Wow - I can't believe how fast this past week flew by... maybe because I didn't really sleep much (other than a few stray hours on my many overnight buses and here and there in the bus station) but in any case a whole other week has just come to an end!
On Sunday I finally made it to Cuzco, Peru. As we were descending and approaching the Cuzco airport (which was a beautiful flight, by the way) I looked out the windows and thought to myself "wow - we're mighty close to these mountains on the sides..." - it wasn't until a few days later that I found out that some say it's actually quite dangerous to fly into Cuzco because of the surrounding mountains - that there is very little room for error there and in the past there have been some accidents. Woops! Anyway - it is beautiful and mountainous and seriously green in this area. I got lucky once more when I was approached by a wonderful taxi driver at the airport who was friendly and honest and helpful - to the point that he agreed to accept Brazilian Real as payment because I didn't have a single Peruvian Sol on me - I was counting on exchanging at the airport but the tiny facility's exchange counter was closed... it is super comforting to a traveler to have someone genuinely want to help you and not try and take advantage of you in a potentially vulnerable situation. And he even spoke to me in Hebrew a bit when I told him I was from Israel! He already knew "todah rabah" so I taught him "bevakasha" even though he kept repeating it as "vebakasha"... anyway, I tried!
Cuzco is full of Israelis! Not just certain places but everywhere! This is definitely one of those places that Hebrew can help you when you don't know Spanish. I was nervous about getting altitude sickness here as many people do suffer from it upon arrival - especially by plane - but thank God I've been feeling great and haven't had to take any pills. The first night that I arrived I was a little disoriented from a major lack of sleep but the next day I woke up feeling much more clearheaded and competent.
I met a girl at the hostel that I checked into and we ended up going ATVing together - it was my first time doing something like that and also my first time trying to drive something that was manual! It was loads of fun, and I got better and better and more and more comfortable over the course of the 3-4 hour adventure. We visted these salt mines and they were amazing! There is this warm water stream that runs through the mines that carries incredibly salty water into pools to create a space where the water can evaporate and leave behind the salt. You can run your hands through the water and lick it - super salty!! Again, the mountainous surroundings were beautiful and overall a really cool experience.
That night I took a bus to Puno to lake Titicaca (hee hee!). We visted the famous floating islands, taking a boat out through the reeds to go meet the locals and learn about their lives and culture. The islands rotate the receiving of tourists so as to spread the income from tourism and as not disturb the flow of work for the locals regularly. It is a very touristy show that they put on which some say exploit the locals (some parts were uncomfortable - like simulating going to the market to trade resources - like settlers of cataan - a simple explanation would have sufficed instead of the faux show). But on the other hand it was still informative to learn about and see the culture and also they kept emphasizing how tourism is actually helping the quality of life of locals - they now have solar panels for energy and cell phones and other "upgrades" ... but do they really need that? They lived for ages without and did an incredible job. Anyway, not my call - just my observing question. We continued to a big island in the middle of the humongous lake called Tequile. On the way we learned about the lake - how huge it is, how super deep it is, and how it is the highest navigatable lake in the world. It also has magnetic properties and at night sometimes you can see incredible lightning. This big island was far more developed than the floating islands - makes sense since it has more resources and is not a disconnected floating island. The natives have really colorful clothing and their garb can often represent different statuses like single, married, leader of the community, etc... For some reason they sell a lot of American imported candy all over the island (m&ms, Twix, Mars, pringles ). It became clear that the Incas have incredibly strong genes - I guess because they keep their community closely knit and don't mix many other genes but there is such a strong and dominant look - many people look very similar to my stereotyping eye. I'm really happy that I got to experience it but a one day trip was definitely enough.
I later went to the bus station for an overnight bus to Arequipa. I've noticed how forward I've become not being bashful about approaching new people. I saw another traveler sitting in the station, I approached him and spoke to him and we ended up waiting together for 4 hours to take the next bus. The next morning at the bus station at 4:30am we sat waiting not sure what to do as it would have been too early to check in anywhere when I saw another traveler, approached him and the 3 of us ended up taking a cab into town together. I thought I would have a quiet restful day in Arequipa to recover from my lack of sleep but I ended up meeting some nice people and we went to the local museum together. There is an ice princess named Juanita who was discovered in Peru in 1995. She was a child sacrifice (about 14 years old) to the Gods in the time of the Inca empire and what's special about her is that she was preserved really well in the ice for hundreds of years to the point that her skin and hair is still intact, as well as her internal organs. She is on display in an ice box of minus 20 degrees Celsius in this museum. It was cool and sad to learn about it but what an opportunity to see her! I also went on a free walking tour (you pay a tip at the end) - it was 3 hours long and fantastic! Super educational, entertaining from the wonderdul guide and a great way to meet other Travelers and see the city (especially because I only had one day there). At the end we were quizzed on information that we learned and I won a free beer! The history of the city and of the Inca and local people was fascinating.
I also signed up for a tour to Colca Canyon as a one day activity - pickup is normally at 3am but because there is a protest going on in Arequipa for 3 days having to do with the local mining situation, some roads were being closed and so they changed the pickup time to 2am - deadly. The tour starts so early because there is a condor viewpoint about 3.5 hours away and the time that they come out to show themselves is between 8-9am approximately. I'm very happy to have seen them here because I missed the condor viewing when I was in Argentina in Cordoba. The Condors are quite large and they glide so gracefully through the sky. Apparently they don't actually fly - they cruise and sometimes they came as close as 10 feet away! The rest of the Colca tour really just involved beautiful viewpoints and learning about the area and history - informative but at times a bit boring and dragged out because it was so far. I did learn that Peru is the Qinoa capital of the world. Before it became popular and trendy in other places in the world, it was considered a component of the typical Peruvian diet.
So I've mentioned that there were protests and it ultimately came to affect me as well. As our van was driving back to Arequipa, we got stuck on the road since the protesters were purposely blocking the roads by throwing big rocks into the middle of many roads in and surrounding Arequipa in order to disrupt normal life for locals and tourists alike. We tried to take side roads but those too were blocked off. We ultimately just pulled over to the side and our guide explained that we would just have to wait there -possibly hours upon hours - until the roads opened up... or we could choose to start walking into town which from that point would have taken about 3 hours. I freaked out a bit because it was Thursday and I was meant to take an overnight bus that night to get back to Cuzco for Shabbat and if we were going to be stuck there for much longer I would miss the bus and have to stay in Arequipa for the weekend. My head was racing, considering all my possibilities and trying not to cry knowing that that wouldn't help me and would probably just push me towards an unnecessary panic. There were only 3 other people who spoke English on the bus - a German man, a Belgian man and his Peruvian born wife. They all decided that it would be better to start walking because who knew how long the wait would be there doing nothing? I decided to go with with them thinking I didn't want to be the only English speaker left on the van and that if I wanted to get to Cuzco, I would need to take a chance because staying there would have meant definitely not making the bus. We started walking along the very dark street, where aggressive and angry protesters continued to throw rocks into the road and yell. After about 20 minutes, when we were already passing cars stuck in the other direction, we got picked up by a van of locals who drove us for about half an hour very close to the main part of town. Sitting in the back of that van, surrounded by locals, not understanding a word of what was being said, I almost laughed out loud just thinking about the ludicrousness of the situation. The guidebook I have certainly didn't recommend this experience... Simultaneously I kept praying to God that I would make it in time and that buses would actually be running out of Arequipa despite the protests and bevy of closed roads. After getting out of the van and walking another 25 minutes to the hostel (at one point realizing that we were actually walking with the protesters!!) I finally made it to safety! I met 3 other people who were heading to the bus station to catch a bus back to Cuzco as well so I quickly joined them and miracle of miracles I made it on time, there were buses running and I have to say that bus ride was the most comfortable bus ride I have had on this entire trip! Huge and luxurious seats and I actually slept most of the ride (I'll attribute part of that to the fact that I was also just dead tired from the week and my body just needed the sleep - no matter what the sleeping conditions were). I am very aware that God took really good care of me on this one.
So I made it back to Cuzco and had a lovely Shabbat meeting really nice people and eating delicious food! I think this Friday night meal was the biggest I've seen at a Chabad - even bigger than Bangkok, Thailand! I finally slept a night in a bed which was awesome although I was rudely awoken this morning by an aggressive bloody nose that caused me to rush to the bathroom leaving a trail of blood along the way -including on my pillow and sweatshirt and face! I think it's a combo of the cold and dry weather as well as the altitude. I even got another one later on during the day... hope it will pass!
I leave tomorrow morning (or really in 5 hours) for a 4 day excursion to the Inca Jungle trail ultimately leading us to the famous Machu Picchu. Looking forward to another exciting journey and to meeting some new people!!
Until next time, adios!
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