El Jueves - 6/19 - Adios Peru :(

I am writing this in Lima airport as I wait for my plane to Chile.  Today I must say goodbye to Perú and goodbye to all the amazing people I have grown so close to on this trip.  I had an unforgettable, amazing, spectacular, great, wonderful, superb, beautiful, life-changing, unbelievable… okay you get the point… time on this trip and I will never forget my time here in this amazing country. 

To all the students on the trip, thank you so much for being an awesome bunch of people to share this new experience with.  I couldn’t have asked for a better, kinder, more fun group.  I truly cherish the experiences I had on this trip with all of you.

To everybody who helped make this trip possible (other than Monica, she gets her own paragraph) - the people with the travel agency, Jenny, my host mom, the people at El Sol, and Henry – THANK YOU SO MUCH.  You guys worked so hard behind the scenes to make this trip what it was.  I feel like we didn’t give you guys enough credit for all the work you did, but thank you so much.

Finally, to Monica… It goes without saying that you were the backbone to this trip.  You organized it, you planned it, and finally you led it.  Your kind-heart and light spirit is part of what made this trip as special as it was.  You truly wanted us to enjoy ourselves and learn as much as we possibly could.  I know that sometimes we gave you a hard time for packing our schedule so tightly.  But in retrospect, looking back, I wouldn’t change a thing about how you organized this trip… not a thing.  But to sum it all up, thank you Monica for showing us your native country and culture.  I loved both and I can’t wait to go back to learn and experience more.

¡Hasta la próxima vez Perú!

El Miércoles - 6/18 - El Último Día Completo en Cuzo

Today was our last day in Cusco, and really the last full day of the trip :(  In the morning, I got some work done on my book reports and repacked all my stuff so that I wouldn’t have to do so much tomorrow morning.  After that, a group of us got lunch at the Peruvian-Thai fusion restaurant right in the city center, which was DELICIOUS.  After lunch, we just walked around la Plaza de Armas just exploring various shops and vendor stands.  Then Nathan, Marcus, Jonah, Erin and I went to get massages, something I have never done before.  We all got Incan massages, which was a blend of all the massages they offer.  It included hot rocks, deep-tissue massage, soft-tissue massage, and everything.  No, we did not get happy endings.  But my whole body was pooped from Machu Picchu and the entire trip in general so it felt great.

Then we went to a school not far from the hotel to have culture classes with Monica and Henry.  Those were a lot of fun actually and really interesting.  In Monica’s class we pretty much went through the presidencies of Peru since the 1960’s and how their policies affected Perú (the poor, the working class, the wealthy class, the economy, etc.).  I’m super interested in that kind of stuff so it was a blast.

El Martes - 6/17 - MACHU PICCHU

Today was the day.  For me the most highly anticipated day of the trip.  Today we went to Machu Picchu, the sacred Incan city in the sky outside of the capital of the Incan empire, Cusco.  We woke up at 4 AM to leave the hotel at 4:30 AM.  It was a two hour bus ride to the train station and then a hour and a half train ride to the base of Machu Picchu.  The train ride was beautiful!  So many snowcapped mountains and all I could think about was how pumped I am for Chile.  We got on a bus at the base and it was about a half hour ride of bumpy, snaky roads up the mountain.  The views out of the bus windows were incredible – mountains like I had never seen before.

We got to the top and it was about a 5-minute walk to where you could finally see the sacred city in the sky.  It was incredible.  How could they have built such an elaborate, beautiful, stone city 600 years ago… ON THE TOP OF A MOUNTAIN!!  We started the tour and split into English and Spanish groups.  While normally I do the Spanish tour, I did the English one today because I didn’t want to miss anything on the tour.  We saw el temple del sol (the temple of the sun), altars the Incans used for animal sacrifices, various plazas, the living quarters of the city, and a bunch of llamas (or alpacas… I can never tell the difference).  While we were there, one of the llamas (or alpacas) gave birth to a baby llama (or alpaca) and we got to see mama llama (or alpaca) teach baby llama (or alpaca) how to walk, which was pretty cool. 

After the tour, we had three hours of free time to explore so a bunch of us went on the hike up above the city of Machu Picchu to La Puerta del Sol (the Sun Gate), which was located in a pass in between two mountain peaks.  We brought up with us, lunch and snacks, and we sat up there enjoying the view for about two hours, which was awesome.  We then hiked back down to Machu Picchu, took the bus back down to the base, and had a second lunch.  Then we took the train back to our bus, took the bus back to our hotel… and slept… very soundly.

Machu Picchu was even more amazing than I thought it was going to be and its beauty is something that you can only truly understand if you see it with your own eyes.  So to anybody who’s reading this that hasn’t been to Machu Picchu, you absolutely have to go (I’m pretty sure the only two people that are reading this are Monica and my mom… so basically, mom, you should go to Machu Picchu).

El Lunes - 6/16

Today we went to la Valle Sagrado (Sacred Valle)… and it was awesome.  The Sacred Valley was named as such by the Incas because it had everything for them.  There was water, fertile soil, a warm climate good for farming, and a good landscape for living.  The Incas also used the Sacred Valley as a massive cemetery.  Next we went to Ollentaymbo, an Incan architectural site carved into the side of a mountain.  It had massive agricultural “steps” built into the side of the mountain so that they could farm on the mountain side.  Finally, we went to a place to a place where they make alpaca sweaters and blankets – all by hand.   We got a presentation of the process, and it was pretty cool – there’s so much that goes into it.  Towards the end of the presentation some of us went to watch the U.S. vs. Ghana soccer game, the first game for the U.S. of the world cup.  We all huddled around a tiny TV to watch the US win 2-1 with a late-in-the-game winning goal.  What an end to the day!

El Domingo - 6/15

Today was our first day of full activity in Cuzco, and boy was it full.  We woke up early to have breakfast in the hotel and then we were off.  Our first stop was Sacsaywoman (pronounced sexy woman).  The city of Cuzco, if looked at from a bird’s-eye view, resembles the shape of a puma, and Sacsaywoman is the head of that puma.  It was an old Incan military fortress, with amazing, complex architecture.  Next, we went to an old Incan labyrinth and walked through that real quick.  Finally, it was off to Tambomachay, another set of Incan ruins, from the top of which you could see all of Cuzco.  Later, we went to Korikancha, a museum with a mix of Incan and colonial architecture.