kulotsalot

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Photos and stories from my trip to Peru!!!


Our hotel in Miraflores. Noisy and damp, unless you happen to get placed in the nicer, newer (?) wing.


Changing of the guards at the gov't palace on the Plaza de Armas (main square) in Lima. Apparently they do this every afternoon!


Fountain at the Plaza de Armas.



Random buildings in Lima. Love the colours!


Congress building, which of course is heavily gated and patrolled.


Larcomar shopping district at the end of Ave. Larco in Miraflores. Wish we had outdoor malls here in Vancouver. There are lots of paragliders around the area.


Trying out Pisco Sour, the national drink. Verdict: full of ew.


Pisco was hit by a massive earthquake last year, so most of the town is either piles of rubble, or half-built. These dogs were hanging out in a half-built building.


Sea lions on our Islas Ballestas tour! This is supposed to be the poor man's Galapagos.





Penguins


Dolphins!


Tour of a wine-making place called El Catador. We tried some 10 types of alcoholic stuff that they make. The best-tasting one was Amor Perfecta, which is supposed to help you have twins?! Um, no thanks.


Oasis of Huacachina. Each time I Google the legend of Huacachina I get a different story. (Huaca = girl, china = slanty eyes) WTF? Most of the group went sandboarding on the dunes.


Whee colourful birds at a restaurant in Huacachina.


Ceviche! Raw fish cooked in lime juice and onions. OMGZORZ YUM!


Mummy from Chauchilla cemetery. There were tons of bones and junk. Not terribly exciting.


Ready for our flight over the Nazca lines!! $78 which was almost double what we'd expected, but still worth it! Flight was stomach-churning, though, in a small 6-seater plane that makes very tight turns.






The night bus from Nazca to Arequipa was BAD. Four hrs delayed, 9-hour long bus ride from Nazca to Arequipa in a stinky, non-ventilated public bus, with a wailing baby sitting beside me. No food, no water, no toilets. Oh joy. I immediately puked when we got to our hotel in Arequipa. :(


With our tour leader Jesus. Smile for the pic!


"Oh, crap, I forgot to smile!"


Smiling lessons, despite being beyond the point of starvation.


At the mirador in Sachaca, a town next to Arequipa. You're supposed to be able to see 3 volcanoes/mountains from here: Chachani, Picchu Picchu and Misti. Don't remember which was which, though!

This was our first high altitude place (2000+ meters above sea level) and I could barely make it up three flights of stairs at the viewpoint. Cold, hungry, sick and altitude problems. Ugh. Not a good mix.


Trying out hats in colca Canyon which was HELLA FREAKIN COLD!!! 3500-4000 masl. The kid was obviously not impressed with our selections. We were all shuddering despite having a windstopper AND fleece over our regular shirts.


At Cruz del Condor (condor crossing) waiting for... condors!


The guide said that the max wing span of the condor is around 10 meters. Holy frick.


Awww, lots of fluffybutts!






On our way to Puno, we pass by a place where locals pile a bunch of stones and make a wish. It is supposed to be some sort of shrine for Pachamama (mother earth). It is also the highest point of our trip, about 4900 masl.


Flamingos!

kulotsalot

Our key holder for Hotel Pukara in Puno. Guess where the room number is located?


Main church in Puno


Gay hotel? Or just unfortunate decor?


Coca is supposed to help you with altitude sickness... and humping.


Lake Titicaca - highest navigable lake in the world. They say: "Titi for Peru, Caca for Bolivia." because caca = shit. I don't think they know what titi means, though... at least for pinoys.


Chillin' (more like freezing) on the boat.


Isla Taquile


Photos with our homestay family on Isla Amantani!


Our dinner which was quinoa soup, fried cheese, potatoes with more potatoes and some cabbage. Peru is supposed to have some 3500-4300 species of potatoes, depending on who you ask. OMG potato overload. I'm off potatoes for another week or so.


They dressed us up after dinner because we would dance with the locals. Their idea of dancing, though, is runnign around while holding your hands tightly (so that you cannot escape even if you are gasping for breath) and simple stepping/turning back and forth. At high altitude in 11 million pounds of clothes and with hiking boots, all I can say is it was a real challenge!!




Hornimans Tea. Have a cup, keep it up!


A hut on the floating reed islands of Uros. Notice the solar panel.




A roll in the reeds doesn't sound too enticing.


Cristo Blanco (white christ) in Cuzco.


The three crosses beside the white christ.


Night lights in Cuzco


Dignatario - my deathly scary Peruvian ride!!! He'd run when all the other horses were running, even though I was trying to rein him in. I really thought I was going to die. :( Either I need to take riding lessons or I should just quit riding horses entirely.


Salsa with the locals in Cuzco! IN HIKING BOOTS!!!


Local futbol game. Cuzco's Ciencianos (red) vs. Sporting Cristal (blue). Cristal, the team we were rooting for, lost 2-1. Best soundbyte ever: Cabeza de calabasa!


A van driver toppled off the cliffs of Pisac after dropping off his tourists at the entrance to the site. Poor guy didn't survive the accident. :(


Inca ruins in Ollantaytambo


Our train from Ollantaytambo to Aguas Caliente/Machu Picchu.


Machu Picchu! supposed to be the highlight of the trip, but for me it was a bit of a letdown.


Tres Ventanas (3 windows) at MaPi

Creatures of the jungle!



Bullet ant




Capybara, world's largest rodent


Cayman, shot through a binocular lens




Tarantula


Another cayman, this time on a night time boat ride.

thecowboy

Way awesome Kulots. Looks like it was a lot of fun. Why was maccu piccu (sp) a letdown?

onlyalad

Great pics.
Showed my wife.
She wanted to got and see the alpacas until she read 9 hour bus ride.
Thanks for sharing.

kulotsalot

HAHAHA!!! Tell her you can fly from Lima to Arequipa, and then take the scenic bus trip from Arequipa to Colca Canyon, where we saw the alpacas, llamas and vicuñas. That shouldn't take 9 hours!

I would do the whole thing over again, even if it meant that I had to do the bus ride from hell again. Compared to the other awesome stuff that we saw/did, that part fades into insignificance. It's a beautiful country and definitely worth seeing if you are into traveling at all.

kulotsalot

Well first of all we had to get up at 3:30 AM for Machu Picchu. Holy fuckity fuck. I'm not functionally human until 10 AM.

4:15 - Breakfast, mostly bananas because they hadn't been able to put the bread out early enough (duh - we told them our schedule the night before!). At 4:45 - Walk to the bus station to line up for the MaPi buses.
5:30 - Buses start running. We get on the 5th or 6th bus.
6:00 - Lined up outside of MaPi to get your ticket stamped. The gate opens at 6AM.

We get in, and it's sooooooooo fucking misty. It's early morning so it's grey and the sun is not fully out. And it's cloudy and misty and ugh. Looked like Vancouver. Can't really see much. Plus this huge milling crowd of people that lined up early with us (EVERYONE wanted to get there first) was getting in each other's way when it comes to walking/pictures.

It just seemed like too much effort for a big mess of people trying to get a great shot of a bad environment (since it was too cloudy that early in the morning). And then we had to meet up with the part of our group that did the Inca trail. Then 99% of them disappeared to get passes to hike up Wayna Picchu (they only let 200 people at a time hike up, and there are specific times when you can go, so you have to get your "ticket" to reserve yourself a spot in the first 200). Which meant that we didn't get to properly start our tour with the guide's explanations until around 8AM. SO WHY THE EFF DID WE TRY TO GET THERE SO EFFIN EARLY?!

When the clouds finally cleared and the sun came out, yes it was nice, but we'd seen two other Inca cities the day before and it just seemed like seeing the same windows, the same architecture, the same temples, etc. Just a larger scale, but of course very, very similar. At that point it seems like just another Inca site, but over-hyped and overcrowded.

canu

Wow great pic's looks like you had a killer time

jabber

Peru looks facinating,thanks for sharing your pics!!

adrenaline

looks awesome. I wish i had $ to travel!

i'm rich biatch

WooHoo Lake Titicaca!!!!

kulotsalot

Haha, trust me, I was saving up for a year for this trip!

DDGuy

First things first.....looks like some one has been growing some bewbies ..

....or was it the Wonderbra :-)


Jokes aside....loved your photo diary...it was almost I was there....cheers

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kulotsalot

It's the fat... and maybe the bra helps a little bit

Anibal

Yeah, the best way to go to maccupiccu is doing the inka trails. Depending on your guide it takes you 7 - 8 days to make it all the way there, you walk and camp ive done it a couple times the last one drinking peyotefor like 3 days. When i got to maccupiccu shit was unreal and also you come across some other ruins that are better than maccupiccu on the way there. Those gigantic rocks in ollantaytambo are just too impressive. Nightlife in Cusco is awesome too.

You got to go everywhere jajajaja some of those places i havent gone to, like Puno, i always wondered how the Uros thing would be but never went there. Seems like the only thing you missed was going to the beach and surfing some, oh and why didnt you let me know you where here ? half of those parasailing dudes are my friends, couldve got you a free ride. Also 1 - 2 hours away from Lima you can do bungee jumping and Islas Ballestas you can get kayaks and it changes the whole experience.

Looks like you had a great time though (you should have seen the soccer team i plaid for once, only lasted 5 weeks and i was fired cause its a first division team, they wear pink uniforms jajaja i might have pic somewhere ill look for it).

Nice to see you made it down here and enjoyed it.