Only in NYC

Empire state of mind

NYC I'm back

Today I went to one of my favorite places in New York City... central park. Especially Fall in central park, it is so beautiful with the leaves changing and all the different colors. There were lot of people out today taking carriage rides, eating lunch, painting classes and musicians playing. Its good to be back!

Adios Sudamericana

Yesterday we went to La Plaza de Armas which is in the center of the city where we walked around a lot and ate some good local food. The one dish I got was very yummy it was a Pre Fix of noodle soup, rice, yucca fries and fried fish, head, tail, bones and all.

After walking around for a while we headed back toward our hostel and got dinner at Pizza Street and then took a cab to the airport for our flight to Mexico City and have a layover here and then headed to JFK. On the plane from Peru to Mexico there was a well known band on our flight called El Tri, they befriended us and invited us to their next gig in NYC. They've played at both Webster Hall and the Nokia Theater and were super cool.

I had a wonderful trip, always on the go, so I'm very excited to go home to my own apt, with my own shower, utilities, water and closet. In South America there seemed to be no sense of urgency which is not my style living in New York City. Its gonna be good to be home.

Lima, Peru

Yesterday we flew out of Cusco and arrived in Lima an hour later. We took a taxi to our hostel along the beach coast, it was beautiful. We arrived at our hostel and then went out to explore the city and get lunch. We got lunch at Pizza Street, where you walk through and the staff at all the different restaurants walk up to you with their menus and offer free drinks to get you to sit down. We found one that we liked, sat down and had lunch and some free wine.

Then we walked around the city for a bit, and quickly realized this was a very Americanized city. We saw Burger King, McDonalds, Dunkin Dounuts, Payless, TGIF's etc. We even found a bar that was playing NFL games and everyone had NFL jerseys on, it was crazy to see in a city so far from home.



After that we walked toward the ocean front and there was a huge mall right on the rocky coast, it was pretty cool. The sun was setting and it was beginning to get cold so we made our way back to the hostel.

Machu Picchu

Today when we woke up at 3:30am, it was pouring and the electricity was still out. There was nothing we could do so we went back to bed in hopes the rain would stop and we could take the bus to the top of Machu Picchu without being miserable in the rain. When we woke at 5am still pouring, so we woke up at 6am and the rain started dying off so we went for it.

We were supposed to go on a guided tour at 6am but we obviously were going to miss that, so we just planned on doing our own thing. We took the 30 mintue bus ride to the top and arrived around 7:30.



When I walked in the entrance of Machu Picchu it took my breathe away it was so incredibly. I couldn´t believe such a thing existed, it was amazing! As we walked in another English tour was arriving as well, so we hung with them for a bit and went at our own pace which worked out probably better than it would have with our planned tour.

I must say walking through Machu Picchu for 5 hours was not easy. Its very hilly, has steep, long stairs and the bug bites I could have done without, but for the views and the history it was worth it.

We then heading back down on the bus and took another 9 uncomfortable hours to get back here to Cusco.

Journey to Machu Picchu

Yesterday I woke up at 6am to get ready for the tour van to pick us up to head to Augas Calientes which is the town at the bottom of Machu Picchu. After 8 hours on a bumpy, unpaved, winding, high cliff with no guard rails, overlooking huge white water rapids, we arrived at the train. We took the train about an hour to Aguas Calientes and had dinner then headed to our hostel.

On the way to our hostel it starting pouring, then came the thunder and lighting. As we were getting ready for bed all the electricity in our room went out. An employee came to our door with a candle and said all the electricity in the city was out and would be for many hours.

So we went to bed and said a prayer to mother nature to end the rain by morning. The plan was to get up at 3:30am to walk the hour and a half climb to Machu Picchu.

Volunteer Cusco

Today we walked into the center and found a flight for Cusco to Lima on Sunday morning, yah, no 30 hour bus ride!

Then we went out to lunch got a 3 course meal of guacamole and potato, vegetable soup, meat and rice for 5 sole about $1.40 USD!

Then we headed back to the hostel to get ready to head out of town to volunteer to teach English to underprivileged children. After a 15 minute overcrowded bus ride, a10 minute walk along a rail road track and hiking up a huge, steep dirt hill we got to the building where we were going to teach. We came up with a lesson plan of what we were going to teach and what games to play, then the children arrived. There was about 15 children and about 7 of us, we did about an hour lesson.


Then we had play time and I took lots of their pictures on my digital camera, which they loved to see themselves, and I also let them use my camera to take pictures, which they loved even more. They were so sweet and it was touching to see them trying so hard to learn a different language. It was sad to see where they live and how unclean they were, but it was cool to see that they were still happy, fun loving kids.

Cusco

Today we went out to explore the city of Cusco. We walked around the center of town and got to see the native people in their very unique attire, which was cool to see. We also booked our trip to Machu Picchu for Friday, which will be a 2day/1 night trip. Exploring Machu Picchu on Saturday.



We went to dinner at at typical Peruvian restaurant and got a vegetable soup, salad, rice, grilled alpacha meat and a beer for about $3.80 each! I'm loving this city!

Tomorrow we are trying to sign up for this volunteer program to teach underprivileged children ages 4-12 English for about 5 hours of the day which would be awesome!

Now we are gonna hang out at our hostel bar for a bit, then probably go out in the town. There are so many bars around here and our hostel is super cool as well.

Oh, Peru

Ok, so not everything can run as smoothly as it has since we got to South America. Now comes the nightmare. We took the bus from San Pedro to Tacna which ended up being 9 hours. Then we had an hour layover, had to take a taxi for about 2 hours from Tacna and cross the border in the taxi. Then we had another hour layover. We finally got on the bus heading to Cusco and instead of the total 15 hours to Cusco like we were told it was a lot more.


We were not in the best moods, we hadn't eaten for 24 hours because we only had US dollars and there was no place to exchange our money. Then it started raining, and the bus started to leak and the bathrooms on the bus, ehh I can't even go into. To top it off there was a newborn baby crying the whole ride, and that's not an exaggeration!



After 12 hours on the bus we stopped to have dinner and were told that we have another 8 hours to go until Cusco. We got Peruvian Sol and we ate fried cheese, baked potatoes and what looked like over-sized corn, which tasted like heaven to us.

We just arrived in Cusco after another 8 hours on the bus making the total hours on the bus from San Pedro about 29 hours meaning we have been traveling for about 32 hours. Not the best part of our trip but things could have been worse.

Now it's almost time for breakfast at our hostel and for us to enjoy Cusco. We get to relax until we continue our journey on Friday to Machu Picchu.

Geysers and hot springs

Waking up at 4am was not easy today, but we did it and it sure was freezing. It was about 17 degrees when we left out hostel and it felt like it got colder once we got out to the desert where the geysers were. We traveled about 2 hours outside of San Pedro and were right on the border of Bolivia at a geyser field with about 80 active geysers which was pretty cool. I stuck my hand in the geyser water and it was scolding hot but felt kinda good because my hands were numb.

Then we headed to some natural hot springs and I forgot my towel but I had my bathing suit so I jumped in anyway and it felt soo good, until I got out, but it was worth it.


After lunch we sat down to discuss and plan out the rest of our trip. We realized its a bit of a journey to get to Machu Picchu from Cusco and that if we make the stop in Arequipa we probably wouldn't have enough time at Machu Picchu. We have decided to skip Arequipa and go straight to Cusco.

We get on the bus here at San Pedro, take an 8 hour bus ride to Tacna. Then take a taxi to a bus to Cusco making that trip about 15 hours totaling 23 hours blah, not looking forward to this!

Moon walk

Today we woke around 9:30am and headed out to the center to book our tours and get our bus tickets for tomorrow. We booked two tours one called Valle de la Luna, which is today at 3pm to look at the valley of the moon. The other is tomorrow at 4am called Geyser del Tatio/Viachuca/Guatin, to see the Geysers, hot springs etc. We also bought our bus tickets for tomorrow at 8:30pm to Arica with a layover in Tacna, with our destination being Arequipa, Peru.

After that we went to a corner store and bought some food for lunch today and some other meals along the way. We went back to our hostel, cooked and a photographer came and took our picture with our meal for the hostels website and the city of Atecama website!

We just got back from the Valley of the moon tour and it was amazing! It was about 4 hours and we drove out to some salt mountains, went walking/crawling through a cave (not meant for people with claustrophobia), saw some active volcanoes and had snacks and drinks out in the desert and watched the sunset. It was beautiful! It felt like we were on the moon! Then we went to dinner at Sol Inti and headed back to the hostel to get up “bright and early”, rather “not bright and cold” for our 4am tour.

High today= 89 degrees gorgeous day
Low today= 30 degrees burrr... can't imagine what its gonna be like at 4am

San Pedro de Atecama

Today our bus left Salta at 7am heading for San Pedro, Chile. What was supposed to be an 8 hour trip ended up being a 12 hour trip. Despite the beautiful drive through the winding mountains, hills, salt falts, and geysers the trip was pretty rough because of the high altitude. Many people on the bus were feeling light headed, nauseous and having trouble breathing but we all made it!

Once I got here it felt like I was on another planet, we were just in the middle of a desert and everything was so open and vast. Now it makes sense that the water is scarce here, its so dry. We went into the center of the village where there were restaurants where most had a fire pit in the middle, which was very comforting since the temperature dropped so much at night. I got chicken and grilled veggies in a red wine sauce that was just delicious along with a glass of tinto vino(red wine).



Then we headed back to our hostel, I am loving San Pedro it has a very indigenous feel, I can't wait for tomorrow when we are going to try to book some tours.