Lima to Cusco
A: On the end of your wristees! Always liked that joke.
Anyway, a long time ago, in a galaxy far far away, I received a letter from a novel sounding man called Tom Champagne. On the envelope it said,
"Congratulations! Inside is a cheque payable to you for one million pounds."
Sure enough, inside was a mock-up of what a cheque for one million pounds payable to me would look like. Without even lifting a finger, I had somehow made it through to the final stages of a Readers Digest prize draw and if I just returned my lucky draw numbers I would be in the final, final stages and that much closer to the magical, mystical one million pounds. I was overwhelmed at my good fortune!
Tom was so convincing in his prose that for the next six months or so I continued to return different sets of lucky draw numbers in the sure and unwavering certainty that the cheque would appear through my letter box any day. Along the way I received a number of free gifts as a thank you for all the hard effort I was putting into this process. I also had to sign up for some "no obligation" book purchases. No problem, I thought, because with my million pounds I'd soon be able to buy a library in which to store the rapidly growing pile of literature.
Imagine my disappointment then when one day the letters with the lucky draw numbers stopped appearing but the packages with the books did not. Tom had rejected me as quickly as I seem to have digressed from insightful travelogues to incoherent rambling. (Honest, there's a point to this story any second now.) The days dragged on (a bit like this story) but Tom would not return my pleading letters or phone calls. I was heartbroken. Meanwhile, the stacks of books in the living room towered over me menacingly.
One day I decided to pick up one of the books to see what it was I was ordering. The title was something like "Unexplained Mysteries Of The World" and on the front cover was a picture of an ancient city sitting high in the mountains. It was Machu Picchu in the Peruvian Andes and I was captivated by its striking aura not least because I was going through an Indiana Jones phase at the time. I already had the leather hat and whip but that's another story. Sitting there among the heaps of books as high as the Andes themselves I said to myself, "One day..." Well that day was yesterday and it was absolutely awesome! And I don't EVER use that term lightly.
Twenty six and a half hours after leaving Auckland in New Zealand, my plane touched down in Lima, capital city of Peru. I only spend two full days in Lima and although it's warm and fairly relaxing during the weekend daylight hours, there's something unsettling about the place. I'm not sure if it's the armed police everywhere or the burly security guards fronting every sizeable store. Perhaps it's the high steel gates in front of most residences but it doesn't encourage me to venture out into the streets much after dark.
Even my efforts to ingratiate myself with the local population through demonstration of my fluent Spanish seem to fall flat.
Neil: "Donde esta Starbucks por pavor?"
Local: "No Starbucks aqui, you greengo peeeg!" (He was more polite than that, but only just.)
I stay in the more modern, westernised suburb of Miraflores and it's a lovely place to wander around or just linger in the street side cafes. The parks are full of artists selling their work and young bands of musicians tour the cafes playing their traditional guitars, drums and pan pipes. It's pleasant to listen to but honestly, there are only so many times you can hear "El Condor Pasa", the melody from the Andes popularised by Simon & Garfunkel. One more rendition and I know who's going to be the hammer and who's going be the nail!!
Leaving Lima, I take the short, one-hour flight over the Andes to Cusco. It's a bit hairy flying through the clouds with the mountains on either side but I get there in one piece. And then feel like I'm crumbling into different pieces as the effects of the altitude kick in immediately. I haven't been this high since... well, let's not go there just now.
Cusco sits 3,400 metres (about 2.1 miles) above sea level and the head rush feelings are not unlike those I experienced on the bungy jump or underwater on the scuba dive. At the hostel I'm given the local coco tea to help combat the symptoms but climbing the stairs to my first floor room is a real effort, struggling for breath and feeling dizzy.
Walking around the town the next day, I have a dull headache similar to a mild hangover. Recklessly, I decide that the best cure for this is to get an actual, stinking hangover so I indulge in a night of heavy drinking and card playing in an Irish Bar with some youthful travellers from the hostel and then repeat the event two nights later.
I really feel my age though when none of the youngsters recognise the 80s soundtrack that's playing in the bar. "Duran who?"
One of the girls is wearing a pair of those woolly ankle sock things (it gets cold here at night) and I helpfully and enthusiastically observe,
"Hey, you look just like Leroy from the Kids from Fame!"
She looks at me blankly as if my unquestionable Alzheimers has just taken a turn for the worse. At least they were polite enough not to comment on my pipe and slippers.
It's the rainy season here in the Andes and it has rained every day I've been here but it can't spoil the bewitching character of Cusco. It's quite a large town but feels small with much of the activity centred around the central plaza. Heavily influenced in style by the long term occupation of the Spanish, there are colonial churches and museums everywhere and markets seemingly on every corner. The cobbled backstreets often reveal cool, airy courtyards filled with flowers and fountains just down an alley or two.
Most of the photographs I've taken seem to be filled with this Catholic imagery, an exhibition of which will take place at Uncle David's in Dollar when I return! Ho, ho, ho!
Every single vehicle in this town seems to be a taxi of some sort and the bigger ones all have Starsky & Hutch type stripes down the side. Very cool! The air is constantly filled with the noise of horns abusing other road users or trying to get the attention of tourists.
On the streets, my most used phrase quickly becomes "No, gracias" as a constant barrage of locals young and old try and sell their wares. Postcards, chocolate, toilet roll(!), tin openers, blankets, jumpers, the list is endless. The kids in particular work the same charm offensive as those I met in Asia, asking me where I come from and then reeling off the capital city and population count of Scotland. Apparently though it's grown to some 500 million since I left. Where on earth do you all live?
To visit Machu Picchu, I really wanted to undertake the four-day, Inca Trail hike, a walk of some 32 kilometres rising to over 4,000 metres at it's highest point. Unfortunately most of the trail is closed during February for cleaning and repairs so I sign up for a two-day trip instead.
To get in to the mood, I first of all undertake the one-day tour of the Sacred Valley which visits various Inca sites in the region and offers spectacular scenery and lunatic driving along the way. I also visit the local ruins around Cusco including Sacsayhuaman (pronounced 'sexywoman') which sits proudly at the top of a hill overlooking the town. Mounting her is an exhausting exercise.
My two-day trip to Machu Picchu starts early with an alarm call at 05.00 and a train departure at 06.15. In our party is a girl from Ireland, a geezer from Norf Laandon and a young Japanese American family with two twin boys aged 6. They're all mischief and Gameboys on the three and a half hour ride to our dropping off point.
It's a warm day and Victor, our guide, explains that we're going to be undertaking a gradual climb for the first few hours until we join the main Inca Trail for the last trek down towards Machu Picchu. If his definition of 'gradual' means lung bursting ascent, then he's spot on! I've never had the greatest knees in the world (disagree at your leisure, girls) and they're soon creaking with the big steps up and down, but mainly up. All of us in the party find any excuse to stop, drink and breathe... all, that is, except the twins who are running and sprinting up the trail with unlimited energy. This would be annoying as hell if they weren't so cute.
The views are tremendous at all times but some of the sheer drops off the side of the mountain have my already sore knees growing even weaker. After lunch the trail flattens out and we're sheltered from the heat of the day by some lush rainforest foliage. I really do feel like Indiana Jones at the beginning of 'Raiders of The Lost Ark'.
Turning a corner, we come across some steep stone steps carved into the mountainside. There's a walled building of some sort at the top and as I struggle upwards the excitement grows within. At the top, however, there's only the remnants of a guard house or some type of watch tower and more of the trail beyond. A little further on, more steep step upwards and another building at the top. I'm all ready to be disappointed again but this turns out to be Inti Punku, the Sun Gate, with the most astounding view down across the valley to Machu Picchu saddled serenely between two sharply peaked mountains. It is the definition of breathtaking as what little breath I have left is sucked out in an astonished gasp. It's four in the afternoon and the sun is drowning the entire scene with a beautiful light. We all drink it in silently for what seems like an age.
By the time we get to the site, most of the day trippers have gone and the whole place is very quiet and still. We only stop at the highest point to take a few photos because we're coming back the next morning to explore it at length. Again, we're lucky to arrive early before the hordes turn up and get a very informative tour from Victor. Machu Picchu is only some 500 years old so it's not the age that makes it so special. The unparalleled setting and the fact that it was only 'discovered' less than a hundred years ago gives it its magic quality. Machu Picchu was once a legend, a fabled place and it's exhilarating to note that there are still legends about other cities and places, perhaps yet to be discovered.
I would unreservedly recommend that you visit this place if you get the chance. Yes, it's growing more and more popular but seeing it for the first time as I climbed over the mountain is a sight that I will never forget for as long as I live. Unless, of course, the Alzheimers continues diminish my already faltering faculties. Now where was I? Oh yeah... "Can I just play outside for another ten minutes Mum?"
And finally, a public information announcement. If you've inadvertently deleted any of the e-mails I've sent and are now kicking yourself at this bewildering lack of judgement, fear not. As well as being published in the Daily Record, I've just signed a staggering two figure deal with multi media colossus Tacky Worldwide Inc. to have the original e-mails posted on their fantastic website in all their original and unedited glory.
This organisation is a bastion of independent thinking, constantly championing the underdog and vigorously resisting the takeover efforts of the Murdochs of this world. Their website is fresh, original and always entertaining so tell all your friends and log on today to be transported to another dimension. It's a different kind of experience altogether.
http://www.tackyprod.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk (2007 Update: The emails have gone but the site is still brilliant.)
Well, time to saddle up and move on because the posse are on my tail so me and Sundance are heading south for the highest lake in the world and possibly Bolivia.
Till then amigos.
Love, Neil x
A: On the end of your wristees! Always liked that joke.
Anyway, a long time ago, in a galaxy far far away, I received a letter from a novel sounding man called Tom Champagne. On the envelope it said,
"Congratulations! Inside is a cheque payable to you for one million pounds."
Sure enough, inside was a mock-up of what a cheque for one million pounds payable to me would look like. Without even lifting a finger, I had somehow made it through to the final stages of a Readers Digest prize draw and if I just returned my lucky draw numbers I would be in the final, final stages and that much closer to the magical, mystical one million pounds. I was overwhelmed at my good fortune!
Tom was so convincing in his prose that for the next six months or so I continued to return different sets of lucky draw numbers in the sure and unwavering certainty that the cheque would appear through my letter box any day. Along the way I received a number of free gifts as a thank you for all the hard effort I was putting into this process. I also had to sign up for some "no obligation" book purchases. No problem, I thought, because with my million pounds I'd soon be able to buy a library in which to store the rapidly growing pile of literature.
Imagine my disappointment then when one day the letters with the lucky draw numbers stopped appearing but the packages with the books did not. Tom had rejected me as quickly as I seem to have digressed from insightful travelogues to incoherent rambling. (Honest, there's a point to this story any second now.) The days dragged on (a bit like this story) but Tom would not return my pleading letters or phone calls. I was heartbroken. Meanwhile, the stacks of books in the living room towered over me menacingly.
One day I decided to pick up one of the books to see what it was I was ordering. The title was something like "Unexplained Mysteries Of The World" and on the front cover was a picture of an ancient city sitting high in the mountains. It was Machu Picchu in the Peruvian Andes and I was captivated by its striking aura not least because I was going through an Indiana Jones phase at the time. I already had the leather hat and whip but that's another story. Sitting there among the heaps of books as high as the Andes themselves I said to myself, "One day..." Well that day was yesterday and it was absolutely awesome! And I don't EVER use that term lightly.Twenty six and a half hours after leaving Auckland in New Zealand, my plane touched down in Lima, capital city of Peru. I only spend two full days in Lima and although it's warm and fairly relaxing during the weekend daylight hours, there's something unsettling about the place. I'm not sure if it's the armed police everywhere or the burly security guards fronting every sizeable store. Perhaps it's the high steel gates in front of most residences but it doesn't encourage me to venture out into the streets much after dark.
Even my efforts to ingratiate myself with the local population through demonstration of my fluent Spanish seem to fall flat.
Neil: "Donde esta Starbucks por pavor?"
Local: "No Starbucks aqui, you greengo peeeg!" (He was more polite than that, but only just.)
I stay in the more modern, westernised suburb of Miraflores and it's a lovely place to wander around or just linger in the street side cafes. The parks are full of artists selling their work and young bands of musicians tour the cafes playing their traditional guitars, drums and pan pipes. It's pleasant to listen to but honestly, there are only so many times you can hear "El Condor Pasa", the melody from the Andes popularised by Simon & Garfunkel. One more rendition and I know who's going to be the hammer and who's going be the nail!!
Leaving Lima, I take the short, one-hour flight over the Andes to Cusco. It's a bit hairy flying through the clouds with the mountains on either side but I get there in one piece. And then feel like I'm crumbling into different pieces as the effects of the altitude kick in immediately. I haven't been this high since... well, let's not go there just now.
Cusco sits 3,400 metres (about 2.1 miles) above sea level and the head rush feelings are not unlike those I experienced on the bungy jump or underwater on the scuba dive. At the hostel I'm given the local coco tea to help combat the symptoms but climbing the stairs to my first floor room is a real effort, struggling for breath and feeling dizzy.
Walking around the town the next day, I have a dull headache similar to a mild hangover. Recklessly, I decide that the best cure for this is to get an actual, stinking hangover so I indulge in a night of heavy drinking and card playing in an Irish Bar with some youthful travellers from the hostel and then repeat the event two nights later.I really feel my age though when none of the youngsters recognise the 80s soundtrack that's playing in the bar. "Duran who?"
One of the girls is wearing a pair of those woolly ankle sock things (it gets cold here at night) and I helpfully and enthusiastically observe,
"Hey, you look just like Leroy from the Kids from Fame!"
She looks at me blankly as if my unquestionable Alzheimers has just taken a turn for the worse. At least they were polite enough not to comment on my pipe and slippers.
It's the rainy season here in the Andes and it has rained every day I've been here but it can't spoil the bewitching character of Cusco. It's quite a large town but feels small with much of the activity centred around the central plaza. Heavily influenced in style by the long term occupation of the Spanish, there are colonial churches and museums everywhere and markets seemingly on every corner. The cobbled backstreets often reveal cool, airy courtyards filled with flowers and fountains just down an alley or two.
Most of the photographs I've taken seem to be filled with this Catholic imagery, an exhibition of which will take place at Uncle David's in Dollar when I return! Ho, ho, ho!
Every single vehicle in this town seems to be a taxi of some sort and the bigger ones all have Starsky & Hutch type stripes down the side. Very cool! The air is constantly filled with the noise of horns abusing other road users or trying to get the attention of tourists.
On the streets, my most used phrase quickly becomes "No, gracias" as a constant barrage of locals young and old try and sell their wares. Postcards, chocolate, toilet roll(!), tin openers, blankets, jumpers, the list is endless. The kids in particular work the same charm offensive as those I met in Asia, asking me where I come from and then reeling off the capital city and population count of Scotland. Apparently though it's grown to some 500 million since I left. Where on earth do you all live?
To visit Machu Picchu, I really wanted to undertake the four-day, Inca Trail hike, a walk of some 32 kilometres rising to over 4,000 metres at it's highest point. Unfortunately most of the trail is closed during February for cleaning and repairs so I sign up for a two-day trip instead.
To get in to the mood, I first of all undertake the one-day tour of the Sacred Valley which visits various Inca sites in the region and offers spectacular scenery and lunatic driving along the way. I also visit the local ruins around Cusco including Sacsayhuaman (pronounced 'sexywoman') which sits proudly at the top of a hill overlooking the town. Mounting her is an exhausting exercise.
My two-day trip to Machu Picchu starts early with an alarm call at 05.00 and a train departure at 06.15. In our party is a girl from Ireland, a geezer from Norf Laandon and a young Japanese American family with two twin boys aged 6. They're all mischief and Gameboys on the three and a half hour ride to our dropping off point.
It's a warm day and Victor, our guide, explains that we're going to be undertaking a gradual climb for the first few hours until we join the main Inca Trail for the last trek down towards Machu Picchu. If his definition of 'gradual' means lung bursting ascent, then he's spot on! I've never had the greatest knees in the world (disagree at your leisure, girls) and they're soon creaking with the big steps up and down, but mainly up. All of us in the party find any excuse to stop, drink and breathe... all, that is, except the twins who are running and sprinting up the trail with unlimited energy. This would be annoying as hell if they weren't so cute.
The views are tremendous at all times but some of the sheer drops off the side of the mountain have my already sore knees growing even weaker. After lunch the trail flattens out and we're sheltered from the heat of the day by some lush rainforest foliage. I really do feel like Indiana Jones at the beginning of 'Raiders of The Lost Ark'.Turning a corner, we come across some steep stone steps carved into the mountainside. There's a walled building of some sort at the top and as I struggle upwards the excitement grows within. At the top, however, there's only the remnants of a guard house or some type of watch tower and more of the trail beyond. A little further on, more steep step upwards and another building at the top. I'm all ready to be disappointed again but this turns out to be Inti Punku, the Sun Gate, with the most astounding view down across the valley to Machu Picchu saddled serenely between two sharply peaked mountains. It is the definition of breathtaking as what little breath I have left is sucked out in an astonished gasp. It's four in the afternoon and the sun is drowning the entire scene with a beautiful light. We all drink it in silently for what seems like an age.
By the time we get to the site, most of the day trippers have gone and the whole place is very quiet and still. We only stop at the highest point to take a few photos because we're coming back the next morning to explore it at length. Again, we're lucky to arrive early before the hordes turn up and get a very informative tour from Victor. Machu Picchu is only some 500 years old so it's not the age that makes it so special. The unparalleled setting and the fact that it was only 'discovered' less than a hundred years ago gives it its magic quality. Machu Picchu was once a legend, a fabled place and it's exhilarating to note that there are still legends about other cities and places, perhaps yet to be discovered.
I would unreservedly recommend that you visit this place if you get the chance. Yes, it's growing more and more popular but seeing it for the first time as I climbed over the mountain is a sight that I will never forget for as long as I live. Unless, of course, the Alzheimers continues diminish my already faltering faculties. Now where was I? Oh yeah... "Can I just play outside for another ten minutes Mum?"And finally, a public information announcement. If you've inadvertently deleted any of the e-mails I've sent and are now kicking yourself at this bewildering lack of judgement, fear not. As well as being published in the Daily Record, I've just signed a staggering two figure deal with multi media colossus Tacky Worldwide Inc. to have the original e-mails posted on their fantastic website in all their original and unedited glory.
This organisation is a bastion of independent thinking, constantly championing the underdog and vigorously resisting the takeover efforts of the Murdochs of this world. Their website is fresh, original and always entertaining so tell all your friends and log on today to be transported to another dimension. It's a different kind of experience altogether.
http://www.tackyprod.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk (2007 Update: The emails have gone but the site is still brilliant.)
Well, time to saddle up and move on because the posse are on my tail so me and Sundance are heading south for the highest lake in the world and possibly Bolivia.
Till then amigos.
Love, Neil x
