¡Hasta luego!

Where to begin?

Late Monday night, we packed “enough” into our book bags for two and a half days. Luckily we were able to leave the majority of our things at the hotel in Cusco. Tuesday morning we hopped on the bus at 8am. From there we headed to the Ccorao Market and a petting zoo! We got to play with llamas and alpacas and feed them. So fun! Then we headed to the Valle Sagrado and Pisaq for some hiking and AMAZING views! But sometimes you just accidently wear sandals because you didn’t understand your leader who spoke 5,036mph… but at least I was in good company with Kelly and Kayla.

Finally we arrived in Ollataytambo to ride the Incan Rail to MACHU PICCHU! It was a two hour train ride and was a blast. We played games the whole time. We stayed in Aguas Calientes for the night and shopped around. This town 100% reminded me of an amusement park. Picture Jurassic Park?

Wednesday morning started at 4am for us! How? 3 alarms and a rooster who was clearly confused. We had breakfast (kinda) in the hotel and sprinted to the bus at 5:30am. From there, we began our ascent to Machu Picchu. I had to make Kayla sit by the window because I still hate (more than anything) bus rides on mountains, and wow this was a mountain. We got to Machu Picchu at 6:30am and began the hike! We spent hours and hours going through the ruins and being absolutely amazed at what we were seeing. It truly looked like a painting. Then we kicked it into gear and went up, up, up for about 2 hours until we reached the most amazing view that my eyes had ever seen. It was quite the climb but the smile never left my face. I don’t know how, but it was better than I imagined.

Then with shaky legs and hungry bellies we began our descent. We headed back down the mountain to the town. We then had lunch at the hotel and collapsed into our bed for siesta. After siesta we headed out on a quest for helado (ice cream). Mission accomplished. After hanging out around the city more, it eventually approached dinner time with which we all (except the boys…) had tears of joy when they put a salad in front of us (more yummy stuff to follow our dose of fiber). Then… groupo fiesta with some “what are the odds?” game time. For those of you who don’t know… your odds are pretty good in this game but some pretty funny and crazy stuff can happen. I had to wear a napkin on my head as a bonnet for the rest of our time there and Kayla was supposed to have toilet paper hanging out of her pants all day today until a complete stranger approached her. All of this led to tears of laughter and a serious ab workout.

Today we headed back to Cusco with some long train and bus rides. We had lunch and then a free afternoon. Kayla, Kelly, Heather, Claire, and I all headed to the plaza to do some reading and people watching. We managed to fit 5 people on a 4 person bench. Snug indeed which was great because the weather here is more confusing than Georgia, which none of us thought was possible!

Best part of the day: An 8 year old Peruvian girl se llama Mariluz talked to us for an hour! She grabbed Kayla’s pen and drew all of us pictures. So sweet. We all bought a llama key chain from her. During the hour of her hanging out with us, we also bought homemade bread and looked at some beautiful paintings from an art student. Safe to say none of us read more than a paragraph.

Heading to a pizzeria tonight!

Buenas Noches!