
Cuzco and Lake Titicaca! We´ll start with the Cuzco side of things. As I said earlier, the hostel was amazing. I can only hope that we´ll stay in another this nice on this trip. In addition to the hostel, the town is great. Its the first town that I could even maybe think about living in. The town surrounds a beautiful plaza,(where the last inca was killed) containing 4 churches. We toured the churches and they were pretty incredible. Their is probably enough gold in these churches to completely take Peru out of poverty and make it a player in global commodity trade. Even more impressive than the gold is the solid wood carved pulpits. If I had been allowed to take pictures, I would have. So pretty much we toured a lot of cathedrals here and set up our second trip to Cuzco at the end of the trip. We are hiking to Macchu Pichu from here in April, when it is considerably drier on the Inca Trail.
The worst part about Peru is easily the food. The best part about Cuzco is a McDonalds. I´ve never been happier to eat a big mac. I had to beg Lauren to go with me but she gave in after one more shitty pasta dish and a couple more indians trying to get us to eat Guinee Pig. Speaking of Guinee Pigs, in order to better explain the Catholic gospel, in all of the Catholic art, they are eating guinee pig and riding llamas!! The funniest is in all of the biggest cathedrals, there is a painting of the last supper, done by a local Inca during the conquests, and they are always eating guinee pig in the last supper!!
On the "touristic bus" from Cuzco to Titicaca, we were immediately met with an exciting surprise. The farmers and train workers decided to go on strike the night before and that meant for tourists taking the train to macchu pichu, they´d have to wait til next time they were in Peru! For me, on a bus, it meant that we would have to weave around boulders, rocks, and trees lying across the the Pan American Highway. The farmers tried to block the roads for the tourists to get in and out of cuzco!! Luckily our driver had plenty of experience driving on the wrong side of the road at high speeds, like all Peruvanos.
Now in Titicaca, the food in this 3rd world country still sucks. They have no refridgeration hardly anywhere! I am so afraid to eat this gross food! They say the trout and King Fish is good but if you saw the water outside Puno, the town I´m in, you´d go for the Pizza. Even pizza is sketchy. No refridgeration means everything is sketchy. I would kill an innocent kid for a velveeta shells and cheese dinner! Theres only so much pan this gaucho can eat! Next time I come to South America I´m gonna bring a whole backpack full of kraft mac and cheese dinners. On the bright side, I did find gatorade at a little bodega today. I bought all they had.
So Titicaca can´t be all bad right? Nah, we went on a boat ride on Gilligan´s salvaged vessel to the "Uros islands", a bunch of indian made floating islands that indians still live on. They make them out of reeds tied together and they are about the size of a football field. I can´t believe people live like this. I have included a picture because I didnt understand what they were till I saw them. These people live a very hard life here. Most people, that aren´t farmers and actually work for pay, make about $3000 per year. One was complaining about how much the private university was in nearby Juliaca.... It was $800 per year.
Anyways, tomorrow we are going to the Bolivia side of Titicaca, which is supposed to be a lot nicer. Right now I just wish I had saved the money and gone to Tahoe instead!! Just joking, but Tahoe is much prettier.
All for now,
-John
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