Los Aventuras de Edmundo y Linda

Took an early bus to Puno, Peru from Arequipa. The bus turned out to be a big piece of junk. The driver was a maniac and drove most of the trip in the wrong lane while passing semis around blind corners on the highway. After somehow surviving that bus ride we hopped on another substancially nicer and calmer bus accross the border to Copacabana, Bolivia. Checked into a nice hotel right on Lake Titicaca. We got a private room with a private bathroom (and 24 hours water) on the 5th floor for $11.50/night! Man, Bolivia is really cheap!

Had some more free breakfast at the hostel. Getting free breakfast is sweet but we have been eating bread, butter, jam, and tea every monring for the past 2 weeks and its getting a little old. We did a hike up a hill above the town. Beautiful views of the town and lake but the hike was extremely tiring due to the altitude. Took a boat ride to the Isla del Sol, which is where the Incas believe their civilization started. The boat took 1.5 hours each way because there was about 50 people on the boat and just a tiny outboard engine. We did a rushed hike up some Inca stairs to nearly the top of a huge hill on the island. The views of the lake and snow capped mountains were spectacular! We sped-walked back to the boat and then stopped at another part of the island to see some Inca ruins.

Took a 10 hour bus ride to Arequipa and arrived at 5:30am. We didn´t sleep much on the bus because the heat was on full blast and we were sweating like crazy. The whole bus stunk because of the sweaty, discusting people. Had a free breakfast at the hostel. Met Kealy & Nico, a cool Austrialian/Argentinian couple. Slept for many hours on the hammocks on the roof and did some city exploring.

Left the hostel at 8am to Colca Canyon, the deepest canyon in the world. The bus ride to the canyon took us over 5000m above sea level. Everyone on the bus had altitude sickness and had to drink coca tea and chew coca leaves or take pills. One man even had to take a ride back to Arequipa because he was having problems with his heart. We saw lots of cool lamas and alpacas, man are they cool and cute! We ate some that night and they were really tasty! Did a hike up to some pre-Inca tombs and lookout over the valley and then went to some hotsprings. Stayed overnight in a town called Chivay.

Left our hostel in Chivay at 6am and did a hike through part of Colca Canyon. The canyon was about 3500m deep at the point we visited but gets to over 4000m in some places. We saw tons of HUGE condors flying around the canyon. There wing span is about 2.8m! Took the bus back to Arequipa and sang along with the sweet 90s tunes the driver was playing. Said bye to Nico and Kealy… thanks for the book!

We enjoyed the fantastic view from our hostel, while eating free breakfast, which Edmundo thinks is awesome because he writes it down in our journal everytime. The hostel is really cool, it has been ... [Continue reading this entry]

We woke up at 4:30am to take a 4 hour train ride to Aguas Calientes, a city near Machu Piccu. We bought some wool mitts and toques because we were so cold. The area we are in now ... [Continue reading this entry]

Finally got to Cusco, Peru after a 15 hours uncomfortable bus ride.  We could barely sleep because there was a baby crying almost all night right behind us.  The first picture shows a bunch of roosters in a mesh bag ... [Continue reading this entry]

Happy Birthday Edmundo!!! The hostel in Huacachina organized a tour to the Nazca Lines for us... a two hour bus took us there. We hopped on a little 6 seater airplane and we had a crazy plane ride ... [Continue reading this entry]

Huacachina is a really cool little town.  The town surrounds an oasis in the desert and is surrounded by huge 300 meter sand dunes.  We took an insane, death dune buggy trip into the desert and then went ... [Continue reading this entry]

We left by bus (4 hours) to Paracas, the landscape was beautiful.  Peru is surrounded by desert with huge sand dunes.  On the way into town we passed a whole bunch of fish meal processing plants... man did it ... [Continue reading this entry]

Lima is a huge city... about 8 million people live there.  There are some very beautiful parts of town that we visited.  The first is a shopping mall that was built into the side of cliff above the ocean.  And ... [Continue reading this entry]

We arrived finally in Bogota, Colombia after a 17 hour bus ride...wow!!  We met two Irish guys named Darrah and David on the bus and then shared a cab and a room in a hostel.  We walked around Bogota´s old ... [Continue reading this entry]