PUNO

Its only 10 minutes drive from Copacabana to the Peruvian border, so after a fond farewell to Bolivia, we walked accross the border into Peru.

Onto the bus for another couple of hours before arriving further along the lake side in Puno and a hail storm! We´d heard mixed reviews about Puno - ranging from ´it´s ok`to ít´s a complete s***hole¨´ - so we were ready for anything! Although not a pretty pretty town, the cathedral and the main square were lovely and the main pedestrianised street were great to walk down.

We also experienced out first tastes of Peru - kids selling finger puppets with the standard phrase of´maybe later´´ if you said no. Restauranteurs are also more vocal in Peru - literally harrassing you off the street to try and get your custom! Also, there were a lot fewer traditionally dressed women in Puno - gone were the colourful shawls and bowler hats of Bolivia that we had enjoyed watching. Bizarrely we also came accross guys using tricycles to get customers from A to B in Puno - very eco friendly, but we did hear that it was something to do with trike oweners not having to pay tax rather than eco warriors on the streets of Puno.

Overnight we had thought it stange that so many people had been up at 3 in the morning - but all was revealed on Good Friday morning when at 6.00am having breakfast - we spotted a huge line of people making their way up to a cross on one of the hills overlooking the town. Some of the people must have started very early as it was quite a hike..

Would also have to wait a bit longer to try our first Inka Kola!

CUSCO

From Puno, we took a day coach tour to Cusco, seeing sights along the way. Had a quick flashback to Torres del Paine when the ´bi-lingual´guide started to tell us about what we were going to see that day...but at least time we managed to catch most of what she was saying this time!!

Arrived in Cusco on Friday evening and headed out from the hostal straight into the Plaza des Armas, and as it was Good Friday - a huge procession through the streets. There were firemen carrying Jesus on the cross, groups of OAP´s with banners, priests, two army bands in direct competition with each other over the music they were playing - plus loads and loads of people! Great stuff!

Enjoyed the next couple of days wandering around the very impressive Inka town - exploring as many of the little roads and streets that we could. Also spent a day hiking up to the Inka site of Sachasaywhuman (sorry for any Inka afficinados about the spelling!) and onto Quenko and then back through one of the barrios back to the centre of Cusco. These were amazing sites and it just blows your mind the work and enginerring that went into these buildings.

One of the downsides of Cusco is that it is soooo geared up for tourists and as such - they pretty much have us over a barrel so to speak. The guide books rave about a ´tourist ticket´ that you have to buy for a whopping 11GBP - what they fail to tell you is that although this covers the Inka sites outside of town and a couple of the museums, the main churches and most of the other musuems are all extra! Humm!!

Found a great bar - ´Norton Rat´s on the main square and enjoyed a number of beers here, although we´re still getting used to the Peruvian restauranteurs style of fighting over you by the restaurant entrance. At one time we were between two, listening to the price of a ´mediana pizza´ bounce between 10 and 15 soles!

MACHU PICCHU

Caught the early train from Cusco to Aguas Calientes - the town near to Macchu Picchu. It took 4 hours but the scenery was amazing. The town was only small, but situated at the bottom of some incredible hills, so you felt very small!

Got up early to catch the bus up to the site and luckily the weather was on our side. You could walk it if you wanted - but that would involve a straight up climb with hundreds of steps - so we took the easier option! Driving up the switch back road you caught glimpses of Macchu Picchu itself - but nothing prepared you for your first full view. Breathtaking how it seems so perched on top of the mountain with the terraces sweeping down the sides that seem scarily high. Quite mind blowing to think how they would have built this place 600 years ago.

We headed straight up to Wayanapicchu (the mountain at one end of the site), in order to see the views. Bloody hell - it was steep! It was worth it at the top though (you can see from the photo above) and the views were phenomenal. Rather than head back the same way we clambered down to see the temple of the moon. On this route we had the added fun of using ladders in a couple of sections and the original Inka steps. Tony was his usual mountain goat self whilst I was a little more leisurely!

The hike was worth it though as it doesnt appear to be that visited and we had the place to oursleves for an hour. The temple was built into an existing cave and the stonework was amazing - true Inka style with no space at all between each block. Making our way back to the main site, the hoards of tourists had arrived - so thought we´d call it a day and head back to the sanctuary of our balcony!

Spent a second day at Macchu Picchu and this time thought we`d make an early start so caught the first bus at 5.30am up to the top. Sod`s law, it was foggy! Doh! Walked up to the Sun gate to see if the clouds would clear - but no. The sun gate is also the entry point into the site, for those who have just spent the past 4 days walking on the Inka trail. Apparently the guides also get them up at 4.30am that morning in order to see the sunrise .... so we felt a bit sorry for the guys who were just staring into fog that morning!

Tony wanted to cover every inch of Macchu Picchu, so he headed up to the top of Macchu Picchu mountain whilst I soaked up the view from the terraces and enjoyed the now appearing sun. To say that we have quite a few photos of this place is an understatement! Also visited the Inka bridge and were again amazed by just how small the paths were and how high they went accross the sides of mountains. I have been wondering how on earth any Inka`s with vertigo would have fared here - or hopefully they were all vertigo free! We`re clocking up a few `Great picnic spots of the world`and this was no exception. You could sit and look at the views over Macchu Picchu for hours.

Headed back to Cusco on the train to spend one final night there before catching the overnight bus to Arequipa. Security was phenomenal as our carry on bags were searched with a `wand`and they also videoed each passenger climbing on board..makes you wonder whats gone on in the past to warrent this much security...did get a chance to finally play bingo on the bus though!

AREQUIPA

NASCA

Arrived in Nasca from Arequipa at 05:30 am feeling very tired after an all night Bingo session in Spanish on the bus.

LIMA

Having been told by several people that we met (and even by the Rough Guide to Peru) that Lima was a dump we were VERY pleasantly suprised to find that it is, in fact, quite the opposite .... lovely, in fact!

The streets are wide and tree lined with very little of the litter that is a way of life in the rest of South America. Didn't even feel threatened when walking late at night (which went against everything that we had heard). that said, we were staying in Miraflores which is the affluent area of the city but even in the other parts the atmosphere was much more laid back than that of the other S. american cities that we had visited. The hostel we were staying in was pretty basic but had little luxuries like DVD and a balcony overlooking the busy roadway, the main factor, however, was the overwhelming OTT security ... cameras on every level, high security gates with electric fencing, alarms everywhere, etc etc. This led us to the conclusion that we were just fortunate not to have witnessed any muggins, etc whilst in the city.

The shore front of Miraflores resembles an upmarket N. American East coast town with lots of nice cafes, expensive stores and even a Hooters Bar! Spent several hours exploring the walkways and enjoyed watching the paragliders taking off from the cliff front ...... lovely take off area with incredible ridge lift which renewed my interest in paragliding!

Whilst in town we noticed a great childrens hair salon where the kids sit in toy cars whilst they have their hair cut .... great idea !

The Taxi to the airport was quite a long one ... about 45 mins .... but was a much nicer option thann trying to fight the locals for a seat on one of the several buses that we would have to have taken.

IQUITOS

Arrived in Iquitos in the heart of the Amazon early in the evening and as soon as the doors opened we knew that we had hit the jungle .... the humidity was huge! Definately a different kind of heat to that which we had been used to. Had a great time waiting for our bags in the airport as the only airport baggage conveyor had broken down so after looking at all the bags on the cart for half an hour the staff simply picked one bag up and shouted something out (presumably "who's bag is this") ... could not get my head around why they simply did not just lay them in a line along the ground and let people help themselves. Anyway, their chosen system created anarchy with about 80 people all rushing to the cart and pointing to their bags and screaming to the luggage attendant sitting on top of the pile! Actually quite a funny sight ... especially as we managed to get our bags relatively early on.

Took the bus to the hotel which was interesting in that it had no glass in the windows .... out of the space where the windows should have been we saw much of Iquitos .... pretty poor (well, very poor actually) with a definate 'frontier' feel (if only they weren't in the middle of a vast wilderness). The contrast when we got to the hotel was unbelievably huge ..... we stayed at the only 5 star hotel in the Amazon and it was so bizarre to step from poverty to luxury in a few short steps. Nice hotel but I was irritated by the American business men / tourists who were there (having said that there could only have been around 10 of them with the hotel only having 30 odd rooms anyway). Would have been nice to experience a 'local' hotel but it felt SO good to get back to the sanctuary of the room after the heat and the tension of the streets.

On the first evening we wandered down to the river where we stumbled upon a Capoira demonstration which was simply amazingly beautiful and put the other demonstartions that we had witnessed in Brazil in the shade. The atmosphere in Iquitos is quite tense and you can feel an undercurrent of resentment against the big companies exploiting the locakl resources without putting anything back into the community. That said, we had no trouble and most people were polite enough.

Spent 5 days in total in Iquitos which gave us a good feel for the place. Visited the museum which was interesting for the life size plaster casts of the local Indian tribes, saw the house that was designed by Eiffel and shipped out in the early part of the century and generally just wandered the streets soaking up the atmosphere and enjoying the food.

One thing stood out though .... the local market ..... truly unlike any other market we had ever visited. Watched a butcher cutting the arms, legs and heads off turtles and then cutting the tongues out and occassionallly popping them raw into his mouth and then wandered down to see a little girl of about 43 or 4 years of age sitting on a table slapping a dead pigs head before sticking her finger into it's eye socket ....... mmmmm, lovely! Actually, Emma could not quite cope with the smells and started to feel sick (can't say I blame her) so we had to get out into the relatively 'fresh' air.

Have to say that we glad to be leaving to head 100 miles deeper into the Amazon at this point.

I cannot begin to describe the overwhelming vastness that is the Amazon Rainforest that we saw as we came into land in Iquitos.

AMAZON RAINFOREST

AMAZON JUNGLE LODGE

From Iquitos we were colected by the lodges' taxi and taken to the jetty where we boarded a speed boat powered by twin 150hp yamaha engines which the 'captain' took great relish in thrashing .... probably the fastest we have ever travelled on water which is just as well as the trip upriver still took around two hours.

Halfway up we droppped several people off at the companies 'luxury ' lodge which is basically a 3 star hotel in the middle of the jungle on the Amazon .... seemed to be the ritcher, older American crowd. We carried on and took a small side turn off where we slowed down and went past a small vilage where people moved on the water in dug out canoes that literally looked as if they would be swamped by a ripple let alone the wash from a speed boat, Literally a different world with naked children swiming and playing in the rather murky river whilst their mothers washed their clothes. Many of the children here have distended bellies from drinking the river water which contains several parasites - apparently they have to reach a minimum of 4 years old before they can be given a herbal medicine to kill the parasites (too strng to give it to them any younger).

Reached the camp lodge and were shown to our 'room' which was basically a thatched hut seperated from the other rooms by wooden boards that did not go all the way up (to allow air to move through and cool the room). It had all mod cons such as a plastic pitcher to collect river water for washing in the morning, a basin for same and most importantly a mosquito net! The toilet block was lovely ....... big pit and ummm, toilet paper. Shower block was a pleasant suprise although the water was brown (pumped from the river) and cold. No electricity which gave the place a lovely glow by oil lamplight. Sounds disgusting but the place was truly beautiful. Discovered that we had a personal guide for the 5 days that we were to be in the jungle whose name was Jose. Bit surly and clearly jaded by having to show tourists around the jungle hewas nevertheless a very knowledgible guide.

Cannot write her of all the things that we saw but here are a few .... bats, tarantulas, giant 1" long red ants, poison dart toads, pink dolphins, grey river dolphins, sloths, birds too numerous to mention and piranha fish (which we actually caught and ate ... very tasty).

Highlights have to be the late night dugout canoe rides on the river as well as the sunrise river ride. As interesting but not as pleasing was the visit to a local indian village .... got to use a blowgun at which Emma proved to be very adept! Our guide told us that he thinks the villagers traditions will only last another 20 years at most as the young are moving to Iquitos to seek work .... quite sad really and we feel priviledged to have witnessed some of their traditions.

Jose also took us to visit his 'friend' on several occassions .... I was quite happy as his friend ran a jungle rum factory ...... unbelievably simple affair where the sugar cane is crushed, the juice extracted, heated in a big pot then put into a still ...... all completely filthy with no sense of hygiene of course but the result was a VERY strong liquor which resembled incredibly bad, very cheap Vodka which has had petrol added to it. Hate to say this but I developed quite a liking to it and returned to the lodge with a few Coka Cola bottles of it! Emma was not so keen but I felt it helped to wash down the raw snails and onions that accompanied it as a snack! These, actually were not that bad. I still maintain that it was the rum that stoppped me becoming violently ill as Emma did on the second to last day ......... thankfully the Ciproflaxin cleared the problem up pretty quickly but not before Emma had n horrendous night of vomiting and diahhorrea.

The realisation that we were to be leaving South America in a few days hit us on the last night in the lodge whilst we swung in the hammocks ..... it had just been an amazing, fantastic and wonderful 4 months and we were sorry to be leaving (although the prospect of being able to understand the language was greatly appealing). We left the Amazon feeling sure that we would return if not to the amazon at least to South America.