Khrys weblog

The overnight bus trip from Nazca to Cusco took 15H instead of 12H planned. Luckily, we were in good company :)
   
Cusco (from Quechua Q’osqo) means belly of the world, as it was at the capital and center of the vast Inca empire, spreading from south of today’s Ecuador to north of Chile and Argentina. It is located in the mountains, 3350m above sea level. To cope with the altitude (difficulties with breathing, headache, etc.), we tried the coca tea, which is served everywhere here. It is advised to spent a couple of days to get used to the altitude before taking any trekking, so we rested the first day and went on a city tour on the second.

The city tour included visit to the Cusco Cathedral (built on top of an old Inca temple), the Sacsayhuaman (sacred temple and fortress, built under the rule of Pachacutec, by 25,000 men in 75 years), the Qenq’o (temple dedicated to the Condor god), the Puca Pucara (red fortress, located at the crossing of the main roads, to defend Cusco), and the Tampumachay (sacred fountain).
Cusco is a bit nicer and wealthier looking city than the ones we’ve seen so far. Temperature is obviously quite different from the coast, and one might need many duvets at night, especially since there isn’t any heating system. Showers, like in the rest of the country, give warm (not hot) water at random.
Photos

We spent about 2 days in Nazca. Mostly doing nothing the first one, to keep this blog up to date, rest a bit (especially since temperature was quite high), and Netta got to try the pool in the first hostel :)
On the second day, we found a very nice and cheap hostel to stay in, owned by a very helpful Peruvian-Dutch couple. It seems that in Peru, hostels are like mini-travel agencies and this one got our flight over the Nazca Lines organized, plus night-bus, taxi pick-up and hostel booking in Cusco for the 2 next days.

Flight over the Nazca lines in a 6 seat plane was … quite an experience. Good tip: take it in the morning, before your breakfast, as this is not for the faint-hearted. The landscape was exceptional and the drawings worth seeing. Nazca lines were drawn in the ground during the pre-Inca period (before 1400 AD), and represent animals, geometric figures and mysterious others things. It is still not fully understood what these figures were for. The common idea is some kind of representation of the star constellations, but to be honest, that doesn’t make much sense to me.
Enjoy the pictures !

From Lima, Francis had organized our arrival in Pisco, next to the Paracas Reserve. It’s important that someone comes fetch you there as the town is rather dodgy by night (we arrived late). We didn’t get much sleep, since tours were already booked and started early in the morning. We have had difficulties to sleep otherwise too, as we (Netta mostly) need to get used to sleep with noise, traffic etc. which they have here late at night and early in the morning.
First tour was a boat trip to Bellastas islands, where we got to see amazing rock formations, a famous drawing called El Candelabre, many species of birds (there are thousands of birds there) including cormorants, pelicans, but also sea lions and penguins, and even a couple of dolphins ! The trip was really great and it was good to breath fresh ocean air after Lima’s pollutions. And Netta didn’t even get sick on the boat! :) The temperature here has been 22 (first day in Lima)-33 degrees, and we already took some colours.
Second tour was a bus trip around the National Reserve. There, we stopped many times to walk closer to amazing cliffs, red sand beaches, yellow sand dunes, fossils and flamingos.
A good deal of Peru is a desert, and Lima is the second largest city built in such an arid place, after Cairo, Egypt. It hardly ever rains, and drinking water is hard to get.
The day was relaxing and felt more like being in a holiday destination. We definitely don’t regret waking up this morning :)

You can see our photos here.

Next step: Nazca.

We stayed 3 days in Lima. We got to see quite a lot in this small amount of time, and experience many aspects of the capital. So Francis, the hostel owner gave us a map in the beginning, where he marked places we should see and the places we should not go into, which was helpful.

We have been using both buses and taxis. The taxis are very affordable, but like for the rest, you need to try to bargain, as they easily take more money from tourists. Traveling by buses we have learned and experienced more the local life and the atmosphere. Plus it is really cheap, appr. 1-2 soles (25-50 cents) depending on the length of the journey. Buses are mostly minibuses, which we find funny for a 8 million inhabitant city. They don’t really have bus stops, but they shout to the people by the roads, tell them where the bus is going and try to get passengers. On the first day, we were extra careful, and didn’t dare taking the camera out much. On the second day, things went so well, that we perhaps became a bit over confident. The third day, while changing buses, Netta got too greedy and took one picture too much. In two seconds the camera was gone from her hand. Chris tried to catch the guy, but it was too dangerous as he disappeared between the traffic. Netta feels bad obviously as she feels she should have known better and not to take the camera out in a place she didn’t know. Especially because so far we have been very careful, took good care of things, left credit cards on the hostel, took copies of our travel documents etc. Well, things like this happen…
Luckily it’s just a thing that can be replaced and the insurance should pay for it, but it was a wedding present from Netta’s parent’s and brand new, so pisses you off for awhile of course.

Otherwise people have been very friendly and helpful. Chris’s Spanish skills have helped us a lot to move around as people don’t speak much English. Today at the police station (which looked like someone’s living room, policemen were watching American serie from tv) we got new proof of people’s friendliness. The police were nice, and when the hostel owner had heard what happened, he came to pick us up from the station and made sure everything was ok.

Lima is not very uplifting city apart from few nice plazas and rare buildings. Most of the buildings are in bad condition, mostly because of the poverty, but also due to frequent earthquakes. The only nice thing about them is that they are colourful.

Prices for food and clothes vary a lot depending on the area. The same menu can cost you 5 times the price, but also quality can be a surprise. The first day we had a traditional chicken dish in a fancy area for 20 soles (5 euros). The following day we wanted to find a price we were expecting from Peru. In the city centre we were happy to find 6 soles (1,5 euro) menu, but found out that beef on the menu was big pieces of pure fat… nice.

Have had some problems with stomach, perhaps for washing teeth with tab water, just keep forgetting it..
Luckily not too bad yet.

Among places we were able to visit: city center of Lima, Cerro San Cristobal (the hill behind the city), Christian catacombs, Huaca Pucllana (sacred pyramid of Lima civilization, 1 to 700 AD), pyramids of Pachacamac (Lima, Ishma and Inca civ.), Arqueologic museum de Lima, etc.

Next episode: Paracas National Reserve.

You can click here and here to see our photos.

We took off as planned from Lyon last Saturday. The flight was short since we were only going to Madrid but things got more complicated when we wanted to board the plane for the second leg of the journey. For some reason, Air Iberia had done something wrong when checking us in to the first flight. In Madrid then next airline’s (LAN) employee told that she cannot let us into the plane as the travel agency who booked our trip didn’t complete the booking correctly. As a result we had to fight with employees of both companies to finally get into the plane on time.
   
After that, we tried to sleep most of the journey (especially since the on-board computer wouldn’t let us watch movies). Even though we were so tired, we didn’t sleep well. I guess it’s always the case in planes.
Netta had some problems with legs as they got stiff and had to stand up and walk many times.

Arrived to Lima airport at 6.30 am. Thanks to Netta’s search over the internet, we managed to choose a good taxi right away, and got to our hostel. Have to say that we were a bit nervous though as we had heard that you have to be very careful choosing the taxi and because the houses looked quite crap on the way from the airport. The hostel staff was very friendly, and the owner was especially helpful showing all the places we should visit in Lima, which bus to take, etc. Since it’s early morning, we take a nap and head outside.