The Sacred Valley

Another early start we got picked up by the bus at 8.15am ready for an overnight trip to go and check out machu picchu and the sacred valley. The first stop on the bus was a town called Pisaq which is in the valleys between the mountains. Unbelievable views, the bus absolutely flies round the tiny corners, as we mentioned this the Australian guy on the bus told us how just a couple of days before he had seen a really bad crash. He told us the front of the bus was destroyed with bodies lying everywhere, latest tip therefore is to sit at the back of the bus (nice one mate!) Once at the town centre there was a market which we had time to look around, Lou finally bought an Alpaca cardigan which she is very pleased about. At the same market we found a restaurant that had its own brood of guinea pigs in a little house, they seemed happy enough, roaming free, getting fattened up, ready for the oven.

We had a buffet lunch at a lovely Hacienda in the country side, and then carried on to a town called Ollantaytambo. Another nice town, this one had Inca ruins at the centre which we climbed in order to see unfinished Inca works, amazing how they constructed their buildings out of massive rocks without any machines. It was really interesting, the problem was that there were like 200 steps and we both ate absolutely loads at the buffet, including a couple of beers, it was hard work to begin with. This older couple that were on  our tour really started panicking about the heights, was quite funny as the woman was crying but the man was no better, he totally left her and was stuck to the wall, the woman was helped down by the guide. funny stuff.

After this we were dropped off back in the town to wait for the train, leaving us with over 2 hours to kill. We hooked up with two American guys (California) and a Brazilian girl and went for a few drinks. One of the local drinks is called Pisco Sour, which we all drank and chatted. The blokes were paramedics in the military and had been out in Iraq. We stayed with them until we all caught the train to Aguas Calientes.

The train journey was forever long and there weren't any views as it was already dark, dont get me wrong it was a nice train, they even gave us a snack of dried fried banana (rubbish) however there were moths in there to terrorise us. The biggest one of the lot landed right in front of Lou! I was hoping the foreign bloke opposite would deal with it, but no he sat there scared to death (it was massive) Lou acted quickly and cupped the beast, launching it out the window, saving us all, I would have dealt with it of course, but was too busy making notes.

We had a tot in Agues Calientes with the yanks again, and some very crap food, the hostel was ok, there is a massive raging river next to it with potential to swell and kill us at any point. We survived.