Peru Album #2!! These are photos from Cusco, Machu Picchu and my motorcycle ride, plus the floating islands in Lake Titicaca. Below you will find a link to the Picasa album as well as a slide show embedded in the blog. Enjoy!
Second Installment of Peru Photos!!
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
Saturday, July 9, 2011
Photos!!
So I am FINALLY getting around to putting my pictures up online. There is little reason for anyone to be checking this blog now that I am back in the United States but just in case I'll post a link each time I put up a new album of photos.
First Installment: Photos from Northern Peru
First Installment: Photos from Northern Peru
Saturday, June 11, 2011
Oh my god Leah is posting PICTURES
I know that I haven´t put up a lot of pictures, but it takes FOREVER to load them. So here is a small selection. When I am back stateside I´ll probably create albums on Flickr for all who want to see the grand motherload of photos (and there are a lot I tell you. A lot).  |
| Isla del Sol - Copacabana, Bolivia |
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| The crowd of "waiting" before leaving Copacabana. The boats in the background are what we took. |
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| There are lots of people with llamas (many with baby llamas that are impossibly adorable) in Cusco who walk around getting tourists to take pictures of them for a tip. I got really angry one day when I saw people take a picture of two girls in native dress and walk away while the girls called out "propina! propina!" The girls chased the tourists down. |
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| Motorcycles to go to Machu Picchu!!!!! (Mine is in the middle) |
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| Dylan and ruins on the ride up the mountain |
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| Impossibly adorable child |
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| Impossibly adorable children who, after Dylan and I both took this picture, crowded around us demanding coins as payment |
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| The woman who made us lunch on the 2nd day of our ride. Delicious trout from the river below. |
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| My fellow motorcyclists (Dyland from Portland and Sander from Holland) and I at Machu Picchu |
Monday, June 6, 2011
Purple thumbs and Presidents
Yesterday Peru elected a new president. You know those pictures of people after they voted in Iraq proudly showing their inked finger? Well its the same in Peru, only without as much of the pride. Rather, much like you find in the United States, everyone I talked to felt as though they were choosing between the better of two bad options. Voting in mandatory here and I met one person who told me she would rather pay the fine (I think she said it was 70 soles which is like 30ish USD) than vote. I met another person who "voted" but really just drew a dick and wrote "No Corruption" between the options instead of choosing one.
The actual day of the election was pretty calm. Because voting is mandatory a lot of stuff shut down, though the voting happened on a Sunday so a lot of stuff would´ve been shut down anyway. In the days leading up to the election there seemed to be a little more happening. First of all, the entire country was covered with propaganda for the two candidates. The favored method seemed to be painting their names and slogans and icons (Every candidate has a sign associated with them, for example Keiko´s was an orange K, Ollanta´s was a stylized red O, a party near Nazca uses a graphic of a bunch of grapes, that is next to their name on the ballot. This is what voters mark with an X to signify their chose. My guess is that its for the illiterate voters out there) in huge letters across buildings, walls, or any other flat surface that people would drive or walk by. For months there are going to be huge orange letters screaming "Keiko Presidente 2011" around the country (Keiko did not win). In the cities there were also banners and I did manage to see a few tv ads, though I haven´t watched all that much Peruvian TV. When I was in Cuzco I did manage to "participate" in a rally for Keiko (and by participate I mean I stumbled upon it and then stood in the crowd, sticking out like a sore gringo thumb). Even though I am clearly not Peruvian I was still handed election shwag, a pendant to wave in the air and a few bracelets that said "Yo Kiero un Peru para mi" (For you non Spanish speakers that translates to "I want a Peru for me" with the "Kiero" a play on the real word, quiero).
It was fascinating to watch the rally. Everyone seemed really worked up! There was more energy and fervor out of this, actually, relatively small crowd than you typically get at American political rallys (rallys during the 2008 election being the exception). The energy actually reminded me of the 2008 election. It sort of felt as though I was seeing democracy in action. I had an interesting conversation with a Peruvian man somewhere between the age of 40 and 60 (I seriously cannot judge peoples´ ages here. Its impossible). He told me why he was voting for Keiko, which basically can be boiled down to the following: the other candidate (Ollanta) was leftist and he thought that with a leftist president Peru would experience terrorism again (a huge problem for Peru in the 80s. Keiko´s father, a former president of Peru, is actually credited with ending a lot of this terrorism and getting Peru back on its feet), he didn´t believe in socialism (other candidate socialist), but mostly he thought that men were two prideful and egotistical and women work a lot harder than men so he was going to vote for the woman candidate. This was followed by a story about how the tale of Adam and Eve is really a story about how men are always trying to blame someone else. Not bad for a guy from a machismo culture! (We also talked about how many people wouldn´t vote for Keiko because her father was charged with corruption and human rights violations after his presidency and currently is in jail. Many people think she would´ve pardoned her father if elected). However, Ollanta won and that has some of the Peruvians that I know worried. He is closely allied to Hugo Chavez and is a military guy so some people are worried about authoritarianism and Peru´s government becoming anti-American, I´m sorry, anti-United States (If your answer to the question "Where are you from?" is "I´m American" many south Americans (especially Argentines and Brasilians) will respond "So am I." Not gonna lie, I find this annoying.)
Perhaps the most intriguing thing about the Peruvian election, no alcohol can be sold from Friday through midnight on Sunday. No drunk voting people!! Sunday night, after the election results had been announced, I traipsed through the city of Trujillo with some Peruvian friends seeking a place that would sell us alcohol before the legal midnight lifting of the ban (it wasn´t that hard to find somewhere). So, thats my election story, not super interesting. I tried to write a post about it before the election took place but the wifi on the bus I was on was being futzy. That´s right, wifi on a bus in Peru. And I got a really good hot meal and a blanket I wanted to steal (but mom and dad taught me well and I didn´t, or I forgot at 1am when I got off the bus) because of its cool gold embroidery. Greyhound are you listening to me? Peruvian buses are kicking your ass! Come on now! Oh, and I bought contacts today because it was cheaper and easier to have a quick eye checkup and buy contacts here than to do it in the USA.
I am now it the town of Chiclayo in Northern Peru. I´m going to explore some pre-Columbian ruins over the next few days before heading back south towards Lima. I have 9 days left in South America! Let the countdown begin!
The actual day of the election was pretty calm. Because voting is mandatory a lot of stuff shut down, though the voting happened on a Sunday so a lot of stuff would´ve been shut down anyway. In the days leading up to the election there seemed to be a little more happening. First of all, the entire country was covered with propaganda for the two candidates. The favored method seemed to be painting their names and slogans and icons (Every candidate has a sign associated with them, for example Keiko´s was an orange K, Ollanta´s was a stylized red O, a party near Nazca uses a graphic of a bunch of grapes, that is next to their name on the ballot. This is what voters mark with an X to signify their chose. My guess is that its for the illiterate voters out there) in huge letters across buildings, walls, or any other flat surface that people would drive or walk by. For months there are going to be huge orange letters screaming "Keiko Presidente 2011" around the country (Keiko did not win). In the cities there were also banners and I did manage to see a few tv ads, though I haven´t watched all that much Peruvian TV. When I was in Cuzco I did manage to "participate" in a rally for Keiko (and by participate I mean I stumbled upon it and then stood in the crowd, sticking out like a sore gringo thumb). Even though I am clearly not Peruvian I was still handed election shwag, a pendant to wave in the air and a few bracelets that said "Yo Kiero un Peru para mi" (For you non Spanish speakers that translates to "I want a Peru for me" with the "Kiero" a play on the real word, quiero).
It was fascinating to watch the rally. Everyone seemed really worked up! There was more energy and fervor out of this, actually, relatively small crowd than you typically get at American political rallys (rallys during the 2008 election being the exception). The energy actually reminded me of the 2008 election. It sort of felt as though I was seeing democracy in action. I had an interesting conversation with a Peruvian man somewhere between the age of 40 and 60 (I seriously cannot judge peoples´ ages here. Its impossible). He told me why he was voting for Keiko, which basically can be boiled down to the following: the other candidate (Ollanta) was leftist and he thought that with a leftist president Peru would experience terrorism again (a huge problem for Peru in the 80s. Keiko´s father, a former president of Peru, is actually credited with ending a lot of this terrorism and getting Peru back on its feet), he didn´t believe in socialism (other candidate socialist), but mostly he thought that men were two prideful and egotistical and women work a lot harder than men so he was going to vote for the woman candidate. This was followed by a story about how the tale of Adam and Eve is really a story about how men are always trying to blame someone else. Not bad for a guy from a machismo culture! (We also talked about how many people wouldn´t vote for Keiko because her father was charged with corruption and human rights violations after his presidency and currently is in jail. Many people think she would´ve pardoned her father if elected). However, Ollanta won and that has some of the Peruvians that I know worried. He is closely allied to Hugo Chavez and is a military guy so some people are worried about authoritarianism and Peru´s government becoming anti-American, I´m sorry, anti-United States (If your answer to the question "Where are you from?" is "I´m American" many south Americans (especially Argentines and Brasilians) will respond "So am I." Not gonna lie, I find this annoying.)
Perhaps the most intriguing thing about the Peruvian election, no alcohol can be sold from Friday through midnight on Sunday. No drunk voting people!! Sunday night, after the election results had been announced, I traipsed through the city of Trujillo with some Peruvian friends seeking a place that would sell us alcohol before the legal midnight lifting of the ban (it wasn´t that hard to find somewhere). So, thats my election story, not super interesting. I tried to write a post about it before the election took place but the wifi on the bus I was on was being futzy. That´s right, wifi on a bus in Peru. And I got a really good hot meal and a blanket I wanted to steal (but mom and dad taught me well and I didn´t, or I forgot at 1am when I got off the bus) because of its cool gold embroidery. Greyhound are you listening to me? Peruvian buses are kicking your ass! Come on now! Oh, and I bought contacts today because it was cheaper and easier to have a quick eye checkup and buy contacts here than to do it in the USA.
I am now it the town of Chiclayo in Northern Peru. I´m going to explore some pre-Columbian ruins over the next few days before heading back south towards Lima. I have 9 days left in South America! Let the countdown begin!
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Motorcyles and Machu Picchu
Everyone has heard of the classic Inca Trail hike to Machu Picchu but have you heard of the other ways to get Machu Picchu? A few hours in Cuzco and you will know almost all of them, you don't even need to step foot into one of the 100s of travel agencies to know the basics of the Salkantay 5 day trek or the multi-adventure option Jungle Trek or of the different 2 day 1 night options-by car, by train, via the Sacred Valley etc... Despite being the most famous and the ''classic'' approach to Machu Picchu the Inca Trail isn't how most tourists arrive. This is because the Inca Trail is highly regulated, only 500 permits per day are issued, 300 of which go to guides and porters. There are heavy fees and taxes associated with the trail as well. All of this means that you have to book the Inca Trail weeks, if not months, in advance and it is, by far, the most expensive way to approach Machu Picchu, thus the many other options being hocked at tourists in Cusco [along with massages, you can't go three feet down the street without someone shoving a flier in your face and saying 'Lady massage!'].
So, which of these alternative options did I take to Machu Picchu? None of them! I broke, slightly, away from the well worn tourist trail and, with two guys I met in Copacabana, and crazily rented a motorcycle to drive to Machu Picchu. Now I haven't driven an actual motorcycle since my parents still owned the farm they sold when I was 14. At that point in time I wasn't actually big enough to hold the motorcycle up on my own, so one of my brothers was aways on the back with me. I did own my 35cc Honda Metropolitan scooter for a few of years, but that is a slightly different beast than a 250cc motorcycle that weighs more than I do. And the road isn't exactly the easiest in the world. Nonetheless, after 20 minutes of practicing in a back yard and on a dirt road in a Cuzco suburb I decided that I could do it. It was more expensive than taking a tour to Machu Picchu [note to anyone planning on going to Machu Picchu, its fecking expensive] but it was SO worth it.
The first day was the easiest as far as driving was concerned. After a little while in Cusco suburb traffic [where I stalled once] we were on smooth asphalt that went through smaller and smaller towns. We missed the turn to Pisac and ended up climbing up the mountain for about 20 minutes in the wrong direction, which was fine cause it gave me some practice on curves. After turning around we hit the Sacred Valley, which was ABSOLUTELY gorgeous. There was the red of quinua crops to one side, lush green hills rising up on either side of us, a roaring river to the right lined with green trees. The road curved just enough to make riding fun but not so much that we had to slow down. After about 45 minutes we hit the small town of Pisac and climbed up to the ruins of Pisac. I'm not gonna lie, you pull into a parking lot crowded with tourist buses on a motorcycle and you just feel cool, whether you look it or not. Things took an unexpected turn after our visit to the ruins because Dylan's bike wasn't functioning properly. It kept dying on him, luckily it was downhill to the town of Pisac. There we asked about a mechanic and were sent to a mechanic that only worked on cars. Then we were told that there was a mechanic a 10 minute ride down the road, but not in the direction we were headed. There was no way Dylan's bike could make it in 10 minutes. We spent at least 20 minutes calling the rental agency, a challenge for my spanish, to see if they could talk us through fixing the bike. [they couldn't]. Finally we put everything on hold to eat, as we hadn't since having bread for breakfast at 7am and, as it was nearly 2pm, were a little grouchy.
During and after lunch I asked a few more people about a motorcycle mechanic and got directions to one in town, which was a little challenging to find. We finally found it but it was closed, as it was Sunday, so I had to go back to the call center, put my Spanish to the test again and call the mechanic [note, new word learned areglar, which means to fix, not be confused with alquilar, which is to rent. These words sound very similar over a phone and can cause confusion]. The mechanic and I finally established that he would meet us at his shop. At this point I'd gotten separated from the boys and after searching for them in the town I just rode to the mechanic, afraid he would leave if I didn't show up. To my great relief the boys were there and the mechanic was working on the bike. The problem, a dirty spark plug. 15 minutes later we were on the road so that we could get to the next town before sundown.
Day 2 we headed off early. We had to try and make it to the town of Aguas Calientes that night if we were going to stick to the 4 day rental plan, and our wallets desired that greatly. We stopped in the impossibly adorable Incan town of Ollantaytambo to expore the incredible Incan ruins there. I cannot understand how the Spanish thought that the Incans were stupid, un-cultured, and infidels. One look at the ruins of their cities and citadels and that seems impossible. I can't imagine what it would have been like to have seen the living, breathing, functioning cities. Only a few minutes outside of town Dylan got a flat tire. Thankfully he got the flat tire about 2 minutes away from a tire repair shop. Half an hour and 15 soles later we were back on the road. The drive was AMAZING. It wound up a mountain pass, with hair pin turns and incredible scenery. We kept stopping to soak it up, though my camera was hard to get out of my bag so I took few pictures. It got cold as we climbed. There were farms and tiny houses and adorable children that let us take their picture and then crowded around us shouting ''Propina! Propina [tip]" There were snowcapped peaks in the distance. It was so incredible! Then the ride took us down. The landscape turned lusher, greener, more jungley. After a rapid descent [minus a stop for the most amazing trout I've eaten on this trip in a tiny, side of the road, truck stop esque restaurant] we hit a dirt road for the last 75-100km. There was road construction and a lot of stopping. The last 30 or 40 km were on a twisting, essentially one lane road with a gorge plummeting down to the river on one side. The boys kept stopping to take pictures, but I was exhausted and just wanted to get to Santa Theresa so I didn't really appreciate this landscape until we drove back to Cusco two days later.
We finally arrived in Santa Theresa, near the bottom of the gorge we had just ridden down. We couldn't find the hotel the agency had told us to store our bikes in, but we found another hostel. In the process of searching I stupidly stopped on a hill and, when trying to start and turn around on it, I ended up dropping the bike on myself. After righting it it didn't want to start. We didn't have time to worry about that though, so we stashed the bikes and grabbed a taxi to the train station. There are no roads that go to Aguas Calientes, the town at the base of Machu Picchu. You can only arrive by train, foot, or horseback. We didn't think we had time to walk to the town [it was 20km supposedly] and we had arrived just in time to take the last train of the day. Now, its common knowledge that where there are tourists there is money but Machu Picchu is taking this to an extreme. Our train ride lasted just over half an hour and cost us abut 18 US dollars. If you don't pay in US dollars you get screwed on the exchange rate into soles. Nonetheless, we took the train, gritting our teeth at the cost. We got to Aguas Calientes, bought our tickets to Machu Picchu, checked into a hotel, ate dinner, and crashed into bed.
The next morning we woke up before 4am. The first 400 people into Machu Picchu can hike up to WayanaPicchu [That would be the mountain you see right at the end of the ruins in all of the photos] and we were intent on being one of those 400 and NOT paying for the $8 bus from the town to the ruins. There is a bridge 2km from the town that doesn't open until 5am [the ruins open at 6am and it, supposedly, is an hour hike from the bridge. The buses leave town at 530 and take about 30 min to get to the ruins]. A small bribe, this is South America after all, got us across the bridge at 430. We hiked up the road in silence, staring at the stars and the black shapes of the mountains and trees. It was incredibly beautiful, peaceful, and worth the bribe. The road itself switchbacks up the mountain but there is steep hiking trail of steps that cuts up, we missed the steps and walked for about half an hour, then saw the lights of the people who had waited for the bridge to open and joined them on the steep climb. Our early entrance cut off probably half the steep climb, which I was glad for. We were probably one of the first 50 people into the ruins. Machu Picchu is amazing. Its beautiful. Its incredible. Its interesting. It lives up to all the hype. Thats all I have to say about it. The hike up WayanaPicchu was steep and hard and exhausting and totally worth the views. We spent about 6 hours in the ruins before heading back to Santa Theresa to fix my bike [an easy fix, electrical chord just not making a connection] and spend the evening in hot springs, soaking our aching muscles.
Day 4 we got up at 6am and drove all the way back to Cusco. The drive was so beautiful. The first 30km scared me much more than they had in the other direction, as this time I was on the outside of the road, closer to the cliff edge. I came to understand why Peruvians are so horn honking happy - its lets people know you are passing them and its a great way to let people know you are approaching on all of the blind corners that exist here. It was early morning so the sun hitting the hills just made everything more stunning. The last section of our dirt roadness was some of the most stunning. I was surrounded by lush, jungle vegetation but right in front of me was a snowy peak, over 5600 meters high, gleaming in the sunshine. For over an hour I rode towards that mountain, climbing all the way. Hitting tarmac again was GREAT, riding was suddenly so much easier. About halfway through the ride my bike started making a funny sound, the boys had gone ahead of me and I was a little panicked, meaning that I took the twisty curves down the mountain slower than I would've liked. It was just dirt causing my chain to stick and a little lube fixed it, the only bike probem we fixed ourselves. We took a different road into Cusco, going through a beautiful patchwork of farms with the snowy peaks of the mountains in the distance. The drive into the city was a little difficult, but I didn't kill the engine once. After returning the bike and showering off the layers of dust I went ahead and took someone up on that ''Lady massage?'' offer.
My next trip...it just might be by motorcycle...
So, which of these alternative options did I take to Machu Picchu? None of them! I broke, slightly, away from the well worn tourist trail and, with two guys I met in Copacabana, and crazily rented a motorcycle to drive to Machu Picchu. Now I haven't driven an actual motorcycle since my parents still owned the farm they sold when I was 14. At that point in time I wasn't actually big enough to hold the motorcycle up on my own, so one of my brothers was aways on the back with me. I did own my 35cc Honda Metropolitan scooter for a few of years, but that is a slightly different beast than a 250cc motorcycle that weighs more than I do. And the road isn't exactly the easiest in the world. Nonetheless, after 20 minutes of practicing in a back yard and on a dirt road in a Cuzco suburb I decided that I could do it. It was more expensive than taking a tour to Machu Picchu [note to anyone planning on going to Machu Picchu, its fecking expensive] but it was SO worth it.
The first day was the easiest as far as driving was concerned. After a little while in Cusco suburb traffic [where I stalled once] we were on smooth asphalt that went through smaller and smaller towns. We missed the turn to Pisac and ended up climbing up the mountain for about 20 minutes in the wrong direction, which was fine cause it gave me some practice on curves. After turning around we hit the Sacred Valley, which was ABSOLUTELY gorgeous. There was the red of quinua crops to one side, lush green hills rising up on either side of us, a roaring river to the right lined with green trees. The road curved just enough to make riding fun but not so much that we had to slow down. After about 45 minutes we hit the small town of Pisac and climbed up to the ruins of Pisac. I'm not gonna lie, you pull into a parking lot crowded with tourist buses on a motorcycle and you just feel cool, whether you look it or not. Things took an unexpected turn after our visit to the ruins because Dylan's bike wasn't functioning properly. It kept dying on him, luckily it was downhill to the town of Pisac. There we asked about a mechanic and were sent to a mechanic that only worked on cars. Then we were told that there was a mechanic a 10 minute ride down the road, but not in the direction we were headed. There was no way Dylan's bike could make it in 10 minutes. We spent at least 20 minutes calling the rental agency, a challenge for my spanish, to see if they could talk us through fixing the bike. [they couldn't]. Finally we put everything on hold to eat, as we hadn't since having bread for breakfast at 7am and, as it was nearly 2pm, were a little grouchy.
During and after lunch I asked a few more people about a motorcycle mechanic and got directions to one in town, which was a little challenging to find. We finally found it but it was closed, as it was Sunday, so I had to go back to the call center, put my Spanish to the test again and call the mechanic [note, new word learned areglar, which means to fix, not be confused with alquilar, which is to rent. These words sound very similar over a phone and can cause confusion]. The mechanic and I finally established that he would meet us at his shop. At this point I'd gotten separated from the boys and after searching for them in the town I just rode to the mechanic, afraid he would leave if I didn't show up. To my great relief the boys were there and the mechanic was working on the bike. The problem, a dirty spark plug. 15 minutes later we were on the road so that we could get to the next town before sundown.
Day 2 we headed off early. We had to try and make it to the town of Aguas Calientes that night if we were going to stick to the 4 day rental plan, and our wallets desired that greatly. We stopped in the impossibly adorable Incan town of Ollantaytambo to expore the incredible Incan ruins there. I cannot understand how the Spanish thought that the Incans were stupid, un-cultured, and infidels. One look at the ruins of their cities and citadels and that seems impossible. I can't imagine what it would have been like to have seen the living, breathing, functioning cities. Only a few minutes outside of town Dylan got a flat tire. Thankfully he got the flat tire about 2 minutes away from a tire repair shop. Half an hour and 15 soles later we were back on the road. The drive was AMAZING. It wound up a mountain pass, with hair pin turns and incredible scenery. We kept stopping to soak it up, though my camera was hard to get out of my bag so I took few pictures. It got cold as we climbed. There were farms and tiny houses and adorable children that let us take their picture and then crowded around us shouting ''Propina! Propina [tip]" There were snowcapped peaks in the distance. It was so incredible! Then the ride took us down. The landscape turned lusher, greener, more jungley. After a rapid descent [minus a stop for the most amazing trout I've eaten on this trip in a tiny, side of the road, truck stop esque restaurant] we hit a dirt road for the last 75-100km. There was road construction and a lot of stopping. The last 30 or 40 km were on a twisting, essentially one lane road with a gorge plummeting down to the river on one side. The boys kept stopping to take pictures, but I was exhausted and just wanted to get to Santa Theresa so I didn't really appreciate this landscape until we drove back to Cusco two days later.
We finally arrived in Santa Theresa, near the bottom of the gorge we had just ridden down. We couldn't find the hotel the agency had told us to store our bikes in, but we found another hostel. In the process of searching I stupidly stopped on a hill and, when trying to start and turn around on it, I ended up dropping the bike on myself. After righting it it didn't want to start. We didn't have time to worry about that though, so we stashed the bikes and grabbed a taxi to the train station. There are no roads that go to Aguas Calientes, the town at the base of Machu Picchu. You can only arrive by train, foot, or horseback. We didn't think we had time to walk to the town [it was 20km supposedly] and we had arrived just in time to take the last train of the day. Now, its common knowledge that where there are tourists there is money but Machu Picchu is taking this to an extreme. Our train ride lasted just over half an hour and cost us abut 18 US dollars. If you don't pay in US dollars you get screwed on the exchange rate into soles. Nonetheless, we took the train, gritting our teeth at the cost. We got to Aguas Calientes, bought our tickets to Machu Picchu, checked into a hotel, ate dinner, and crashed into bed.
The next morning we woke up before 4am. The first 400 people into Machu Picchu can hike up to WayanaPicchu [That would be the mountain you see right at the end of the ruins in all of the photos] and we were intent on being one of those 400 and NOT paying for the $8 bus from the town to the ruins. There is a bridge 2km from the town that doesn't open until 5am [the ruins open at 6am and it, supposedly, is an hour hike from the bridge. The buses leave town at 530 and take about 30 min to get to the ruins]. A small bribe, this is South America after all, got us across the bridge at 430. We hiked up the road in silence, staring at the stars and the black shapes of the mountains and trees. It was incredibly beautiful, peaceful, and worth the bribe. The road itself switchbacks up the mountain but there is steep hiking trail of steps that cuts up, we missed the steps and walked for about half an hour, then saw the lights of the people who had waited for the bridge to open and joined them on the steep climb. Our early entrance cut off probably half the steep climb, which I was glad for. We were probably one of the first 50 people into the ruins. Machu Picchu is amazing. Its beautiful. Its incredible. Its interesting. It lives up to all the hype. Thats all I have to say about it. The hike up WayanaPicchu was steep and hard and exhausting and totally worth the views. We spent about 6 hours in the ruins before heading back to Santa Theresa to fix my bike [an easy fix, electrical chord just not making a connection] and spend the evening in hot springs, soaking our aching muscles.
Day 4 we got up at 6am and drove all the way back to Cusco. The drive was so beautiful. The first 30km scared me much more than they had in the other direction, as this time I was on the outside of the road, closer to the cliff edge. I came to understand why Peruvians are so horn honking happy - its lets people know you are passing them and its a great way to let people know you are approaching on all of the blind corners that exist here. It was early morning so the sun hitting the hills just made everything more stunning. The last section of our dirt roadness was some of the most stunning. I was surrounded by lush, jungle vegetation but right in front of me was a snowy peak, over 5600 meters high, gleaming in the sunshine. For over an hour I rode towards that mountain, climbing all the way. Hitting tarmac again was GREAT, riding was suddenly so much easier. About halfway through the ride my bike started making a funny sound, the boys had gone ahead of me and I was a little panicked, meaning that I took the twisty curves down the mountain slower than I would've liked. It was just dirt causing my chain to stick and a little lube fixed it, the only bike probem we fixed ourselves. We took a different road into Cusco, going through a beautiful patchwork of farms with the snowy peaks of the mountains in the distance. The drive into the city was a little difficult, but I didn't kill the engine once. After returning the bike and showering off the layers of dust I went ahead and took someone up on that ''Lady massage?'' offer.
My next trip...it just might be by motorcycle...
Saturday, May 28, 2011
A post that is nearly a long as it took me to get to Cuzco
The first I heard about the Lake Titicaca border crossing between Copacabana (Bolivia) and Puno (Peru) being blockaded by protestors was on my flight from Rurrenabaque to La Paz. One traveler was asking if anyone had any information and everyone´s response was ´The border is closed down?´ This was indicative of how easy it was to find information about the blockade. I learned that Peruvians protesting plans to mine a spiritual Incan mountain and dump the waste in Lake Titicaca had shut down 80km of the road between Copacabana & Puno, effectively closing down the land crossing. However, there were boats that were ferrying tourists between the two towns so there was no need to worry. A Peruvian from Puno I met in Sucre said he would keep me updated after telling me that he had walked 7 hours through protestors to get home. Even when I searched for news in Spanish over the next week & a half all I found were articles from when the protestors first shut down the road.
When I arrived in Copacabana the only signs of the protests were computer printed signs saying 'Boat to Puno tomorrow, 7:30am' taped over the placards usually advertising bus departures. The town was quiet, peaceful, and not full of stuck travelers. The first signs that things were shifting came when I returned from a night on nearby Isla de la Sol. A fellow traveler stopped me on the street and asked if I was trying to get to Peru. He and two friends (all Portlanders!) had been riding their bikes but now had a broken wheel and were trying to avoid the boats because (a) they were concerned about getting the bikes on (b) they were expensive and (c) they had heard stories of people paying to get on the boat and then being told there was no space for them and their backpacks. They had found a bus & driver who was willing to go to the Peruvian border via the other side of the lake, they just needed to get enough passengers to make it financially feasible. I figured, what the hell, I do want to get to Peru, these guys seem cool, sounds like the boats might not be reliable, and this could be an adventure. What followed was a nearly 3 day long adventure that involved lots of struggling with the way that Bolivians communicate, especially with tourists they are trying to earn money off of, which is to say not very well.
After hours of recruiting the planned bus departure fella through because two large groups and a couple of other people bailed at the last minute, leaving us with too few people to make the bus worth it. There was scrambling and a minibus was found that would fit the 12 of us remaining. We loaded all of our bags and three bikes on the top. Then the communication issues began. At first we had been told that it would take about 4 hours to get to Puerto Acosta, the town nearest the border. Now we were told that it would take 6 hours and that the driver would be leaving us there, not driving us the extra to the border. When asked why he responded 'There is nothing there.' Our efforts to find out if there would be buses from Puerto Acosta that late at night (it was nearly 3pm) were not met with straight answers. For the next 15 minutes we went in circles, trying to find out how easy it would be to get from Puerto Acosta to Juliaca (the transport hub north of Puno in Peru) and why exactly the bus driver refused to drive us straight to the border. Eventually we realized that it was pretty late to leave and all of us were a little off guard by the lack of straight information. So all of our bags and the three bicycles that had been piled on top of the van were unloaded. One of the Portland boys decided to try and ride through the protests after meeting two French guys who were also riding (their ride turned out to be amazing, it was beautiful and the protestors were super nice). The other two Portland boys (Dylan and Gabe) had a broken bike wheel and were sick so they joined a girl from California (Yasmine) and I in finding a hostel and booking a boat for the next morning.
We were told to be ready to go at 6:30am. The owner of our hostel was sweet enough to hurriedly make us a breakfast that we scarfed down before hurrying to our meeting place, where we promptly waited for at least 45 minutes before loading the bus and then waited at least another 15 before leaving. It was ten a minute drive to the border. I think that the Bolivians made a mint off of the border closure. Firstly, the cost of a boat to Puno is much more than a bus would´ve cost. Secondly, after explaining to us all that even though we had bought our tickets from different agencies we were all traveling with his company the owner of Titicaca tours explained that he had, through his friendship with the Peruvian border, gotten a pack of the immigration slips we needed to enter Peru. For 1 Boliviano we could buy the slip and be more prepared than the other travelers at the border, which would be very good for us since we would be arriving at about 5:30 and the immigration office closed at 6. I turned to Gabe, said that was BS, the guy totally got them for free, we didn´t need them in advance and then because they were just 1 Boliviano, maybe 30 cents, we bought them anyway. This became something of a theme over the next 2 days. (Another theme of the coming days was the pain in the assness & difficulty of moving the 8 panniers that Gabe & Dyland had between the two of them since they had been instructed to take apart their bikes in order to get them on the bus and boat. After the entire ordeal Gabe professed his undying gratitude for the multiple times Yasmine and I lugged a pannier or two in addition to our own bags).
We arrived at the middle of no where spot near the border where there were three impossibly small looking boats waiting for the mass of us tourists and then we waited. And waited. I have no idea what we were really waiting for because after about 10 or 15 minutes of waiting two guys in border guard uniforms appeared and then a few minutes after that the table that would serve as the makeshift immigration office appeared and then a table where we could exchange money appeared. But still we waited. After about an hour one group of tourists finally got their exit stamps, but then they had to wait for their boat (they left after my group did). My group waited for another 15 minutes and then we were finally told to line up for our stamps. Then we discovered that we had to pay 2 Bolivianios for our stamp (remember when I said the Bolvians were making a mint? There were probably at least 100 of us trying to get to Peru and the strike had been in effect for over 2 weeks). Begrudingly we paid our 2 Bolivianos and lined up to get on the boat. They would only let 4 or 5 people load at a time and they instructed the bikes to go on first. Then they wouldn´t let Gabe come back for the last of the panniers or let me join him in the loading. So I shoved my way through the tourists in front of me, thankfully allowing Yasmine and I to get the last two comfy seats inside the boat cabin. It was 10:30 by the time we left. Granted all of this was an ad-hoc operation BUT they´d been doing it for more than 2 weeks and I gotta say there was a lot of confusion and a lot of waiting and a serious lack of information (please note previous statement about communication when dealing with tourists whose money you want) and I thought that after 2 weeks of doing this it should´ve been much much smoother. This was in great contrast to what we ended up experiencing in Peru.
A long, slow, dull 8 or 9 hour boat ride across Lake Titicaca was next. We thought that Puno would be quiet, that the protestors were just blocking the road part of the way between Copacabana and Puno. We thought that Yasmine and the boys would catch a night bus to Cusco while I was planning on staying in Puno for a few days. The Peruvian I had met earlier in my trip had invited me to stay with his family outside of Puno and I really wanted to see the famous floating islands. We were wrong.
We arrived in Puno in darkness (it gets dark at 6pm this time of year. totally hard to adjust to). In the madness of unloading one of the 8 panniers vanished. While the boys were looking for it I talked to the guards at the end of the dock about buses to Cusco. He told me we couldn't leave tonight, the protestors had blocked the road north of Puno to Juliaca. He laughed and I thought he was joking, then another guard told me wasn´t. Yasmine and I went ahead of the boys while they put together their bikes to see what we could figure out about a place to stay and getting out of Puno. But first, we had to get our Peruvian entry stamp in our passports.
We didn´t know that the protestors had made it to Puno but they had started filling up the town 4 days earlier. The first few minutes of our walk the streets were quiet, there was even a family playing volley ball in the street. Then there started to be people. Then things started getting busier and busier. There were more and more people. We came upon a plaza were trucks and cars were corralled together. The backs of the trucks had been turned into kitchens and everywhere people were eating and talking. There were banners and slogans written on the sides of the truck saying things like 'Aqua es vida'. Everyone was kind to us as we wove our way through the masses, trying to work our way towards Plaza de Armas where we had been told we would find the immigration office. A few blocks from the plaza a man stepped out of a tourist agency and tried to convince to leave our bags in his office before continuing to the immigration office. Considering the loss of the pannier 10 minutes earlier we refused. He relented but insisted on accompanying us to the immigration office. The protestors had filled the plaza and it would not have been safe for us to walk through it. He took us around the plaza via side streets. I had thought that things looked crazy and packed until we got closer to the plaza and I heard the riotous chanting. The immigration office looked closed, you had to knock on the door to be let in. (Actually most of the businesses looked closed. If they were open they had the gates that they pull down when they are closed down with just a tiny door open that they could quickly shut when the protestors went by). Travelers poured in to get stamped and travel agency officials were offering different ways to get to Cuzco left & right. Yasmine & I were worried about the guys, hoping that they would also have a nice Peruvian befriend them and get them safely to the office, which, thankfully, is exactly what happened.
Miguel was our hero for the night. He had offered Yasmine & I hotel room earlier, but I told him we had to wait for our friends. He found and escorted Gabe & Dylan to immigration, waited for them to get stamped, then took all us to a hotel (which we got for a discounted price) after stoppping at an atm for us. Next he took us to a restaurant (we´d been eating cookies all day), found us a way to get to Cusco the next morning, came to the restaurant to tell us and then booked it for us. We all collapsed onto the comfy hotel beds for 5 hours of sleep before getting up to meet Miguel at 5 am.
The road to Juliaca closed the day we arrived in Puno and throughout the night the tour operators of Puno were coming up with alternatives to get travelers out of the city. Some people ended up on minibuses the night we arrived and the drivers bribed the protestors to get past the blockade. We were to take a boat across Lake Titicaca to where the roads weren´t closed, where minibuses would be waiting for us to drive us to Juliaca where we could catch buses to Cusco. At 5 am we headed out into the dawn lit, mostly empty streets and headed towards the dock. There were rocks, big rocks the size of mangos, littering the streets from protestors throwing them at cars and trucks trying to get through. As we headed down the ramp towards the dock another group of tourists were walking towards us, telling us to turn around. Protestors had heard about the plan to get us out and had blocked entrance to the dock. The Peruvians with us headed us a different direction, towards a different dock. We had made it less than a block from the dock when we heard the chants of protestors. A line of men, waving flags and running came down one of the streets from the city center. They were headed towards the dock we had just left but when they saw us there was a louder cry and they switched directions, running straight towards us. This was the only truly scary part of the trip.A rock was lobbed from across the street and shattered on the ground in front of us. Another rock was thrown that some how Gabe managed to catch. I held up my small backpack to protect my head. We tried to huddle together. A few more rocks were thrown. The Peruvians escorting us managed to placate the protestors by giving them money for breakfast, though not before one of our guides was pulled away when someone shouted that he was the one in charge of the gringos. After that they left us, our guides hurried us to the other dock where we quickly loaded up the boat before more protestors showed up. Some of us on the boat were headed to other parts of Peru and some were trying to get to Copacabana so our boat had to dock at the floating islands to wait for the boat headed to Copacabana catch up to us. So I did get to see the floating islands, even though it was only for a few minutes it totally made my day because they are completely awesome.
The rest of the day went smoothly. We chugged for a few hours across the lake, the mini buses were waiting for us and were quickly loaded. They stopped in a little town so we could all buy food and then drove us the hour to Juliaca. While on the boat one of the guides had come around and asked where we were going, selling tickets to our onward destinations. I knew he was overcharging for a ticket to Cusco, I told him that and he lowered the price a little. Even though I knew he was overcharging and I knew it wouldn´t be hard to find a bus on our own , he said it would be no problem to get the bikes on so we just bought our tickets from him, content to pay a little more to have things be easier. When we got to Juliaca they dropped us off at the bus we would be taking (Not surprisingly not a tourist bus as the guy had told me it would be, but one they just put us tourists on first). It was missing most of its wheels because they were changing them. Nonetheless we loaded our bags, went and ate, returned to the bus (which seemed to almost leave us behind but in fact was going to get gas, ignoring the fact that we COULDN´T see it at the gas station and when it wasn´t where we left it would think it had left) and finally set off on the last leg to Cusco. It took another 7 or so hours, but we arrived in Cusco, got cabs to a hostel and group hugged in our room. It had been a long trip.
Even though the protests made my trip here long and even though the confrontation with the protestors on the way to the boat was scary I have to give a huge kudos to the tour operators in Puno. They came up with a plan to get us out of Puno on the spot and it ran far more smoothly than our exit from Bolivia, which had been going on for more than 2 weeks. Though they certainly made money off of us they also were genuinely concerned for our safety and well being. They put themselves in danger and some of them had to walk through the protestors for hours to get back to Puno. Also, the vast majority of the protestors were peaceful and kind to us all. The ones that confronted us in the morning were drunk young men who had been up most of the night and were caught up in a riotous mood. We, apparently, got out in the nick of time. There was another boat from Puno at 9am (which we almost went on instead of the 5am one) and I overheard people in my hostel here in Cusco talk about it. They had much more intense confrontations with protestors, involving having to hide from them. The aquatic crossing from Bolivia is no longer open, we were the last or second to last day to get into Peru that way. I have friends who are having to return to La Paz and cross into Peru via Chile. I don´t know if this is true but I heard that the military intervened yesterday as well.
Cusco is beautiful. The weather is wonderful. Next stop is Macchu Picchu. I officially don´t have enough left to explore Peru before my flight home. The end.
When I arrived in Copacabana the only signs of the protests were computer printed signs saying 'Boat to Puno tomorrow, 7:30am' taped over the placards usually advertising bus departures. The town was quiet, peaceful, and not full of stuck travelers. The first signs that things were shifting came when I returned from a night on nearby Isla de la Sol. A fellow traveler stopped me on the street and asked if I was trying to get to Peru. He and two friends (all Portlanders!) had been riding their bikes but now had a broken wheel and were trying to avoid the boats because (a) they were concerned about getting the bikes on (b) they were expensive and (c) they had heard stories of people paying to get on the boat and then being told there was no space for them and their backpacks. They had found a bus & driver who was willing to go to the Peruvian border via the other side of the lake, they just needed to get enough passengers to make it financially feasible. I figured, what the hell, I do want to get to Peru, these guys seem cool, sounds like the boats might not be reliable, and this could be an adventure. What followed was a nearly 3 day long adventure that involved lots of struggling with the way that Bolivians communicate, especially with tourists they are trying to earn money off of, which is to say not very well.
After hours of recruiting the planned bus departure fella through because two large groups and a couple of other people bailed at the last minute, leaving us with too few people to make the bus worth it. There was scrambling and a minibus was found that would fit the 12 of us remaining. We loaded all of our bags and three bikes on the top. Then the communication issues began. At first we had been told that it would take about 4 hours to get to Puerto Acosta, the town nearest the border. Now we were told that it would take 6 hours and that the driver would be leaving us there, not driving us the extra to the border. When asked why he responded 'There is nothing there.' Our efforts to find out if there would be buses from Puerto Acosta that late at night (it was nearly 3pm) were not met with straight answers. For the next 15 minutes we went in circles, trying to find out how easy it would be to get from Puerto Acosta to Juliaca (the transport hub north of Puno in Peru) and why exactly the bus driver refused to drive us straight to the border. Eventually we realized that it was pretty late to leave and all of us were a little off guard by the lack of straight information. So all of our bags and the three bicycles that had been piled on top of the van were unloaded. One of the Portland boys decided to try and ride through the protests after meeting two French guys who were also riding (their ride turned out to be amazing, it was beautiful and the protestors were super nice). The other two Portland boys (Dylan and Gabe) had a broken bike wheel and were sick so they joined a girl from California (Yasmine) and I in finding a hostel and booking a boat for the next morning.
We were told to be ready to go at 6:30am. The owner of our hostel was sweet enough to hurriedly make us a breakfast that we scarfed down before hurrying to our meeting place, where we promptly waited for at least 45 minutes before loading the bus and then waited at least another 15 before leaving. It was ten a minute drive to the border. I think that the Bolivians made a mint off of the border closure. Firstly, the cost of a boat to Puno is much more than a bus would´ve cost. Secondly, after explaining to us all that even though we had bought our tickets from different agencies we were all traveling with his company the owner of Titicaca tours explained that he had, through his friendship with the Peruvian border, gotten a pack of the immigration slips we needed to enter Peru. For 1 Boliviano we could buy the slip and be more prepared than the other travelers at the border, which would be very good for us since we would be arriving at about 5:30 and the immigration office closed at 6. I turned to Gabe, said that was BS, the guy totally got them for free, we didn´t need them in advance and then because they were just 1 Boliviano, maybe 30 cents, we bought them anyway. This became something of a theme over the next 2 days. (Another theme of the coming days was the pain in the assness & difficulty of moving the 8 panniers that Gabe & Dyland had between the two of them since they had been instructed to take apart their bikes in order to get them on the bus and boat. After the entire ordeal Gabe professed his undying gratitude for the multiple times Yasmine and I lugged a pannier or two in addition to our own bags).
We arrived at the middle of no where spot near the border where there were three impossibly small looking boats waiting for the mass of us tourists and then we waited. And waited. I have no idea what we were really waiting for because after about 10 or 15 minutes of waiting two guys in border guard uniforms appeared and then a few minutes after that the table that would serve as the makeshift immigration office appeared and then a table where we could exchange money appeared. But still we waited. After about an hour one group of tourists finally got their exit stamps, but then they had to wait for their boat (they left after my group did). My group waited for another 15 minutes and then we were finally told to line up for our stamps. Then we discovered that we had to pay 2 Bolivianios for our stamp (remember when I said the Bolvians were making a mint? There were probably at least 100 of us trying to get to Peru and the strike had been in effect for over 2 weeks). Begrudingly we paid our 2 Bolivianos and lined up to get on the boat. They would only let 4 or 5 people load at a time and they instructed the bikes to go on first. Then they wouldn´t let Gabe come back for the last of the panniers or let me join him in the loading. So I shoved my way through the tourists in front of me, thankfully allowing Yasmine and I to get the last two comfy seats inside the boat cabin. It was 10:30 by the time we left. Granted all of this was an ad-hoc operation BUT they´d been doing it for more than 2 weeks and I gotta say there was a lot of confusion and a lot of waiting and a serious lack of information (please note previous statement about communication when dealing with tourists whose money you want) and I thought that after 2 weeks of doing this it should´ve been much much smoother. This was in great contrast to what we ended up experiencing in Peru.
A long, slow, dull 8 or 9 hour boat ride across Lake Titicaca was next. We thought that Puno would be quiet, that the protestors were just blocking the road part of the way between Copacabana and Puno. We thought that Yasmine and the boys would catch a night bus to Cusco while I was planning on staying in Puno for a few days. The Peruvian I had met earlier in my trip had invited me to stay with his family outside of Puno and I really wanted to see the famous floating islands. We were wrong.
We arrived in Puno in darkness (it gets dark at 6pm this time of year. totally hard to adjust to). In the madness of unloading one of the 8 panniers vanished. While the boys were looking for it I talked to the guards at the end of the dock about buses to Cusco. He told me we couldn't leave tonight, the protestors had blocked the road north of Puno to Juliaca. He laughed and I thought he was joking, then another guard told me wasn´t. Yasmine and I went ahead of the boys while they put together their bikes to see what we could figure out about a place to stay and getting out of Puno. But first, we had to get our Peruvian entry stamp in our passports.
We didn´t know that the protestors had made it to Puno but they had started filling up the town 4 days earlier. The first few minutes of our walk the streets were quiet, there was even a family playing volley ball in the street. Then there started to be people. Then things started getting busier and busier. There were more and more people. We came upon a plaza were trucks and cars were corralled together. The backs of the trucks had been turned into kitchens and everywhere people were eating and talking. There were banners and slogans written on the sides of the truck saying things like 'Aqua es vida'. Everyone was kind to us as we wove our way through the masses, trying to work our way towards Plaza de Armas where we had been told we would find the immigration office. A few blocks from the plaza a man stepped out of a tourist agency and tried to convince to leave our bags in his office before continuing to the immigration office. Considering the loss of the pannier 10 minutes earlier we refused. He relented but insisted on accompanying us to the immigration office. The protestors had filled the plaza and it would not have been safe for us to walk through it. He took us around the plaza via side streets. I had thought that things looked crazy and packed until we got closer to the plaza and I heard the riotous chanting. The immigration office looked closed, you had to knock on the door to be let in. (Actually most of the businesses looked closed. If they were open they had the gates that they pull down when they are closed down with just a tiny door open that they could quickly shut when the protestors went by). Travelers poured in to get stamped and travel agency officials were offering different ways to get to Cuzco left & right. Yasmine & I were worried about the guys, hoping that they would also have a nice Peruvian befriend them and get them safely to the office, which, thankfully, is exactly what happened.
Miguel was our hero for the night. He had offered Yasmine & I hotel room earlier, but I told him we had to wait for our friends. He found and escorted Gabe & Dylan to immigration, waited for them to get stamped, then took all us to a hotel (which we got for a discounted price) after stoppping at an atm for us. Next he took us to a restaurant (we´d been eating cookies all day), found us a way to get to Cusco the next morning, came to the restaurant to tell us and then booked it for us. We all collapsed onto the comfy hotel beds for 5 hours of sleep before getting up to meet Miguel at 5 am.
The road to Juliaca closed the day we arrived in Puno and throughout the night the tour operators of Puno were coming up with alternatives to get travelers out of the city. Some people ended up on minibuses the night we arrived and the drivers bribed the protestors to get past the blockade. We were to take a boat across Lake Titicaca to where the roads weren´t closed, where minibuses would be waiting for us to drive us to Juliaca where we could catch buses to Cusco. At 5 am we headed out into the dawn lit, mostly empty streets and headed towards the dock. There were rocks, big rocks the size of mangos, littering the streets from protestors throwing them at cars and trucks trying to get through. As we headed down the ramp towards the dock another group of tourists were walking towards us, telling us to turn around. Protestors had heard about the plan to get us out and had blocked entrance to the dock. The Peruvians with us headed us a different direction, towards a different dock. We had made it less than a block from the dock when we heard the chants of protestors. A line of men, waving flags and running came down one of the streets from the city center. They were headed towards the dock we had just left but when they saw us there was a louder cry and they switched directions, running straight towards us. This was the only truly scary part of the trip.A rock was lobbed from across the street and shattered on the ground in front of us. Another rock was thrown that some how Gabe managed to catch. I held up my small backpack to protect my head. We tried to huddle together. A few more rocks were thrown. The Peruvians escorting us managed to placate the protestors by giving them money for breakfast, though not before one of our guides was pulled away when someone shouted that he was the one in charge of the gringos. After that they left us, our guides hurried us to the other dock where we quickly loaded up the boat before more protestors showed up. Some of us on the boat were headed to other parts of Peru and some were trying to get to Copacabana so our boat had to dock at the floating islands to wait for the boat headed to Copacabana catch up to us. So I did get to see the floating islands, even though it was only for a few minutes it totally made my day because they are completely awesome.
The rest of the day went smoothly. We chugged for a few hours across the lake, the mini buses were waiting for us and were quickly loaded. They stopped in a little town so we could all buy food and then drove us the hour to Juliaca. While on the boat one of the guides had come around and asked where we were going, selling tickets to our onward destinations. I knew he was overcharging for a ticket to Cusco, I told him that and he lowered the price a little. Even though I knew he was overcharging and I knew it wouldn´t be hard to find a bus on our own , he said it would be no problem to get the bikes on so we just bought our tickets from him, content to pay a little more to have things be easier. When we got to Juliaca they dropped us off at the bus we would be taking (Not surprisingly not a tourist bus as the guy had told me it would be, but one they just put us tourists on first). It was missing most of its wheels because they were changing them. Nonetheless we loaded our bags, went and ate, returned to the bus (which seemed to almost leave us behind but in fact was going to get gas, ignoring the fact that we COULDN´T see it at the gas station and when it wasn´t where we left it would think it had left) and finally set off on the last leg to Cusco. It took another 7 or so hours, but we arrived in Cusco, got cabs to a hostel and group hugged in our room. It had been a long trip.
Even though the protests made my trip here long and even though the confrontation with the protestors on the way to the boat was scary I have to give a huge kudos to the tour operators in Puno. They came up with a plan to get us out of Puno on the spot and it ran far more smoothly than our exit from Bolivia, which had been going on for more than 2 weeks. Though they certainly made money off of us they also were genuinely concerned for our safety and well being. They put themselves in danger and some of them had to walk through the protestors for hours to get back to Puno. Also, the vast majority of the protestors were peaceful and kind to us all. The ones that confronted us in the morning were drunk young men who had been up most of the night and were caught up in a riotous mood. We, apparently, got out in the nick of time. There was another boat from Puno at 9am (which we almost went on instead of the 5am one) and I overheard people in my hostel here in Cusco talk about it. They had much more intense confrontations with protestors, involving having to hide from them. The aquatic crossing from Bolivia is no longer open, we were the last or second to last day to get into Peru that way. I have friends who are having to return to La Paz and cross into Peru via Chile. I don´t know if this is true but I heard that the military intervened yesterday as well.
Cusco is beautiful. The weather is wonderful. Next stop is Macchu Picchu. I officially don´t have enough left to explore Peru before my flight home. The end.
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Notes on La Paz
I had only planned on staying 2 more nights in La Paz after returning to the city from the Amazon. I ended up spending 4. La Paz grew on me. Its a chaotic, interesting, city full of contradictions. It is nestled in a valley with houses and streets climbing up the steep walls. In the distance the snowcaps of the Andes loom. The first sight of the city, when approaching by bus is breathtaking. It appears out of no where, sprawling before you in a cozy kind of way.
I was struck mostly by the contradictions of the city and the markets. There are markets EVERYWHERE. Every street is lined with little shops or stands or people just sitting on the sidewalks with their wares spread before them. The markets seem to be organized by theme. On one street everything is hardware related, then it transitions to lighting fixtures, toilets, on to cleaning supplies. One street is full of fruit, bananas at one end, followed by strawberries, followed by papayas. Another street has just sporting goods, soccer balls, trophies, and jerseys for sale. Then there is the electronics street, full of cameras, cell phones, tvs, etc. Another street has fabric and the sparkly, ruffled skirts that the indigenous women wear. As we walked through the streets we would call out to each other "We are in the fabric avenue now! Oh, we've moved onto the Chola clothing street! Banana street!" In addition to all of this there were evening markets that would pop up and then there was the black market, a massive web of stalls selling everything imaginable. Everything was so cheap that I was tempted to buy more than I needed. I bought two pairs of sunglasses ($3 each) and a watch (also $3). The "expensive" watches were $15, they were genuine the shopkeeper explained to me.
The contradictions were the other thing that got me. On the one hand La Paz is a hip, urban place with tattoo parlors with young people who would fit right in in a major US city. On the other hand it is a city in a third world country with the poverty, dirt, and chaos that comes with that. You see cholas in their bowler hats, sparkly flouncy skirts, petty coats, dress shoes, and colorful bundles on their back walking next to women in professional business suits, carrying briefcases, chattering into their cell phones. Swank Mercedes, clean and new, contend with wheezing buses chugging their way up the hills. There are beauitful buildings, old victorian/edwardian style buildings, in some parts of the city. The presidential palace is gorgeous and the national art museum is in a beautiful on colonial building. But most of the buildings are ugly, square, utilitarian red brick affairs. The traffic is massively insane, chaotic, and seemingly completely unorganized BUT there is a government program promoting pedestrian safety (for some reason this program involves people in zebra suits at crosswalks. Not all crosswalks, and not all the time, but you see the zebras every now and then). Because it is so congested, and nestled in a valley, the air can be thick with exhaust. But the prado (the main street through the center of town) has a beautiful, artfully designed, garden separating the two lanes of traffic. Its a crazy, interesting city and I could've spent even more time there. But, the people I was hanging out with left and so did I. After a night in the beautifully located town of Sorata I have finally made it to Copacabana. Exploring Lake Titicaca and then going back to Peru are the next items on my agenda.
I was struck mostly by the contradictions of the city and the markets. There are markets EVERYWHERE. Every street is lined with little shops or stands or people just sitting on the sidewalks with their wares spread before them. The markets seem to be organized by theme. On one street everything is hardware related, then it transitions to lighting fixtures, toilets, on to cleaning supplies. One street is full of fruit, bananas at one end, followed by strawberries, followed by papayas. Another street has just sporting goods, soccer balls, trophies, and jerseys for sale. Then there is the electronics street, full of cameras, cell phones, tvs, etc. Another street has fabric and the sparkly, ruffled skirts that the indigenous women wear. As we walked through the streets we would call out to each other "We are in the fabric avenue now! Oh, we've moved onto the Chola clothing street! Banana street!" In addition to all of this there were evening markets that would pop up and then there was the black market, a massive web of stalls selling everything imaginable. Everything was so cheap that I was tempted to buy more than I needed. I bought two pairs of sunglasses ($3 each) and a watch (also $3). The "expensive" watches were $15, they were genuine the shopkeeper explained to me.
The contradictions were the other thing that got me. On the one hand La Paz is a hip, urban place with tattoo parlors with young people who would fit right in in a major US city. On the other hand it is a city in a third world country with the poverty, dirt, and chaos that comes with that. You see cholas in their bowler hats, sparkly flouncy skirts, petty coats, dress shoes, and colorful bundles on their back walking next to women in professional business suits, carrying briefcases, chattering into their cell phones. Swank Mercedes, clean and new, contend with wheezing buses chugging their way up the hills. There are beauitful buildings, old victorian/edwardian style buildings, in some parts of the city. The presidential palace is gorgeous and the national art museum is in a beautiful on colonial building. But most of the buildings are ugly, square, utilitarian red brick affairs. The traffic is massively insane, chaotic, and seemingly completely unorganized BUT there is a government program promoting pedestrian safety (for some reason this program involves people in zebra suits at crosswalks. Not all crosswalks, and not all the time, but you see the zebras every now and then). Because it is so congested, and nestled in a valley, the air can be thick with exhaust. But the prado (the main street through the center of town) has a beautiful, artfully designed, garden separating the two lanes of traffic. Its a crazy, interesting city and I could've spent even more time there. But, the people I was hanging out with left and so did I. After a night in the beautifully located town of Sorata I have finally made it to Copacabana. Exploring Lake Titicaca and then going back to Peru are the next items on my agenda.
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
The Amazon
I just got back to La Paz after a trip to the Bolivian Amazon Basin. I did a tour of the pampas where I saw monkeys, lots of birds, some crocodiles, an anaconda, pink dolphins, and some other wildlife. I caught and ate a piranha (their teeth are sharp) and my ass and upper legs are covered with mosquito bites. The pampas was recommended to me by other travelers and I just spent one afternoon in the jungle (where I ziplined over the jungle canopy) and, honestly. I'm trying not to kick myself for not having a jungle tour cause I enjoyed my half day in the jungle more than my 2.5 days in the pampas. The pampas are wetlands/swamps and other than the presence of the dolphins, monkeys, and piranhas it reminded me of the swamps of Louisiana, though I think louisiana is actually more beautiful. The real adventure was getting to Rurrenabaque-the gateway city to the amazon.
You can take a bus but it takes between 15-30 hours depending on the day and the bus to cover just 400km. A friend took it and it took him 25 hours to get there and "just" 17 to get back. And the buses aren't comfortable & break down. The flight is about $130 and takes 50 minutes. Most people reccommend the flight.
I booked an 8:40am flight but got a call the night before telling me that the flight time had been changed to 12:35pm. At 9:45am I got a call telling me to go straight to the airport cause now the flight was at 11:30 (it takes 30 minutes to get to the airport). I grabbed a cab and hurried there, only to find out that the new flight had actually been at 10:30 and I'd missed it. So I was booked onto the 12:35 flight, which left at 1:30ish. The plane was the second smallest I've ever been on. There was one seat on either side. It only sat 19 people and you could see straight into the cockpit. The plane was so small you could feel all the bumps and turbulence that a bigger plane wouldn't have felt. The windows were all foggy and opaque so it was hard to see out. A ways into the flight there started to be a beeping. The beeping accelerated with time and I wasn't sure if it was a normal beeping or a bad beeping. We broke through the cloud cover and suddenly everything below us was green. It looked like the opening shots from the tv show LOST. We were much closer to the ground than i'd realized and we were still going really fast. The beeping got faster. The pilot said something over the speaker but I couldn't hear him at all. If I couldn't see him I wouldn't have known that he said anything. I really wasn't sure if he was saying we were landing in a few minutes or to brace for impact. We flew low and fast over the trees and then out of no where the Tarmac appeared. We landed and there was NOTHING around us. I couldn't even see the airport. It was warm, tropical, and humid. Couldn't have been more different than La Paz.
You can take a bus but it takes between 15-30 hours depending on the day and the bus to cover just 400km. A friend took it and it took him 25 hours to get there and "just" 17 to get back. And the buses aren't comfortable & break down. The flight is about $130 and takes 50 minutes. Most people reccommend the flight.
I booked an 8:40am flight but got a call the night before telling me that the flight time had been changed to 12:35pm. At 9:45am I got a call telling me to go straight to the airport cause now the flight was at 11:30 (it takes 30 minutes to get to the airport). I grabbed a cab and hurried there, only to find out that the new flight had actually been at 10:30 and I'd missed it. So I was booked onto the 12:35 flight, which left at 1:30ish. The plane was the second smallest I've ever been on. There was one seat on either side. It only sat 19 people and you could see straight into the cockpit. The plane was so small you could feel all the bumps and turbulence that a bigger plane wouldn't have felt. The windows were all foggy and opaque so it was hard to see out. A ways into the flight there started to be a beeping. The beeping accelerated with time and I wasn't sure if it was a normal beeping or a bad beeping. We broke through the cloud cover and suddenly everything below us was green. It looked like the opening shots from the tv show LOST. We were much closer to the ground than i'd realized and we were still going really fast. The beeping got faster. The pilot said something over the speaker but I couldn't hear him at all. If I couldn't see him I wouldn't have known that he said anything. I really wasn't sure if he was saying we were landing in a few minutes or to brace for impact. We flew low and fast over the trees and then out of no where the Tarmac appeared. We landed and there was NOTHING around us. I couldn't even see the airport. It was warm, tropical, and humid. Couldn't have been more different than La Paz.
Monday, May 9, 2011
A small update and salt flat photos
I don´t really feel like writing anything, though after nearly 2 weeks in Bolivia there is much that I could say about this country. In brief, it is VERY different from Chile & Argentina, another world really in terms of culture and infrastructure. However, it is not at all what I was expecting after hearing other travelers talk about how terrible it was in terms of transportation, cheapness, and bathrooms. Though the amenities are no where near the level found in Chile & Argentina they aren´t at all as bad as I´d prepared myself for. In fact, because Bolivia is so cheap its possible to "splurge" and eat amazingly delicious food in fancy tourist restaurants for the price of a cheap meal in Argentina and stay in private rooms rather than dorms room. The buses mostly appear to retired buses from the surrounding countries, so while they are no longer clean or quiet or ride smooth they still beat the old retired American school buses of Central America (though the distances here are also much longer, so better buses are appreciated). I wonder if the people who talked about how awful Bolivia was had ever been to other third world countries. I will say, though, that I´ve seen enough people pissing in the streets in just the last two days to last me a lifetime (I´m sure I´ll see more though) and even though I haven´t gotten sick (other than some mild difficulty adjusting to being at 4,500 meters in altitude) my digestive system is very clearly a little disturbed by the food here.
Since I last wrote I´ve taken a 4 day jeep tour from Tupiza through the desert to Uyuni and its salt flats. I then took an overnight bus from Uyuni to Sucre with three Israelis I did the jeep tour with (one of them, Shani, and I hung out in Salta for a few days and reconnected in Tupiza). I´ve been in Sucre, a beautiful colonial town, for 4 days and tonight I am taking a night bus to La Paz. To give you a price comparison it cost me nearly $100 to go from Mendoza to Salta (a trip of about 12 hours) in a semi-cama seat, it is costing me less than $20 to go about 11 hours in a cama (aka step up from semi-cama) seat.
Since I don´t feel like writing anymore and I think this internet is good enough for pictures you are finally going to get some. These are all from the trip that I took from Tupiza, Bolivia to Uyuni, Bolivia. The gaps between the lasts photos posted and these ones will probably not be filled in until I´m back in the States. Sorry. and Enjoy!
On the salt flat you can play with perspective, so a tour of the salt flat is pretty much an excuse to play with photos. None of these have been photoshopped, they come straight from the camera.
Since I last wrote I´ve taken a 4 day jeep tour from Tupiza through the desert to Uyuni and its salt flats. I then took an overnight bus from Uyuni to Sucre with three Israelis I did the jeep tour with (one of them, Shani, and I hung out in Salta for a few days and reconnected in Tupiza). I´ve been in Sucre, a beautiful colonial town, for 4 days and tonight I am taking a night bus to La Paz. To give you a price comparison it cost me nearly $100 to go from Mendoza to Salta (a trip of about 12 hours) in a semi-cama seat, it is costing me less than $20 to go about 11 hours in a cama (aka step up from semi-cama) seat.
Since I don´t feel like writing anymore and I think this internet is good enough for pictures you are finally going to get some. These are all from the trip that I took from Tupiza, Bolivia to Uyuni, Bolivia. The gaps between the lasts photos posted and these ones will probably not be filled in until I´m back in the States. Sorry. and Enjoy!
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| View outside of Tupiza |
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| Bolivian Llama |
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| Adorable Bolivian Children |
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| Hot Springs on Jeep Tour |
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| Me and Juan (the stuffed tiger) at the Dali Desert (if you zoom in the rock shapes behind us look like they belong in some of Dali´s paintings) |
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| Laguna Colorado |
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| Sunrise on the Salar (this is me and all the folks from my jeep) |
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| Daniel squahes Andrea |
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| Andrea, Adva, and Daniel jump on Shani |
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| Andrea is so strong she can lift me! |
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| I feed Adva a large cookie |
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| We try to escape from Daniel´s hat! (there is another photo like this only its us escaping from a bag of coca leaves. Coca leaves are a god send at altitude. I agree with the Bolivian slogan: "Las hojas de coca no son una droga/Coca leaves are not a drug") |
Saturday, April 30, 2011
Argentina´s Moneda Situation, horn honking, and Welcome to Bolivia
I think that I have already mentioned that Argentina is having a presidential election later this year and that the current president, Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, have tried to win some popularity points by creating some federal holidays. (She also is advertising herself via photos of her hugging her late husband, the president before her. He was pretty well loved prior to his death and is much more loved since he passed away. Clearly trying to gain some points from his memory). However, if Cristina REALLY wants to secure her re-election she should find a solution to the moneda, or coin, situation in the country. The problem is scarcity. There just aren´t very many coins. In B.A. this problem is exacerbated by the fact that the bus ONLY take coins. People horde them B.A. Sometimes a shopkeeper won´t sell you something if they have to make change and in Northern Argentina you end up getting lots of carmelos (candy) because the shopkeeper owes you 50 cents but doesn´t have it, so they just give you that much candy. Why the problem exists? I have no idea. But if Cristina could fix it I´d vote for her.
My last days in Northern Argentina were good. They involved some relaxing time in the town of Tilcara and some time exploring the interesting landscape of Quebrada Humahuaca. The area is a desert and the rocks are multi-colored, streaks of red, yellow and green catching your eye and bending and twisting with how the rocks have been moved over the ages. (You´d get pictures, but there is no way that this computer or internet can actually handle it). A girl from my hostel (who I´m actually with in Bolivia now) and I walked between the town of Maimara and Tilcara one afternoon along the road. Practically every car driving towards us honked and the men driving them waved or made some sort of signs. I understand that this is a cultural thing, a simple difference in gender relations maybe, but I just DON´T get it. I DO NOT understand what these guys are trying to accomplish. Are they expecting me to wave them down and climb on top of them? Are they just trying to express some sort of appreciation for having been able to ogle my breasts for half a second as they passed? Why would they think that I would appreciate it? Do Argentinean women appreciate this? And I have to say that I find this different than the people who mutter comments to you or whistle at you when you walk past them on the street. At least those people can actually SEE me, whereas these guys can only tell that I´m woman and really have NO time to determine if they think I´m attractive or not. Which makes their honks meaningless in the appreciation department, I mean really. Interestingly none of the cars going the same direction as us honked, just the ones going the other way. We got so annoyed by it after about an hour that we waded across a river to take a secondary road.
So I have escaped Argentina and am now in Bolivia. My last few days in Argentina it was evident that we were getting closer to Bolivia. The looks of the people, the food, and the handicrafts all changed some and the buses weren´t quite as nice. But crossing the border was still interesting. It was exhausting and simple all at the same time. I was stupid and kept putting off getting American dollars to pay for my $135 visa. For some reason the Argentine border town had NO casas de cambio (there were dozens on the Bolivian side, but that did me no good) and the bank had no American dollars (probably the only Argentinean bank with no US dollars) so I ended up paying for my visa half in Argentine pesos and half in US dollars and getting ripped off by the exchange rate. I knew better, its my own damn fault. In the Bolivian border town I was told that there was no cash machine (though a traveler in the town we are in now says there was one. Dammit). Luckily I had gotten 40 Bolivians in change from the border guard so we had enough to buy our bus tickets to Tupiza, where we expected to find a cash machine...expected... Our bus broke down on the way to Tupiza (it took about 20 minutes to fix), a far cry from the luxurious double decker semi-camas of Chile, Argentina, and Peru. Then we arrived and found out that not only is there no ATM here but Monday is a holiday so the banks are closed until Tuesday. For a moment we thought we were going to have NO way to get money, but thankfully the banks were open for 4 hours this morning so we were able to get cash advances...Ah, the joys of travel. BUT, on the flip side, for a grand total of $20 a night we have our own room in a lovely hotel with a pool and a GREAT breakfast. And we spent a grand total of $11 (put on my credit card) for two pizzas, two fresh squeezed juices, and a big salad in a nice restaurant.
Tomorrow we head off on a for day tour of the salt flats. Very excited.
Addendum: Argentinean Spanish has completely screwed with my head. Argentines pronounce "y" and "ll" sort of like the "s" in treasure and they don´t really understand you if you pronounce those sounds like they do in nearly all other spanish speaking countries. Plus they use "vos" rather than "tu" and the conjugation of some verbs changes (ie vos tenes instead of tu tienes or vos podes vs tu puedes). Bolivian spanish is music to my ears; they speak slowly and they pronounce things the way I´m used to. BUT I keep pronouncing things like an Argentine and using vos. Sigh.
I just had a conversation with a Bolivian shopkeeper who let me pay 7.50 instead of 8 for Snickers bar (mmm dinner) because of change issues. Apparently Bolivia has the same problem as Argentina. In response to my question "Why?" he said that the coins are taken across the border, apparently to Brazil, and melted down. That is the word on the street apparently.
Addendum: Argentinean Spanish has completely screwed with my head. Argentines pronounce "y" and "ll" sort of like the "s" in treasure and they don´t really understand you if you pronounce those sounds like they do in nearly all other spanish speaking countries. Plus they use "vos" rather than "tu" and the conjugation of some verbs changes (ie vos tenes instead of tu tienes or vos podes vs tu puedes). Bolivian spanish is music to my ears; they speak slowly and they pronounce things the way I´m used to. BUT I keep pronouncing things like an Argentine and using vos. Sigh.
I just had a conversation with a Bolivian shopkeeper who let me pay 7.50 instead of 8 for Snickers bar (mmm dinner) because of change issues. Apparently Bolivia has the same problem as Argentina. In response to my question "Why?" he said that the coins are taken across the border, apparently to Brazil, and melted down. That is the word on the street apparently.
Monday, April 25, 2011
"Trapped" in Northern Argentina
For about the last week I´ve been saying "In a couple of days I will be in Bolivia." Those "couple of days" are stretching themselves out far past even a few days. From Cordoba I was planning on going straight to Salta but changed my mind at the last minute and went to Mendoza. This was not actually the best idea logistically or in practicality and, largely because of this, Mendoza was a wash. Part of the problem was that I got sick the day I arrived in Mendoza so I wasn´t motivated to do anything. The other part of the problem was that last week was Semana Santa, which is basically a week of vacation for Argentinians. This meant that (1) the hostel I stayed in was booked up past Thursday and (2) the receptionist freaked me out when I arrived by saying that all of the buses to Salta might already be booked up so I went and booked my ticket to Salta the day I arrived in Mendoza. I really needed one or two more days in the area to have made the trip (Mendoza was out of the way) worth it. But, I´d already booked my ticket...so meh.
Salta. Salta is the real reason that I haven´t made it to Bolivia yet. I say that I am leaving tomorrow to head to the small Argentinian town of Tilcara for a few days...but...I haven´t booked my ticket yet...Why am I "trapped" in Salta? Simply because my days here have been wonderful. The city itself is one of the most beautiful cities in Argentina. Unlike Mendoza, which was destroyed by an earthquake in the 1800s, or Buenos Aires the architecture is largely colonial. In the areas around the city there are also a number of small towns with colonial buildings and cobblestone streets. It feels like a different country (its only 400km from Bolivia and you can see that in the people and feel it in the atmosphere) in some ways and is still very Argentinian is others.
My first full day here I took the bus to a town called Chicoana. This is a small town just 50km from Salta that is known for its "gaucho" culture. Gauchos are the Argentinian equivalent of an American cowboy. The town was cute enough but didn´t have much going on. While I was eating lunch at a plaza side restaurant a group of people, two adults and a bunch of kids, rode up on horses. As I watched them I thought "You know, I´m in gaucho country, I really should´ve booked a horse ride, but I already booked a tour for tomorrow and then I´m going north..." Then the people came up to me, handed me a business card, asked me if I wanted to go for a ride, and told me the price (which was way cheaper than any of the tours from Salta). So I went and it was magically perfect. It was just me and the Argentine guide who had lived his whole life in Chicoana. We rode up in the mountains and it was beautiful. He could tell that I´d ridden before so we galloped and ran the horses, it wasn´t just a boring, slow walking, trail ride. Up in the mountain we reached a meadow where there was this ageless old Argentine man with his cows and his goats and his dogs. The sun was perfect, lighting the place up golden, and there were hundreds of butterflies flitting about the purple flower bushes. It was just marvelous. On our way back down we crossed paths with the other guide, a dutch woman, who asked if I wanted to go back up the mountain with her and the non-spanish/english speaking french woman she was guiding. I said yes so I went back up the mountain and got to see just how perfect my first trip had been. Now the meadow was in shade and the butterflies and old man were gone. But the ride was still wonderful.
The next day I took a guided tour to a town about 150km from Salta. The tour was great, a really good tour guide and driver. The first hour was a bit rough cause I went out the night before with some folks from my hostel and only got like 3 hours of sleep...but after that it was just great fun. Most of the people on the tour were Argentinians who were on vacation for Semana Santa. Somehow that made the tour feel less "touristy" and more like I was really experiencing Argentina. It was just a great day! Back in Salta a few people from the hostel and I went out to a parilla and ate a lot of really good meat for not that much money.
Today and Israeli girl and I went out to the mercado and bought a bunch of food and then came back to the hostel and prepared an amazing feast for a group of us. The food was soooo good and the conversation was just as nice. There has just been this wonderful, relaxed, comfortable, smooth, happy vibe permeating my entire stay here. Which is why I´m having so much trouble leaving. But I´m pretty sure I´m going to leave tomorrow...pretty sure...I mean I only have 7 more weeks in South America before I return to the states and I still have to do Bolivia and Peru and I´ve been in Argentina for quite a while now...
Salta. Salta is the real reason that I haven´t made it to Bolivia yet. I say that I am leaving tomorrow to head to the small Argentinian town of Tilcara for a few days...but...I haven´t booked my ticket yet...Why am I "trapped" in Salta? Simply because my days here have been wonderful. The city itself is one of the most beautiful cities in Argentina. Unlike Mendoza, which was destroyed by an earthquake in the 1800s, or Buenos Aires the architecture is largely colonial. In the areas around the city there are also a number of small towns with colonial buildings and cobblestone streets. It feels like a different country (its only 400km from Bolivia and you can see that in the people and feel it in the atmosphere) in some ways and is still very Argentinian is others.
My first full day here I took the bus to a town called Chicoana. This is a small town just 50km from Salta that is known for its "gaucho" culture. Gauchos are the Argentinian equivalent of an American cowboy. The town was cute enough but didn´t have much going on. While I was eating lunch at a plaza side restaurant a group of people, two adults and a bunch of kids, rode up on horses. As I watched them I thought "You know, I´m in gaucho country, I really should´ve booked a horse ride, but I already booked a tour for tomorrow and then I´m going north..." Then the people came up to me, handed me a business card, asked me if I wanted to go for a ride, and told me the price (which was way cheaper than any of the tours from Salta). So I went and it was magically perfect. It was just me and the Argentine guide who had lived his whole life in Chicoana. We rode up in the mountains and it was beautiful. He could tell that I´d ridden before so we galloped and ran the horses, it wasn´t just a boring, slow walking, trail ride. Up in the mountain we reached a meadow where there was this ageless old Argentine man with his cows and his goats and his dogs. The sun was perfect, lighting the place up golden, and there were hundreds of butterflies flitting about the purple flower bushes. It was just marvelous. On our way back down we crossed paths with the other guide, a dutch woman, who asked if I wanted to go back up the mountain with her and the non-spanish/english speaking french woman she was guiding. I said yes so I went back up the mountain and got to see just how perfect my first trip had been. Now the meadow was in shade and the butterflies and old man were gone. But the ride was still wonderful.
The next day I took a guided tour to a town about 150km from Salta. The tour was great, a really good tour guide and driver. The first hour was a bit rough cause I went out the night before with some folks from my hostel and only got like 3 hours of sleep...but after that it was just great fun. Most of the people on the tour were Argentinians who were on vacation for Semana Santa. Somehow that made the tour feel less "touristy" and more like I was really experiencing Argentina. It was just a great day! Back in Salta a few people from the hostel and I went out to a parilla and ate a lot of really good meat for not that much money.
Today and Israeli girl and I went out to the mercado and bought a bunch of food and then came back to the hostel and prepared an amazing feast for a group of us. The food was soooo good and the conversation was just as nice. There has just been this wonderful, relaxed, comfortable, smooth, happy vibe permeating my entire stay here. Which is why I´m having so much trouble leaving. But I´m pretty sure I´m going to leave tomorrow...pretty sure...I mean I only have 7 more weeks in South America before I return to the states and I still have to do Bolivia and Peru and I´ve been in Argentina for quite a while now...
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Random comments on random things
I went to Che Guevara´s hometown, Alta Gracia, the other day. It is a pleasant little town about an hour away from Cordoba. I liked it. There is a museum in one of the houses Che grew up in. I have to admit that the museum puzzled me. Here is this quaint little town, clean streets, tourist office by a park with a grand lake, a big ole hotel with a garden park area open to all, a seemingly middle class, rather straight-laced place paying homage to their most famous citizen, who happens to have been a revolutionary who essentially rejected his hometown and native country. I wondered what Che would´ve thought. There are photos of Che with Fidel Castro, Che in military garb in the factories of Cuba, in the Congo, in the jungles. There are copies of letters he wrote to his children (did you know he had 6, I didn´t) telling them to be good little revolutionaries and there are photos of Fidel himself and Huga Chavez visiting the museum at its opening. I found myself wondering how Che became the figure, the face plastered on so many shirts and displayed in so many college dorm rooms. Is it because he was killed by the CIA in Bolivia (I can´t find the question mark on this keyboard). I have a hard time picturing the same people who put up a poster of Che putting one up of Fidel but why wouldn´t they. I mean, Che was just as, if not more, radical than Fidel. He helped Fidel come to power in Cuba, he was an integral part of Fidel´s early government in Cuba. Do the people who wear his face on their shirts know that. And while Fidel stayed in his own country (please note that che was not Cuban) to rule and govern his own people Che went off to fight in a jungle of another country he wasn´t from. No matter what you think of Fidel´s politics you have to admit that staying to govern the country you were born in, grew up, and care about is far more conventional than a doctor becoming a soldier and fighting revoutions in countries that weren´t his own. (I should state here that I do not believe in the pan-latin americanism that Che espoused so, yes, in my eyes he was fighting in foreign countries. In my uneducated opinion a middle class argentinian has as much to do with the struggle for indigenous rights in bolivia as I do in the rights of a native navajo, less actually). So, yeah. those were my thoughts after visiting the che guevara museum.
I will be leaving Argentina in a few days. I am in Mendoza currently, a location I added to my itinerary at the last minute. It was probably a silly idea, but oh well. I am headed to Salta in Northern Argentina tonight and then on to Bolivia. I have been thinking about Argentinian men during my last few days here. Following with the stereotype of latino men they cat call, but there is something different about Argentinian cat calling that I´m not sure I´ve quite put my finger on. There is little threatening about their cat calling. It isn´t the whistling or the "hey pretty baby" that you associate with the cat calls of construction workers, for example. No, its more that when you walk past them they murmer a few sentences about how beautiful you and your friends are (I´ve noticed that this tends to happen more when I´m not alone, this may be because groups of women attract more attention or I´m just not to the tastes of most Argentinian men). Cars will honk their horns or guys will call out to you as they pass, but its almost always a complete phrase. Its innocent and annoying all at the same time and I wonder how its tied to other things I´ve noticed. For example, yesterday I overheard a woman try to get the attention of a waiter by calling out "flaco!" (aka "skinny!") Today I was buying some stuff and the first shop attendant asked me what I needed by calling me "hermosa" (pretty) a few minutes later another shop keeper questioned if I´d been helped and refered to by "linda" (another way of saying pretty). There is nothing meant by these comments, these men weren´t hitting on me and the woman mentioned above wasn´t being rude. This is just the Argentinian version of sir or madam I guess.
That is all for now. I´ve got a bag to pack and a bus to catch.
Friday, April 15, 2011
On the Road Again
After a five week rest the red backpack has been dusted off and hoisted onto my shoulders once again. It was odd packing up the tiny bits of my life that had scattered themselves across my B.A. apartment, it was as though I'd forgotten that it could all fit in one bag and I was disappointed to discover that, in fact, it did all fit with room to spare. I am finding that I am not as in love with life on the road as I once was. I take a new pleasure in the tiny normalcies of life: showering and sleeping in the same place, walking to the subway each morning to go to school, recharging my phone or buying my fruits and vegetables at the same corner stores, going to the same Mexican restaurant twice or three times in a week, getting to know the people who run the laundromat. Maybe it is because even while it becomes a routine I know that it is temporary so I don't become bored or bogged down by it. In short, I was sad to leave my little B.A. home bubble and, though looking forward to going to the places I'm headed, I'm not vibrating with excitement the way I did on some past travels.
Saying goodbye to people has become an all too normal part of my life. The goodbyes to my fellow CELTA teachers was drug out over a few days. All 10 of us + one spouse went out to dinner on Friday night at an all you can eat steakhouse, Siga La Vaca, in B.A. The all you can eat menu included either an entire bottle of wine or a liter of beer per person. No one ever hurries you out of restaurant in Argentina so our feast was a nearly four hour long affair, starting at 8 and ending at midnight, which was good cause 11 bottles of wine is a lot to drink, even when there are 11 of you. Some goodbyes were had at dinner and then the rest of us went out to an awesome bar in Palermo (my neighborhood) which was decorated in a funky Portlandesque style and had games like Pictionary, scrabble, and jenga for all the tables. It made me a little homesick to see all of these people playing games at a bar. Every table was playing a game. We played pictionary in spanish, which was challenging because half of the time we had to have Gabriela (who is Argentinian and now certified CELTA english teacher) translate the cues for us. It was pretty hilarious. I spent the weekend soaking up my last bits of BA. I did a decent amount of exploring in my time there, but I was so busy with the CELTA that I didn't go out at night much and there was lots that I didn't do. Our trip to the game bar and some of my wanderings my last few days there made me want to get know the city even more. On the one hand, I know my way around and have seen a lot. On the other hand there is so much MORE to discover! Alas, you can't do it all.
Two of my fellow CELTA folk, Ollie and Kari, and I traveled to Uruguay to visit another CELTA cohort, Christel. Christel is marrying an Oregonian diplomat and they are stationed at the US Embassy in Montevideo. It was the perfect trip, even Kari and I almost getting in like five car accidents in the taxi on the way to the ferry terminal was great (and by great I mostly mean hilarious because we didn't actually get in an accident and the taxi driver was singing along to 80s tunes in English the whole time and blaming the other drivers).
We took the slow, 3 hour long, ferry from B.A. to Colonia, a small colonial town on the Rio de la Plata in Uruguay. The sun was shining and we spent the entire time out on the top deck, soaking up the sun and playing backgammon and cards. Everyone I asked about Colonia pretty much had this to say about it, "Yeah, Its pretty but....you just need a few hours there and that's enough." We spent just a few hours there, loved it, and could've stayed longer. This is probably mostly due to the fact that we rented scooters and had an amazing time zipping through the cobblestone streets of the old town and up the coast (the river is so wide it looks like you are already at the Atlantic), stopping at beaches and an abandoned bull ring before taking backroads back into town. Poor Kari kept switching between riding on the back of my scooter and Ollie's because both of us kept saying things like "wow! Its so much harder to drive this thing when you are on it." The old town of Colonia is beautiful and we went a little picture happy.
We slept the entire 2.5 hour bus ride to Montevidea, which meant we were wide awake when Christel picked us up at the bus station in her pink Chinese knock off of a mini cooper. We picked up two other CELTA peeps, who were staying at hostel in Montevideo, and forced the poor pink car (which I named Lola) to cart all six of us up the hill to Christel's beautiful apartment where her husband-to-be had an amazing dinner and wine waiting for us. We stayed up late, talking, eating, drinking and playing the guitar.
The next day we wandered along the beach, had lunch with Christel at a cute little restaurant, and then wandered around the old town of Montevideo. Most guidebooks describe Montevideo as a city that seems stuck in time or as a quiter, tinier, tamer, older looking version of BA. This is true but also a little unfair. The downtown, Ciudad Viejo, area of Montevideo does sort of look like a quiet, slightly run down neighborhood of B.A., with French Art Noveau turn of the century buildings that are a bit run down looking, but the city is growing, developing and expanding outside of the city center. That said, it is MUCH smaller and quieter than BA. There are only 3 million people in the entire country of Uruguay and a third of them, 1.3 million, live in Montevideo. That night we went to a sleek, modern, new Brazilian bar in the shadow of the sleek, modern, new World Trade Center not too far from where Christel lives to hear the wife of a US diplomat sing. Picture a sassy, blonde, buxom, 40 something year old from Kentucky. Now picture that woman winning the Urugayan equivalent to American Idol when she'd not really had a musical career before and then launching a music career by playing at local bars and venues. Boom. That was our concert. It was great.
The entire trip everything seemed to just fall into place for us and the next day was no exception. The weather was perfect for a beach day, which was what we had planned. We spent 3 hours just relaxing, reading, and sleeping on the beach and then ambled back to Christel's to watch a movie in which Christel starred. Christel is Dutch and she was a teenage actress so we got to watch the first movie she was ever in (and she had the starring role). It was really fun to see. That night we went to a parilla (grill house) just around the corner from her house and I had the best steak I've ever had in my entire life. Delicious!
The next day was the last round of CELTA farewells. First saying goodbye to Christel, then to Ollie, and then, finally, to Kari. On to a bus I went and now I am writing from the apartment of my Swedish-Argentinian couch surfing host in Cordoba...and now I have to figure out what comes next...I'll keep you posted.
Saying goodbye to people has become an all too normal part of my life. The goodbyes to my fellow CELTA teachers was drug out over a few days. All 10 of us + one spouse went out to dinner on Friday night at an all you can eat steakhouse, Siga La Vaca, in B.A. The all you can eat menu included either an entire bottle of wine or a liter of beer per person. No one ever hurries you out of restaurant in Argentina so our feast was a nearly four hour long affair, starting at 8 and ending at midnight, which was good cause 11 bottles of wine is a lot to drink, even when there are 11 of you. Some goodbyes were had at dinner and then the rest of us went out to an awesome bar in Palermo (my neighborhood) which was decorated in a funky Portlandesque style and had games like Pictionary, scrabble, and jenga for all the tables. It made me a little homesick to see all of these people playing games at a bar. Every table was playing a game. We played pictionary in spanish, which was challenging because half of the time we had to have Gabriela (who is Argentinian and now certified CELTA english teacher) translate the cues for us. It was pretty hilarious. I spent the weekend soaking up my last bits of BA. I did a decent amount of exploring in my time there, but I was so busy with the CELTA that I didn't go out at night much and there was lots that I didn't do. Our trip to the game bar and some of my wanderings my last few days there made me want to get know the city even more. On the one hand, I know my way around and have seen a lot. On the other hand there is so much MORE to discover! Alas, you can't do it all.
Two of my fellow CELTA folk, Ollie and Kari, and I traveled to Uruguay to visit another CELTA cohort, Christel. Christel is marrying an Oregonian diplomat and they are stationed at the US Embassy in Montevideo. It was the perfect trip, even Kari and I almost getting in like five car accidents in the taxi on the way to the ferry terminal was great (and by great I mostly mean hilarious because we didn't actually get in an accident and the taxi driver was singing along to 80s tunes in English the whole time and blaming the other drivers).
We took the slow, 3 hour long, ferry from B.A. to Colonia, a small colonial town on the Rio de la Plata in Uruguay. The sun was shining and we spent the entire time out on the top deck, soaking up the sun and playing backgammon and cards. Everyone I asked about Colonia pretty much had this to say about it, "Yeah, Its pretty but....you just need a few hours there and that's enough." We spent just a few hours there, loved it, and could've stayed longer. This is probably mostly due to the fact that we rented scooters and had an amazing time zipping through the cobblestone streets of the old town and up the coast (the river is so wide it looks like you are already at the Atlantic), stopping at beaches and an abandoned bull ring before taking backroads back into town. Poor Kari kept switching between riding on the back of my scooter and Ollie's because both of us kept saying things like "wow! Its so much harder to drive this thing when you are on it." The old town of Colonia is beautiful and we went a little picture happy.
We slept the entire 2.5 hour bus ride to Montevidea, which meant we were wide awake when Christel picked us up at the bus station in her pink Chinese knock off of a mini cooper. We picked up two other CELTA peeps, who were staying at hostel in Montevideo, and forced the poor pink car (which I named Lola) to cart all six of us up the hill to Christel's beautiful apartment where her husband-to-be had an amazing dinner and wine waiting for us. We stayed up late, talking, eating, drinking and playing the guitar.
The next day we wandered along the beach, had lunch with Christel at a cute little restaurant, and then wandered around the old town of Montevideo. Most guidebooks describe Montevideo as a city that seems stuck in time or as a quiter, tinier, tamer, older looking version of BA. This is true but also a little unfair. The downtown, Ciudad Viejo, area of Montevideo does sort of look like a quiet, slightly run down neighborhood of B.A., with French Art Noveau turn of the century buildings that are a bit run down looking, but the city is growing, developing and expanding outside of the city center. That said, it is MUCH smaller and quieter than BA. There are only 3 million people in the entire country of Uruguay and a third of them, 1.3 million, live in Montevideo. That night we went to a sleek, modern, new Brazilian bar in the shadow of the sleek, modern, new World Trade Center not too far from where Christel lives to hear the wife of a US diplomat sing. Picture a sassy, blonde, buxom, 40 something year old from Kentucky. Now picture that woman winning the Urugayan equivalent to American Idol when she'd not really had a musical career before and then launching a music career by playing at local bars and venues. Boom. That was our concert. It was great.
The entire trip everything seemed to just fall into place for us and the next day was no exception. The weather was perfect for a beach day, which was what we had planned. We spent 3 hours just relaxing, reading, and sleeping on the beach and then ambled back to Christel's to watch a movie in which Christel starred. Christel is Dutch and she was a teenage actress so we got to watch the first movie she was ever in (and she had the starring role). It was really fun to see. That night we went to a parilla (grill house) just around the corner from her house and I had the best steak I've ever had in my entire life. Delicious!
The next day was the last round of CELTA farewells. First saying goodbye to Christel, then to Ollie, and then, finally, to Kari. On to a bus I went and now I am writing from the apartment of my Swedish-Argentinian couch surfing host in Cordoba...and now I have to figure out what comes next...I'll keep you posted.
Friday, April 8, 2011
Buenos Aires
Two weekends ago was a national holiday in Argentina and everyone got a four day weekend. The reason? There is a presidential election coming up and the current president, in an attempt to gain some popularity votes, gave the entire country a few extra days off. I had considered leaving Buenos Aires for the long weekend, but laziness won out and I stuck around the city and pretty much did a whole lot of nothing.
After a few weeks of long days spent in classrooms getting outside to soak up some late summer/early fall sun seemed like a wonderful idea. A fellow CELTA trainee met me at this massive park area between our apartments. At one end of the park is a botanical garden and a zoo. Then there are typical large, tree dotted, grassy fields one usually finds in a park. Past that there was a large lake (which we determined was man made) encircled by a wide avenue of sorts for people biking, walking, running, and rollerblading.
Rollerblading. In the United States it went out of fashion sometime in the late 90s. Rollerblades were relegated to roller skate rinks and off-season hockey practice. Here in Argentina they are still in vogue. I could not get over how many rollerbladers there were. The park was full of families and couples and I swear that half of them were probably on rollerblades, decked out with knee and elbow pads. There was even a place that you could rent them! The 90s are still alive in Buenos Aires.
In addition to renting rollerblades you could rent peddle boats or row boats and paddle about the lake. We decided to rent a peddle boat, which was mildly entertaining. We tried to run over the geese (they were very slow to get out of the way, Argentinians must not operate peddle boats in the same manner they drive, cause if those geese were pedestrians in this country they would´ve known to move it) and at the end discovered that peddling backwards (and in circles) was much easier and more fun.
The park also had a lovely rose garden, which made me a little nostalgic for Portland. It was really a beautiful and wonderful place. As we were starting to leave we noticed a guy, wearing a fur coat without pants, setting up a stage. He was going through an elaborate miming of smoothing out a circus like mat and we decided to sit down on the hillside, buy an ice cream from a guy selling them from coolers strapped to a bike, and see what the show was all about. It was a treat, really wonderful "street" theater. Underneath the fur coat were various "cave man" outfits, which the performer took off in a strip tease of sorts that would never have been tolerated in an American park with kids in the audience. He mimed strutting like a model and even when he took of the last item pretended that he was naked, before revealing leopard print panties. The conclusion of the show was an acrobatic routine on a rope slung between two poles.
On Saturday night Buenos Aires had a city wide arts festival called Noche en la Vela. There were free events, concerts, and shows all over town. A fellow CELTA trainee, Ollie, and I spent hours wandering around the city taking in different shows and missing plenty of others. We saw a large scale tango band and could see many couples dancing tango in the street. We saw a group of people dancing to Reggatone on a street corner, following the instructions of a gym like instructor. We caught the end of an amazing outdoor concert with an accordian band and energetic music that you couldn´t help but dance to. People were dancing in circles and starting folk dance style chains where you went under arches formed by peoples´arms. We also listened to wonderful tango music in a little cafe that looked like it belonged in turn of the century Italy. It was crowded so we couldn´t see the band at all (if we moved away from the bar to try and get a better look the older Argentinian women would yell at us for blocking their view, even though they couldn´t see the band either). At the very end of the evening we caught the end of an outdoor Argentinian folk concert. It was incredible because it seemed as though everyone in the audience knew the words to the all the songs. The band was cheered on stage for an encore and the crowd went wild when they began the song. All of sudden handkerchiefs appeared out of peoples´ pockets and all over the street and plaza people were dancing an old folk dance that clearly was well known. There were probably 10 couples dancing right by us and there were handkerchiefs fluttering in the air all throughout the crowd. Ollie and I looked at each other in disbelief, where did all of the handkerchiefs come from!?!
I´ve been very bad about blogging lately. I started this post a week ago and even then I was writing about things that had happened a week or so earlier. Today is the end of my Celta course. Yesterday was my last teaching practice. We all just shared a glass of champagne with our Celta tutors and most of us are meeting up for dinner tonight. It feels so odd to know that this is probably the last time I will sit in this computer lab. I will most likely never see these people again. My life has been incredibly structured for the last month. Every morning a subte ride to school, school followed by lesson prep...repeat. Monday I start traveling again. I haven´t touched my backpack in over a month. It feels very odd to be in this position, to know that I´m going to have to figure things out day by day again. If my plans don´t change I have about 2 months of traveling left. When I landed in Peru three months ago five months seemed like forever, it felt too long. When I came to Buenos Aires two months ago I felt as though I had already been on the road for ages, much longer than two months. But now the last month has flown by. It honestly feels as though I just started this course two weeks ago, not five weeks ago. I know that the next two months are going to fly by as well and in the blink of an eye I´ll be on my way back to the United States. Or who knows what.
After a few weeks of long days spent in classrooms getting outside to soak up some late summer/early fall sun seemed like a wonderful idea. A fellow CELTA trainee met me at this massive park area between our apartments. At one end of the park is a botanical garden and a zoo. Then there are typical large, tree dotted, grassy fields one usually finds in a park. Past that there was a large lake (which we determined was man made) encircled by a wide avenue of sorts for people biking, walking, running, and rollerblading.
Rollerblading. In the United States it went out of fashion sometime in the late 90s. Rollerblades were relegated to roller skate rinks and off-season hockey practice. Here in Argentina they are still in vogue. I could not get over how many rollerbladers there were. The park was full of families and couples and I swear that half of them were probably on rollerblades, decked out with knee and elbow pads. There was even a place that you could rent them! The 90s are still alive in Buenos Aires.
In addition to renting rollerblades you could rent peddle boats or row boats and paddle about the lake. We decided to rent a peddle boat, which was mildly entertaining. We tried to run over the geese (they were very slow to get out of the way, Argentinians must not operate peddle boats in the same manner they drive, cause if those geese were pedestrians in this country they would´ve known to move it) and at the end discovered that peddling backwards (and in circles) was much easier and more fun.
The park also had a lovely rose garden, which made me a little nostalgic for Portland. It was really a beautiful and wonderful place. As we were starting to leave we noticed a guy, wearing a fur coat without pants, setting up a stage. He was going through an elaborate miming of smoothing out a circus like mat and we decided to sit down on the hillside, buy an ice cream from a guy selling them from coolers strapped to a bike, and see what the show was all about. It was a treat, really wonderful "street" theater. Underneath the fur coat were various "cave man" outfits, which the performer took off in a strip tease of sorts that would never have been tolerated in an American park with kids in the audience. He mimed strutting like a model and even when he took of the last item pretended that he was naked, before revealing leopard print panties. The conclusion of the show was an acrobatic routine on a rope slung between two poles.
On Saturday night Buenos Aires had a city wide arts festival called Noche en la Vela. There were free events, concerts, and shows all over town. A fellow CELTA trainee, Ollie, and I spent hours wandering around the city taking in different shows and missing plenty of others. We saw a large scale tango band and could see many couples dancing tango in the street. We saw a group of people dancing to Reggatone on a street corner, following the instructions of a gym like instructor. We caught the end of an amazing outdoor concert with an accordian band and energetic music that you couldn´t help but dance to. People were dancing in circles and starting folk dance style chains where you went under arches formed by peoples´arms. We also listened to wonderful tango music in a little cafe that looked like it belonged in turn of the century Italy. It was crowded so we couldn´t see the band at all (if we moved away from the bar to try and get a better look the older Argentinian women would yell at us for blocking their view, even though they couldn´t see the band either). At the very end of the evening we caught the end of an outdoor Argentinian folk concert. It was incredible because it seemed as though everyone in the audience knew the words to the all the songs. The band was cheered on stage for an encore and the crowd went wild when they began the song. All of sudden handkerchiefs appeared out of peoples´ pockets and all over the street and plaza people were dancing an old folk dance that clearly was well known. There were probably 10 couples dancing right by us and there were handkerchiefs fluttering in the air all throughout the crowd. Ollie and I looked at each other in disbelief, where did all of the handkerchiefs come from!?!
I´ve been very bad about blogging lately. I started this post a week ago and even then I was writing about things that had happened a week or so earlier. Today is the end of my Celta course. Yesterday was my last teaching practice. We all just shared a glass of champagne with our Celta tutors and most of us are meeting up for dinner tonight. It feels so odd to know that this is probably the last time I will sit in this computer lab. I will most likely never see these people again. My life has been incredibly structured for the last month. Every morning a subte ride to school, school followed by lesson prep...repeat. Monday I start traveling again. I haven´t touched my backpack in over a month. It feels very odd to be in this position, to know that I´m going to have to figure things out day by day again. If my plans don´t change I have about 2 months of traveling left. When I landed in Peru three months ago five months seemed like forever, it felt too long. When I came to Buenos Aires two months ago I felt as though I had already been on the road for ages, much longer than two months. But now the last month has flown by. It honestly feels as though I just started this course two weeks ago, not five weeks ago. I know that the next two months are going to fly by as well and in the blink of an eye I´ll be on my way back to the United States. Or who knows what.
Monday, March 28, 2011
A bit about BA
Oh Buenos Aires. I did not instantly fall in love with this city the way that I did with Santiago, but its slowly been growing on me. Here are a few random thoughts and things about BA.
(1) Tread carefully. You must be very very careful when you are walking down the sidewalk, primarily for two reasons. The first, main, reason is dog shit or landmines, as I heard someone refer to them. Porteños (aka people from Buenos Aires) love their dogs. I think that they are a status symbol of sorts. If you have a dog, especially a pure bred one, and you can hire a dog walker then clearly you have a good cash flow, right? I wouldn´t be surprised to discover that 85% of porteños have pet dogs. It isn´t uncommon to see dog walkers with 12 or 13 dogs traipsing along next to them (or to see that many dogs leashed to a pole with the dog walker no where in site, probably getting a coffee). This is especially intriguing to me because in Chile and Peru there were lots of dogs but there were nearly all stray dogs lounging about the streets. I have only seen one or two stray dogs in Argentina. Anyway, they love their dogs here but they haven´t quite jumped on the "pick up your dog´s shit" bandwagon yet so tread carefully. The second reason to watch your step is that in many places the tiles that compose the sidewalks are missing or loose or broken half off. I re-twisted my ankle probably 5 times the first three days here (it was already swollen from hiking in Torres del Paine).
(2) Schedule. Argentina is on very different schedule than the United States. I´ve already talked a little bit about "latin time" and having to adjust to it, but Argentina (and especially BA) takes latin time to the extreme. Restaurants literally don´t open until 8:30pm. People typically don´t go to eat dinner until about 10pm. Finishing dinner at midnight or 1am is completely normal. Many clubs don´t even open until 1am and, just like in America, you don´t want to be there at opening. This means that staying out on the weekend until 5am means you are going home early. Funnily the subte (aka metro or subway) closes at 10:30pm. The buses run all night though. Because everyone stays out so late stores don´t typically open until 10 or 11am. On the weekends this gets pushed back even more. I´ve left my apartment at 12:30pm on a Saturday and only one of the many business near my apartment was open.
(3) Car headlights. I would estimate that 60% of taxis do not use their headlights. They only use their parking lights and I´ve even seen cars that just have blue lights, not those bluish white lights but full on blue, aka I can barely see you, lights. I have not gotten a satisfactory answer as to why this is. I´ve watched cars go past the corner I live on with their dim parking lights on and seen them flash their lights as they approach saying "Yo, I´m coming through! Car here!" A teacher at my school said its because when their headlights stop working they won´t take it to a mechanic to get fixed because they don´t trust the mechanic to not steal other parts of their car. My response is "You need a mechanic to change your headlight lamps? Don´t they just pop in and out?"
(4) Pedestrians DO NOT have the right of way. Cars will run you over. I swear to god. You just gotta get out of the way. This is complicated by the lack of stop of signs and an apparent dislike of signaling. Even when you have the walk signal a car turning right will practically plow into you.
(5) Could you walk any slower please? My American sense of impatience comes out full force here, especially on escalators and sidewalks. Argentinians seem to have a knack for lazily strolling down a busy, crowded sidewalk, four abreast, idily chatting. I want to scream "MOVE IT!" Instead I perform a weaving dance, avoiding the doddering grandmas, the baby strollers, and the perfectly abled adults that just seem to enjoy walking 1 mph. I have to just do deep breathing exercises on the escalators. They do not have the same "stand on the right walk on the left" room that all Americans are born knowing. A guy in front of me even set his briefcase down on the left side of the escalator the other, effectively blocking all traffic. Drives me crazy.
(6) Prices I have yet to figure this out. Some things seem to be super expensive. For example, it isn´t uncommon to spend $3 on a cup of a coffee or spend $6 on a beer. But a haircut will cost you less than $10. A friend and I went out for dinner, ordered 2 main courses, a huge salad, a bottle of wine, and two bottles of water and the entire bill came about to about $30 (and you don´t have to tip here and when you do you never do more than 10%). BUT I´ve also gone out and spend like $10 on a hamburger at a completely non-touristy cafe and I wasn´t ordering the most expensive thing on the menu.
Buenos Aires is a beautiful city. If you were dropped here and no one told you were in South America you would never guess it. Everyone says it so it feels almost cliche to say it but its true; Buenos Aires is a very European city. There are tons of cafes and many of them have a very old European feel to them. There are cobble stoned streets and tree lined avenues, tall, stone apartment buildings with art nouveau intricacies. Its a lovely lovely place. I recommend visiting it.
Okay, that is all for now. Next time I write I´ll actually tell you about some of the stuff I´ve been doing here. And maybe, if you are lucky, you´ll get some photos.
(1) Tread carefully. You must be very very careful when you are walking down the sidewalk, primarily for two reasons. The first, main, reason is dog shit or landmines, as I heard someone refer to them. Porteños (aka people from Buenos Aires) love their dogs. I think that they are a status symbol of sorts. If you have a dog, especially a pure bred one, and you can hire a dog walker then clearly you have a good cash flow, right? I wouldn´t be surprised to discover that 85% of porteños have pet dogs. It isn´t uncommon to see dog walkers with 12 or 13 dogs traipsing along next to them (or to see that many dogs leashed to a pole with the dog walker no where in site, probably getting a coffee). This is especially intriguing to me because in Chile and Peru there were lots of dogs but there were nearly all stray dogs lounging about the streets. I have only seen one or two stray dogs in Argentina. Anyway, they love their dogs here but they haven´t quite jumped on the "pick up your dog´s shit" bandwagon yet so tread carefully. The second reason to watch your step is that in many places the tiles that compose the sidewalks are missing or loose or broken half off. I re-twisted my ankle probably 5 times the first three days here (it was already swollen from hiking in Torres del Paine).
(2) Schedule. Argentina is on very different schedule than the United States. I´ve already talked a little bit about "latin time" and having to adjust to it, but Argentina (and especially BA) takes latin time to the extreme. Restaurants literally don´t open until 8:30pm. People typically don´t go to eat dinner until about 10pm. Finishing dinner at midnight or 1am is completely normal. Many clubs don´t even open until 1am and, just like in America, you don´t want to be there at opening. This means that staying out on the weekend until 5am means you are going home early. Funnily the subte (aka metro or subway) closes at 10:30pm. The buses run all night though. Because everyone stays out so late stores don´t typically open until 10 or 11am. On the weekends this gets pushed back even more. I´ve left my apartment at 12:30pm on a Saturday and only one of the many business near my apartment was open.
(3) Car headlights. I would estimate that 60% of taxis do not use their headlights. They only use their parking lights and I´ve even seen cars that just have blue lights, not those bluish white lights but full on blue, aka I can barely see you, lights. I have not gotten a satisfactory answer as to why this is. I´ve watched cars go past the corner I live on with their dim parking lights on and seen them flash their lights as they approach saying "Yo, I´m coming through! Car here!" A teacher at my school said its because when their headlights stop working they won´t take it to a mechanic to get fixed because they don´t trust the mechanic to not steal other parts of their car. My response is "You need a mechanic to change your headlight lamps? Don´t they just pop in and out?"
(4) Pedestrians DO NOT have the right of way. Cars will run you over. I swear to god. You just gotta get out of the way. This is complicated by the lack of stop of signs and an apparent dislike of signaling. Even when you have the walk signal a car turning right will practically plow into you.
(5) Could you walk any slower please? My American sense of impatience comes out full force here, especially on escalators and sidewalks. Argentinians seem to have a knack for lazily strolling down a busy, crowded sidewalk, four abreast, idily chatting. I want to scream "MOVE IT!" Instead I perform a weaving dance, avoiding the doddering grandmas, the baby strollers, and the perfectly abled adults that just seem to enjoy walking 1 mph. I have to just do deep breathing exercises on the escalators. They do not have the same "stand on the right walk on the left" room that all Americans are born knowing. A guy in front of me even set his briefcase down on the left side of the escalator the other, effectively blocking all traffic. Drives me crazy.
(6) Prices I have yet to figure this out. Some things seem to be super expensive. For example, it isn´t uncommon to spend $3 on a cup of a coffee or spend $6 on a beer. But a haircut will cost you less than $10. A friend and I went out for dinner, ordered 2 main courses, a huge salad, a bottle of wine, and two bottles of water and the entire bill came about to about $30 (and you don´t have to tip here and when you do you never do more than 10%). BUT I´ve also gone out and spend like $10 on a hamburger at a completely non-touristy cafe and I wasn´t ordering the most expensive thing on the menu.
Buenos Aires is a beautiful city. If you were dropped here and no one told you were in South America you would never guess it. Everyone says it so it feels almost cliche to say it but its true; Buenos Aires is a very European city. There are tons of cafes and many of them have a very old European feel to them. There are cobble stoned streets and tree lined avenues, tall, stone apartment buildings with art nouveau intricacies. Its a lovely lovely place. I recommend visiting it.
Okay, that is all for now. Next time I write I´ll actually tell you about some of the stuff I´ve been doing here. And maybe, if you are lucky, you´ll get some photos.
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