Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Cusco and the desert

alright, for those of you who dont know (and i cant imagine there are many of you who do), south west peru is real worthless. really they just have a lot of desert, and a few worthless towns built where there must be a natural spring or something, because it certainly doesnt rain out here. on our 10 bus ride from nasca to arequipa, i saw lots of sand, and some hills of sand out in the distance--for 10 hours (execpt when i was sleeping). arequipa is a cute little (almost a million people makes it a bit bigger than ¨little¨, but it feels small) colonial town. the new yorker and i found a private room for pretty cheap, but it was very basic, and the south african opted to find somewhere more expensive, mission number one completed! we slept for awhile before getting some food and checking out the markets. they have some fabulous cakes and pastries here, which will be my demise, and i had a good latte too (first one in 6 weeks).

that night we found a local disco with not a gringo in sight. after a pitcher of bad beer a couple locals helped to show us how to dance, which didnt go drastically well, but was a blast either way. we spotted some drug deals in the club and on the way back to the hostel as well, so that was kinda exciting. next day was more wandering and more coffee and more pastries. we bumped into alli and her friends (the crazy aussies) but were lucky enough avoid being stuck walking around with them (alright, maybe im a little harsh, but whatever). at 3 my friend from new york took a bus to puno, by lake titicaca and i got one to the coast. i would have liked to stick around with her longer (shes one of the funniest people i have met here, and we didnt stop laughing for more than a few minutes the whole time we were travelling together) but she was moving way to fast, and had to be in Rio by december 17th.

i missed the stop to the town i planned to go to because the bus was stopped for all of about 15 seconds so one person could get on, and a few minutes later the bus attendant came and told me that was where i wanted to get off, isnt that helpful...so i got off at the next big town about half hour away and stayed the night and went back the next day. it was real worthless excursion, but i guess it gave me something to do. now im in cusco taking it easy (at 3300 meters). i had a delisious bacon avacado bbq burger for lunch. ummmm.

ill post again before i head up to machupicchu, if theres anything to post about.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Pictures, pictures! Please, post pictures - of places, these travelers you're hanging with, hte locals, the Peruvian desert...!