"Going dark" on the Inca Trail

Just getting off the 4 day hike to Machu Picchu, via the fabled Inca trail. Bradley and Christine, and Danuders came down to join us for this trip. All was perfect, except for the fact that they "forgot" to make Daniel´s reservations onto the trail (booked 4 months prior, and impossible to get once they the realized mistake).

They told us there was one solution to the problem: They could sneak me through the control checkpoints in the cover of darkness. I decided it was better that I go covert and let Daniel use my reservation because if I let anything happen to him, I knew I would have some explaining to do to Mom and Dad

The following adventure ensued...

Monday morning, 1:30 AM:
Two Peruvian men, Rafy and Chino, pick me up and we drive 1.5 hrs to the entrance to the clandestine trail head. Along the way, we talk politics and the upcoming Peruvian election. Both guys are strong supporters of the far-left socialist candidate, and articulate intelligent reasons why they believe Peruvians have the right to profit from the nationalisation of oil production.

When the conversation turns to American politics, it becomes clear that their distaste for Bush and American policy is strong ( this is commonplace across the majority of South America). When asked my opinion, I decide that agreeing with them is in the best interest of my safety, as I am about to venture into the darkness with these strangers in less than one hour. A bad thing to say here would have been "You know, I think American world domination is really in Peru´s best interest." Instead, I went with "Ya, Bush is a loser."

3am: Arrive at rickety footbridge to cross the river. Our driver Rafy announces, "Here is where I turn around. You two are going to walk 1.5 hours until you hit the Control checkpoint. When you get within a 2Kms, turn off your flashlight and walk slowly and quietly. Everyone should be sleeeping. Facil, no problema."

3:05am: Five minutes in, Chino tells me to turn off my flashlight, it is too bright. For reference, my flashlight is about as bright as an indiglo watch. I started to get a bit nervous, as we are walking along a rig line, with a loud river roaring a few stories below. Trail is about 2 feet wide.


3:20am: Following conversation ensues...
me: "So Chino, how many years you been working for the company?"
Chino: "First day, I don´t actually work for them...just tonight¨"

I consider asking him if he has ever walked this trail before, but decide I dont really want to know the answer. (I find out later the next day that he was a friend of our guide. The guide was worried about him showing up for our mission, as he had been out at the bars chasing woman pre-1:30am. If I had known this, I think I would have felt more comfortable holding the lone flashlight)

3:50am: Chino whispers, "From here, we go dark." I immediately start having flashbacks to childhood, when we used to paint our faces with green and black paint, and play Army in Calvin and Ben May´s back yard. Only problem this time, is that instead of Johnny Cance blasting me from behind a bush with a squirt gun, I am worried it is going to be a Peruvian soldier with a sawed off shot gun.

4am: Been dark for 10 minutes. Tripped a couple times, but happy to have not yet fallen into the below river. Chino describes the moment, whispering, "We are like mexicans trying to cross the border to the US." I laugh, nervously

4:15ish: We can see the light from the control tower. We both know that conversation is over for the next 15 minutes. We inch forward until we are only meters away. All we can hear is our breath and our hearts beating...until suddenly, what sounds like a large dog starts barking. We keep walking, Dog sounds like it is getting closer. Suddenly, the whole "mexicans crossing the border" joke isn´t so funny.

4:25: We evade the dog, find a hole in the barbed wire fence, and take our first steps on the controled side of the Inca trail. Once my breathing slows down, I realized I am smelling some fresh poop. Pretty sure I probably stepped in the horse variety, but quietly wondered if I had a little accident in my pants.

4:45: Chino and I arrive at our previously agreed upon spot on the Inca trail to rejoin the group later that morning. We find a grassy spot outside a farmers hut, put down a plastic pancho, and try to sleep despite the near-freezing temperatures. I want to cuddle for warmth, but decide that would be awkward. An hour later, we watched the sun rise over the moutains and valley. Decided it was all worth it.

10am: Meet up with Kristen, Daniel, Christine, and Brad. Machu Picchu, here we come!

Pictures from the trail and and Machu Picchu coming next post...

From the shores of Lago Titicaca:

Hola all. we have just finished three weeks of language school in Cusco. Tomorrow Daniel, Brad, and Christine land in Cusco for a trip to Manchu Picchu and more days of fun. We are running behind on timeline of pictures, but flashing back to Dateline End-of-April, here are some pictures posted from Lake Titicaca (on the Border between Bolivia and Peru).

We started our Lake Titicaca tour, spending a night on the shores of Isla de Sol, the birthplace of the sun, according to the Inca legends. The above picture is our lunch spot--a traditional meal of lake Trout on the grill. After lunch we were planning on finding this "birthplace of the sun", but after a beer and a full stomach, we decided it was time for a nap. Our hostal could not offer us electricty, heat, or running water, but they did have lots of blankets and cost us about $3 for the night. Given the compassion of the Señora of the house, we were more satisfied.
In the above picture, Kristen is still searching for the birthplace of the sun. Turns out, we never really found it. We saw lots of Donkeys, Llamas, and sheep, but no evidence of UV rays being born. Next time...
Our last stop in Bolivia was a little town on the shores of the lake called Copacabana (above). We ended up staying here a couple more days then planned, due to an inpromptu transportation strike. We were upset for five minutes before realizing there are worse places to be stuck. If you look closely, you can see our hotel!! It is the giant pink one on the waterfront on the far right--we used our stellar spanish here to bargain for a nightly rate of $7.00, including breakfast. See below of for the view from our window.

The man below is one of the inhabitants of the Uros islands, a string of floating islands in Lake Titicaca, made out of lake reeds. There are close to 40 islands that were constructed years and years ago by the ancestors of the current inhabitants who were trying to escape wars on the mainlands. The entire culture of the islands centers around the reed plant--their islands are made of them, their boats are clearly made of them, they make their houses from them, and yes, they even EAT them!! (they kinda tastes like celery). Unfortunately we didnt get any good pictures of the islands themselves. We did, however, meet a Catholic priest on our trip to the islands from Tressie´s home of Effingham, IL and he knew of her family--what a small world.

As the sun set on Lake Titicaca, we realized we are not destined to see water again until the northern beaches of Peru. Dont feel too bad for suffering traveler, beaches are only two weeks away.

Hasta Luego,

Your now fluent spanish amigos

April 16-20: Salar de Uuyuni, Bolivia

Finally!! We have our pictures! Although this trip was a few weeks ago, we thought it was worth posting the pics because this was one of the most unreal things we have seen yet. We left San Pedro de Atacama, Chile on Sunday, the day of Easter. By 10 AM, we had crossed the Bolivian border (i.e., had showed our passports to a lone man in a one room house at the first point in Bolivia). Katie and I already had to use the bathroom at this point--when we asked where it was, the imigration hombre pointed to a 50 year old American school bus that had been painted by hippies and had no wheels, which was lying on its side 100 meters away from the "office." Apparently, the shield it provided from the open desert was a bathroom!! It was the last one we saw that day! After walking over the border, we jumped in a 4x4 with two other couples, Katie and Jim, and Haley and Tom (We had met haley and tom a few different times along the gringo trail) and set off on the tracks you see behind us--we didn't see a road in the conventional sense for three days. Ten minutes in, we passed the other jeep in our group stopped, with theguide under it, doing repairs...ALREADY!!!! The scenery was similar to what you see in the picture for the entire day--and I thought Delaware was the middle of nowhere!

Our 4x4 trip lasted three days, at the end of which we arrived in Uuyuni, Bolivia. It was the most incredible drive EVER! The first day we saw red lakes, green lakes, lakes so clear they looked like glass, pink flamingos, with the most interesting and colorful mountains as a constant backdrop--they also made an excellent backdrop for Dahli's paintings. (Hint: pay no attention to the people in the photos--we've ruined perfectly good lanscapes)


Day two we began at a naturally occurring rock tree, which was surrounded by all sorts of other weird rock formations--we literally felt like we were on another planet.

Day three was by far the most spectacular. After spending the night in a hotel made entirely of salt bricks (note to contact wearers: do NOT kick salt from the floors into your eyes, this causes severe pain), we left before sunrise to get out onto the salt flats of Uuyuni. The salt flats were created a really, really long time ago when plates shifted and drained a lake(or such is the current hypothesis). Now, all that is left is a 3-4 meter layer of salt as far as the eye can see. The lake was a gigantic one. The salt is mined in one area, but mostly the flats are empty. It rained the night before we went out, and so there was a shallow layer of water, in which the sunrise reflected perfectly. As we drove, the sun came up and the colors of the sky were reflected underneath us....we felt like we were driving through the sky!! Our road.... After a few KMs, we were out of the water, and it was just salt as far as the eye could see...wow.

There are some fun tricks you can do with cameras on the flats. After breakfast, we decided to go out and play. Katie and I didn't like the food too uch on the trip...we had begun to waste away....
The trip and the scenery were both even more amazing than the pics capture--our guide, Alejandro, was also the best, and we had a great time with him and our crew. There are more pics to come of our other stops in Bolivia. We are getting the kinks worked out of our blog methods, but some mysteries remain...how to delete a duplicate pic?????