed to be the hardest and coldest, and yea, it’s pretty cold. We woke up at 4:00am to be picked up at 4:40am by the minibus. Rode two hours to where we’d have a breakfast of bread and jam and begin our trek by 9:00am. It was a three and a half hour walk, mostly through ankle-deep mud, until we reached the lunch place…behind a shack in the middle of nowhere, served at a table and benches made from piled stones and slats of wood, beneath a straw-grass roof. Surrounded by tall green mountains with the rain pouring down around us, it was a beautiful lunch.
We left the lunch place at 1:30pm and walked another four hours to where we would camp and eat dinner. It continued to rain sporadically the entire time, even when the sun was shining. I eventually stopped taking off my blue plastic poncho and just left it on…it kept me warm anyway. By the time we reached the campsite I was exhausted and ready to take off my awesome, eighteen-dollars-at-the-black-market hiking boots and relax. It was a tough day and tomorrow is supposed to be harder; steeper, higher, less air, a further distance. I’m a bit nervous about it, but I know I’ll make it. Even if I have to crawl.
Dinner inside a tiny, tin-roofed shack, beneath the most incredible starry sky was amazing and everyone else on the trail seems really cool. There are eleven others; five loud, boisterous guys from Argentina, two guys and a girl from Belgium, a guy and a girl from Saint Louis, Missouri, and a guy from Israel. And our guide, Darwin, from Peru. During the meal, all kinds of languages were flying around like balls on a tennis court. I felt like a spectator at Wimbledon. While fascinating, it also makes me feel discouraged. Tyler’s Spanish is so good so the Argentineans were mainly talking to him and ignoring me. I don’t know how I’m going to get better with him around. I sort of lean on his Spanish like a crutch. Gotta stop doing that. And hearing these people switching from Flemish to English to French to Spanish faster than I can spell Hola makes me feel so inadequate. It really makes me question my desire to go back to school. Would I rather get my M.A. or become TEFL certified and travel the world, teaching English and learning new languages and cultures? I don’t know. But I have a big decision to make since I know I could start at SFSU in September (I got accepted a few days ago). I have a lot to think about…well, we wake up early tomorrow for Day 2, so I better get some sleep…














(Pics: 1st, Starting out. 2nd, At the highest point of the trail! 3rd, Lunchtime. 4th, Campsite, night 2.)

Day 2:
Looking at pretty mountains is so much easier than climbing them. Ascended over 600 meters today. The “hardest day” was really hard. We woke at about 5:30am, breakfast of pancakes by about 6:30am, on the trail by about 7:30am. It was steep and cold and there weren’t many good hiding places to go pee. But it was incredibly beautiful. Salkantay, we learned today, means “Powerful” in Quechua. No one has ever climbed to its peak and lived to tell about it.
At the start, on your left is the rushing white river, descending thousands of feet to bubble past you. All around are reaching, green mountains and on your right is another, climbing, stretching toward a clouded sky. Before you, between the distant pointed gullet of two touching foothills, you can see a towering wall, glowing white between dramatic steaks of gray-black. It is the face of the Salkantay glacier. As we ascended, the air got thinner, therefore, my breath shorter. Two hours later we reached the tallest point of the climb…4,653 meters (over 15,000 feet) above sea level. At this point, I was baffled as to why it wasn’t snowing. However, there was a heavy mist that began to soak through me. This mist turned into a constant downpour over the next five and a half hours as we crossed over countless different landscapes. We descended down muddy slopes (the mud was just as obnoxious today as yesterday) and rocks, in between boulders the size of houses, over rivers and across waterfalls, through swampish flatlands and into tropic-like forest. By the end, though I feel immense love and appreciation for my eighteen-dollar hiking boots that I bought at Molino (because they are sturdy, comfortable, and stayed pretty dry considering the land and weather), my shoes, pants, and sleeves were totally drenched. Like, dripping-drenched. Though it would seem I followed a sudden and unwise compulsion to dip my extremities into the river, this was not why my shoes, pants, and sleeves were soaked. It was because a bright blue plastic poncho has its limits and can only cover so much.
We reached the campsite around 5:30pm and I washed the crusted layer of mud out of my socks and pants and hung them out to dry along with my jacket and sweatshirt. The campsite is adorable. It is so much less than a tiny village that I don’t even know what to call it. There are four tin-roofed shacks here, some chickens and pigs, and a wooden fence surrounding. Lunch and dinner today were both riquisimo; I really like our cook. And now, at approximately 9:00pm, I close this entry by saying that I am vastly thankful for clear night skies in the middle of nowhere.
























(Pics: 1st, Starting out. 2nd, Crossing a waterfall. 3rd, Part of the river. 4th, Quick little monkey! 5th, Campsite, day 3. 6th, Hot springs!!)

Day 3:
The landscape is indescribably, unfailingly beautiful. I wish you could be here to see it. Because words and photographs cannot do it justice. The rushing rivers, the waterfalls bubbling over red and gray stones, the rickety wooden bridges that you slightly fear might collapse while crossing. The endless green in thriving jungle and sprawling mountains. The variety of beauty contained within a ten-mile distance is beyond dreaming. I wish you could have hiked it with me. To witness God’s astounding work while yet whispering to him secretly that if he erased mud from existence you would still die happy. Same as Day 2, we woke up at 5:30am, breakfast of omelets by 6:30am, walking by 7:30am. We only walked five and a half hours today instead of the usual seven or eight. After lunch, we went by van to the campsite. It was a fun, fast, slightly frightening ride through the winding mountains, driven by Darwin. When we arrived at the site, a tiny, chirping monkey was there to greet us. He was a ham. He sprang up through an open window and into the van, jumping around from seat to seat with wide, hyper eyes. Once we had chosen our tents and put our stuff down, we changed and headed for the big treat of Day 3…hot springs!!! They were like a resort paradise. In the midst of more mountains and waterfalls, three large pools to relax in and soak up the heat while drinking a beer from the onsite tienda. My muscles needed that, so sore from days of walking. And today my left knee began to cry out in powerful objection. It was screaming for me to stop for the final two hours, even as I limped to lighten its load. Anyway, the springs felt great. I felt like a limp noodle afterward, ready for dinner and sleep. The bus from the hot springs back to the campsite was like a discotec. The Argentineans are some of the rowdiest, funniest, merriest bunch of boys I have ever met. Constantly clapping their hands and belting out sing-a-longs in Spanish. Hearing their laughter makes me smile, even though the clapping kind of hurts my ears. I am so ready to sleep. We get to sleep in until 8:00am tomorrow! Need a good sleep-in for sure.







(Pics: 1st, Scary bridge. 2nd, The high jungle--banana tree to the left. 3rd, Coffee beans. 4th, Lunchtime! 5th, Tyler and I found a giant centipede friend.)

Day 4:
Today we didn’t have to wake so early. We got to choose our rising time, so we collectively picked 8:00am. Breakfast at 8:30am. The Argentineans were lagging like always, but especially because they’d all (basically everyone but me and Tyler) stayed awake until about 2:00am drinking and dancing. So we finally got walking at around half past ten. It was a hot day, walking first on a rocky, desert-like terrain. My knee had started really hurting on Day 3; enough to make me unable to really walk on it. So by Day 4 it was quite painful. I limped my way up and down and over the boulders. Eventually we came to the high jungle. This was extraordinary. Along the way you could find avocado, passion fruit, and banana trees all growing wild. And you could find tiny wild strawberries and coffee beans everywhere. We hiked through the high jungle for a long time, until we at last came to our lunch place. And by that time, my knee was in such pain I couldn’t bend it at all. So Lionel, one of the Belgians, lent me his spare knee brace. It seemed to help, along with a couple doses of Advil. It took three hours to hike to where we had lunch; on the second, open-air floor of a cute little restaurant. We had palta (avocado) and veggies, which was delicious. Then we walked the last three hours, over train tracks scattered with really annoying rocks, to Aguas Calientes—the small tourist town at the foot of the Machu Picchu mountain. Here, we settled into our hostel, took our first showers of the week, Tyler and I used the internet, and we all met at 7:30pm for dinner. We ate at a local restaurant and it was like a Thanksgiving feast! With trout, rice, yuca, pasta salad, fried cauliflower, and veggies. Great final meal with a celebratory beer to top it off! Tyler and I are going to bed immediately. We’ll be waking tomorrow morning by about 4:00am to begin the final climb to Machu Picchu by 4:30am. Eeesh!!















(Pics 1st, Early morning hike up the mountain from Aguas Calientes. 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, Machu Picchu!!!! 6th, The hillside of Waynapicchu. 7th, View of Machu Picchu from the top of Waynapicchu.)

Day 5:
Machu Picchu day! It was rough waking up, but well worth it. The climb up there was so steep. Over 2,500 steps total, but not quite as hard as I thought it would be. Especially with my objectionable knee. We made it up the mountain in about an hour and twenty minutes. Early enough to ensure entrance to Waynapicchu, the neighbouring mountain with the best view, on which they only allow 400 people per day (the number allowed into Machu Picchu each day is unlimited). It was raining when we got up there, and then it was clear and sunny for a bit, and a few hours later it really started raining again. But Machu Picchu was impossibly stunning.
The name, in Quechua, means “Old Mountian.” And while the ruins do look old, with ancient crop terraces and pathways carved out of the mountain and built into gray stone temples, houses, walls, stairwells…they still appear brilliant. New in the way that they make you marvel, command you to stand still and try—try—to take it all in. The vivid contrast of spring-green grass and wild orchids in a centuries-old ashen world is like a collision of what you know and what you couldn’t have ever imagined. Surrounding mountains point high and disappear at their peaks into the misted white sky. These same mountains, their yellows and browns and reds all melt together and cascade down in innumerable patterns, until finally dripping into the brown river below and rushing east.
It was a marvellous place. The view of it from Waynapicchu was astounding. I wished I could have taken a piece of it with me; more than pictures and more than what is left in my memory…due to fade. I wished I could bring it home and show you what they built; the unfathomable world they created on that Old Mountain.

Approximately 52 Hours on Buses

(Pics: 1st, A plaza in Lima. 2nd, Hanging out in the Naylamp Hostel. 3rd, Ready to go surfing. 4th, Emma and me in Huanchaco. 5th, Tyler, me, the beach and some reed boats. 6th, Ruins being excavated in Trujillo. 7th, Dinner overlooking the plaza in Arequipa. 8th, A view of Cañon del Colca. 9th, A condor in flight.)

March 15, 2009...
They start in the distance. I can see the gray-green mounting as it approaches, taller, swiftly taller, until it is curling over me, and then the white lip crashes down on top of my head. Just as I get past this one I am preparing myself for the next, and the next, and the next. I finally reach the instructor, out of breath from the battle, my eyes on fire, only for him to turn me around and shout “Rema! Rema! Rema!” So I paddle as hard and as fast as my weary arms will go as another cold crest mounts up and pushes me forward. After four calculated strokes, I press my hands against the board and rise clumsily to my feet, resembling something like climbing stairs in the dark, I’m sure. At last I stand up, feeling secure-ish and yet new-kid-on-the-first-day-of-school awkward.
I am surfing, and trying hard not to think the word sharks.
Tyler is several yards away, doing the same but better and with more consistency and probably without thinking the word sharks. It is so fun, though. I tire quickly and must have approximately 67 ounces of water ringing around inside my head, having entered through various orifices, but I am having such fun.
We arrived in Huanchaco this morning, Tyler and I, at about 7:00am on 10:00pm bus from Lima the previous night. The beaches at the north of Peru are rumoured to be the best, so here we are. We checked into the Naylamp Hostel, set down our backpacks, and ventured out into the adorable beach village we’d be enjoying for the next couple days. The beach is great, the ceviche is excellent, and we met a cool girl named Emma from England who joined us for our tours of the local pre-Inca ruins, The Temple of the Sun and the Moon and Chan-Chan.
Before this it was Lima. I flew in from Cusco at 4:00pm last Thursday and Tyler was waiting for me at the airport. It was good and surreal to see a face from home.
Lima can be described as a stuffier, stickier, dirtier, more dangerous, more coastal Los Angeles. If you step outside of the tourist-bed Miraflores, you find yourself in the South American version of Watts. We stuck close to Miraflores and various museums. The Museo de la Nacion was really interesting. It’s a converted prison, and the exhibition covering the terrorism that devastated Peru from 1980-2000 was unbelievable. We also visited the Monasterio de San Francisco, a gorgeous, still-functioning monastery with catacombs open for public tours. The bones were gross and stinky and really old.
Our next stop from here is Arequipa, about 25 hours south by bus. We leave tonight at 9:45pm…

March 23, 2009...
Arequipa was great. It boasts the prettiest plaza I’ve seen in Peru besides the Cusco plaza. Tyler and I hung out there and rested for a day (it’s amazing how tiring it can be to sit on a bus for what seems like endless hours). We walked around, ate at this nice rooftop restaurant, did some window shopping.
Our second and third days in Arequipa we spent on a bus tour (I know, another bus) of the Cañon del Colca, which is the second-deepest cañon in the world (the deepest is another in Peru, called the Cañon del Cotahuasi). We stopped for a lot of beautiful vistas and got to see wild condors in flight. This was astounding. Condors are black and white, with a fuzzy white collar and ancient-looking faces, and they have a wing span of 9 feet. As they soared over me, the mountains and cañon and sky disappeared and those condors in flight were all I could see.
The day we returned from the cañon tour, we caught a night bus to Cusco…our home for the next four months. But we would only be home for one night. Monday morning we would wake early to begin the Salkantay trek to Machu Picchu…