Machu Picchu y Aguas Calientes

We`ll we`re in La Paz, Bolivia now - an absolutely wonderful place. It`s been a while since I`ve had a chance to sit down at a computer and make a blog post (apologies), but this one is about Machu Picchu and the little town about twenty minutes on foot away, Aguas Calientes. Basically there`s one word to summarize Machu Picchu: spectacuar. We were both affraid that after seeing so many pictures before hand that actually being there wouldn`t be such a big deal, but we were thankfully wrong.

We had to take a miserable 4 hour train from Cuzco which took us out of the altiplano and in the cloud forest. It was kind of strange looking out the window seeing modern Incans working their farms, giving us a creepy colonial India feel. But as we decended the landscape became more and more enchanting, especially following the river. We stayed one night in Aguas Calientes then in the morning made the twenty minute walk to the base of the mountain, then the hour and a half climb to Machu Picchu. We could have taken a bus, but though the feeling of doing the climb would be worth it. Once we got to the top we went through ruins, listening to other people`s tours, then made the hike to the Incans Bridge (not the one we saw in Mendoza) then to the Sun Gate.

I have way too many photos to upload, but here are some highlights:

This is Aguas Calientes. Pretty much this town exists to serve Machu Picchu tourists. It was very pleasant even if it had a theme park feel.


This picture was shot on our way up to the ruins.


Here`s Antonia posing in front of the ruins.


Here`s a shot from inside the complex showing the beautiful landscape surrounding the site.


Here`s another from inside the complex.


This is the Incan Bridge. You can`t go across anymore, but the walk there was really nice.


Here`s a picture taken from the Sun Gate, the end of the Incan Trail. It was about an hours walk from the ruins uphill.


Here`s a shot of Machu Picchu mountain. You can barely make out the ruins on the the upper left hand side.

Cuzco

We´ve made through Machu Picchu so we´re a little backlogged on the blog. We spent three days in Cuzco and yesterday we came to this little town called Aguas Calientes. Machu Picchu is just down the one road in the town. You have to take a train to get here as there are not road, except the one connecting it to Machu Picchu. Cuzco was pretty incredible though. We´re going back in a hour then tomorrow we´re going to Puno, Peru on Lake Titikaka.

Cuzco is pretty crazy though. It use to be the Incan capital before the Spanish took over. A lot of the building still have Incan foundations. Now though, the Incans are relageted to chasing you down the street asking you to buy goods made from Alpaca wool or to come to their restuarant. If you just walked by the say "Okay friend, maybe tomorrow". It´s really pretty sad the poverty. Especially outside the town. We took a bus up to these Incan ruins and walked back into to town. On the walk we saw some houses people were still living in that might as well be ruins as well.

This is a woman and her daughter downtown. They ask you if you want to take a picture. If you ask how much it costs they say its voluntary. After you take the picture though they get really mean and demand at least a sol per person.


This is a little village by some of the ruins.


Here´s the Plaza de Armas at night.


From a distance, here´s the "Red Fortress", one of the ruins outside of Cuzco we saw.


Okay, that´s all for now, folks. We got to go catch the train back to Cuzco.

Lima, Peru - Que puedo decir?

So Antonia and I started our big trip. We took a flight to Lima, Peru Sunday and are staying with our friend Luke, the one who came to visit us in Buens Aires. He lives with a few guys who run a non-profit and right now there's seven girls from the States volunteering, so it's a pretty full house. We only plan on staying here a few days then, we're off to Cuzco and Macchu Picchu. After that we plan on going to Laka Titicaca, La Paz, Los Salares de Uyuni, then back into Argentina for Salta and Cordoba, before returing to BsAs.

I was thinking "BEST VACATION EVER!" when this picture was being taken. An amry guy without a machine gun was looking at us and laughing too.


This is taken from behind the presidental palace too, but gives you a nice shot of the moutains.


This is a big church in the Plaza de Aramas


Here's a little procession we ran across.


This is a little market inside the post office downtown. The post office itself was closed, since it was a Sunday we were there.


This is a four hundred year old church downtown with catacombs underneith. We couldn't take pictures down there, but the basic image would be this: the bones of 25,000 people in a church basement.


We took a bus trying to go to this section called "La Punta", which is really nice (see the next picture), but got dropped of in this area instead. About two blocks we fit for gingos, the areas outside those two blocks - where I took this picture - got really sketch really quickly. We heard someone whistle and got out of there quick.


This is "La Punta". The day we went there was really overcast and misty so we could barely make out the islands off the shore. But this picture is some fishing boats near the shore.


This is the actual Punta. The islands should be barely visible.


This is a park taken in Miraflores, which is more or less a barrio of Lima, but for legal purposes is a city. It's pretty much the rich area of town.


Here's another shot of Miraflores. The city looks really lush here - but it's not. It's something like this area and the neighborhood where Luke lives takes up 95% of the water in the city. There are neighborhoods (like the one visible on the mountain in the second picture) that don't have running water, but these neighborhoods can use sprinklers to make the city look like this.

San Telmo, finally an entire post

Lots has been going on with us. I'm still working on my spanish web site, Online Spanish Help. So go check it out, please! Also, we're planning a trip up to Lima. Hopefully all that will happen well. Mostly both of us have just been working from home and not really doing too much aside from that. However, recently I realized that I've never made an entire post about San Telmo. Considering that we've now had two apartments here and even when were living in Colegiales we still spent quite a bit of time here, I figure I should make a post about it.

This is Defense on a typical Sunday. They close off the street to cars and tourists from all over gather here to buy over-price antiques and crafts. We live on this street but pretty far from where this picture was taken.


This is the park across the street from us. The Nation Museum is also in this park. It's very nice and always lively.


This is a crazy Russian Orthodox church near us. I think it looks more like it belongs in Disney World than San Telmo but it's here either way.


And finally this is the center of San Telmo, Plaza Dorrego. Some of the pictures from my birthday were taken here. During the night it fills up with tables from the near-by restaurants and also tourists pathetically trying to learn tango. So far Antonia and I have resisted. On Sunday this is the prime spot for the over-priced antiques.

Another new apartment, back in San Telmo

Here's some pictures from our new apartment in San Telmo. We're right across from the National Museum and this big park. It's pretty nice. We share the place with two of our friends from the first place we live, Adam and Rubia. I think my favorite thing about this place is the view, but it's hard to choose since we have a digital TV and a washing machine too. ;-)

Also, please, continuing checking out my new spanish page http://www.onlinespanishhelp.com!

More from Mendoza

Here are the pictures I promised, the ones the Catharine and George, our extremely nice tour-mates took for us.

This is Antonia and me in front of Aconcagua, the tallest mountain in the western hemisphere.


This is the Puente de Las Inca. a natural land bridge and hot springs. The Argentines built the sturcture below at the turn of the century to lodge guests to the hot springs.


Here we are at the Chilean-Argentine border.


Condor!


Dy-no-mite!

Mendoza

It's been a while since I've made a post up here. A lot has been going on. My parents came down for a week and the week after, Antonia's mom came down for two weeks. I've also been pretty busy with work, spanish class, and this other website I've been working on called Online Spanish Help. Natalia my spanish teacher has been helping with it. Check it out! ;-) Also, we moved into a new apartment with our friends Adam and Rubia. I'll make a large post about that later.

Any ways, this weekend we went to Mendoza. It was beautiful. A very pleasant place. It's known for it's wine (90% of Argentine wine comes from the province), but we never made it to a winery. Instead we took a hike through the huge park they have in town and took a tour up through the Andes. Half way up through the tour however my camera ran out of batteries so I wasn't able to take pictures from the more magnificent areas. This extremely nice Greek couple took some pictures for us and as soon as they email them, I'll post more.

This was a big reservoir right aas soon as you get in the Andes.




This was the last town in the Andes before reaching Chile. It's called Uspallata. It's weird Brad Pit filmed "Seven Years in Tibet". Very beautiful.


This was a little bridge (or the reconstruction thereof) that General San Martin and the Andian Army used when fighting the Spanish during the war for independence.


In the background is the largest mountain in the western hemisphere, Aconcagua. In the foreground is a ski resort. It was too warm and dry obviously for anyone to sky.


Here's some photos of the huge park just outside of town.




There was this big hill in the middle of the park too. Here's photos from that.




Here's downtown Mendoza from the hill.


Here's downtown Mendoza from, well, downtown.


Here's the street between the park and downtown. It's filled with BMWs, mansions, luxury apartments and cafés.


This is from outside of our hostel while we were waiting for the trolley at dusk.


These are the four were on our tour. The couple on the right are the Greek couple who were nice enough to take pictures for us after my camera died. One the right, she is from Argentina and he's from Germany. This picture was taken when we just randomly ran into them while sitting at a cafe.