Week 5-6?

Hey everyone!

In case you’re wondering: we’re still very much alive and kickin’ in Peru! It’s been a week or two since our last entry, because really there wasn’t that much to tell :)

There have been some minor changes in our apartment: seeing that we are going to stay here longer than all the other volunteers, we got to move into a room with its own bathroom. Kind of nice to have a bathroom you can keep clean… Also, two newcomers have arrived: Alexandra and Vicky. They will only be working in Urpi Sonqocha for two weeks. After this week, they are going to explore the rest of Peru for two more weeks before returning home. 

In the project everything is still going fine. The kids can be really loud and energetic, but that’s probably not any different from back home :) Last week, we started separate ‘reading classes’ with a first group of children. This is a continuation of a project two volunteers started a month or two ago, as an internship for their studies. We worked around the story of ‘Pinocchio’. We did some reading, showed parts of the Disney movie and played some games. The purpose is to stimulate the kids to read more on their own. Actually pretty fun to do!

On Sunday, a circus group (‘Circusco’) came to the project to perform for the kids. They were friends of Ellen’s (one of the project’s coordinators), so they did the show for free. The kids loved it (and so did we, of course)!  

The same day, we also had another cooking class. This time we made ‘causa’, which looks like a big pie filled with mashed potatoes, chicken, egg, mayonnaise, avocado… Yummy!

Last weekend, we put our salsa-knowledge to the test for the first time in Cuzco’s nightlife, accompanied by some other volunteers and our salsa teacher. Among other places, we went to a club with live salsa music. Despite the large amount of decibels, we had a lot of fun. A strange thing to see was that a lot of guys danced with each other. A bit weird at first, but they seemed to have a lot of fun, so why not? :) 

On Wednesday, we went to a very nice Couchsurf-meeting in the centre of Cuzco. Apparently, each Wednesday evening, both couchsurfing travelers and Cuzco residents get together in the same bar (with very cozy seats, an open fire place and rock music), to meet new people and exchange experiences. We’re definitely going back some time!

A couple of days ago, we both had our hair cut. At first we were a bit scared, but it turned out we picked a good hairdresser :) In total, we paid about €7 for both haircuts. Amazingly cheap!

Finally some statistics of our blog:

- we’ve had about 1700 pageviews, which is a lot, thanks

- most pageviews are done on the internet browser ‘Safari’ (34%), followed by ‘Internet Explorer’ (26%), ‘Firefox’ (23%) and ‘Google Chrome’ (13%)

- most pageviews are from Belgium, but also from the US, Luxemburg, Germany, France, the UK, Russia, Denmark, India and Ecuador (which is a bit puzzling, because in some of these countries we don’t know anyone at all).

That’s all folks! A lot of love from Peru!

Tía Verónica y tío Jasper

P.S. Maybe good to know: Peru doesn’t have a summer time/winter time, so instead of 7 hours, the time difference with Belgium is now reduced to 6 hours. P.P.S. Next Wednesday evening, we’re leaving for Arequipa and the Colca Canyon (a 3 day/2 night tour), so you can expect a lot of pictures when we return!

Inca Trail

The Inca Trail in one word: AMAZING. During the four days of the trip we got to see the most beautiful Inca sites, walking in between breathtaking mountains and through jungle-like areas. The trip itself was very hard: we were almost constantly going up or down and when it rained, we had to watch our every step in order not to slip.

 

 

 

Our group consisted of a guide, a cook, eight porters and eight hikers. Beside ourselves, there were three Argentinean women, an Englishman and an Australian couple. Most of the time, we walked alongside Jess and James (the Australian couple), with whom we had a lot of fun.

 

 

The food was surprisingly good. We ate - among other things - soups, popcorn, pancakes, amazingly varied Peruvian dishes and cake. The porters made sure the dining tent was set up each time we arrived. In the evenings, they also took care of our personal sleeping tents, which were, by the way, more than OK. The only downside to the trip was the ‘bathrooms’. We’d probably better not discuss them in detail. Let’s just say we survived it without permanent traumas.

The first day was supposed to be the easiest one, but turned out to end with a hell of a climb. In the afternoon, we saw our first Inca site. Bit by bit, we got to unveil – thanks to our wonderful guide Rolando - some of the intriguing mysteries of the Inca culture.

 

The second day was the longest hike and, supposedly, also the hardest one. We had to climb two passes (one of which was called ‘Dead woman’s pass’, because of the boob-like shape of the mountain), which wasn’t easy but actually went quite smoothly. In the afternoon, we were lucky to witness the (after)birth of a lama!

 

 

 

On the third day, we only had to walk half a day. We visited three Inca sites, the last one of which was the most beautiful we had seen all along. It even turned out to beat Machu Picchu, probably because there weren’t any other tourists there and we could enjoy the overwhelming quietness of the surrounding mountains.

 

 

 

 

 

On the last day, after waking up at 3.30 a.m., we only had a couple of hours to go before reaching Machu Picchu (actually pronounced as ‘Matshu Pichtshu’). Despite the many (MANY!) tourists, we were still able to enjoy the beauty of the site. It definitely deserves to be one of the Seven Wonders of the World. In the afternoon, we visited the natural hot springs of Aguas Calientes, together with Jess and James. This turned out to be a major disappointment. The water was brownish and had nothing natural to it. Thankfully, a nice drink and meal (pizza alpaca!) afterwards made up for it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

While the other members of our hiking group left for Cuzco, we stayed an extra night in Aguas Calientes to enjoy the luxury of a hot shower and an incredibly soft bed. Before taking the train back to Cuzco, we visited the Machu Picchu museum and botanic garden, and stuffed ourselves with the best French pastries ever.

Back at home, we got together again with Jess and James to visit one of Peru’s best restaurants (Gastón Acurio’s Chicha). What was supposed to be one of the most expensive restaurants of the country only cost us about fourteen euros each.

Week 2

Ok, as we already mentioned last week, the blog is going to be in English from now on. This way, we don’t have to spend too much time on translating our magnificent adventures in Peru.

So… where to begin?

Last Saturday, we went to Cuzco on foot. It took us, more or less, two and a half hours to get there (the centre of Cuzco is approximately eleven kilometers from our apartment). Although we enjoyed the trip, the road itself wasn’t very pleasant to walk by: hundreds of incredibly polluting cars, buses and trucks passed us by every minute. At times we even found it difficult to breathe. The scenery along the way is a curious mixture of beautiful fountains and shabby houses. People seem to be working all day long, often with the help of their children. Ironically enough, we ended our afternoon reading, comfortably seated in two of Starbucks’ cozy sofas. Well yeah, who could blame us? :)

On Tuesday, we went to visit ‘el Parque Arqueológico de Tipón’. This Inca centre for the worship of water consists of numerous little waterfalls, all deriving from one ‘sacred’ spring. It was quite a hike to reach the entrance of the site, but when we saw that we were practically on our own between the colossal mountains, we were glad to have made the effort. Definitely worth it.

 

The next day we had a day off, due to a bus strike. So you see, that doesn’t only happen in Belgium! As a consequence, we had all the time in the world to do our laundry on top of our building :)

On Saturday, we went with Sadith (one of the teachers at Urpi Sonqocha) to Cuzco, to buy some new books and manuals for the children. Pretty fun to choose any book we want, without having to pay for it. Afterwards, we enjoyed the setting sun on one of Cuzco’s idyllic ‘plazas’:

Yesterday (Sunday) we had our second cooking class with Lucy. This time we made ‘salpicón de pollo’, a delicious mixture of peas, onions, carrots, corn, French fries and chicken, topped with some mayonnaise. In the afternoon we unexpectedly had to take care of the children of Urpi Sonqocha on our own. Luckily, only eight of them were present, so we managed to send each and every one of them home alive :)

Now… That’s about it! Today we’re going to go to bed early, seeing that we have to get up at 4 a.m. As most of you will already know, tomorrow we start the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu! Of course, we will take a lot of pictures and share the most remarkable ones on this blog. Instead of returning on Friday, we’ve booked an extra night in a hotel in Aguas Calientes, so that we can take our time to explore Machu Picchu and afterwards still be able to enjoy the hot springs.

So… wish us luck!

P.S. While cooking, Jasper found an onion that (according to him) ‘totally looked like a Ninja Turtle’: