Welcome to Cusco

Well we made it safe and sound to Cusco, this city is like 11,000 feet high. So getting off the plane you are gasping for breath, what fun. We arrive at our hostel, LOKI, and it's a huge building built in the 1400's, this place is OLD and ironically the wireless Internet connectivity is almost as old, which does not work. So I worked my networking magic and and could still not get it to work, HUMPH! this is on hodge-podge network, i=I did however get the cat5 network cable to work in our room after plugging in a few switches. HURRAY!!!!!

The altitude sickness is definitely gonna hit you HARD! This is not a fun time, you feel dizzy, short of breath and almost wanna throw up. I took my prescription meds (paid full price in the states, but its available here for a FRACTION of the price, oh well) and the meds kicked in, it causes parts of your body to tingle, yeah tingle, its a little wired, first it was my fingers then my toes then the heel of my feet were tingling . In fact they are tingling now as I write this blog. They offer us the cocoa tea that really does work in helpping ease the symptoms. It is a very flavorfull tea that definitley has helped with our ailments of altitude sickness. They keep an endless supply of the tea and an oxygen take due to the 1 in 20 chance od even an athelete getting mild to severe altitude illlness.



This town is AMAZING its sooooo old, this building the Loki hostel is over 400 years old! http://www.lokihostel.com/cusco/the_house/history amazing history and archetype. There are soooo many pics we have taken and I can't upload them all but we will try!!



We are gonna tray Cuy tomorrow (Guinea pig) :-)



So we are having lots of fun and then lots more. here are some pics!!!!

Protest in Cuzco over the incredible hike in prices due to tourism. We being tourists having breakfeast at the Plaza de Arms where a bit captivated and a little uneasy at what may happen. Maggie bravley srtormed the crowds for pictures and believe it or not they gladly led me ahead of the crowd to do this. The Andean culture is very friendly and I do feel it is unfair of the inflation of costs due to the escalation of tourism in Cuzsco!!

This is the main plaza where the protest happened but this is awesome shot Lane got with a bunch of pigeons flying around. They almost looked like they where having their own little protest.This is one of the many amazing churches in Cuzco. St. Theresa's Cathedral

This the view from our room!!!! yeah it was that cool. There is a cubbky hole in the window that is nice to ssit in and look over Cuzco out to the Andeas. The temperature here is very sunny and around the mid 70's, but dropps very cold in the evening.

This is a shot from the plane, this was the Andies mountain. very , ,, brown. So glad we elected to fly instead of a 22 hour bus rid of this brown landscape. With very dangerous and curvy mountainside streets.

Well that's it for now, we are off to Machu Picchu, tomorrow morning early!!! We will be blogging from Agues Calentes tomorrow hopefully!!!

Chow!

We are in Cusco!

Quick update to let you all know we are safe in Cusco. Lane has a touch of altitude sickness, but this place is the most amazing and spiritual place. We have many pics and stories to update. We are at the Loki Hostel and it is an amazing place to stay! We miss and love you all....promise we will update this blog ASAP!!

Welcome to Lima!!

Well we got up early in the morning with about 2 1/2 hours sleep after packing and headed to the airport for our 7am flight out of Miami for Ecuador then on to Peru. We arrived a couple of hours early for the plane and was killing time at the airport. At about 45 minutes before the flight left we wandered over to the loading gate and was hearing them say final call for our flight, and so we gave them our tickets, and they asked that we stand aside and wait. A little nervous we did so; then they presented us with our new Business Class tickets!

They upgraded us, and we are not sure of the reason, but WOW first class on a 4 hour flight was NICE!
They of course wait on you hand and foot, but the seats have crazy controls and even lay flat! I

have to say that LAN airlines is the best airlines I have ever flown.

Well we landed in Ecuador and had to wait for 5 hours, then off to Peru, here is a pic of Ecuador.There was no first class for this 2 hour leg of the trip, but where well rested from the first leg. When we landed we had a couch sufing buddy waiting for us at the airport, Oscar, he was AWESOME!!! We grabbed a Taxi back to his place where he had another couple of couch surfers staying at this large house. We actually got our own room! There was a little party that night at his house as it was Saturday night and his friends were over; everyone was drinking Pisco Sour's. Here is a photo of Oscar and another of our beds in Lima

The next morning we were up and went with Oscar to this restaurant and had our first Cevechi. This is fish that is soaked in this lemon or lime marinade for a few minutes. The Peruvian fruit has a special acidity that actually cooks the fish with no heat. It was yummy!

After that we went with Fernando and 2 of his friends to Miraflores, which is a section of the city. These are paintings that were for sale there. There were some awesome pieces of work there. Some were only 7 bucks!!

As you may or may not know Peru is mainly Catholic so Baroque architecture is very prevalent and extremely ornate in Peruvian culture.

This is the door of that church.

After that we walked around lots more we snapped this photo from my dying camera. We had more awesome food and then a off to bed. its late so I'm wrapping up and will post more later!!!!

Recovering...

Well I am definitley feeling much better than I was this morning. Lane took good care of me and beware of Wet Willie's " Call a Cab" drink!!
We did have a great time and I am glad Lane has a funny story to tell everyone now...
I have to Miami is definitley and eclectic place. I think the inventor of the bedazzler is from here...let's just say that there is somthing to be said about "Miami style". ( Pictures coming soon)
So we are packing away and catching an early AM flight to Peru... We enjoyed our adventure in Miami and are ready for the next chapter of this trip.
Here are a few more pictures from Miami and we will post more as we get setteled in.
The weather was not too bad for a tropical storm coming through. we really enjoyed the lightning storm!

Welcome to Miami!!

Well hello friends and family!! this is the new blog Maggie and I will use to keep you all up to date on our travels abroad!

I purchased a new laptop and it is TINY, the placement of the shift key is VERY awkward and hard to use so if i forget to capitalize a letter please forgive me.


SO
We took the red eye from Seattle to Miami, got on board our 737 (YAY BOEING!!) and discovered that we were in a emergency exit isle. This meant two things, first we had to memorize the escape card, and second our seats did not recline (SUCK!!!). so the flight could have been better but we landed safe and sound in Miami airport at 5:30 am. Took a taxi to our hotel in Miami south beach. the royal hotel is about 3 blocks from the beach and is a awesome price, but we think it was so good because of the fact there is no real lobby as they are rebuilding it.

We arrived at the hotel at like 6am, and could not check into a room until 8am, so we walked around for a couple hours, and saw the sunrise over the Atlantic ocean. a very welcoming sight, the ocean was warm and salty.

our hotel room is very, ,, arty. its totally white, everything is white, the bed, the furniture, the white cold marble floor, the drapes,everything. kinda weird. the furniture in this room looks like it came directly out of the movie beatlejuice, I expect the chair couch thingy to start walking away at any minute. here is a photo





























So here for the first night we went to this place called wet willies, they had more slushy style drinks then you can shake a stick at!! this place had these drinks called "call-a-cab" and this was no lie, we had 2 drinks each and we were done! things got silly after that.

this is the slushy style machines, there was 22 of them here alone. each one will put you on your kiester







Every restaurant on ocean drive has their dishes of food on display, so i got photos of me with the various beauties trying to entice people to eat that each place.



Well now its the next morning and Maggie is really not feeling well, she had a little to much slushy. so until I can post again.

WELCOME TO MIAMI!