Isla del Sol and Copacabana

Last week we took a gorgeous journey to the Isla del Sol in the middle of Lake Titicaca, where the Inca and Aymara people believe the sun god first emerged to bestow man, woman, the stars, and the sun and moon upon the earth. There is a boulder there shaped (though you have to look hard) like a puma's head. This is where the name Titicaca comes from. In Quechua titi = puma and in Aymara khar'ka = rock. Yay educational travelling!

Later on that night in the little lakeside town of Copacabana, we encountered a huge brss band playing loudly in the streets. After a gorgeous sunset over the lake we headed back to the squae where the band played on all night in preparation for Bolivian Carnival which is Feb 2. The most amazing thing was seeing all these little Bolivian women in their traditional skirts and bowler hats getting tipsy of liters of beer and dancing in the streets!

From there we took a bus across the straight of Tiquina where the bus is actually loaded on to a tiny decreped wooden "ferry" and sent across the chopy and rainy waters. That was pretty wild. We were also stopped by some very sketchy "police" on the highway who said they wee loking for drugs and then confiscated a carton of coke bottles some Bolivian women had been transporting. I have no clue what that was about, but I'm glad no money was involved.

At peace in La Paz

Following a bus journey through the Altiplano, ¨the Tibet of the Americas¨ we've been having a very chill time in La Paz, the semi-capital of Bolivia. There is quite a tense polticial situation here with the resource rich Sant Cruz province wanting to break away and the La Paz government issuing a new constitution that is very much like the one in Venezuela (if that means anyting to anyone). As a compromise negociations are taking place in Sucre which is the judicial capital. Here in La Paz though, Evo Morales and his semi-socialist agenda are extremely popular and I even bought a wrist watch with his face on it to prove it!

Otherwise this city is shockingly beautiful. It's emormous, cosmopolitan (we've been eating at an awesome 100% Natural food restaurant) and full of life. It must be what Mexico City is like. We're staying in this palacial old hotel that rents out as cheap as a hostel because it's falling apart. For us though, it's serious luxury and is right next to the main plaza. We're touring some art museums, such as the Museo Contemporanio Plaza yesterday which is a private gallery in an amazing old decorated house here and had some really amazing pieces, and just getting ready for some serious travelling across Chile. It's 8 hours to the beach in Arica from here and then 28 hours to Santiago and another 18ish to Puerto Montt from there. All that in about 10 days. Yipes! More from Chile... and photos will be up to illustrate all this blabbing very very soon (I hope).

treking the top of the world!

We explored Machu Picchu yesterday and were totally blown away (almost literally a few times, those stones are slipery and it´s windy!). In addition to the beautiful ruins themselves, we also hiked up the nearby Wyna Picchu which is a couple hundred feet taller than Machu Picchu. It was 2 hours of pretty intense hiking but totally worth it. The peak of the mountain is actually above the clouds, so it´s extremely surreal. Occasionally the clouds would blow away and there was a perfect view of the main ruins on the other mountain. Christine and I had been joking about how you want to reach out and touch the clouds as a kid. It´s unbelievable that there´s a place in the world where you actually can!

We spent about 6 hours there all together, including the hike through gorgeous tropical jungle back down to the little town at the bottom of the mountain, Aguascalientes. The town gets its name from the thermal hotsprings located here. We spent pretty much the whole day there when we arrived. It´s pretty awesome soaking in naturally hot mineral waters surrounded by amazing mountains that scrape the clouds. We met up with a Portuguese lobbyist there who we had met in Cusco at dinner the night before and had a great time with him eating out again here. He introduced us to a really cool Chilean couple who told us to look them up when we get to Santiago. Yay travelling connections!

Otherwise, things are going wonderfully. The Peruvians (Peruanos en Español) are great people. Friendly, chill, and beauftiful in a really servere mountain way and we´ve been enjoying living off the mercados in each town. Today we made some delicious avacado and cheese sandwhices (which cost about 2 dollars for everything) and ate them in the little plaze here next to a big statue of some Inca king. We´re just killing time here until we catch the train back to Cusco and then the bus from there to Bolivia. Execpt for the copious gangs of tourists, it´s pretty much a paradise.

En el ombligo del mundo - Cusco, Peru

Christine and I arrived here in Cusco, known by the Inca as the "navel of the world" and center of their outrageously huge empire at about 7:30 in the morning yesterday. I had been up for a full 24 hours at that point and was ready for nothing but a bed to crash in. After a couple hours of sleep at our hostel, I woke up and suddenly remembered I was in South America and got up to check out the town. Luckily, I didn't have to go far since there is a terrace on the roof of the hostel with a perfect view of the main plaza and the city.

There are two dominant colors here: the intense green on the mountain slopes and the ubiquitous dull red of the tiles covering every single roof top. The people here are amazing. There are groups of the tiniest old women you'v ever seen all dressed in sarapes and traditional dress at al the plazas surrounded by a totally modern populace. It's a rich contrast.

We've still only been here a short time, and it's taken a while to not just feel like I'm in Mexico again. The tiny cobbled streets leading up the mountain to our hostel, the coca tea, and constant sounds of Andean flute players have helped remind us that we are definitely somewhere else.

Our first night found us on the balcony of a little upstairs bar where we got to know the staff and some wandering Australians and the bottoms of a few glasses. After that we found a really cool restaurant where one entire wall was made up of the ancient Inca stone walls that this entuire city is built on top of. We had Alpaca steak and wine and a great time walking home through the drunken singing and sights of ou first Saturday night south of the equator.