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We have tied up our loose ends and have finished our volunteer stint at the yoga center. It is bittersweet for me because there is so much more that I would like to teach the staff but we have a flight to catch in a few days and are homesick for American culture like we never thought possible.

My time at the yoga center was great. I had a chance to work on my meditation skills, read a bunch and slack off in the yoga department, as usual. I’ve learned a lot teaching cooking and really enjoyed the teaching aspect. I hope to carry that passion with me, perhaps I’ll be teaching classes for PCC or something. It’s really enjoyable to cook, but sharing that knowledge is more satisfying than I thought possible.

I left the staff with a number of recipes (in spanish!) and I hope that they can follow the recipes once I am gone. This center is a slice of heaven in the Sacred Valley, which I don’t think we would have noticed had we done the gringo trail, see a few ruins and move on. Spending some time in this valley made me realize it’s different than the rest of Peru. Sure, life is slower and communication is still difficult (and in general sanitation doesn’t exist–except the yoga center, of course) but they have irrigation canals with fresh water from the mountains, gardens and gorgeous mountain views. It’s really quiet once you are away from the town centers and we felt safe everywhere we walked.

We had the opportunity to visit a small mountain village that is part of WT’s Childrens’ Fund and that was really nice. The children, all dressed in traditional garb, ran to meet the bus, throwing flower petals on our heads, handing us bouquets and leading us by the hand to their schoolyard. They sang songs and danced for us, and we (along with a group of Missoulans) sang a few songs for them. We got to see their schoolrooms that previous groups had donated money to build/fix up and their guinea pig house, where they raise guinea pigs and sell them. The government isn’t really there for the students or teachers. The teachers were sleeping 6 in a room (2 beds) before Wilka T’ika got involved and now there is lodging for the teachers. The government recently cut the funding for a hot lunch (meaning the kids only had one potato for breakfast, 1-4 hour walk to school, nothing, walk home in the dark and finally eat something else). The owner of WT set up a food program with the help of her guests and now the children get something to eat during the day. I think it’s great she’s built an oasis in the valley for yoga groups to come to but it’s even cooler that they are reaching out to the local poor communities and improving the children’s educational and nutritional needs. I am honored that we were able to be even a small part of it all. I hope we have the time to make a return visit one day.

We’re getting to meet a lot of other travellers here at the yoga center. Most people are friendly and nice, but the majority of them are in large groups on their own agenda. We met some independent travellers from Missoula, MT (a girl our age just finishing her stint in PeaceCorps in Paraguay, her mom and their friend) and hit it off immediately. We went and visited Pisac together and had a blast. Pisac contains more Incan ruins, hence piles of rocks, but these are spread out over numerous hillsides with great views. There’s impressive ceremonial baths, irrigation systems, agricultural terracing, funerary niches, ceremonial centers with very large carved boulders, a marker for a soltice and people trying to sell you stuff. Luckily the hassling only happens the first set of ruins after the entrance (flutes, woven belts, mostly). We had a local offer to be our guide and when we said no thanks, he went crazy, saying we had plenty of money to kill people in Iraq but not to hire him for a guide…..um, not the best way to drum up business. We just wanted to explore and one of our friends had a guidebook that explained it all.

It was a big site and took us a couple of hours to see it all. We hiked back into town, which was a little steep but not too bad. We passed a few waterfalls and the trail went through some terracing. I don’t understand why the locals don’t use this perfectly well made terracing…it’s just all grass and flowers. All the Incan terracing in the hills that I’ve seen is just abandoned. Maybe it’s an ancestor thing…no one gives me a straight answer when I ask. After Pisac, we walked through their market, which is basically all the same artesania stuff that most towns have (alpaca sweaters, flutes, knick knacks, etc). The nice thing about not having a home is that I’m not tempted to buy anything to decorate it with! I also had really yummy chocolate chip cheesecake at Ulrike’s in the plaza (the only good cheesecake I have had in S.A.)

We also visited Ollantaytambo (20 minutos on a local bus for sl.1) a set of ruins near us. Their agricultural terracing is bigger, steeper and more expansive. They have very large boulders as well, houses, ceremonial baths and one section of 5 foot stone walls set up like a maze. At least it felt like a maze to me, I got lost. I think we may be getting ruined out!

We tore ourselves away from our little paradise and did the Macchu Picchu thing. We decided to take the train from Ollantaytambo ($31 US for 1.5 hours). WHAT a ripoff, even more so because the train is owned by Chileans. But it was quick and we got into Aguas Calientes and bargained for a private room for sl.20 ($7), our cheapest bed yet. Obviously food is overpriced but we were able to bargain at some restaurants and snuck our own food into the Macchu. There’s signs everywhere saying you can’t bring any food in, but no one checks your bag and there’s no food available on the site. I’m not getting all grumpy and hungry because of a silly rule they don’t enforce. The student rule is also a crock. When we bought our tickets, I thought I could get the student price but apparently students have to be under 21! Most people don’t graduate college by 21. So, $40US to get in and we opted NOT to take the bus up to the site (another $12, roundtrip). The hike wasn’t bad at all, just uphill for about an hour and a half. If you DON’T want to pay to enter, you can follow this detailed blog here.

The ruins themselves are impressive. I don’t know how much of it has been restored, probably most of it, and it didn’t have the Indiana Jones feeling that Kuelep had but it was expansive and planned out. People still aren’t sure about it’s purpose or why it was mysteriously vacated, but it was cool to walk around and eavesdrop on some tour guides’ spiels and learn a thing or two. We left around dawn and got there before most of the major tour groups. We beelined it to Wayna Picchu, a peak higher than MP with more ruins and an amazing view down onto MP.

The hike was straight up but the trail was obviously maintained and used. The mountains around these ruins are HUGE and shear and green. It was like a movie backdrop it was so unreal. We only suffered a short rainshower and the rest of the day was sunny. The stone masonry is quite unbelievable. Here I am, so proud when I make a blanket or windchimes out of driftwood and these Incans move rocks bigger than me to make walls, houses, astronomical markers and the scariest bridge I’d ever seen.

At least most bridges have something to hold onto with your hands and if it snaps, you can still hold on and climb up the other side. The Incan Bridge, located behind MP, maybe 20 minutes of walking, is basically a shear rock exposed flat face with a bunch of rocks piled up, maybe 4 feet wide, but rocks piled up at least 100 feet. If your rock slips, there’s nothing to hold onto. It’s closed off now because just that happened to a tourist.

Scary bridges aside, we enjoyed the day, the views, the artificially planted grazing llamas and impressive ruins with monster boulders. It would be a nice place to live if it wasn’t such a pain to hike down to the river for water.

The next day we took the backpacker way out: walked on train tracks for 2 hours to a Hydroelectric Plant and opted to walk another 1.5 hours through a transition zone into the jungle (since the local buses weren’t leaving the plant for another 2 hours). We hitched a ride the rest of the way, which I’m glad we did. The main trail would have taken us only 30 more minutes, but a new bridge was built and we crossed that which led behind town through a valley before going into Santa Teresa (probably more than an hour more that way). I was sad we didn’t get to cross in the arroyo, a metal bucket that you pull yourself across the river, but we had a nice hike, saw lots of chickens, banana and coffee plantations and made it back to our temporary home in the evening. From Sta Teresa, we caught a local bus to Sta Maria, then another bus (they said it was the last bus…i think the last bus with gringos) which was an SUV we shared with 4 non-chatty foreigners. I think there’s more local buses for cheaper, but the trip back cost a total of $13 instead of the $31 on the train.

On another note, I bought a chocolate popsicle in Sta Maria made from fresh cacao from the jungle (Sta Maria is on the edge of the jungle). It was delicous! Matt had a fresh strawberry popsicle. Here they fill bags with the liquid, tie it off and freeze it. Like homemade Otter Pops or Freezies.

We’re at our final volunteer project on this trip and have set some roots for the next month at Wilka T’ika, a yoga retreat center with a vegetarian kitchen. They don’t have a volunteer program like most yoga centers, because this place is not like most yoga centers. The staff is all local Quechua and the center is more set up for outside yoga groups to come and tailor their own trip. The place is beautiful and made with all local materials and the details are so impressive. Gardens galore filled with territorial hummingbirds of all sizes, rooms with natural stone work, large yoga rooms with hardwood floors..it’s so nice to sit on the ground again and stretch or read in the grass not filled with litter and nastiness.

My project here is to teach vegan and gluten free recipes that they can add to their lacto-ovo repetoire. Matt’s project is to teach English and answer computer queries. The staff is really friendly and most of them are family that helped with the construction of the site. I’m having a lot of fun teaching them stuff in the kitchen. Last night we served my first entree here and it was a big success: Lasagna! We made the pasta dough from scratch, ricotta and sauce from scratch and sauteed up some spinach and garlic to give it a kick. It was delicious and the guests liked it so much that a group of them requested it for lunch today. We didn’t have time to make the pasta, but it still came out yummy.

It’s fun teaching comfort foods and homemade bread and vegan cuisine. The gluten free teaching hasn’t begun yet, as I can’t seem to find any buckwheat or sorghum flour. Not sure if it exists in Peru, but we will try. Oats just seem too risky to use…especially since the only oats in Peru are Quaker brand. Yeah, it’s probably all sorts of tainted with wheat.

Our free time has been spent meditating and reading and we don’t really have much of a desire to leave the center most days, it’s just too beautiful and peaceful here to want to go anywhere else.

After months of having one of the top questions by locals be: have you been to Cusco? We can finally answer YES. We took an overnight bus from Arequipa via Cruz del Sur, THE western friendly bus to take in southern Peru. We liked it, but didn’t think it was anything over the top, especially since part of the route was on a dirt road and kept Matt awake.

So, we are back at high elevation, and it is cold! It feels possibly colder than Puno, although it is at a lower elevation than Puno. A little rain at night, but not too much. The streets remind me of Granada, Spain. The sidewalks are barely wide enough for one person, the cobblestone roads are barely wide enough for a car. The houses have terracotta roofs, and it could be quaint, except for the obvious fact that it’s a tourist town. Meaning, people approach quite often selling you paintings, jewelry, alpaca hats and massages. They aren’t very pushy, which is nice. And it’s cute to see the llamas walking around with their owners, even if they are just doing it for photo money.

So far we’ve walked around the city, did a trolley tour, and saw a local soccer game versus Arequipa (and the crowd was pretty rowdy. people brought flares and drums and trumpets into the stadium with them. we didn’t witness any violence, and cusco won. when we made the first goal, a guy rushed the field to hug the player that made the goal, so that was neat. Sadly, no streakers.) Things obviously cost more here than the rest of Peru, but the food is good. We had breakfast at a place called Jack’s, aptly named. I think Jack would be pleased with the large portion sizes. Very yummy breakfasts!

We found the Cusqueña Beer Factory but were not allowed in. I guess the concept of factory tours isn’t really understood here. The guard told us it’s just a factory, but if we really wanted to go in, we’d have to gather a group of 10 people and give them a week’s notice…notice for what? I’m not sure.