along the argentine-brazilian border, the iguazu river turns in on itself to form a vast semicircle of thundering waterfalls. currently, it's rainy season, when the water is red with silt and flowing far above its normal level. the spray that the water kicks up is impressive, reaching across the sky and regularly splintering into rainbows. the basic conclusion is that this place has far more water than should be allowed in one spot. really, it's mindboggling.
the falls are accessed by catwalks that wind through the surrounding subtrocial rainforest, where you are accosted by butterflies of all sizes and colors. we also managed to spot a couple toucans there! after a couple weeks of basic hostel living and camping, we treated ourselves out to a couple nights in the sheraton inside the national park...our room had a view of the cascades! there's no topping that.
toucans! these guys are so vividly colored and oddly shaped it was hard to believe they weren't animitronic tourist attractions.
no account of our peruvian experience would be complete without a few snapshots of the best part of the trip: our new friends!
on the inca trail, we were joined by sarah and todd, two globetrotting trekkers from tennessee. sarah does social work and todd produces documentaries; this meant for some fascinating conversations in our dining tent! yeni, our guide, gave us indispensable support as we fell victim to sickness and injury, offering folk remedies that actually worked. everyone was very patient and understanding with our delays. we were really thankful to have such enjoyable company along the trail.
here are three of our seven porters: elario, sergio, and epifanio. these guys were incredible. they would strap fifty pounds worth of gas tanks, stoves, tents, tables, chairs, and food to their backs and race up the mountain like nobody's business. when mimi had to give up her backpack, sergio just tied it on top of his load and continued skipping up the trail. insane.
we spent a lot of time with cesar during our first few days in peru. he and his warmhearted wife lida owned the imperial hostel, our center of operations in cusco. cesar took us on two amazing daytrips through the sacred valley, treating us out to lunch at his favorite dining spots. this restaurant had guinea pigs running around the kitchen...we ended up settling on some delicious pork chicharrones instead!
fernando was our guide through manu national park. he was born and raised in the rainforest, and is a fanatic birdwatcher. we spent many educational days with him observing wildlife and learning about the customs of the people of manu. fernando bent over backwards trying to extract us from our little road disasers, and always tried to find us entertaining distractions while we waited for repairs to be completed. here, he is teaching us how to crack open a coconut that we plucked from a nearby tree.
...a final pic of the inca trail group enjoying one of sergio's tasty breakfasts!
while the conclusion of the peru blog chronicles is cause enough for celebration, this day also marks the completion of 26 years on this earth for sam. happy birthday luv!! i wish i was there with you. fortunately, i'll be joining the party soon enough...^_^;;
happy 23rd birthday, phil! glad you made it back from the dominican republic in one piece so that you could celebrate chicago-style! damn tho, you gettin' old... =P
we woke up at 4am to get an early start on the the final day's trek. the goal was to reach the sun gate, a.k.a. intipunku, before dawn, so that we could watch the morning light unveil machu picchu. once a year, on the december solstice, the light of the rising sun beams directly through the gate and into one of only two windows in machu picchu's temple of the sun, illuminating an altar inside. (the other window is for the june solstice. pretty cool, huh?) although we had a few crises along the way, we all managed to make it to the sun gate in time to watch the natural light show.
sunrise over machu picchu
it was a good thing we chose to hike to machu picchu rather than grab a bus like most tourists do. we arrived nice and early, and were rewarded for our extra effort with the opportunity to explore the ruins while they were still tranquil and relatively empty. machu picchu was a lot bigger and more elaborate than i expected. rather than just a few walls nestled into a mountain peak, it turned out to be a massive, intricate, and developed city, consisting of residential, industrial, and academic districts, buildings for crop storage and the fabrication of goods, a sophisticated aqueduct system, terraced gardens, and broad stretches of land for the celebration of religious festivals. as before, the incans' capacity for urban planning never fails to amaze me.
views from within the ruins. one has to wonder what machu picchu looked like in its prime, when all the buildings had roofs and the terraces abounded with crops, in addition to countless species of orchids, which the incans cultivated for decoration. the colors, activity, and life there must have been incredible.
all in all, we had enough time to leisurely explore the city before the tourist buses began to arrive en masse, around noon. the place soon filled up with crowds, transforming the atmosphere from one of serenity, beauty, and awe to something more along the lines of an amusement park. the experience was nevertheless fascinating, and totally worth it.
the only thing we didn't get a chance to do was scale huayna pichu, the mountain next to the ruins. its summit holds the temple of the moon, which also served as an incan observatory. but after our climb earlier that morning, and given that we arrived later than we had planned, we instead opted for relaxing at various points within in the city itself until it was time to head out.
in closing, a full vista of machu picchu...this time unspoiled by a bunch of dirty backpackers in the foreground.
one final amusing fact about the ruins...there is clearly a lot of grass there, but no way in hell is anyone going to run a lawnmower through machu picchu. to maintain the landscape, llamas are simply allowed to wander freely throughout the ruins, where they continually munch away at the greens, thereby keeping everything nice and trimmed!
mimi, kristin, and our guide yenni making their way up centuries-old incan stairs.
machu picchu wasn't the only archeological site along the trail. we hiked past several temples, fortresses, and towns, many of which were only accessible by the multi-day trek. above you can see the ruins of sayacmarca, an incan outpost perched on a cliff. we got the chance to climb those stairs and explore it!
kristin and i heading down from runkuraqay, the second highest mountain pass on the trail. the highest was warmi wañuska, a.k.a. the infamous dead woman's pass, which we scaled the previous day. it required the longest sustained climb of the trail: an ascent of about 3600 feet (1100m) in one day.
the terraced farmland of wiñayhuayna, an example of just how advanced the incans were in the arts of urban planning. natural springs were manipulated so that running water flowed through each terrace and past all the living units in the urban center. the inhabitants thus had running water for their homes! impressive.
sam and i take in the iridescent blue of lake titicaca.
and now back to our regularly scheduled show. next on the itinerary was lago titicaca, the "highest navigable lake in the world". by navigable they must have meant enormous, because even after a couple hours of boating into the waters, the opposite shoreline was still nowhere to be seen, save for a few distant snowcapped mountains.
our first stop: the amazing man-made reed islands of the uros people. the uros began constructing these floating islands centuries ago, in order to distance themselves from more aggressive groups like the inca or the aymara. nowadays, even though intermarriage with the aymara has left few if any pureblooded uros on titicaca, many continue to lead their traditional waterborne lifestyle. although the tin-roofed medical center is rarely used (children are born on the uros islands without modern medical attention), there are public schools on the reed islands now, and some houses even put up solar panels to bring in a little electricity. have a peek:
the uros build their islands from scratch and have to continually reinforce them with fresh reeds as the old ones on the bottom rot away. the islands range in size, but all are big enough to allow for the raising of fowl and ibis. some even hold patches of dirt where potatoes can be grown. the uros are primarily known as fisherpeople, however.
a snapshot of an uro kid in front of his house. those reeds are edible by the way...they're kind of tasteless and crunchy. walking on the islands is also pretty fun. they are spongy and in constant, almost imperceptible motion...a bit like walking on a waterbed.
even the boats are made of reeds! these gentlemen gave us a lift and taught me all i know about the uros en route. so you can thank them for this little history lesson.
after the uros islands we headed for taquile, one of the largest natural islands in the lake. the people of taquile maintain a strong sense of cultural identity due to their isolation, and it's evident in their dress and customs. much of their traditions revolve around weaving and knitting. throughout the island, men and boys are always seen knitting away (as a requirement for marriage, they must knit their own marriage hat, among other things). women are constantly spinning--- an absentminded task to busy their hands as they attend to other things. you can easily identify whether a man or woman is single or married based on the hats they wear or how they arrange their shawls. on taquile, we also ran into the island's official celebration of peru's national flag day. all the schoolchildren were out en masse reciting poems and songs and waving flags. i must reiterate: peruvian children are damned cute. quite possibly the cutest kids to be found anywhere. i want one!
mimi and kristin catching their breath as we hike taquile island. lake titicaca is 12,500 feet (3800m) above sea level. that's about 2.4 miles up. and trust me, your lungs can feel it.
kids bashfully waving flags in taquile's main plaza during the celebration of national flag day. yes, i will refrain from raving about the cuteness...
after the festival, we managed to squeeze in a few days at the rainforest. there, we observed the mating rituals of the bright red gallito-de-las-rocas (peru's national bird), plucked exotic flowers, visited villages, and interrupted the wars and daily rituals of leaf-carrying and army ants. we were treated to mist-draped landscapes, white cascades, bursts of rain, and entertaining wildlife. our trip was almost extended indefinitely, however, due to a series of disastrous car troubles. even though we had dished out the cash for a private vehicle, the van we received was clearly on its last legs. throughout the trip, we agonized through a total of seven flat tires, not to mention several hours of rapidly deflating ones, which our driver revived by stopping every ten minutes to manually pump in air. the "patches" they applied accomplished nothing; we soon grew familiar with the sound of flapping rubber.
the final day was the most eventful. the ascent back to cusco involved several hours of driving up narrow lanes along sheer cliff faces. we regularly passed wooden crosses that marked the points where others had met their unfortunate end. needless to say, our useless tires, "patched" after the blowouts of the previous night, did not last long on this terrain. after we ran out of intact tires, we camped out on the road trying to convince passing drivers (few and far between) to loan us a spare. one reluctant guy finally forked one over, but it didn't help much when another tire blew a couple hours later. by this time it was getting pretty dark out, which meant that no more cars would be passing by. our driver then had the brilliant idea of attemping to drive on the rim --- gunning it along a cliff on screeching metal. not good. after screaming at him to stop and then leaping from the van in terror, we were were forced to remain stranded in the darkness along the side of the road, while our guide went back to the nearest village, a distant three hours down, to try and phone for help. we passed the time trying to spot monkeys with flashlights and despairing of ever escaping the rainforest. about four hours later, the cavalry arrived in the form of a packed bus, the likes of which we had never encountered before. it was the last night bus out of the jungle, and thus so stuffed with people, some were crouching in the aisles. the seats were tight even for me, bunches of bananas dangled from the racks above our heads, every possible niche was crammed with firewood, sacks, & boxes, and the entire vehicle reeked of body odor, fish, & kerosene. on this moving disaster we finally exited the amazon, and started on the long dry road to cusco, during which we were blasted with so much dust, we had to wrap handkerchiefs around our faces in order to breathe. oh, and just for good measure...halfway along, this bus also got a flat tire. unbelievable.
we finally got back to our hostel at around 4am...nine hours after our scheduled arrival and two hours before we had to get up to get ready for our bus to lake titicaca. phew. even now, any mention of a possible flat tire makes my heart freeze. it's a good thing that excursion was worth all the trouble. la selva is a pretty fascinating ecosystem, all told. just be sure to go with good tires!!
a hike through cloud forest before descending into high forest.
left: a thingummy tree (i think those are coconuts but have no experience with these things). right: wild orchids!
a campesina ushers her animals away from the road.
no surprise: peru is a very photogenic country. its longstanding tradition of using bright dyes inspires all kinds of creative and vibrant textiles, patterns, and fashions. altogether, the colors, the culture, and the people---against the stunning backdrop of country's vast and breathtaking landscapes---make for some incredible visions. even though it felt like we saw quite a bit during our two weeks there, we really only caught a glimpse of the southernmost regions. peru has so much more to offer, i'm fairly sure i will be back again at some point.
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