As time is now running out for this trip, Aaron and I have begun to take several day trips to some of the great ruins in the valley. We wanted to make good use of our tourist tickets and traveled to Pisac last Wednesday.

The ruins in Pisac were great! These ruins rival Machu Picchu!

The site is located about a 2 hour hike into the mountains north of Pisac which is about an hour bus ride to the east of Urubamba in the Sacred Valley. Both Maria and Nick think that the actual ruins here are in fact better than the ones on Machu Picchu.

I can't say if I agree with that statement. The ruins might be in better condition than at Machu Picchu, but the location of MP still beats out Pisac!

To get there Aaron and I hopped on a bus traveling to Cusco via Pisac. Once we reached Pisac, we spent a few minutes at the Pisac market which is famous for its size and the Alpaca (llama) clothing they sell.

My guide book recommended that we take a taxi up to a section of the ruins called Qanchisracay and then hike down. We did exactly that.

Once we were on site it was easy to see why Nick and Maria had such a high opinion of the ruins. Unlike Machu Picchu, the ruins here are in much better shape. As you will be able to see from the pictures, the stones they used here were massive and cut to perfection. It was very apparent that the stones used here took more skill and time to carve and install than the ones seen a Machu Picchu. The stones were flat and seemed to fit together like toy building blocks.

Another plus for this site is the amount of people present. It was basically deserted during out time there and made for a really peaceful environment for marveling at the architecture.

To hike from Quanchisracay to Intihuatana (main sun temple) we took a series of steep cliff passes and a very narrow tunnel through a rock face. The views from the hike were fantastic. On our way down once we had finished seeing the main temple, the views of the western and eastern Sacred Valley were very impressive and worth the 2 hour hike back into Pisac.

Once we were back in Pisac, we flagged down another bus and road back to Urubamba just in time for our late afternoon lessons!

The pictures from this day trip will be up shortly!

A massive earthquake hit northern Peru last night registering somehwere between a 7.5 and an 8 on the Richter scale. Here in Urubamba we didn't feel anything. According to CNN, Lima had power outages and 85 casulties 15 of which were fatal.

I am going to now post updates to the blog!

CNN also reports that at least 330 are dead in a few northern cities.

Pictures from last weekend are now up!

I have changed the layout of the site a little. All the picture links will now appear in the 'Pictures' category on the right panel. Pretty complicated, right?

Today after tutoring Tany (the correct spelling--I was yelled at!) we took the bus into Cusco to check the prices of plane tickets to Lima (for my departing flight) and to get bus tickets to Puno (the main city on lake Titicaca).

It was a long day of walking all over Cusco. The brand new major bus station is located close to the airport and was a long walk from the Urubamba bus station. We stopped at several travel agents on the way to see what they had to offer in the way of bus tickets to Puno. The cheapest ones they offered were 60 soles.

I figured that this was a ripoff and decided to walk all the way to the actual bus station which was located far from the city center and inquire there about tickets.

The first booth we ran into offered us seats for 15 soles. We took them.

So now the plan is to go to Cusco firday and see some of the ruins; spend the night; and catch the bus at 800am the next morning for Puno. We are thinking about coming back that monday--giving us 2 nights at Lake Titicaca.

That's it for now!

Our plans changed slightly for this past sunday the morning of. Nick was very instant that Aaron and I not miss the festivities that were taking place at Moray.

A celebration from what I could tell was called Pachamama took place in the old Incan ruins at Moray. Nick said that Pachamama was a Simon and Garfunkel invention. I wasn't really sure what he meant by that, all I know is that he couldn't remember the actualy nave of the festival. All of the fliers called it Pachamama.

So Aaron and I woke up early again and caught a taxi to the ruins. This was a mistake on our part as we could have gotten their for a lot cheaper if we had taken the bus or setup of collective taxi ride.

Moray was once believed to be an Incan research center. It is a depression in the earth which the Incans terraced and tested certain crops at certain altitudes.

This was a very serious celebration. There were lots of people in attendance most of whom were locals. The celebration took place at the base of the ruin and involved what looked to be at least 200 people (give or take 50). The first part of the celebration consisted of 5 groups of kids dressed in red, green, orange, and yellow costumes. Each kid carried an Incan flag (rainbow which closely resembles the gay pride flag). The kids paraded down the steep ruins and each color occupied a ring around the base (the pictures will do a better job of explaining).

There was a group of drummers and people playing wooden flutes for the whole thing. Once the kids were all setup, people with offerings of food made their way down and eventually Patchatuec himself (Incan hero) made his way down. The whole thing took at least 2 hours to get setup and then another 1 and a half to finish! Needless to say, we didn't stay the whole time.

On our way back we decided to walk the entire way! We started out by climbing a small hill to survey the area and pick the general direction that would take us to Urubamba.

From that small hill only about a quarter km from the Moray ruins, we could somewhat make out the highway which lead down from the high plains and into the sacred valley--into Urubamba.

So we started to walk towards it! There is no such thing as trespassing in Peru. You can walk were ever you like and people will only wave at you.

Of course the path to the highway was not what we envisioned. We made our way across the high plains with extraordinary views of the peaks of the Sacred Valley the entire way to a impassable gorge. We decided to take a left and walked around the gorge. I ran into some locals who pointed us in the right direction to a trail that lead down into another valley.

We made out way along that trail into another incredible little valley that descended directly into the Urubamba river. After wading through some irrigation canals and jogging across several hay fields we eventually found another trail which seemed to be used by horsemen.

We took this trail all the way to the Urubamba river. We ended up about 2km west of Urubamba itself and actually came down from the high plains right next to Salinas (salt flats which have been used for over 350 years).

We crossed a shabbyy wooden bridge across the Urubamba to reach the main highway. We hiked down the highway all the way back to Incaland.

This was an amazing trek which from our best guess ended up being about 10-11km. We free lanced the whole thing (with a little local help!) and had a great time!

I think Nick was happy that we had finally taken his advice and gone for a random walk in the valley. He is a big fan of this type of thing and thinks that Peru is the best place in the world to do it.

I hope the pictures do our trek justice!

This pas weekend was very busy.

We planned on going to Ollantaytambo on Saturday and then to the Pisac ruins and market on Sunday.

Saturday we got up reasonably early and caught a combi to Ollantaytambo at about 1030am. The ride was uneventful and very crowded. Of course everytime you get into a combi the ride is cramped. The combi is no bigger than a VW bus and they stick on average about 25 people and usually one of two dogs. I think I have a picture of the ride up to Ollan.

Once there we made our way through the main square and to the site of the ruins. Ollan is the same town at which we catch the train to Machu Picchu. So technically I have been to Ollantaytambo 6 separate times! This also means that it offers great views of the valley that leads to Machu Picchu.

The combi costs one sol (about 35cents) from Urubamba. The more I think about it the more I think that Urubamba is the best place to be in the Sacred Valley. It is no more that an hours drive to any of the ruins in the valley, and makes getting to Machu Picchu extremely easy. Its location has allowed Aaron and I to see MP a total of three times without (It is still expensive) draining our funds completely.

Anyway, once we made it to the entrance of the ruins we noticed that the entrance and price of the tourist ticket (allows access to all of the ruins in the sacred valley for 10 days) was half for students. I of course had left my student ID in my room.

The drive is only about 25min in a combi (10 in a taxi) so while Aaron milled around in all of the tourist shops I caught a combi back to get my ID. The drunkard that sat next to me who kept asking what my name was (in spanish) made the time fly!

Once I got back we both purchased the tourist tickets and entered the ruins. These were some of the best preserved ruins in the Sacred Valley. This site was the only place where the Incan forces were able to repel the Spanish conquistadors. I believe it was during the Incan rebellion lead by Mano Inca during which Ollan was turned into a fort and withstood a Spanish onslaught.

After spending about two hours there we headed back to Urubamba. The pictures are great and will be up shortly.

It has been a while since my last post. I have been quite busy.

Wednesday last week I had a great oportunity to make a difference in a small rural school here in the Sacred Valley. Will has been volunteering at a small school in the town of Urquillos (about 10min east of Urubamba off of the main highway to Pisac) to fulfill a school requirment.

This small was smaller than any village I had ever been to in Louisiana. The school house was no bigger than two average sized bungalows put together. The town itself probably had a population of about 500. As I arrived that day, they were just getting what seemed to be their first paved road.

That morning, Nick randomly mentioned to me that Will's school was in need of tech support. I wasn't really sure what to make of it, but I was told that I should drive the family's RAV4 to this school to lend my computer skills. Amazingly enough this school had just received 4 (yes that's right!) relatively new LG computers! They were having running power cables and making sure the new network was working correctly.

I spent about an hour or so getting everything setup.

As I was working the kids seemed to wonder out of class and huddle around me as I worked. Seeing their faces light up as the computers booted is something I will never forget. These kids have probably never seen a computer before in their life, and now they have the chance to explore the world of computing.

I put some of the more animated screen savers that windows XP has to offer on and just watched the kids as they stared in awe.

It was really gratifying to know that a remote village in the Sacred Valley is becoming tech savvy!

I took some pictures with my cell phone--I might be able to get them on the site.

I could definitely see myself doing this sort of this full time. Hell, they will definitely need someone out here when those computers eventually run into problems!

I might be back out at the school later to help with other things. The kids were very amused at seeing a gringo walking around!

I have created a link on the right panel to a hilarious article that Nick wrote about Urubamba and Peru in general. Funny stuff!

What a crazy weekend.

Aaron and I had been planning on going to Cusco for sometime and what better time to go to one of Peru´s largest cities than the Peruvian independence day!

As it turned out the kids, extended family and friends were also planning to go to Cusco for the day to purchase a SINGLE cat. The family gave Maria del Carmen two kittens for her birthday a week or so before I got there. One of them died a couple of days ago (from stomach parasites?) and to give the other one (named Chika) some company, the family´s plan was to buy a kitten from the black market in Cusco.

The black market is something very popular in Cusco. It consists of many tarps and little shacks huddled together selling anything from stolen ipods to sides of beef.

Having worked with animals at the Audubon Zoo in New Orleans, I was disgusted with the treatment of the animals in Cusco. Hundreds of kittens, puppies, and rabbits were stuffed into little cages which sat in the mud.

Anyway, the family spotted one kitten they thought would be a good match. So after thinking about the decision for about 20min they got it.

But that wasn´t it.....

They ended up purchasing two puppies and an additional kitten.
The family now has 5 cats and three dogs. There is an addition street dog that runs around the yard which is basically part of the family also.

The family then took us out to a typical Peruvian lunch and they were off.

Aaron and I found a great Hostel for 15 soles a night (about 5 bucks) that over looked the entire Place de Armes (main plaza). The pictures are great.

This trip to Cusco was really on to see what the night life of Cusco was like. Nick assured us that we would night have trouble finding a party.

We started out having a couple of pints on a balcony that overlooked the main square. The staff hung a banner with ballons while we were there and took out picture from across the street. So Aaron and I are offically in an advertisement to a Cusco balcony bar. The banner they were haning said ¨Drink as much as you can¨. We werenñt really sure what that meant because we sure didn´t get any kind have discount!

Later on we ended up at a place called Mythology which MOON guide book recomended. They had crazy salsa dancing experts until about midnight at which point the place turned into a night club.

Someone ended up teaching me how to salsa dance and I stayed at this place until about 430am. Aaron left an hour earlier or so I think...The place was packed and a great time.

We both woke up the next morning hurting. We got on a bus back to Urubamba and I took about a 5 hour nap.

The pictures from this weekend will be up either tonight or tomorrow.

I will also be putting up pictures from a couple of hours I spent at Yucay. We went to a festival celebrating local customs and Independence day--very nice liitle town.

thats it from now

So last night Aaron and I hosted a Quiz show at the Muse here in Urubamba.

Last week we played in a quiz game at the Muse and won it! This meant that we had to setup this weeks quiz game.

There were a ton of people last night and everyone love our questions. We had 8 categories ranging from famous qutoes, to Bushisms, to random Peruvian facts. At one point each team had to write a song (and sing it) about their experiences in Peru. Lots of beer and dancing was involved. Hopefully no pictures were taken! At some point I fell in a fountain, but I cant quite remember that...

AS YOU MUST KNOW, the Peruvian Independance day is this weekend on the 28th of July. Aaron and are planning on going to Cusco to join in the party. We have been told by many of the locals here in Urubamba that the only thing we need to bring out that night are our shoes, pants, and maybe a shirt.

We may or may not have pictures of this weekend!

ALSO, I have recieved mail at the address posted so the route is reliable!