Flying on the ground

It was like flying


We’ve tried to avoid flying as much as we can on this trip, doing everything overland where possible. So we were a little surprised at our experience with the buses here in Peru.

We arrived at the bus terminal to be directed to a ‘check in desk’, where after confirming tickets and passports, they take your luggage, weigh it and tag it, and attach the luggage receipt to your ticket. It’s an odd experience having to trust the luggage will be making its own way onto the bus – not something we felt entirely comfortable since this wasn’t actually an airport!

But not just an ordinary bus...


You then queue to enter the departure lounge, where they search you and your hand luggage (for what, we’re not quite sure), and use one of those funky wand things to check for metal or guns or something. In the lounge itself (alas, no duty free) are comfy seats, and a queue building at the departure gate – no sign of Ryanair style priority boarding yet though!

The team on the bus, excited at our free headphones and pillows!


On the bus itself, the surreal experience continues. Someone comes past with a video camera to film the face of everyone in each seat for security reasons. The seats have blankets, pillows and free headphones and recline to 160 degrees – and there’s food on board. We were slightly disappointed to find they don’t serve complimentary alcohol, but the in-flight game of bingo made up for it!

It should be said this was with the expensive bus company ‘Cruz del Sur’ – peruvian roads are notorious for crashes and we weren’t going to take our chances. However, there are definately some things National Express or Megabus could learn from this!

Simon

PS. Having written this, we just had the most confusing bus bingo ever. Laura thought she’d won, but we didn’t want to declare it since we don’t actually need a (non-transferrable) bus ticket back to Cuzco. Then it seems like half the bus went up to claim their prize to be told they hadn’t actually won yet, including an elderly woman who was asked to sing to us for entertainment while her numbers were checked. And then when there was an actual winner, two people rushed to claim the prize. You definately don’t get this kind of excitement on the buses back home!

Bingo!

Cuzco and Machu Picchu

Looking down from the mountain above. You can see Wayna Pichu behind in the distance


I’d forgotten quite how vibrant Cuzco is. It was the capital of the Inca Empire, and still has that feeling about it – granted, you have to pretend that the hordes of tourists aren’t there, but watching colourful parades in the main square with fluttering rainbow flags and Inca temples up on the steep hillside above, you get a sense of what life was like here 500 years ago.

Cuzco’s also the city I spent most time in ten years ago, as I volunteered here with a friend’s charity, Kiya Survivors. It was fun wandering around the city finding old haunts and trying to work out which place we’d lived in for six weeks. I’d hoped to be able to pay a visit to them at the Rainbow Centre on Urubamba which was newly started when we were there, but alas it didn’t quite work out with our timing.

Standing over Cuzco


The city’s prominent place on the tourist map does have some distinct advantages once you get over the abundance of white tourists who speak only English. There’s plenty of great international food in the town (we even had a Indian buffet, and a full English breakfast!), and some of the sights are amazing. We dropped into the pre-Colombian art museum, which had stunning exhibits of ceramics, metal and woodwork from before the Incas. You could really see how actually they were a lot more sophisticated than the designs and techniques used in later years; presumably a lot was lost in the Inca conquest.

Midwinter is a big event in the Inca calendar, and with it only a few weeks away, the streets of the city were alive every day with cannons of fireworks and continual parades around the main square. On the day of the Queen’s Jubilee, we were more than a little surprised to see a corresponding military celebration in Cuzco’s main square – royalists at a distance, we wondered? Or perhaps this was a coup taking place, with all the guns, gunpowder and bayonets on display? The woman in the tourist office set the matter to rest, clearly bored with it already as she told us this happens every Sunday. Only in Peru!

Fireworks, on a wicker cage metres from the crowd...

Around the city are various Inca relics that survived Spanish destruction, the highlight of which is Sacsayhuaman (conveniently pronounced ‘sexy woman’), a temple/fortress where many of the annual Inca festivities were celebrated. The place is formed from huge carved rocks, which have been amazingly chiseled and fitted together perfectly – the Incas didn’t use mortar, but there’s absolutely no gap between each stone.

We also took the chance to make the mandatory pilgrimage to Machu Picchu, the famous hilltop Inca site which was never discovered by the Spanish and hence never destroyed. It really lived up to expectations even on a second visit – an incredible set of stone structures perched on an unworldly mountaintop, with wonderful views around. We climbed Machu Picchu Mountain behind the site, with even more impressive views looking down.

For all of its aesthetic glory, Machu Picchu has unfortunately become an example of the bad side of tourism. As its fame has risen, authorities have been keen to cash in on wealthy foreign tourists – meaning the place is entirely out of reach of the very locals whose heritage is being put on display. It’s not helped that the only way to get to the town below the site is on foot (that’s the Inca Trail), or by train – with even the cheapest fare costing $50 one way. That’s the sort of price you might get on the railway back home!

Even excluding transport, we were pretty stunned at an entrance fee of $47, which is a lot to us as backpackers. The fee for locals is half that – but when you consider that it works out at 75% of the Peruvian average monthly salary, it is still ridiculously high. That’s equivalent to a ticket to Stonehenge costing £1500! Other than guides and others working there, we saw no obvious Peruvian faces during our visit, and it really isn’t hard to see why. Instead, there were hordes of rich westerners queuing for the lunch buffet at the cafe on site – a snip at $35 – before some retire to the lodgings at the hotel on site, possibly one of the most expensive hotels anywhere, with rooms from $975 (excluding tax). It’s almost as jaw-dropping as the view of the ruins themselves.

Taking it all in, you’re left thinking that there must be some better way of making it work – sure, make all the profit you can from us rich foreigners, but not at the cost of denying Peruvians access to their own heritage.

Simon

Canyon Country

The group of us at the canyon


Every now and then we end up in a place that isn’t remotely like the South America we expected. It’s happened twice this week, in Arequipa and then the Colca Canyon..

Locals are fond of saying that “When the moon separated from the Earth, it forgot to take Arequipa”, which may be overstating it somewhat, but the place is pretty striking. Another legend that’s perhaps more believable is that the fourth Inca ruler was passing through the valley and became so enchanted that he shouted out to his guards ‘Ari, quipay’ – “let’s stay”, thus giving the city its name. I think we all let out a collective ‘wow’ when on the first night we turned into the European-style central square, lined on three sides with arched buildings and the other with a huge illuminated cathedral – this wasn’t what we expected of Peru!

The city sits in a valley beneath the picture-postcard Misti volcano and Chachani (which is apparently one of the easiest 6000m summits in Peru, but we decided against it this time!), and despite its sprawling size, the centre manages to feel tranquil and tourist-friendly.

The highlight of our time there was the Monasterio de Santa Catalina, a gorgeous 16th century convent with fortress-like walls occupying a whole city block. The place is labyrinthine inside, and you can wander round all the old nuns’ cells (complete with attached kitchens), and stumble into lane after lane of photogenic colours and crumbling beauty. We were entertained to hear that the Convent was known as a bit of a party house during its time; the rich Spanish daughters within confined to a life of religious servitude opted instead to continue their lifestyle from outside, with between one and four (black) slaves apiece, holding regular parties, and even inviting musicians from the city to perform for them – until the Pope found out and imposed a strict discipline some three centuries later!

Flowers at the convent

Our second surprise was a couple of nights ago, when eating at our hostel in Cabanaconde at the Colca Canyon. Not only did our drinks arrive before we’d finished our food (actually before the food even arrived!), but they were out of stock of one of the pizza toppings and came over to apologise and ask what we wanted as a replacement! Pachamama Hostel – highly recommended!

The Colca Canyon is 3191m at its deepest, making it twice the size of the Grand Canyon, and the second-deepest in the world (the deepest is 100m more, and just next door, but much harder to reach). There’s a viewpoint at the top that’s famous for Condor spotting, and it didn’t disappoint – in the hour or so we were there, we saw about 10 condors, perched on rocks just below us, and then soaring into the blue sky above. At one point, one flew only a couple of metres above us – with wingspans up to 3m, it’s a scary sight when they block out the sun above!

A condor coming in to land – amazing photo thanks to Simon Barrow

(Other) Simon and I spent a tough day walking down the canyon side to an oasis at the bottom, and then after a swim and lunch, back up again in the hot afternoon sun. It was satisfying if entirely exhausting, and right at the bottom we had a revelation – at just 2100m above sea level, it was the lowest we’d been in 4 weeks! As you’re walking down, you can see the thousands of distinctive pre-Inca terraces that mark out the contours of the hillsides in furry green vegetation, and when you look carefully, tiny silver rectangles which when you get closer slowly turn into houses.

There are various isolated communities around here clinging to the sides of the mountains, only accessible on foot – and a hell of a trek down and back up the canyon at that, since they’re on the other side. Much like we experienced in Langtang in Nepal, one can only imagine the difficulties people here have accessing basic amenities like healthcare when it’s a multi-day hike to the nearest road. We as tourists may take (false) pride in having ‘done the canyon’ in a day, but it’s a different matter when it’s part of daily life.

Simon

Floating Islands and Steamships

Local women at the island

Following the beautiful blue shore of Lake Titicaca, we crossed the border into Peru and the town of Puno. Two things immediately stuck us – firstly, rickshaws are back for the first time since Asia (going to have to give them a try!), and secondly, it’s absolutely freezing!

The cold is a bit odd since we’re on the same lakeshore (and hence altitude) as sunny Copacabana; it might have something to do with the city being in the shadow of a mountain for the afternoon. On our first night we needed all the extra blankets and layers we could muster, on the second the water tank above the hostel even froze solid according the owners!

Puno is the jumping off point for the lake’s famous floating reed islands, a big tourist trap but also a chance to see a way of life that has been relatively unchanged for generations. When the Incas conquered the area 500 years ago, the Uru people fled onto the lake, initially living in boats, and then on floating islands they made from reeds out in the middle of the lake. The 42 islands host a dwindling population of a few hundred that is arguably maintained only for tourism. with most now living on the mainland instead.

The islands require considerable maintenance, with new reeds laid on top of the old every two weeks or so, and an ongoing harvest to fulfil this need. You can imagine there’s also a bit of a fire risk with cooking on an island made only from dry reeds – the trick is apparently to insulate it using stones, and I guess there is at least plenty of water nearby! And no, we didn’t ask about how they cope with drinking the lake water that is also where the sewage goes…

Although one of the most tourist-filled things we’ve done in a long time, it was a fascinating view into a different way of life, cut off from much of modern life (even if the new introductions of solar panels are beginning to change that). It was also fabulously colourful, with the women in brightly coloured traditional dress giving us a chance to look inside their homes and meet their (very sweet) kids.

The Yavari in the late afternoon light


(Other) Simon and I also took the chance to visit an entirely different piece of heritage – the oldest steamship on the lake, the Yavari. It is quite a story, with it and a sister ship built in Birmingham (UK) in 1862, in 2766 iron parts, which were then ‘shipped’ to Puno – round Cape Horn to a town which is now in northern Chile, and then over the Andes to Puno, initially by train, and then by mule for the final stretch when the line ran out! This took an amazing six years! The ship was launched on Christmas Day 1870, and ran for many years ferrying passengers across the lake, with llama dung used instead of coal for the engines.

After being abandoned by the Peruvian Navy and left to rust, it was bought by a British woman for $5000 in 1982, and has been lovingly restored and is now a floating museum and mini-hotel. We were shown around by the ship’s engineer, a man who must be in his seventies and enthusiastically showed us every detail with a passionate explanation in Spanish. The place positively gleams with the polished brass and love and attention it has received, and we were similarly beaming after being shown around the cabins, engine room and bridge by someone who had clearly put their all into it. It was quite a contrast in waterbourne living to how we’d started the day, but just as eye opening and a great sample of another side to life on the lake.

Simon