Peru

First stop- LIMA
We left the house at 3:30 A.M. to get the airport in Montevideo. We made it to Lima by 9:45 (Peru time) and had a taxi driver and a sign with Kara's name on it waiting to take us to our Lima home. Our first hostel was in Miraflores in Lima. interesting fact about Miraflores- The fog you see in the picture is a regular occurrence and it causes that part of town to be about 20 degrees cooler than the rest of Lima... which is good... cause it was pretty hot.(in Lima)
In the next picture we have Stefanie playing the out-of-tune hostel guitar as we wait for our accommodations. When you only pay 10 dollars a night sometimes you have to be willing to wait on your service. We switched hostels 5 times in the course of our week. They ranged from really COOL to "I should've payed more money so I could've stayed somewhere with better blankets cause I'm freezing COLD."




The first day we hung around Miraflores and at night hung out at the hostel with the people staying in our room. Stefanie had the symptoms of an on coming cold before we left Montevideo and her influenza hit its stride the second morning we were in Lima. She opted to stay in because none of us had much sleep under our belts from the traveling and really the best cure for her was rest. Kara and i went into the world of Lima. We took the map the hostel worker outlined for us and headed by taxi to the Plaza San Martin.

(Kara D. Dubose hangin out in the Plaza San Martin)


(Plaza de Armas, and Cathedral in Lima, Peru)





Let's be honest, shall we?-Kara and I are terrible tourists.
It's painstakingly true. With nary a guide book and very little desire or intention to find the Rick Steve's crowd (no offense) we got out at the Plaza San Martin ready to slowly make our way through downtown. After I made Kara stand with me for a 5 Peruvian Soles polaroid, we turned onto the suggested pedestrian street that took us to the Plaza de Armas. We genuinely enjoyed these main attractions and we even voluntarily opted to enter the Cathedral like a good tourist would. (mom would be so proud.) Admittedly, as we stepped out of the sun and under the high ribbed vaults the cool air of the Cathedral was comforting and reminiscent of our semester in Europe where cathedral visits came with every trip... but by that time the main attractions were seen (and honestly a little mundane, though no less awe inspiring) and we really thought it time to venture in to the part of Lima where a blonde and a dreadie became the strange minority... and my camera was the only one to be found.
(Note: I'm speaking in the past tense, so no amount of cautionary advice or warnings to be heeded will change anything I narrate... we know we stick out. All is well and I got some cool pictures.)

CUSCO
I imagine watching us in as we had our first day in Cusco would've been somewhat like watching the three of us win the Miss America title, except with out the dresses and makeup and more like three messy haired girls wearing the same clothes they wore the day before. (which allowed for more jumping up and down than a prom dress would have... and nobody cried.) Luckily we were very intuitive in our trip planning and assumed based on our personalities that we would much rather spend the majority of our days in Cusco and simply visit Lima. It just so happened we were very right. We stepped of the plane into cool air and a mountain range as a backdrop to the runway. We contained our excitement all the way to our hostel... but as soon as the helpful desk woman left us with our key and our room jubilees, celebratory bed-jumping commenced.



Some of our hostels may have been a little rough (a night with no water, concave beds, smelly mates) the first hostel in Cusco was the best welcoming we could have had. We sipped on Mate de Coca for the altitude and looked at the skyline of downtown Cusco. wicked. We spent a lot of our time in Cusco relaxing and enjoying the place... we didn't shop, ever... at all.






















CUSCO day3

Day three in Cusco we were picked up from our glorious hostel by the adventure agency. We wound through the mountains for 45 minutes to the place we were going to run off the side of the mountain... like dummies.
This is the random and beautiful spot we picked up our instructor.




We spent the day Paragliding and waiting. It's a slow process but it was a beautiful day and what is there to complain about when you're taking naps in the Andes mountains? I went first. Everyone thought it was really funny how hard it was to fit the helmet on my head. I personally wasn't amused as it seems to be a reoccurring theme in my attempts at head wear. I won't hold it against them. We also though it was pretty funny that in his instructions I was told to "don't sit, no jump... run off of mountain. Run off of mountain." All I want to know is, what idiot discovered how to do this? As it were, my super wonderful parents bought me a new telephoto lens for Christmas. We used it to take pictures while we were in the air. You can't tell but in this picture that Kara took, I have on awesome socks.



If you think thats all we have. It's not. In fact we're not even halfway through, but for both of our sakes I'm going to let this story be continued. I'm going to get one of Raquel's cookies.

chau.
jessalyn