New York

Just a quick entry to announce that we did try the local delicacy of "Cuy al Horno", oven baked Guinea pig last night.

Tasted ok, once we both got past the fact that it looked like a giant hairless rat road kill, and that all its organs, face, claws and teeth were still included. Certainly was a unique flavour, that neither of us will be rushing to order again I don't think. We were in a restaurant with only one other couple there, and I think the woman was a vegetarian judging by the looks that we were getting, especially when picking up bits of carcas and taking photos of each other. It even smiled for the camera.

As for taste, it kind of tasted a bit like rabbit, but there wasn't a lot of meat to eat, and we both spent most of our time poking at it, trying to avoid the slimy bits. The skin was like rubber. Wasn't too bad though, and we're both still alive today.

We travelled to Cusco on an overnight bus with one of the cheaper companies on offer. This turned out to be a bit of a mistake. We got on the bus in Areqipa at about 8pm and the bus was due in at cusco about 5.30am. No sooner had we started moving than a video came on the TV screen, which we were sitting very close to. For the next hour we had to endure a Peruvian brass band commercial - a not very good Peruvian brass band - blaring out at us and jumping about inca ruins on the screen. Not a good start, as we were both knackered. In addition to this the bus was absolutely freezing, and there was a draft coming through the window, for the entire journey. There was also a big fat woman who was a couple of rows back snorting and grunting in her sleep which was extremely annoying. The worst of it was yet to come though. When we arrived we got off the bus and found a hostel and went straight to bed, having had next to no sleep on the bus. When we got up to go have a look round the city Jenny realised that her phone had been knicked from the bag. Someone must have reached under our seat to get it, because it was on the floor the whole time, at our feet. So the first place we visited in the city was the police station. Got a report, which was like pulling teeth. Took the officer about 30minutes to write 4 lines of notes on what happened. Having acheived this we had to go to the bank to queue for an hour and pay them for a copy of the police report, then return to the station with the receipt. A total hassle. Anyway, afterwards, we went and got a bite to eat.......during which we realised that the cameras had also been stolen from the bag. Couple of idiots. So we had to go back to the police station to explain this. Needless to say the officer thought that we were trying an insurance scam. He did believe us in the end, and we did get our report a day and another trip to the bank later. Not a good start to Cusco. We have chipped in together and bought a new camera between us.

Cusco is at an altitude of 3,500m (11,500 feet). At this height, everything is such an effort. Both me and Jenny have suffered quite a lot from altitude sickness. Both had really sore stomachs. The locals say that coca tea, made from the leaves of the cocaine plant abundant here, is the antitdote, so we've been drinking gallons of the stuff.

Also got some pills from the pharmacy. Apart form all of this Cusco is a really nice town. Loads to do and see.

Lots of locals clad in traditional gear with llamas or alpacas in tow. Jenny is using up most of the memory on our joint camera taking pictures of the llamas and alpacas.

We have not done too much in Cusco other than try to aclimatise to the altitude. Just been taking it easy.

The initial plan for me was to be to do the traditional inca trail up to Machu Picchu. Unfortunately I wasn't organised enough to get on one of the tours. You have to book it 3 months ahead, not 3 days as I imagined. Don't think we'd have managed given the altitude sickness anyway. Instead, we took the lazy way up, by train and bus. Train costs an absolute fortune.

Jenny was struggling a bit on the journey and had to hang her head out the window for most of the journey here, again because of the altitude. We stayed last night in Aguas Calientes, the town from which you take the bus up to the ruins. It's a bit of a dump and overpriced.

There are hot springs however, which we went to yesterday afternoon. They also serve the local beer by the litre which is helpful, although expensive.

This morning I dragged Jenny out of bed at 5 am to try and get the first bus up the hill.

Managed to get the second one and arrive not long after the sun was up. The place is absolutely amazing. Unfortunately we had to wait quite a while for the cloud/mist to lift before getting a proper view. Thankfully it did lift, and turned into a really nice day. I had very high expectations of the place, and wasn't disappointed. It's incredible. Wandered about the ruins for a most of the morning. Decided not to pay for a guide. Did a bit of evesdropping on other English tours, lurking about in the background pretending to be interested in something else. Although Jenny was impressed by the geography of the place, don't think she was that impressed with the ruins because they are only 500 years old, and "the Romans probably had electricity 500 years ago". She was impressed with the llamas/alpacas roaming about the place though, so we've got even more pictures of them after today.

Killing time just now waiting for the train back to Cusco. We've been waiting until both of us felt a bit better before trying the local delicacy of oven baked Guinea pig (or Indian Rabbit). Think tonight could be the night though. Probably going to head for Lake Titicaca tomorrow. It's another 500m higher which is worrying on account of the altitude sickness.

Landed in Lima on the 26th of April. Very excited about being in South America, always wanted to come to Peru. It hasn't disappointed so far. Lima was nice enough, although only spent one night there before heading south to a small town on the coast called Pisco. We went there to do a bit of wildlife stuff for Jenny. There is an island just off the coast which is dubbed "the poor man's Galapagos islands", and seeing as we don't have a spare 1000 pounds to go there we settled for the 5 pound boat trip out to the Islas Ballestas. These are islands which are basically made from bird shit, and they absolutely stank, a far cry from the Galapagos. We saw loads of birds, sea lions, and there were a few penguins. All in all was a pretty good trip. Spent one night in Pisco and drank a few Pisco sours, the local drink made from White grape brandy, lime and egg white. Quite nice.

From Pisco we headed further south and a bit inland to a desert oasis called Huacachina, near Ica. This place was amazing. Basically just a tiny wee lake surrounded by palm trees, surrounded by huge sand dunes on all sides. We got pretty drunk on our first night and met up with an English couple who we ended up travelling with to Arequipa. We also did a sand boarding trip with them the next day. Sand boarding's basically the same as snow boarding but warmer and softer. We got taken off into the desert up these enormous steep sand dunes in a dune buggy. The drive to, from and between the different dunes was probably the best part of the whole trip. The driver was a lunatic. Was great fun.

The sandboarding was good as well, although we never managed to actually stand on the boards. We got taken to the top of these really steep dunes and went down on our fronts head first. Got sand everywhere, and bruises all down my elbows from clinging to the board, was well worth it though.

After this we headed much further south to Arequipa, a 12 hour overnight bus away.

Arequipa's quite a big place and there's plenty to do. It's flanked by a big volcano and mountains. On our first day here we went to a museum, our first cultural experience for a while. The musem exhibits "Juanita" who is a frozen 500 year old mummy, an inca sacrificed girl found on the volcano beside Arequipa. Actually quite interesting, even Jenny found it interesting. The frozen body was pretty creepy, perfectly preserved in the ice, with face and hair and teeth and apparently organs all still in tact. No eyes though. Spent quite a long time staring at it thinking it might move or wink at me.

We decided to do a bit of trekking into the Colca Canyon which is a 5 hour bus trip away from Arequipa. We arranged this through the hotel that we were staying at. We paid for a guide called Alain to take us there and cook for us. He was a bit strange but funny. He didn't speak very much English, so I got a chance to put my Spanish to the test. I can now have proper lengthy conversations with people which is helpful.

Colca Canyon is the 2nd deepest canyon in the world. The tour started by getting the 5 hour bus at 1.30am to the canyon. It was horrendous. The bus broke down every hour or so, and we sat while the driver fiddled about with the engine. It was freezing cold, and there was a phantom farter sitting somewhere close to us who farted every 20minutes or so....and the windows didn't open. It stank. Not a good start. When we eventually got to the canyon we had to descend down into it which was very very vry steep and took about 6 hours, the last few in the blazing heat. We did see 2 condors which was good. We went on the tour with the English couple that we had met, Sally and Peter.

Peter did not enjoy the walking. From about 2 hours into the tour until the end he spent most of his time sulking and whinging. I didn't think it was all that bad, although it was hard work. We stayed our first night at a tiny little place in at the bottom of the canyon. It was amazing. It had no electricity and we stayed in bamboo huts.

It had natural hot springs which we went in after dark and looked at the stars which was incredible. We had a go at fishing with bamboo rods, but didn't manage to catch anything.

The owner of the place had a net, so he caught fish which we ate that night. The next day we hiked up the side of the canyon and walked to an oasis where we stayed on our second night. This took about 4 hours, 4 of which Peter spent moaning. The Oasis was similar to the place we stayed on the first night, although it had a swimming pool. Was absolutely freezing though, so didn't bother with that. After another day's walking we were all feeling pretty tired. We had not slept much, given that for the 2nd days hike we had to get up at 5am. We both had blisters and our legs were very sore. When Alain told us that we were having to get up at 3am the next morning to hike out of the canyon, up about 1000m, that didn't go down to well, especially with Peter. Anyway, instead of walking we decided to pay a little extra and take mules up. Needless to say Jenny enjoyed this a lot. It was quite good fun, although surreal and scary at the same time.

The path up was so so steep and rocky, and the mules seemed to like going right to the edge of the sheer drops. It was also dark the whole way up because we set off at 3 am. The whole canyon was lit up by the full moon though which was quite cool. All in all the tour was really good.

We went out last night in Arequipa with Peter, who had finally stopped whinging by this stage, and Sally, and had a really nice meal and few Pisco Sours, before they got on the overnight bus to La Paz. We on the other hand are taking it easy and catching up on some sleep, before heading for Cusco probably tomorrow. From there we will hopefully be able to do some sort of trek up to Macchu pichu.