Mark's Wet Socks & Sound Soup

Hola gang, some more tails from the llamas back,

After finally reaching the town of Cuzco, in the south of Peru s tall climbs, our team of 6 (Oz, english, dutch) went about finding a tour to go on the 3 day hike down the Inca trail to the lost city of Machu Picchu. 2 days and 400 questions to 16 tour shops later, (these Poms are so good at faffing around!) we found a crew, and armed ourselves with plastic ponchos, llama socks, and pointy woolen hats with essential ear flaps to combat the cold conditions one can face on the trail.

And so like lemmings, we hiked for 3 days through amazing scenery, patches of cloud forests, green flowing fields home to grazing sheeps and horses, surrounded by moutains towering around us in the distance capped with snow and swirling clouds, in altitudes of 3000-4000m. Not bad! The trail had it s steep moments, and at times when we would be huffing on the trailside, inspiration was easily drawn from our Porters, die hard muscle bound locals who actually run up and down the trails wearing sandals and shorts carrying about 30kgs of tents and food for everyone in a hession sack on their backs, putting us all to shame. Visited a couple of ruins along the trail, usually found on a mountain side with grand views of the extending green valleys. The last day had us awake at 4.30am, hoping to get to Machu Picchi before the bus loads of day tripping gringos could arrive and disturb the ambience. 5am, 6 of us raced along the rocky mountain path in steady rain, and up to the sun gate walls, where all would be revealed in front of our eyes. 1 hour, and 2 inches of rain later, faces were long, as we all stared blankly into the thick clouds blanking everything in front of us. Eventually we gave up on the postcard vantage point, and strolled down to where the city finally revealed itself through the fog, hundreds of meters of rock walls which formed the cluster of buildings and temples of the Incas built in the clouds on top of a mountain, later the clouds did eventually clear giving perfect vantage of the green valleys and neighbouring sky scraping mountains towering up from the ground below. Magic settings! Caught the late train 4hrs back to Cuzco, a great place to party in the evening, as every venue vuys for your custom, offering first drink free, after which you then leave and score another free drink elsewhere, then elsewhere, then elsewhere.....Sadly parted some of our gang here, travelling together for a while, celebrating 2 birthdays also with cakes, party hats and poems and plonk.

From here we shuffled south again to Puno, set on the shore of Lake Titicaca, also home to the Uros, people who live on 40 floating islands completely made from reeds growing in the lake. Boats and tiny cottages are also of the reed breed, the experience is just like walking around on a giant waterbed. Pigs roll around temporarily in the island corners, while the humble trout keeps these smiling castaways fed, however couldn t figure out where they grew the potatoes they served us? Amazing!

Will head round the other side of the lake tomorrow, which also takes us into Bolivian territory, where I ll do my best in keeping on the good side of the folk there, as Bolivian womens builds rival those of Mack trucks.

Luvin' life. Till next edition, Mark.

PS. Note, no domestic pets were harmed or devoured during the making of this story. _ _ ______________________________________________________ _ _

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