Some more Pictures of Machu Picchu:

The view once we reached Machu Picchu looking out over the Andes Mountains as the sun was rising.

Llamas and alpaca graze the Lost City´s center, where the townspeople would gather to listen to Incas and important figures like shamans address the community.
Wildlife:



























The train that we took 11km from the Hydroelectric Plant to Aguas
Calientes.

They say that the Incas carved faces in this stone of spirits. Can you see them? Taylor was a disbeliever, but I can make out a few.


The next three pictures are a series. Can you see what this 20 ft. rock composition makes up?

































The top two pictures are of the wings of the Condor and the bottom is the head.



Intihautana, the hitching post of the sun: a sun dial with a wealth of astronomical and religious importance. Considered the most sacred location in Machu Picchu.














Looking up at agricultural terraces and the guardhouse, through a great example of the Inca's trapezoidal windows - smooth, beautiful, and sturdy enough to withstand earthquakes.

The Islands of Lake Titicaca

After taking a night bus from Cusco to Puno (where we were told it would arrive at 5am and that we could stay on till 6, but instead we arrived at 4 and were told to get off the bus, leaving us to nap some in the terminal, á la Mendoza) we began our exploration of Lake Titicaca. At about 3800m lake Titicaca is billed as ¨the highest navigable lake in the world.¨ After sleeping for a few hours in the bus station, thankfully without incident, we were aproached by a travel agent describing a one night homestay, three meals, and boat ride to some of the islands; we agreed and were quickly off on a new adventure.



We visited a floating island on the lake that was created by first cutting 2m by 2m squares of reed roots, then lashing them together in a grid maybe 20 meters across, and finally laying cut reeds on top of the blocks to create the surface of the island. On this island there are small huts where about 10 people live.

Floating Island:

The next island, Amantani, is where we met our new family that we stayed with for the night and who cooked our breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Each meal was simple but tasty; both lunch and dinner were served with a spectacular soup, one of quinua and the other of noodles, and a second dish of rice and potoatos. Breakfast was a piece of bread and a delicious pancake. The island was beautiful and simple - it was made up of small villages that surrounded the two peaks, Pachamama and Tatapacha (Mother Universe and Father Universe in Quechua), which stood about 4200m tall. We hiked up Tatapacha at the end of the first day and watched the sun set over the lake which was spectacular, despite being approached a dozen times each by the same five little kids trying to sell us the same bracelets.

The next morning we said goodbye to our new family and got on the boat to head to the next island, Taquile. When we arrived our travel guide gave a great explanation about the history and the culture of the island and then let us walk around and explore before meeting up again for a traditional island lunch. The views from the island were breathtaking and this island was bigger then the last and was more developed, with a Plaza de Armas and electricity unlike Amantani. Lunch consisted of a quinoa soap, and trout with rice. Then after lunch we headed for a three hour boat ride back to the port.

Machu Picchu (and Cuzco pt. 2)

Machu Picchu is only accesible via the town of Aguas Calientes, at the base of the mountain, and Aguas Calientes is accessible mostly via a long, expensive train ride. We elected to take a cheaper, longer, less traveled, and more adventurous route that basically involved a lengthy flanking maneuver by car to approach Aguas Calientes from the more remote back side. It was an all-day affair, with an international cast of 10 stuffed into a minivan; crossing dozens of engorged creeks; climbing up over passes somewhere around 13,000 ft; passing through the cloud forest villages of Santa Maria and Santa Teresa (among smaller ghost towns that the jungle was visibly reclaiming); squeezing into the trees to let big trucks past on an impossibly narrow road; waiting in a crowd to watch two police investigators try to make sense of a head-on collision between a tour bus and a now crumpled minivan eerily resembling ours (we saw an almost identical accident on the return trip); and finally descending into the gorge where a short segment of train tracks reached out from Aguas Calientes to an unlikely transportation outpost - the Cuzco region´s hydroelectric plant. How´s that for a sentence - can you tell Taylor is writing? On the 45 minute train ride upstream from the hydro plant, we got to witness the source of Cuzco´s and Puno´s electricity - the Rio Urubamba, cascading torrentially through the steep gorge with the force of late-summer rains. We checked into our hostal in Aguas Calientes, ate a quick dinner with our fellow tourists, and bedded down to prepare for an alpine start.

Up at 4:30, we left town, crossed a footbridge with the Urubamba thundering below us in darkness, and by light of the moon began the climb to the ¨Lost City of the Incas.¨ We got to the main entrance just before six, as the sun was beginning to illuminate the mist that filled the mountains around us. There we joined a few dozen other smiling hikers waiting for the gate to open, satisfied to have beaten the first bus up the hill. Inside, we had a few minutes to cross the city, grab tickets for the first-come, first-serve climb up the neighboring crag of Wayna Piccu, and meet our tour guide at 6:40. The 2-hour tour was great, though we didn´t learn much that Juan hadn´t already told us at the other ruins. Machu Picchu deservedly bears the title ¨Maravilla del Mundo¨- one of the new 7 wonders of the world. From its breathtaking location to the beauty and scale of its stone architecture, to the feeling it impressed on us of being transported back through time, it was the most memorable thing we´ve seen on the whole trip.

Here´s a shot to go on the wall back at work (the matching shirts were even cuter because our names were on the back). We had do this because our friend Mike brought back a picture with his Second Nature shirt atop Aconcagua, the highest peak in S. America. Maybe this is the start of a tradition...

Yesterday was a day of rest after all that climbing, back in Cuzco with Juan, Marta, Wendy, and Aaron. They took us to a lake where we all crammed into a paddleboat for quick afternoon excursion, then to a local open-air restaurant that specialized in the infamous Peruvian delicacy, Cuy (guinea pig). Unsettling as its appearance was, we had to admit it was not half bad.

Finally, here´s a shot of Cuzco´s central plaza from a balcony where we had lunch today - really good Thai food, of all things. Tonight we're off to Puno and Lake Titicaca.

Cuzco pt. 1

Hey friends,
Well, from Mendoza we headed north to a small mountain town called Cafayate in a valley filled with yet more wineries. We skipped out on doing any more wine tours but enjoyed seeing the town from our dusty, dirty little $3 campsite. Taylor hiked a couple of hours in the sun to see a series of waterfalls on the Rio Colorado, and got to cool off by swimming in a beautiful spot. Unfortunately the pictures have all been unloaded to CDs that are on their way back to the States now. Meanwhile Melissa was busy doing a phone interview with Springfield College, where she just this evening learned she was accepted for grad school!

From Cafayate we slogged a long, long way on a series of buses up through Bolivia (beautiful country, minus all the trash that people throw everywhere), straight through to Lake Titicaca and Peru, winding up in Cusco in time to meet Taylor's mom Lynn the day after she landed. We've now spent the better part of a week in Cuzco, staying with Lynn's shaman friend Juan and his family. We spent several days driving around Cuzco's surroundings, including the Sacred Valley, seeing one impressive set of Incan ruins after another. Usually we arrived early and got the ruins all to ourselves, with our own personal guide recounting humorous legends and giving explanations of all the spiritual architecture from his shamanic perspective. It's been magical.
Tomorrow we leave Cuzco for Aguas Calientes and the crown jewel of South American archeology, Machu Piccu!

Mendoza

First of all, we went back and added some pictures to the last three posts, so check them out.

Well, we`re packing up to leave Mendoza, Argentina tomorrow, after spending a week in the home of a winemaker and truly wonderful host, Pablo. It`s late now, so maybe we can say a little more tomorrow before we catch our bus, but the gist of it is that wine country has been beautiful and relaxing, minus an unexpectedly ugly start:

After getting into the Mendoza bus terminal around 5am, we lay down on our thermarests to nap a bit and let the sun come up. After a while, though, the experience became significantly less restful when a man who had been sleeping on a nearby bench started moaning, then got up and approached us, mumbling unintelligibly and spitting on the floor. We tried to get him to go away, but instead he tried to sit down on Taylor`s thermarest. When Taylor pushed him away, he got angry and started swinging. Fortunately none of the punches landed, and a couple of Gendarmarios (sort of military, sort of police) came around the corner and put him on the ground right as he tried to kick Taylor in the chest. No harm done, except that we were a little shaken up, and that we spent half of our first day in Mendoza sitting in a police station filing a report in two languages with the help of the Tourism Police, a select few officers who speak English and are assigned to help foreigners like us with any problems. I suppose the silver lining of that experience was how helpful they were, even driving us around some and storing our packs as we tried to get ahold of Pablo.

Since then, the week has gone totally smoothly. We`ve toured enough wineries to begin losing track, and consequently have learned (and tasted) a lot. Getting to know Pablo has made the stay here even richer. We also spent two nights up in the mountains outside of Mendoza, where we had a hostel pretty much all to ourselves. This week has added even more variety to our trip, as the slower pace has been a welcome change from the constant turnover of cities, buses, and hikes we`ve experienced so far. Mendoza, we`ll miss you!

Pucón

After Siete Tazas, we headed on a bus through the night to Pucón where we were going to try to climb Villarrica Volcano, just north of the lake region in Chile. We arrived into town in the morning and with little information from the CONAF (forest service) sites or tourist center we headed to the volcano with the hope of summiting it. Villarrica stands 2847 meters and is a steep walk up crushed lava to the rim. On our way into the park we drove by the CONAF officers, who waved us on without giving us any sort of information.

Volcan Villarrica seen from the town of Pucon

When we reached the top parking area where the ascent on foot would begin, we combed the area in search of a trail, or someone to talk to you and ask where to begin and any other information that would be helpful. We found nothing. We spotted a girl coming down the volcano and approached to ask for some information, she pointed us towards the top and said it would take about 5 hours. Since we couild see the top we began to climb upward. We walked for a while until reaching a hut just shy of the snowline, where, for the first time came upon some information about summiting the volcano. It said that noone is able to go beyond this point without registering with CONAF, and without the proper gear - an ice pick, a helmet, and crampons. We were disapointed, but were trying not to lose sight of the spectaular view around us. From where we were, we could see the impressive Volcan Lanin, even taller than Villarrica, towering over nearby Lanin National Park, as well as some lakes scattered across the wide valley.

We hitched a ride back to town with a professor who told us a place to rent the gear we needed and how cheap it was to rent, but since we would need another day for a second attempt, we decided to continue with our plan to return to Santiago through the night. We spent the day walking around the touristy ski town and took a short nap on a black sand beach along the shore of a beautiful mountain lake.

Back in Santiago for one last day, we stopped back in to see Jaime and Pablo, who were now hosting a guy from Norway. We ventured to the zoo, which was a bit of a disappointment. It was disheartening to see how cramped and dusty the habitats were, although because the zoo is situated on the side of a hill, most of the animals do have a nice view of the sprawling metropolis.

Our Adventure Continued

At one point the cairns, cow and horse tracks that we were following disinergrated. We combed the area for any sign of the trail and came up short, so we decided to drop our packs. Taylor went in search of the trail while Melissa stayed with the packs so we wouldn`t lose those or travel any further in the wrong direction. While Taylor went in search of the trail a white tailed hawk flew from his direction over Melissa and perched on a tree in the direction that we came from. So we went with that sign and followed in the hawk`s direction. As Taylor neared the tree the hawk took off and and changed direction; as its path and Taylor's crossed, he stumbled upon another cairn. We took this as an omen that we were being looked after and continued onward.

We hiked till dusk, which was about 8:30, estimating that we had made about 16 - 18 miles this first full day. We found a flat spot on a cliff over looking a lush green valley, which we would later find out was the valley that we wanted to be in to see Siete Tazas. The next morning we awoke sore and exhausted, packed up our stuff and fell back into the routine of trekking. We climbed over a mountain to a plateau to find wild horses grazing in our path and a tree line approaching. The treeline looked hopeful as it seemed to have a more defined trail. After hiking about 4 miles we came up on a man and his son making what looked like a sweat lodge out of organic materials. They had built a hut out of trees, covered it with leaves and were now adding dirt and sealing it with water. After talking to the men about where we were, we found out that we were FAR ,very far from the Park. How far, we didn't know - they had no clue, not even a guess, just very far. However they told us that we could follow the road till it got to a main road and that road would eventually lead us to Molina, the city that we were going towards after the park. So with no clue how far to walk on this dusty road we took off, with blisters, sunburn and disappointment.

About five hours and maybe 6 miles later we saw a house and approached it to ask, again, where we were and how far we were from civilization. A very generous family offered us water with wheat flour and sugar and told us that we were not the first trekkers to have stumbled upon their house. We drank the sweat concoction and were given a bag of tomatoes and peppers and led through a yard under some barbed wire, and over a river by three kids that said we should hit a main road in about an hour or an hour and a half. After two hours of walking down this dusty gravel road we came upon the road that led to the park, right as a bus that read Siete Tazas was coming down the road! We were finally where we had wanted to be, after hiking about 40 miles, in the heat for two and a half days.

The park was not what we were expecting. All of Chile also thought that this would be a great place to pass the hot, summer days and so there were droves of people packed into campgrounds that rimmed the Rìo Claro. As we got to the end of the bus line we were in a dusty overcrowded campground where we were able to buy a few beers and a completo (a hot dog in a bun that was dense and homemade smoothered in chopped tomatoes, guacomole, mayo, ketchup, and mustard. YUMMY!! And yeah, Melissa ate some of the hotdog - we were so hungry after all that hiking we both would have eaten anything at that moment. However, we were well prepared with enough food to make the trip and did not need to buy anything (so you parents don´t worry - we could have cooked a meal for ourselves, for we had enough supplies for a few more days if we were still lost in the woods).

The next day we saw the falls, which were magnificent. We even were able to swim in a pool of water that had a huge waterfall falling into it, which was freezing. All in all the journey turned out to be quite the adventure and all worth it.