Cumple doble en Peru

Oh heyyyy there, guess who just back from 2 weeks in Peru and is ready to tell you alllll about it?  Sit tight, this could be a long one.  Let´s just say our "cumpleaños doble" in Peru was a huge success (with a few minor hiccups along the way).  What hiccups?  Well, for starters my camera got stolen...at Machu Picchu...on the LAST day of our trek...before I uploaded a single pic on my camera.  Boo.  Luckily, I´ve scrapped together a few pictures and we didn´t let that ruin our experience in Peru.  

Ok, now let´s rewind back to the beginning of the trip.  We set sail (so to speak) on Saturday, October 13th in the wee hours of the morning.  We took a bus from Iquique to Arica, a taxi from Arica to Tacna and another bus from Tacna to Arequipa.  Simple, right?  Should have been but sadly, it was not.  When we got to Arica, a man working at a (reputable) bus company offered us a ticket to Arequipa for 18,000 pesos (about 40 bucks give or take) which seemed pretty legit considering we´d done no research into the prices.  We figured we skip the step of going to Tacna, finding a bus etc etc.  Turns out, the guy just taxied us over the border, walked to the ticket booth with us and bought us a 5,000-peso ticket to Arequipa.  Since the taxi ride across the bored is usually about 3-4,000 pesos, we basically paid $20 each to get our hand held to the ticket counter of a crappy bus company.  We ended up not even using the tickets because we weren´t familiar with the brand and really wanted something we knew was reliable/safe.  Ooops, rookie mistakes that someone who has been in South America for NINE months really shouldn´t be making...but C'est la vie.  

Finally, 6ish hours after we boarded a nice, SAFE (you're welcome mom and dad) bus, we arrived in Arequipa.  We were given a hostel recommendation from a friend and we really loved where we stayed.  We spent Jeff´s birthday doing a mountain biking tour of the Arequipeañan countryside (of which, no photos remain), exploring downtown and noming on all kinds of good (and super cheap) food.  For dinner we had some Peruvian delicacies.  Jeff tried llama (I, of course, refrained) and I had some delicious ceviche.  That night we had a few beers with some new friends at the hostel and the next morning we checked out of our hostel and did some river rafting.  

Later that night, we set off  to Cusco which was about nine hours by bus.  We arrived at 6:30 am which wasn't exactly ideal since we couldn't check into our hostel until 1:00 pm...but we made the best of it.  We wandered around the Plaza de Armas and the local market, ate a delicious breakfast and drank some coca tea while we waited to take a hot shower and a quick power nap and head out again.  Our few days in Cusco were great, complete with horse-back riding, rock-climbing and some lovely little strolls around the city.  After four days, we set off on our trek to Machu Picchu, the best part of our trip.

 

Day one of the trip, included a fairly-long ride in a van after meeting up with the rest of our group (13 in total).  I got pretty car sick while we were heading up a long and windy road into the mountains but was fine as soon as we got out and got some fresh air.  We did a four-hour bike ride (all downhill) through some gorgeous landscapes and then grabbed some lunch at a local restaurant.  Some of the group went to go river rafting but we sat it out since we had already gone once on the trip and wanted to save a little bit of cash.  As a group, we decided to mix up the regular plan of the trip and stay at a residencial family house in the mountains instead of the hostel in Santa Maria. Those of us who opted to the skip the rafting, hiked up to the house after lunch and the others came after their rafting trip.  The house was called La Casa del Mono (and yes, they had a pet monkey) and it was kind of a make-shift hostel/organic farm/educational station where they show the process of making chocolate and coffee.  There was an AMAZING view and it cut a few hours off our hiking for the next day.  

Day two was still a hike-all-day kinda day.  We had a few little stops along the way, including a dip in a river and crossing the rapids in a "cable car" (aka a 2x4' scrap of metal attached to a cable that goes over a river...eeek).  Our day ended in a trip to the hot springs in Santa Teresa (fabulous), dinner in the town afterwards and crashing out in our hostel to get up bring and early the next morning for zip-lining!  

Zip-lining was great and our hike (walk really) on day three was absolutely beautiful.  We walked about three hours to Aguas Callientes where we had our own room in the hostel and a hot shower for the first time in three days (yesss!)  

Day four was (of course) the most amazing view of all, Machu Picchu!  We got up at 4 am, hiked up (and I mean straight up) for a little less than an hour over about 2,000 stairs (not exaggerating) and finally we were there.  The ruins were covered with fog and it was an awesome (although partially obscured) view.  Eventually the fog burned off and we were able to explore MP with our trusty guide, Yawer who was really great the whole trip.  Unfortunately that is where my camera got snagged but we tried to make the best of things and thoroughly enjoy one of the Seven Wonders of The Modern World.  After we returned to Aguas Callientes, we grabbed some pizza and beers with a few friends and hopped on a train back to Cusco.

Day One

 

Day Two

 

 Day Three

Day Four!

Back in Cusco, we wrapped up the trip by buying a few souvenirs and grabbing some drinks with the friends from our trek before starting our long series of bus rides back to Iquique.  Thanks for such a great time Peru, it won't soon be forgotten. 

Feliz Cumpleaños a Mi Querido Chile

Cumpleaños feliz
Te deseamos a ti
Feliz cumpleaños Chile
Que los cumplas feliz

 Just ten days after Chile's celebration of 202 years of independence, I celebrated my monthaversary with Chile once again.  I'm up to eight now and my passport now has six Chile stamps for the cops at the border-crossing in Peru to eyeball suspiciously (much like they did last night).  I'm just a tourist, I swear!  

For el dieciocho (Independence day), Jeff and I had three days of vacation from work so we decided to chill in Iquique for the weekend and hit up a few asados with friends.  Then on Monday, we headed up north to Arica in hopes of visiting Lauca National Park  and popping into Bolivia to do a little visa renewing.  Unfortunately the tours were closed for the holiday.  I couldn't bring myself to go to Tacna yet again so we stayed in Arica and tried to make the best of it by exploring some different areas, vising the Fondas and day drinking on the beach (pictured below).

This weekend we returned to Arica with the same intentions but once again plans fell through.  We ended up crossing back into Tacna, Peru for a few hours and then going to Arica for the night.  We decided to forfeit the other half of our flight and took a bus down this morning.  Overall it was pretty disappointing considering the money we spent on the both trips and the fact that we still haven't seen Lake Chungara or anything else in Lauca.  We're thinking about hitting it on our way down from Machu Picchu at the end of October (which by the way is this month...can you believe it?!) if we can swing it.  

On the home-front not much has changed.  I'm still really liking my job although I'm getting considerably fewer hours which is a little worrisome financially.  Our lease is up on the 13th of this month and after that our living plans are still a little up in the air.  We're planning to store our luggage at a friend's house while we're on our trip and move into a new apartment on November 1st.  We have a place in mind but we still have to check it out and figure out the details with our friend who is the owner.  Meanwhile, I'm going a little stir-crazy in Iquique and have recently been thinking about moving back to Santiago.  As I've mentioned before though (and as Jeff loves to remind me) I change my mind and thus my plans a lot so don't hold me two it.  For now, I'm here in Iquique and trying to focus on the short-term plans: get the apartment cleaned up and moved out, find a new place to live and have the most amazing trip/birthday ever. Beyond that, vamos a ver.  Happy October everybody!     

Los Días Pasan Volando

A big hello to all of you good people who keep up with my little blogski here (I know, it's really difficult since I update soooooo often...)  Here I am again; now with seven months of life in Chile under my belt (can you believe it??).  The last month has seen a few exciting events although, to be honest, nothing too radical has changed (sorry to disappoint).  For one, August brought me back to the beach.  Now I'm back to running and surfing once again which was a bit of a shock to my post-death-bed body al principio.  I'm still readjusting, but luckily I've come a long way from my level of strength and stamina the first week back which was laughable...to say the least.  

August also brought me my first NON-laughable paycheck of the past seven months, whoot whoot.  I've now been working at my "new" job for about a month and a half and I'm still loving it.  I'm really lucky to have such great students and coworkers and I honestly enjoy what I'm doing (much more than I ever enjoyed being threatened and cussed at by teenage boys). Even when I have one of those days when making it to a class seems like a chore, I can push myself by thinking about my students and I'm genuinely motivated to keep chugging along through my (often very long) day.

Being an English teacher has really given me the opportunity to give my mother-tongue a nice hard look and think about things that had never before crossed my mind.  Like what the hell does "got" actually mean?  And why DO we use auxiliary verbs in some questions and not in others?*  Sometimes I feel like my English is actually getting worse, the more I dissect it.  As far as Spanish goes, sometimes it feels like it is improving and some days my brain just doesn't function in either language, let alone both.

There are some words that have been irrevocably changed into Spanish in my brain, so much so that the English translation has left my vocabulary entirely.  Examples include: palta, teraza, salvavida,chauchera, banano & chocopanda.  Side note: thank goodness we've seen less of the latter up here in Nor Chil (Yes, that's short for Northern Chile).

Although my vocabulary is growing (slowly but surely), my grammar still needs a little love and attention which will HOPEFULLY be happening shortly when my boss gets a move on with this whole Spanish class thing at the academy.  I'll keep you posted.

Jeff has been understanding more and more, which is great, although we still agree that he would benefit from a formal class which we plan to get started real soon.  He's still working at the institute where I use to work and seems to be enjoying it for the most part, although he still doesn't feel like a "real teacher".  He's learning more and growing with his teaching style all the time which is pretty cool to see.  However, I do think he misses the whole being threatened and cussed at by teenage boys thing (to each their own I guess).

We are planning to take a trip to Machu Picchu in the beginning of October (before raining season) if we can pull it.  We still haven't solidified anything and (as you've noticed if you've been following along with my blog posts) plans change quite a lot around here.  For now, we're just taking things day by day and enjoying the little things like our little beach-side bike ride today and the delicious homemade pesto that I made (first pesto I've eaten in 7 months, yikes!)  Ok, that's all the news for now.  Un besito, chauuu!  

 

*I would be happy to explain either of those things to you in great detail...for a small fee of course.  Teachers gotta eat.