Machu Pichu, Peru

Machu Pichu (Big Mountain in the Inca language).

Where to begin...? Magical, mysterious, immense... far more incredible than I had ever dreamed of!
At 6am after three days of trekking (the first of which was on bicycles) we arrived at the lost city of the Incas. It took us almost and hour, running in the dark up the steep trail from the town of Aguas Calientes. We practically killed ourselves trying to beat the sunrise. We didn´t quite make it, but were nonetheless rewarded with a breath taking view full of misty clouds weaving their way through the ancient ruins.
Wandering through the city one could feel the presence of an impressive civilization. Even though the Incas reined for only a short time, they left behind a facsinating spiritual energy that we were so lucky to experience.


After wandering for several hours we climbed for 45 minutes up the almost vertical trail to the top of Waynapichu (small mountain). Here we were rewarded with a breath taking view of the entire city of Machu Pichu. Up here in the cliffs were built more Inca structures, passage ways and tunnels.

I stayed in the city for almost nine hours, long after most of our group of 11 had returned to Aguas Calientes. As time ran out, myself and my Irish compainon Kevin, ran down the steep stepped trail back to town to catch the train back to Cusco leaving behind us an amazing magical day.

Lake Titicaca, Peru

Nick, Amelie and I made our way to country number four on our trip, Peru. For Amelie and I, the three hour bus ride was made extra uncomfortable when we were singled out to leave our seats and sit on little wooden benches on the floor. The bus was over booked and it was a mystery to us why we were chosen to sit in the isle... But anyway... we made it safely to Puno, Peru. The following day we began a two day tour of the Peruvian side of Lake Titicaca.
Our first stop was the floating Uros Islands. People actually live on floating island made of reed roots covered with dried reeds.

We then spent the night with a Quechua family on the island of Amantani. We ended up venturing a little farther into the world of Gringo Tourism than we would have liked...

Copacobana & Lake Titicaca, Bolivia

An easy bus and boat ride took us from La Paz to the tiny town of Copacobana on the banks of Lake Titicaca, the highest lake in the world. This is the view from the roof of our hostal just after dawn as we prepared for our trip to Isla del Sol (Island of the Sun), the capital of the Incas. In Copacobana we ran into Australian Nick who we had volunteered with at the animal park. Nick and his guitar came along with us to the island.
We spent one night and two days wandering along the Inca made paths on Isla del Sol. Here we saw our first Inca ruin, el templo del sol (the Temple of the Sun), orriginally built by the Incas predecors.

The trail passes over the summit of the island, showing incredible views of boths sides at the same time. Our second day was rainy and foggy. This is my favourite photo taking weather. The whole island had a cool, mysterious energy.
There are tons of quinoa fields here, so dark and colourful.

La Paz, Bolivia

La Paz is yet another large capital city that I found wonderful and beautiful. This picturesque city is built at around 4000 m above sea level, surrounded by immense mountains with nowhere to grow but up. The night view of the city is the best, when you can see the lights climbing up the mountain ridges like tiny arms. Unfortunately I have yet to master the art of taking night photos :(
We were lucky enough to have our own private tour guide, Djanira, a contact through a friend of Amelie´s in Canada. Djanira was born and raised in La Paz and showed the sites during all four days of our visit! Above is the incredible view from her house.

Parque Machía, Villa Tunari, Boliva

Meet Leoncio, one of the 8 pumas who walk through the jungle everyday, led on a rope by a volunteer in Parque Machía. There are hundreds of animals living in the park who were born in captivity and are either here for life being treated much better than in their former home, or being prepared to live in the wild. We volunteered here for two weeks.

I worked with what were called the ¨Small Animals¨ which included Tayras, Tehons, Cuchi Cuchis, Night Monkeys and Turtles. With the exception of the turtles I had never heard of any of these animals before.
Here I am with Petronia, likely the most spoiled animal in the Park. She loves to be held and if you get close enough, will crawl up your leg into your arms. Even though she looks lovely and harmless she bit me several times as I tried to end cuddle time.
Baby Cuchi Cuchi at dinner time! There are four nice cute ones and unfortunately one temporamental one named Frank who makes the whole job very difficult. Poor Frank is suffering from an inferiority complex because he is missing half his tail.
Amélie worked in the monkey Quarantine. This is where new arrivals to the park stay until it is confirmed that they don´t have any sort of parasite to spread to rest of the park. Sick monkeys also live here until they are well enough to be in the monkey park.
Claudio... the most adorable little baby capuchin monkey in the Quarantine.

Sucre, Bolivia

Sucre is a town out of a fairy tale book, with its orange coloured rooves clustered amongst the rolling green hills.

Although the government and activity of the capital city is in La Paz, from the beginning, the Bolivian constitution holds Sucre as the Capital City. In August 2007 there will be a revision of the constitution to try and either make La Paz the official capital or move the government to Sucre. Obviously there is much conflict throughout the country over this. I´m glad to be in Bolivia now and not in four months...




There were great views of the city from the roof of this church.
Diego!!! Here he is in the Casa de la Libertad where the first constitution was signed and Simon Bolivar lead the country into independence.









In Sucre we sadly said good bye to our German buddies Jonas and Philip AND our Chilean buddy Diego, leaving us Canadian chicas once again on our own.

Potosi, Bolivia

The four of us arrived in Potosi at 4:30am after a horrific 8 hour bus ride that covered about 300 km before which we almost lost all of our bags on top of the wrong bus. After some solid sleep we explored the gorgeous city seemingly from another era. Potosi was at one point the most important city in the world with an intense wealth from the silver mines that the Spaniards profited on.





Potosi´s silver mine is to this day a very important part of the region employing thousands of miners who work in the most terrible conditions. We went on a tour of the mines and for about two hours got to see first hand what these miners live through everyday. We felt the intense heat, crawled and climbed through frighteningly tight passage ways and enhaled the toxic gases that everyday are killing the workers as young as 10 years old. It was mind blowing to see that in this day and age there are people making a living like this.


Every group of miners (Quecha aboriginials) has there own Tio (god of the earth or the devil according to the Catholic Spaniards). Before starting the day of work they must give offerings to el Tio such as alcohol, coca leaves or cigarettes. It is custom to give el Tio a lit cigarette to smoke. If he smokes it, then a good day of mining is sure to come.




Here in Potosi we met up with our friend Diego who we met way back in Val Paraiso, Chile. Our nice little gang of five then headed off together to Sucre, the official capital of Bolivia.