October 30, 2011
So on Saturday morning I head down to Havitush tours where I was told I would meet with him at 8:45am and he would take me to the right bus for my "Sacred Valley" tour. I get there at exactly 8:45am and his shop is closed and locked up like all the other ones and I immediately start thinking that he forgot since the locals do operate on a completely different time with the attitude "I get there when I get there" even though the tour bus leaves at 9am. As my imagination is now telling me this tour day of the sacred valley might be a complete waste of a day because of this I begin to feel a "FUCKEN HOLA!" starting to build deep within me and I know by 9am I will be shouting that out loud for all to hear if he isn't at his shop by then.
As I am waiting realizing he probably isn't even open on Saturdays I see a guy down the alley waving his arm and I am hoping it is for me so I begin walking towards him and he tells me he is with the tour company and here to pick me up and bring me to the bus.
I meet 2 women from NYC on my tour. Later on I was surprised to find out one was a doctor and another sold corporate bonds on wallstreet. They were dressed like "gucci" princesses with not even a hair out of place. On the tour bus I find out that Benjamin who was my guide for the previous tour is also our guide on this tour of the Sacred Valley. It is 9:20am and we aren't moving yet so I ask Benjamin what the hold up is and he says "We are waiting for the locales since they all love to be late". Yes I am definitely figuring that out since being on TIME is not important to them. In North America the bus leaves without you if you are a minute late but we wait until 9:30am before we finally leave.
On our way to our first stop Benjamin is in the front seat with his microphone and shows us the fields of crops on both sides of the road and tells us that there is 286 types of corn in Peru and 2,721 types of potatoes here!
Our first stop is a gift shop which doesn't surprise me since these tour guides get kickbacks from bringing tourists through and I don't mind because there are always interesting cheap things to buy there. I don't mind aggressive sales people who display their wares on the side of a sidewalk since they might not see that customer again but I don't like aggressive sales people in the gift stores since I am there and not going anywhere but as you are looking at things they will come up and pick up things you are totally not interested in and put it 2 inches in front of your face as they jabber away in spanish. The only english words they usually say is "Very cheap!" or "Special price". As they are totally in my face which is turning me off from buying anything at their souvenir stores I feel like telling them to go to the far side of the gift store and put their nose in the corner while remaining quiet and I will ask them when I need their assistance! OK, you're right. That might be a bit too excessive but I would like them at least one arms length away from me at all times since their sales practices are just aggressive and pointless. If I like something I will buy it and not them picking up everything and taking things down to show me that I am not interested in.
After that we stop in the little town of Pisaq and have 30 minutes to look around. I wandered into an old woman's store that probably doesn't see too many customers per day and she wants to sell me a toque that I don't really want. She offers it at 10 soles ($3.33US) which is cheap but for every step I walk out her door she drops the price "nueve!, Ocho! Siete!" and as I am leaving all I hear is "Cheap, Very cheap, incredibly fucken cheap where even a cheapskate can't say no" so I buy the toque for $2US.
We drive up one of the mountains of Pisaq and come to the old Inca ruins. I notice Benjamin doesn't really give us a lot of time at these ruins since that is why we are all there and not spending time in gift shops and restaurants etc... I tell Benjamin I am going to the other side of the mountain and will meet him at 12:30pm at the bus and he tells me that it is impossible to do that in that amount of time and instead wants to show me a guinnea pig farm at the site. After that I just leave since I did recognize 2 women from the UK on our tour going along one of the mountain trails that wraps around the mountain to the other side. As I am walking along the mountain cliff tops of this trail I have to go through a tunnel to the other side of the mountain where it continues on along the cliff sides and I eventually catch up to the 2 women (mother and daughter) from the UK and they basically complain about the tour where they are not allowing us enough time and the gift shop excursions etc.. and the fact we wasted 30 minutes waiting for some "locals" to arrive to the bus tour and I am in complete agreement since us gringos do operate on a different level and being "on time" and seeing the things you came for is what we want. Before going into the site I did check out the stuff for sale from the venders and a guy was giving me a good price of 15 soles for his different chess sets that looked better than the one I bought so I told him maybe when I come back. I was late coming back for the bus and thought I could sneak by him but he immediately offered any chess set for 10 soles ($3.33US) at which I couldn't say no. So now I have 2 chess sets. I am thinking with these prices I will be able to do all my Christmas shopping for under $20US down here haha.
So the 3 of us see some more Inca ruins on the other side of the mountain and now have to hurry back since we know we are going to be late and I arrive at 12:40pm and Benjamin comes up to me and tells me I am late and where are the other 2 people at which I tell him I am on "local time" and in my mind and so I am exactly on time which is whenever I arrive and he laughs since he can't argue with that.
Our next stop is for lunch in a town called Urubamba which is an "All you can eat" buffet for $8US. I am not exactly starving but decide I will get my $15US worth of food haha. The 2 women from NYC watch my bag as I go up first with my plate and then they go up and come back with hardly anything and tell me when they went up all the food was gone since the place was incredibly busy bringing in all the tour buses passing through. I realized later they make their money on the drinks since my 2 papaya juices were the same price as the buffet.
Our next stop is Ollantaytambo and I notice the 2 women from the UK depart our group since they plan to take the train the next day from there to Machu Pichu and a couple others leave as well from our tour group. We can see old Inca food storage buildings high up on the mountain on the other side of the site we are at and we climb up many terraces to reach the top.
Our last stop on the way back to Cuzco is "Chinchero" which is basically a church with some Inca ruins around where the spanish built on top for their own churches etc... When we are sitting down in the church listening to Benjamins information I notice every South American person entering the church immediately form the cross across their bodies and bow down as they enter. They are very Catholic down here. Upon leaving I am walking by all the venders displaying their crafts and a young woman is determined to sell me some little money purse with zippers and bright colours and after starting at 10 soles she is down to 5 soles ($1.75US) and I finally buy it even though I didn't want it just so she wouldn't pester me anymore. Sometimes I feel like I am paying "tribute" to them so they will leave me alone. I certainly don't mind buying these cheap things and putting a few peruvian soles in their pocket which isn't a lot.
We get back to Cuzco at 7pm and I head back to my hotel. I decided to try the "San Pedro" cactus powder and it honestly tasted horrendous (maybe even worse than ayahuasca) and it tasted like... well like cactus juice! It didn't have any effect on me though. Just so you all know, Cuzco is 900 meters higher in elevation than Machu Pichu and I was having difficulty sleeping (I don't think it was from the cactus powder) from the higher altitude. It felt like when I was in Tibet and had to focus on breathing all night and there is no heat in this hotel but just piles of wool blankets you throw over yourself and I couldn't sleep because I had to focus on breathing and expanding my lunges more than they are use to with natural breathing. To make a loooooong story short I didn't sleep a wink on Saturday night and at 8am after focusing on breathing for the previous 10 hours and uncomfortable I decided to shower and head out and find COFFEE that I really needed.
OK, what blog entry of mine would be complete without me complaining about the lack of real coffee. The last 2 mornings I have had horrible coffee that I take two sips of and I can't finish. The 2 women from NYC told me that their hotel served REAL COFFEE to get your caffeine fix so I jotted that down and on Sunday morning after having absolutely no sleep I went to find their hotel and the bartender "Ha-sue" served me 3 small cups of coffee ($3.50US each) and gave me some spanish lessons as I asked him questions. I didn't bring my spanish verbs with me so as you can imagine it is hard to build sentences without verbs unless you like pigeon spanish and sounding like a cave man "Me coffee need" and "Where bus?".
That was probably the most I have paid for coffee but it was at a nice hotel and it was more than worth it for the much needed caffeine I recieved so I could mentally function without sleep for the past 24 hours. I came back and told the owners of the hotel that I will be leaving on Monday morning to Machu Pichu and will be returning on Tuesday night and want to leave a suitcase with them so I am just carrying a day bag to Machu Pichu. They tell me that today is a Peruvain holiday and they are closing the main door with a metal door that goes over it and she gives me a key so I can come and go and says that I will be the only one here. This place I am at is a hotel/hostel so they have dorms which are crammed full of young and extremely noisy teenagers. Sometimes these kids would knock on my door just to piss me off and then run away laughing. So I am happy to have the place to myself today with no noise.
I have also noticed that these spanish people down here (Mexico on down) do love to make noise. Every place I am at they are up late making noise or blaring music and partying. No wonder stores don't open until 9am down here.
The train to Machu Pichu is a whopping $70US each way and the car tour I am going on to Machu Pichu is $140US which includes all transportation, entrance fees to Machu Pichu $45US and Wayna Pichu $12US with a night accommodations at Aguas Calientes which is the closest town to Machu Pichu so I will be coming back to this same hotel in Cuzco on Tuesday night and may stay a second night to see the remaining sites on my tourist ticket before heading to Puno (Lake Titicaca area) on Thursday morning.
My next blog entry about Machu Pichu will probably be on Wednesday morning since I am leaving my laptop at this hotel in Cuzco with my suitcase. I get picked up at 7:30am on Monday and it is 6 hours to my destination where I will be hiking with our group for 2 1/2 hours to reach Aguas Calientes and on Tuesday morning I will be getting up at 4:30am and heading to Wayna Pichu first to be there at 7am when they open and then hike down to Machu Pichu a few hours later and then back down to Aguas Calientes at 1pm to catch a train back to our car and then the 6 hour car ride back to Cuzco on Tuesday night.
So on Saturday morning I head down to Havitush tours where I was told I would meet with him at 8:45am and he would take me to the right bus for my "Sacred Valley" tour. I get there at exactly 8:45am and his shop is closed and locked up like all the other ones and I immediately start thinking that he forgot since the locals do operate on a completely different time with the attitude "I get there when I get there" even though the tour bus leaves at 9am. As my imagination is now telling me this tour day of the sacred valley might be a complete waste of a day because of this I begin to feel a "FUCKEN HOLA!" starting to build deep within me and I know by 9am I will be shouting that out loud for all to hear if he isn't at his shop by then.
As I am waiting realizing he probably isn't even open on Saturdays I see a guy down the alley waving his arm and I am hoping it is for me so I begin walking towards him and he tells me he is with the tour company and here to pick me up and bring me to the bus.
I meet 2 women from NYC on my tour. Later on I was surprised to find out one was a doctor and another sold corporate bonds on wallstreet. They were dressed like "gucci" princesses with not even a hair out of place. On the tour bus I find out that Benjamin who was my guide for the previous tour is also our guide on this tour of the Sacred Valley. It is 9:20am and we aren't moving yet so I ask Benjamin what the hold up is and he says "We are waiting for the locales since they all love to be late". Yes I am definitely figuring that out since being on TIME is not important to them. In North America the bus leaves without you if you are a minute late but we wait until 9:30am before we finally leave.
On our way to our first stop Benjamin is in the front seat with his microphone and shows us the fields of crops on both sides of the road and tells us that there is 286 types of corn in Peru and 2,721 types of potatoes here!
Our first stop is a gift shop which doesn't surprise me since these tour guides get kickbacks from bringing tourists through and I don't mind because there are always interesting cheap things to buy there. I don't mind aggressive sales people who display their wares on the side of a sidewalk since they might not see that customer again but I don't like aggressive sales people in the gift stores since I am there and not going anywhere but as you are looking at things they will come up and pick up things you are totally not interested in and put it 2 inches in front of your face as they jabber away in spanish. The only english words they usually say is "Very cheap!" or "Special price". As they are totally in my face which is turning me off from buying anything at their souvenir stores I feel like telling them to go to the far side of the gift store and put their nose in the corner while remaining quiet and I will ask them when I need their assistance! OK, you're right. That might be a bit too excessive but I would like them at least one arms length away from me at all times since their sales practices are just aggressive and pointless. If I like something I will buy it and not them picking up everything and taking things down to show me that I am not interested in.
After that we stop in the little town of Pisaq and have 30 minutes to look around. I wandered into an old woman's store that probably doesn't see too many customers per day and she wants to sell me a toque that I don't really want. She offers it at 10 soles ($3.33US) which is cheap but for every step I walk out her door she drops the price "nueve!, Ocho! Siete!" and as I am leaving all I hear is "Cheap, Very cheap, incredibly fucken cheap where even a cheapskate can't say no" so I buy the toque for $2US.
We drive up one of the mountains of Pisaq and come to the old Inca ruins. I notice Benjamin doesn't really give us a lot of time at these ruins since that is why we are all there and not spending time in gift shops and restaurants etc... I tell Benjamin I am going to the other side of the mountain and will meet him at 12:30pm at the bus and he tells me that it is impossible to do that in that amount of time and instead wants to show me a guinnea pig farm at the site. After that I just leave since I did recognize 2 women from the UK on our tour going along one of the mountain trails that wraps around the mountain to the other side. As I am walking along the mountain cliff tops of this trail I have to go through a tunnel to the other side of the mountain where it continues on along the cliff sides and I eventually catch up to the 2 women (mother and daughter) from the UK and they basically complain about the tour where they are not allowing us enough time and the gift shop excursions etc.. and the fact we wasted 30 minutes waiting for some "locals" to arrive to the bus tour and I am in complete agreement since us gringos do operate on a different level and being "on time" and seeing the things you came for is what we want. Before going into the site I did check out the stuff for sale from the venders and a guy was giving me a good price of 15 soles for his different chess sets that looked better than the one I bought so I told him maybe when I come back. I was late coming back for the bus and thought I could sneak by him but he immediately offered any chess set for 10 soles ($3.33US) at which I couldn't say no. So now I have 2 chess sets. I am thinking with these prices I will be able to do all my Christmas shopping for under $20US down here haha.
So the 3 of us see some more Inca ruins on the other side of the mountain and now have to hurry back since we know we are going to be late and I arrive at 12:40pm and Benjamin comes up to me and tells me I am late and where are the other 2 people at which I tell him I am on "local time" and in my mind and so I am exactly on time which is whenever I arrive and he laughs since he can't argue with that.
Our next stop is for lunch in a town called Urubamba which is an "All you can eat" buffet for $8US. I am not exactly starving but decide I will get my $15US worth of food haha. The 2 women from NYC watch my bag as I go up first with my plate and then they go up and come back with hardly anything and tell me when they went up all the food was gone since the place was incredibly busy bringing in all the tour buses passing through. I realized later they make their money on the drinks since my 2 papaya juices were the same price as the buffet.
Our next stop is Ollantaytambo and I notice the 2 women from the UK depart our group since they plan to take the train the next day from there to Machu Pichu and a couple others leave as well from our tour group. We can see old Inca food storage buildings high up on the mountain on the other side of the site we are at and we climb up many terraces to reach the top.
Our last stop on the way back to Cuzco is "Chinchero" which is basically a church with some Inca ruins around where the spanish built on top for their own churches etc... When we are sitting down in the church listening to Benjamins information I notice every South American person entering the church immediately form the cross across their bodies and bow down as they enter. They are very Catholic down here. Upon leaving I am walking by all the venders displaying their crafts and a young woman is determined to sell me some little money purse with zippers and bright colours and after starting at 10 soles she is down to 5 soles ($1.75US) and I finally buy it even though I didn't want it just so she wouldn't pester me anymore. Sometimes I feel like I am paying "tribute" to them so they will leave me alone. I certainly don't mind buying these cheap things and putting a few peruvian soles in their pocket which isn't a lot.
We get back to Cuzco at 7pm and I head back to my hotel. I decided to try the "San Pedro" cactus powder and it honestly tasted horrendous (maybe even worse than ayahuasca) and it tasted like... well like cactus juice! It didn't have any effect on me though. Just so you all know, Cuzco is 900 meters higher in elevation than Machu Pichu and I was having difficulty sleeping (I don't think it was from the cactus powder) from the higher altitude. It felt like when I was in Tibet and had to focus on breathing all night and there is no heat in this hotel but just piles of wool blankets you throw over yourself and I couldn't sleep because I had to focus on breathing and expanding my lunges more than they are use to with natural breathing. To make a loooooong story short I didn't sleep a wink on Saturday night and at 8am after focusing on breathing for the previous 10 hours and uncomfortable I decided to shower and head out and find COFFEE that I really needed.
OK, what blog entry of mine would be complete without me complaining about the lack of real coffee. The last 2 mornings I have had horrible coffee that I take two sips of and I can't finish. The 2 women from NYC told me that their hotel served REAL COFFEE to get your caffeine fix so I jotted that down and on Sunday morning after having absolutely no sleep I went to find their hotel and the bartender "Ha-sue" served me 3 small cups of coffee ($3.50US each) and gave me some spanish lessons as I asked him questions. I didn't bring my spanish verbs with me so as you can imagine it is hard to build sentences without verbs unless you like pigeon spanish and sounding like a cave man "Me coffee need" and "Where bus?".
That was probably the most I have paid for coffee but it was at a nice hotel and it was more than worth it for the much needed caffeine I recieved so I could mentally function without sleep for the past 24 hours. I came back and told the owners of the hotel that I will be leaving on Monday morning to Machu Pichu and will be returning on Tuesday night and want to leave a suitcase with them so I am just carrying a day bag to Machu Pichu. They tell me that today is a Peruvain holiday and they are closing the main door with a metal door that goes over it and she gives me a key so I can come and go and says that I will be the only one here. This place I am at is a hotel/hostel so they have dorms which are crammed full of young and extremely noisy teenagers. Sometimes these kids would knock on my door just to piss me off and then run away laughing. So I am happy to have the place to myself today with no noise.
I have also noticed that these spanish people down here (Mexico on down) do love to make noise. Every place I am at they are up late making noise or blaring music and partying. No wonder stores don't open until 9am down here.
The train to Machu Pichu is a whopping $70US each way and the car tour I am going on to Machu Pichu is $140US which includes all transportation, entrance fees to Machu Pichu $45US and Wayna Pichu $12US with a night accommodations at Aguas Calientes which is the closest town to Machu Pichu so I will be coming back to this same hotel in Cuzco on Tuesday night and may stay a second night to see the remaining sites on my tourist ticket before heading to Puno (Lake Titicaca area) on Thursday morning.
My next blog entry about Machu Pichu will probably be on Wednesday morning since I am leaving my laptop at this hotel in Cuzco with my suitcase. I get picked up at 7:30am on Monday and it is 6 hours to my destination where I will be hiking with our group for 2 1/2 hours to reach Aguas Calientes and on Tuesday morning I will be getting up at 4:30am and heading to Wayna Pichu first to be there at 7am when they open and then hike down to Machu Pichu a few hours later and then back down to Aguas Calientes at 1pm to catch a train back to our car and then the 6 hour car ride back to Cuzco on Tuesday night.
