Tuesday, October 1, 2013

Whatever it Takes to Get There

Let's get this started with a little message about Sublimes (read: soob-leem-ays). We know our last post started with an ad for TACA, but since we are laying in our beds eating sublimes as we have done every night, we figured we would give them a shout out. While the ingredients read "chocolate, peanuts, and milk," there is just no way that can be true due to our physical and mental addiction to the candy. We kid you not when we say that we have "sublime time" every single night where we sit cross-legged on our respective beds in silence until someone finishes and consequently talks about how sad they are that it's gone. In order to cater to this addiction, we are probably going to have to start a Sublime branch in the US when we get back... Honestly, you're welcome. 

While this intro may make you think all we do is eat Sublimes (not entirely false), we have actually ventured around the Sacred Valley a lot in the past week. It only makes sense to start with the headliner of our trip thus far. Let us clarify that we specifically chose the word headliner because it was in no way a highlight, but instead one of the most bizarre things that we have ever done. Which is really saying something because we are quite odd and have had some really strange experiences. Anyways, here goes nothing (we no longer say "here goes nothing" because that's what got us into this mess). 

Traveling throughout South America, we have learned to truly embrace expecting the unexpected (Thanks for the training, Shacks). So when the power went out in Ollanta shutting down the entire town, our friend Juan- a Rustic Pathways guide- asked us if we wanted to tag along with him to meet up with his gap year tour group in the jungle. We figured, "hey, that's cool... We like jungles... We like animals... Let's go." Usually it's a simple trip where you catch a coach bus in the town center and arrive in the jungle about five hours later. Are you shocked to hear that there were no busses running on this particular day? Yeah, we weren't too surprised either. But now are you shocked to hear that we found ourselves in the back of an 18 wheeler, sitting on sacks of sugar, surrounded by eggs, with a random, yet very friendly, Brazilian? Actually this one was a little surprising, even for us. After riding in the back with Juan and our Brazilian for about an hour, the driver asked if anyone wanted to sit up front with him. Since the view from the back consisted of rotten wooden walls and a trailer door, we figured, yeah, it might be nice to see the Andes mountains and a glacial peak. Soon after joining Carlos, the driver, and his copilot, Quechi, we were drowned in cultural facts about Peru, and asked if we had tried Peru's most famous beer, Cusqueña. Soon, we were no longer drowned in historical facts, but rather beer. By this, we mean Carlos and Quechi stopped in every small town we passed to buy us more Cusqueña. While we may have drank a few too many Cusqueñas, heard the entire history of Peru, and had countless "what is going on" moments, after nine hours, four more than usual, we made it safely to the jungle. As we clarified the headliner, we should also clarify what we mean by jungle. In our minds there were jaguars, monkeys, lush banana trees, we don't know, maybe even a sloth. Turns out the only animals in this jungle were Mosquitos. Not your everyday Mosquitos, or even malaria Mosquitos, but Mosquitos that leave you with a blood blister to compliment the never ending itch (seriously never ending, it's been a week). Aside from all this, there were some positives: we camped in the "Peruvian jungle," there were some pretty cool hot springs, and man, what a story. But wait, the biggest up side is that we bought sublimes, coke, and animal crackers, which we enjoyed on the five hour drive home. Yes, we did make this drive at 9am the next morning, meaning we were in "the jungle" for a total of 9.5 hours, 6 of which we were sleeping. 


Back of the 18 wheeler- Juan taking a snooze and Claire taking in the beauty of the wooden walls and sugar bags 


Hot springs and the bathroom across from our Sublime stop- told you the addiction is serious


Moving away from the headline, there have been some serious highlights. The majority of these highlights have been hikes in the Sacred Valley surrounding Ollanta:

Hike 1: Incan Pool. We went on this easy hike with a local friend, and went swimming in an Ancient Incan pool that overlooked the river, Andes, town, and our friend, Veronica (a glacier.. Friends are hard to make here. But hey, we have five total contacts in our cell phone now. Yes, one contact is our own number because we can't remember it to save our lives. Talk about popular)


Hike 2: Intiwatana. Since we think we are Incan, we decided to forge our own hiking path to the Intiwatana ruins. The ruins were awesome, but a recent forest fire burnt everything which led to mixed feelings. It was terrible but made the ruins look so cool. 


Ruins in the distance, valley, mountains, cool


Hike 3: Pumamarca. Like we said, it's hard to make friends here. So, when we were accompanied by two great dogs, Puma and Stan (great names, we know, we named them), we were pretty happy. The ruins were about four miles through the mountains and overlooked an isolated farm, 3,425 meters high. There's not much to say other than they were incredible. 


Ruins and dogs


Big girl little door - Incans were miniature 



When we aren't hiking, riding in 18 wheelers, or eating sublimes, we do something relatively normal (Well, normal if you overlook the 1.5 hour walk and 20 minute moto ride)- we teach English at a grade school in the rural village of Pomatales. The great thing about grade school is they still have recess, which gave us a prime opportunity to draft teams for a soccer game (we can't give up the dream). Pretty sure recess was extended by about 30 minutes, but as true Princeton athletes, we believe in Education through Athletics. 

To end, we wanted to introduce everyone to a little thing we call "This is the End" (Libby, 2013) (honor code, gotta give our friend Libby credit for this idea which arose after hearing about "the jungle"). We will be keeping track of the moments when we think to ourselves, "oh yeah, this is the end."  Here we go:

This is the End 
1. Nabs falls up makeshift ladder, spills bucket of contaminated, muddy, puddle water and swallows it 
2. Claire refuses to brush her teeth with purified water because she is too lazy to carry a water bottle to the bathroom
3. We are in the back of an 18 wheeler on route to "the jungle"
4. The Quechua-speaking abuela/witch. She will kill us. Don't know how, don't know when, but when she is in view we know it could be the end. 


All good for now though! 


3 comments:

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  2. I can't get enough of this. I laugh after every single sentence. Also, the trip looks amazing so far! Miss you two a whole lot.

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  3. laughing so hard at my desk (not in a jungle) and having the most FOMO of not being able to experience this all with you both!! bring me sublimesss!!

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