Peru 3

Other Journeys

The Peru Report 3

In this report, Nancy Stevens, is making her way to Machu Picchu, Peru, by way of Lima with a tour group. She then plans to travel to Lake Titicaca.

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Urubamba

Urubamba November 9
My head feels better today. My mother is sick though. Breakfast is, once again, white bread, and I'm craving oatmeal and whole grains. We went on a rafting trip, which was basically just a float down the Urubamba River. I was in the front and did get wet during one class 2 rapid. Other than that, though, it was quite mild. Met some really nice Peruvian's - the guides on our boats. And, of course, the Andes are incredibly beautiful. We were in Ollantaytamba. We saw ruins and had lunch back at the river rafting site. After lunch, we went to a place where they make chicha, which is basically beer made from corn. You can tell if a place is open and selling chica because they put out a red plastic bag on the front of the house/building. There was a game called sapo there that we played, girls against the boys. You get ten coins and you toss them trying to get them in the mouth of a golden frog. The frog sits on top of what looks like a bedside table. There are also other slots on the top of the table. And the drawer opens up and has separate compartments with different point values. Our guide, Walter, said that if we got a coin into the frogs mouth, we'd get a free bottle of chicha. The first female thrower got a coin in the frog's mouth. I also got a coin in the frog's mouth. So the girls beat the boys, but we got two big bottles of corn beer to split amongst ourselves.

I learned how to say "how are you?" in Quechua - "Ayeeanchoo" - that's my phonetic interpretation, having no idea how it's really spelled. The response you give if someone says that to you is "ayeeanmee", which I assume means "I am fine".

Later that evening, we split into two groups and went to the home of a local Peruvian family for dinner. At the home were the mother, her 14 year old daughter, her 11 year old daughter, their 15 year old cousin and another 10 year old cousin. It was fun talking to the kids about all kinds of things. They were really nice and cute - and they were especially interested in learning how to do some Chinese finger exercises that I showed them.

After dinner we went to a dance. It was a celebration of the 147th anniversary of the town of Urubamba and the Sacred Valley. People came from a bunch of different towns. They stood around in circles, sometimes with some alcoholic beverage in a bottle in the middle of the group. And they danced by moving slightly in place. At one point I saw two guys holding onto each other in what looked like a hug. It looked like they were going to start kissing or something, though one of them looked upset. I found out later from a guy I was with at the party that one of them was upset because a girl wouldn't give him the time of day. And the other one was holding onto him and whispering in his ear to try to calm him down and stop him from reaching into his pocket to get something which my friend assumed was a knife. Of course we'll never really know.

November 10
My mother is better today. It seems like everyday someone else in our group is getting some kind of indigestion, headache, diarrhea (sp?) or a fever. I guess I'm lucky I got off with just a headache!

Today we went to Machu Picchu. On the way we stopped at an elementary school and visited a classroom of third graders. They were really cute. Their teacher told us that the biggest problem they are having right now is that the roof needs to be fixed. Oh, and also, that sometimes teachers don't show up to teach. The kids sang a song for us in Spanish, then in Quecha. Then we sang "Row your boat" in a round, in English, for them. They seemed to like it, as some of them sang with us.

We went to a train station and took a train to Aguas Calientes. I saved my ham and cheese sandwich and gave it to a woman when I got off the train. This was a suggestion from Walter, and it seemed like a good idea, since they've been feeding us a lot! We walked to our hotel. Our room overlooked the river and we could see up into the mountains where we would be heading to get to Machu Picchu. Machu Picchu is breathtaking. Machu Picchu means "Old Mountain" and Wayna Picchu -or Huana Picchu - means "Young Mountain". Walter showed us the hitching post of the sun. When we got there, there was a group standing around it, and a shaman was walking to each of them and performing some ritual on them. I looked up and noticed that a woman from our group had put herself into the circle of people the shaman was helping. It was pretty funny - she had a look on her face like a cat who had swallowed a mouse. The shaman just passed her by, though. Once they left, Walter told us about how the hitching post of the sun got damaged during a beer commercial. They put two beers on top of it, and the crane fell and broke a piece of it off.

The weather was great while we were at Machu Picchu, but when we got to our hotel, it started pouring. So we decided to get pizza delivered. We're all hoping it clears by tomorrow as three of us are hoping to climb Wayna Picchu.

While I was in the lobby using the internet, three guys from Chicago were talking to the woman at the hotel desk. They were trying to get massages, since an hour massage was only $25. There were only two women available to give massages and one man. It was funny to listen to them try to figure out what to do. They all wanted the women and none wanted to be massaged by a guy. They ended up just having two of them get massages. They told the woman at the desk to send two pretty women over for the massages and not the guy. The woman said the guy who gave massages was prettier than the women. I found out later when I ran into one of the guys at Machu Picchu that he was twenty-six years old. For some reason, I thought they might be younger than that!

November 11
It poured all night but let up by the morning. We awoke at 5 am, showered, packed and got a bus at 7:15 to go back to Machu Picchu. The rain let up enough for us to climb Wayna Picchu. It was really foggy on the climb up, though. And a bit drizzly. We also had Cero, a guide, with us. We reached the top in 45 minutes. The fog was rolling around and giving us glimpses of Machu Picchu below us. I could see the switchback trail that the bus takes up to Machu Picchu. I could see the Urubamba River and sections of the buildings and terraces below us.

There was a couple and their two daughters at the top - they were from Alaska. I asked if I could take their picture and they said yes. Then one of their daughters held out her hand and said "Where's my sol?" A sol is a coin worth about 30 cents. Everywhere you go in Peru, there are people dressed in traditional attire, and if you ask to take their picture, they expect you to give them a sol. When I told the Alaskan's I would email the picture to them, they said I could take their picture with their camera. So I did. And then I asked them for a sol and they laughed.

While I was sitting on the top, a call came across from the walkie-talkie that my mother wanted to talk to me. She had climbed to the Sun Gate, which is an easier climb, but also gets you up pretty high. Walter had suggested she call me to say hi. We stayed at the top for a while, soaking in the magnificence of the place.

On the way down I met one of the guys from Chicago. He was hiking alone because his two friends wouldn't join him. I also ran into a guy wearing a "Reach the Beach Relay" shirt. That's a running relay race that goes over night and into the next morning in NH (and maybe VT) - but I think it's just NH. It ends at Hampton Beach. He was from Burlington, VT.

On the way down from Machu Picchu in the bus, we saw a little boy, dressed as an Inca, and he was yelling something. Then at the next curve, he was there again, waving and yelling. He was at each turn on the way down and at the end he got on the bus, did some more yelling and collected money. I talked to him and he told me that he was 8 years old. That he does the run down two times per day. That he gets a ride back up on the bus. He was sweating when he caught up with us. I told him he was really fast and he seemed pleased with that.

Later, at lunch in Aguas Calientes, one of the cooks made really cool looking figures out of carrots. I had a fish. There were also birds, dogs - I took pictures - I can show you when I get back.

We took the train back to Ollantaytambo. When I saw Memo, our bus driver, it was like seeing a long lost friend - and we all hugged and kissed him. He drove us to Cusco, where I am now. We stopped at a weaving demonstration and I bought some alpaca socks with pictures of llamas on them.

November 12 Sunday - Cusco - weather: beautiful, warm, sunny

When we got on the bus this morning there was a shaman sitting in the back. We traveled to a local market. We were each given the name of something we could find in the market, and were sent in on a mission to find the item. We were going to give these items to the shaman in exchange for the healing ceremony he would perform, since he didn't take money. My mother and I got "cherimoya". I asked a young girl what it was, but she didn't know. She asked her mother, and we found out it was a fruit. Then that woman took us to another woman who was selling it. It's a round, green, dimpled fruit with a white custardy middle. It also has black seeds. The woman let us try some - it was good - sweet. You eat the white part, but not the skin or seeds. When we got back on the bus, we all explained what we had bought. Some people had bought the wrong thing. Walter, our tour guide, held up a bag and said that what he had in it was alive. He was holding it over my lap, so I asked him to back up. He did. Then he opened the bag and showed us cow lips and nose, still attached. He pretended to make it talk. I was slightly grossed out. He said that he, the bus driver and the shaman would all like to eat it. They would boil it, slice and grill it, and eat it. He said that they don't waste anything here in Peru.

Next we went to Sacsayhuaman which is a bunch of rocks that are supposed to be the teeth of a puma. The puma represents earth and power. I think the city of Cusco was supposedly built in the shape of a puma. They consider it to be the umbligo (belly button) of the earth.

Then we went to a field on a hillside where the shaman was sitting in between some benches in a circle. He was preparing for a healing ceremony. He had some paper on the ground held down by rocks. He put all sorts of things on the paper like: confetti, animal crackers, wafer cookies, sugar, beans, rice, corn, quinoa, llama meat. I asked why there was so much sugar and was told that since mother earth is a woman, she likes sugar. The stuff he was putting together was an offering for mother earth. We were all given three coca leaves and after blowing on them three times, we put them into the offering. He poured alphabet soup letters over the coca leaves to represent spelling our names. Then he folded up the package. We each got up and pointed to any place we were having pain and he patted us with the package of stuff and said some stuff we didn't understand. We had to blow three times on the package and that was it. Then after we were done and getting on the bus, he burned the package containing the offering for mother earth.

Nancy

Links

Yoga Link Yoga Theory 1 Class Starting Nov 9 7 pm

Antigua Miraflores Hotel

Rent Viv's English Flat

The Doctor Is In