Mark And Ann's Travel Journal (Public view)

What a big day.  We left the hotel at 8:00am and returned after 11:00pm.  We had a 2 hour bus trip to get to the other side of the worst of the mudslides which were still unrepaired.  These people have literally moved mountains to get this train operational in the 8 weeks since the disaster hit.  There have been mudsli...

Todaqy was a mixed up day.  We went out for some adventuring and ran into one of our group, Tim, who informed us that we needed to buy our entry ticket into Macchu Picchu for tomorrow today in the city.  This then involved a line up for 2 hours at the cultural centre as EVERYONE in Cusco seemed to be heading for the lo...

The adventure of getting home last night was an amazing one.  It was Holy Monday and there was an incredible celebration going on in the city centre.  The people bring out a statue of the crucifiction made out of llama skin and parade it around the main square.  It is said that during an earthquake in the 1650,s the pr...

We decided to check out bakery street today.  They seem to have streets devoted to things here.  There is barber street, lawyer street and so on.  Mark was hankering for a sweetie so off we went.  They don´t do bakery like we do bakery let me tell you.  We found one shop that sold ´sausage rolls´ that ended up being a ...

We decided to have a rest day today.  After doing some catch up on the journal we wandered the shops for  a while and bought a few more souviners.  After lunch we went to the store and bought some nibblies and headed home for a movie afternoon.  We had a full body massage as is the done thing after trekking apparently....

Slept like a log.  Atmosphere in the camp was much more lively.  Journey´s end was in sight.  My knees struggled seriously with the downhill trek yesterday and I hoped they would hold out for the day.  It is strange getting served 3 course meals in a tent in the middle of nowhere but it was much appreciated. Our chefs ...

Well, day 2 started with having not much sleep.  Nerves playing as a big a part as anything else.  Mark slept okay. The first 2 hours of the trek was to be the hardest and they didn´t let us down.  We had a hearty breakfast in our little dining tent and readied ourselves for the effort.  Santi, our guide, was very pati...

Up at 5:30 to take the bus back to the Sacred Valley to begin our journey across the Andes by foot.  We arrived in Calca and went into a bakery to buy bread to give to the children that we will meet along the way on the trek.  We bought a bag of bread each all 11 of us.  Lots of bread.  We then went to the market and h...

Today we took a bus through the sacred valley.  The scenery was magnificent.  The valley sits between enormous mountains of spectacual beauty.  It comes with snow caps in places too.  We stopped at several townships along the way to look at the markets and get food.  Santi took us to a bakery for a snack.  It was a sto...

WE were up early to take the boat ride back to Puerto Maldonada for our return flight to Cuzco.  On arrival we went to Air Peru office and retrieved the precious Iphone.  There was much cheering from the group when we reached them with phone in hand.  The day was a bit of a waiting game through airports etc.  We reache...