Bus Trip through the Andes

We boarded a bus in Santiago, Chile this morning and spent the next seven hours making our way to Mendoza, Argentina. The scenery going through the Andes was amazing, the bus was very comfortable, and the border stop was fairly quick and easy. We have not traveled much by bus, but we definitely consider it a viable option for future travel after this wonderful experience. We did have a little snag when we got to the bus station in Mendoza because we were unable to withdraw cash from the ATM and the taxis didn't take credit cards. But, ultimately we worked everything out with the help of our landlord and finally arrived at our home for the month, which is a huge and wonderful place, in a very nice neighborhood, in the heart of Mendoza. We have been having so much fun fast traveling the last couple of weeks, and we are still sort of amazed by all we have seen and done, but we are ready to slow down and settle in for a while. Jeff will be taking a Spanish class while we are here, and the rest of us have various projects and activities to work on.

Beautiful Chile

Beginning to wind through the Andes

Snowy mountains

So much color and texture

Potrerillos Lake

A long, winding road

The vineyards in Mendoza are massive and beautiful.
We may or may not drink some wine while we're here!

Our lovely courtyard at our home for the month

Easter Island

We boarded a plane in Santiago, Chile at 5:30 in the morning on Thursday bound for Easter Island, after traveling all day and night the previous day. Jeff had upgraded us to first class, so we could stretch out and get some sleep, and it was a brilliant move on his part. We arrived well-rested and ready to begin a new adventure. That first day, our priorities were showering and finding a place to do laundry, and we had moderate success with both. The shower was cold but got us clean, and we were told that the only laundry facility on the island had "blown up" last week. However, our landlord's mother offered to do our laundry, so we were not completely out of luck. After those important tasks were taken care of and our national park tickets and groceries were purchased, we found a place to have lunch and then visited an awesome playground overlooking the ocean. The kids played there happily while Jeff and I wandered down the path to see our first moai statues, which was just amazing. We have both always wanted to visit Easter Island (also known as Rapa Nui), and we couldn't believe we were actually here! We all reconvened just as the sky opened up and started spilling its contents, and we headed back to our cozy little cabin.

The next day, we set out to explore the tiny island, which has a total area of only 63 square miles and contains three volcanos but only one town. The drive along the coast is absolutely stunning, and we had so much fun stopping to look at all the moai, especially the large group of 15 that stands on the coast and the ones scattered along the slopes of the Rano Rarraku volcano, which is believed to be the birthplace of all 887 statues on the island. We also visited another volcano, Rano Kau, which houses a mysterious village and has amazing views of the Pacific. It also has an amazing crater, which is now filled with a freshwater lagoon that acts like a greenhouse for many different types of plants. There is one spot from which you can view all these things at roughly the same time, and we believe it may be one of our favorite places on Planet Earth. Later in the evening, we had dinner at Pea, which sits right on the water.

On Saturday, we set out for another day of exploring, revisiting a few places and hitting some of the sites we had skipped during the rain storm that moved through the day before. We kept being astounding that we were actually here! It is such an amazing place and has been on our bucket list forever. We ended the day with an amazing dinner at Te Moana.

Today was our last day on the island, but we had time to visit the museum and Rano Kau again before our afternoon flight. We are so thankful we had the opportunity to visit this magical place!

Moai

Rano Kau
Clockwise from left top: Crater, Orango Village,
View of the Pacific, Rock carving

Amazing Rapa Nui

Fun for the whole family
(Notes: Top left--We never check bags, so it was special for
Clay to pick up his bag in the baggage claim. Bottom right--
Ruth wanted to say she had driven on Easter Island, so she
had the opportunity to learn to drive a stick shift.)

Arranged by size

Some of the moai scattered on the slopes of Rano Raraku

One of our favorite places on Planet Earth

The Outskirts of Cusco

The AirBnB where we stayed last night was listed as "entire place," but the hostesses were actually staying in a room in the house, which was a little awkward but not terrible as they were very nice young ladies who stayed out of our business. Also awkward was the fact that the water went out completely after only two of us had had cold showers. The water, though still cold, was back on this morning, but the awkwardness continued when the next guests showed up while we were still on the premises. They were eager to shower and move into the rooms and just lingered while they waited for us to vacate. This was a very new AirBnB listing, and we feel sure they are still just working out the kinks. We just considered it a quirky travel experience and basically got a good chuckle out of it.

After breakfast, a driver picked us up for some sightseeing on the outskirts of Cusco. First we stopped at a wonderful little textile market. There were llamas and alpacas to feed, and we got to see a demonstration of how wool becomes textiles. It was fascinating, and we really loved it! Ruth and Weston even found some items to purchase in the market stalls, and I can tell you they got some really good deals.

Textile Market

When we left the market, we headed to a salt farm in the mountains. They harvest the salt that is formed from the natural minerals found in the mountain waters, and it is quite an impressive facility. The water is diverted to hundreds of different pools and several kinds of salt are formed and collected at the site.

Salt Farm

Later, we went over to a site called Moray, which is an agricultural area built in concentric circles at different elevations. Our driver suggested that we visit the restaurant at the top of the hill as he imagined it would be cheaper for us to purchase something there for lunch and then view the area from their perch on the hill than to purchase tickets to the actual site. He was very wrong about that as the set lunch menu, served in eight courses, was around $125 per person. The idea was that it was supposed to be an experience, but it was not worth the price tag to us, so we just ordered drinks, which was still about the same as buying tickets to the site, and moved on. It was a bizarre place but somewhat interesting, and there was a nice view of Moray.

Clockwise from top left: The restaurant, The coffee experience,
Hot chocolate, The chocolate experience, The distillery,
Distilled spirits containing local flora, Mata Cuy from distilled
sugar cane, Herbs hung up to dry

Moray

From there, we headed back to Cusco to catch a flight to Lima and then a connecting flight to Santiago, thus ending our time in Peru.

Santiago airport in the middle of the night

Cusco and Machu Picchu

Not all travel is easy or goes according to plan. We left Iquitos early on Monday morning. We flew to Lima and were to connect to Cusco, where we were to be met by a driver and driven to a town a couple of hours away to catch a train to Aguas Calientes, where we would stay for the night. But when we got to Lima, we found we had randomly been bumped from our flight, which meant we wouldn't be able to make our other connections during the day. Jeff worked with the airline, trying to figure out our options, while I ran upstairs to the train ticket office to try to reschedule our train trip.

Eventually, we made it as far as Cusco, where by happy accident we had an apartment waiting for us, since we had booked it for the wrong night. We were worn out from a day of travel and stresses but walked over to one of the main plazas to buy our tickets for Machu Picchu, only to find that ticket office closed. Inquiries at a travel agency revealed there was another ticket office not far away that was likely still open. So, Jeff ran over there while the rest of us hung out in the plaza. Finally, with tickets in hand, Jeff returned, and we all breathed a sigh of relief as our last kink of the day worked out. Then we popped into a chocolate shop for some samples before eating dinner next door at Chicha. It was a nice restaurant with delicious food, and we got to try some popular local fare, including alpaca and guinea pig.

The streets of Cusco reminded us of Europe

A building in the plaza flying the Cusco flag

Double "Giddy-up Horsey"

The Choco Museo

Cuy (guinea pig) and blue corn crepes

Alpaca carpaccio

Alpaca curry

This morning, we caught a very early train at a station outside of Cusco and had a lovely ride up to Aguas Calientes, where we caught a bus that took us up to Machu Picchu. It was so surreal to be in a place that I have typically thought of only as a National Geographic photo. It was amazing and worth all the trouble, and we had a wonderful day making happy memories!

Train ride to Aguas Calientes
(Top left--There was no power in the train station when we arrived,
but there were several propane heaters set up throughout the station.)

Killing the Bucket List!

Machu Picchu

The Amazon

We arrived late last night in Iquitos and spent the day today exploring. Our day started with a delicious breakfast at our hotel. Then we had our first rides in motortaxis, which whisked us away to the Belena Market, the largest in the city. It was certainly a spectacle! We enjoyed (and didn't enjoy!) a vareity of experiences for all our senses. We got to try concha, an egg-based drink with boiled yuca, sweetened with sugar and vanilla. We all thought it was delicious! The bravest amongst us (Ruth and Weston) also tried a type of grilled worm. It was one of the more unique items for sale, but we saw plenty of other interesting things.

Hotel breakfast

Motortaxis

Balena Market

From bait to brunch

When we finished up in the market, we climbed aboard a couple of very small homemade boats in order to explore the floating village. For six months out of the year, the river overtakes the streets of the village and the area is only navigable by boat. I have never seen anything like it, and I truly cannot imagine living that way. However, the people seemed quite content, and we were told by our guide that they are a very happy people.

The floating village

Later, we boarded a larger boat for a tour of the Amazon and one of its tributaries. The tributary was especially beautiful and serene. We saw all kinds of birds and two varieties of river dolphins. The boys also got to fish for piranhas, but to their disappointment, they weren't successful. We had lunch aboard the boat, which included fresh fruits, cheese sandwiches, and juane, a local dish consisting of chicken, eggs, and olives wrapped up in a ball of rice and baked in some sort of leaf. It is a traditional dish of that region of the Amazon and it was very good.

An Amazon tributary

Fishing for piranhas

Juane

Pink dolphins playing in
the mighty Amazon

At the end of our tour, we visited a smaller market, where we tasted some roasted seeds from a plant related to cacao and some freshly shelled and peeled Brazil nuts. We enjoyed both.

The smaller market

Back at our hotel, we rested for a while before going out for dinner at a place recommended by the person working at the front desk, who, along with the rest of the staff, were very eager to please us. We suspect we may have been their first American visitors. Anyway, the dinner place turned out to be a sort of fast food place, which we think was recommended to keep us from having to wait long. Mother's Day is a huge deal here, and the restaurants were indeed packed. We got a good chuckle out of celebrating Mother's Day with fast food, which is typically forbidden by me when we're in the States. The food was good, though, and we had a great time.

A very happy Mother's Day indeed!

Exploring Paracas

This morning, after a nutritious breakfast of cake and cookies, we went over to Paracas Bay, where we boarded a tour boat that took us out to the Ballestas Islands. These rocky islands are full of cool rock formations and arches and are home to tons of wildlife, including dolphins, boobie birds, cormorants, penguins, and sea lions. We also got to see another awesome line drawing on the side of a hill.

Boat tour to Ballestas Islands

After the boat tour, we got to drive through the Paracas National Reserve, which is an amazing national park where the desert meets the ocean. The landscape was almost eerie, though quite fascinating, in it's desolation.

Paracas National Reserve

Following a tasty and big-portioned lunch, which included tacu tacu, a traditional Peruvian rice and bean dish, we made the four-hour drive back to the airport in Lima to catch a plane to Iquitos. The flight had rigorous weight restrictions for carry-on bags and fees for checked bags, so before checking in for the flight, we removed just the things we needed for the next several days and repacked into our daypacks. Then we left the rest of our stuff in the airport's luggage storage area. I feel sure I left something important behind that I will soon discover isn't as important as I thought!

Lunch at El Piloto

Nazca, Ica, and Paracas

We left Lima early this morning and headed to the Atacama Desert near Nazca, where we hopped on a little 12-seat plane in order to see the famous Nazca lines. We always love seeing things and places we've learned about in History class, and this was a truly amazing experience!

Ready to board the plane

Nazca Drawings

Afterward, we had lunch at the beautiful Hotel El Huacachinero in Ica. It was built in the 1800s, and it has literally set itself up as an oasis in the desert. It was awesome to look out on the hotel's man-made lake at the base of the massive sand dunes while we dined on the patio.

Hotel El Huacachinero

After lunch, we hopped in a dune buggy to explore the dunes and have a bit of adventure. We had a blast bumping along through the dunes, but our adventure got even better when the driver pulled out the sandboards. We laughed and squealed and completely covered ourselves with sand as we slid down the steep hills of the dunes. It was a blast, and I imagine we will be talking about it from now on!

Dune Buggy Fun

Sandboarding

A fabulous day with my favorite people

When not one more inch of our bodies could be covered with sand, we left Ica and drove off into the sunset towards Paracas, another coastal city. We are staying in a hostel in one room with three bunk beds, which is kind of an adventure in itself.

Sunset in the Atacama Desert

Hospedaje Racs in Paracas

*Click on photos to enlarge