Llama Farm

My school in Cusco took a field trip to a llama farm. It's a cooperative that gathers people from all over Peru who know how to do the traditional weaving, which is in danger of becoming a lost art. They raise the llamas, alpacas and vicuñas for their wool and for meat. Vicuña wool is the finest, followed by alpaca with llamas at the bottom. Not only is the vicuña wool the softest and warmest, the vicuña can only be shorn every 2 years and are almost impossible to domesticate.

All the wool gathered at the collective is either left its natural color or is dyed using only vegetable dyes, which is the traditional way. People who are part of the collective come for 10 days at a time to dye and weave the wool and then return to their villages to sell what they have made, leaving some for the collective to sell in their store. It's very expensive but fortunately not my taste. A table runner was around $350 and a bedspread for over $1000 (picture-taking in the store was not allowed).

While there, we were able to get up close to the animals and feed them. In that respect they reminded me of the goats at a petting zoo - they knew we had food and they wanted it! Except this little tiny brown guy that I think was sick, we laid sprouts right in front of him, but he just ignored them, and us.

I also got to see two of them spit, but not at each other. One spit very close to me, I think I felt a little spray. Usually it's something they only do amongst themselves and is akin to a dog growling in animal parlance.

Many of the llamas reminded me of shaggy dogs, but my favorite one also had goofy, protruding lower teeth and a lumbering, graceful walk (video below). Oh, and there was one who looked like my classmate Alex. Of course it could just be the way the photograph is framed...

I found out that the look this llama in this video gave me is actually typical of them. Today, in a park in Arequipa, I think one was thinking about spitting at me just for looking at him, but he was tied up and I was too far away.

Machupicchu, Day 2 (Wayna Picchu)

After a night of not great sleep (crazy man howling, crying and moaning outside my window off and on for hours) I received my 5am wake-up call. I didn´t get up until 5:30 and then had to pack since I´d been to tired the night before after my long, hot bath, followed by a hot shower with water pressure - those two things alone made the trip worth it. After I packed, I ate breakfast, which was nice for a hotel complimentary breakfast: fresh fruit and juice, granola, yogurt, pancakes, eggs, ham and cheese sandwiches, cake and very strong coffee. Then I went to the bus station to get my bus to Machupicchu, it was around 6:45.


The bus left a few minutes after I boarded and we got up to the entrance around 7:20. I had to wait in line to go through the checkpoint. When I got near the front of the line I was asked for my ticket and since I didn´t have one was sent to the ticket office. The office isn´t marked, I just saw a place that said "Oficina" tucked away in a corner, so I went in. There IS a charge to get in! It´s 120 soles (about $40). So Amy didn´t get suckered! I told the woman that I hadn´t bought a ticket the day before and got in. "You walked in without buying a ticket?" "Yes." "And you actually went to Machupicchu?" "Yes, for hours." She just gave a look to her coworker, said something in Spanish (don´t know what, far from fluent).

Before I left the hotel, I decided to make my bag lighter and put my big wallet in my luggage and just brought my change purse with all the cash I had, about 50 soles, which I thought was plenty for the day. I left my bankcard in my wallet. So I couldn´t get into Machupicchu without returning to my hotel. It was too early to be able to catch a bus back down, so I had to walk, which took 2 hours. By the time I got back in town, it was too late to be able to get back and do the hike I wanted and since I spent several hours at Machupicchu the day before, I decided not to go back. Oh well, it´s a reason to return. And with my extra time, I was able to finally download some pictures. But given that it took me almost four hours to finally download just 19 pictures, I don´t know how many more I will be downloading while in Peru. But I do have have pictures of the sometimes perilous stairs I walked down! Unfortunately, those are not some I was able to download.

To see all the pictures I did download, go to http://www1.snapfish.com/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=181849070/a=30879917/t_=30879917. It´s at Snapfish and you need an account to be able to see them.

Machupicchu

Machupicchu, Machu Picchu, MachuPicchu. All three spellings seem to be used interchangeably; spelling variation is something I appreciate in a word.

It really is spectacular. I keep using that word to describe it, although I looked for others. Synonyms found: amazing, astonishing, astounding, breathtaking, daring, dazzling, dramatic, eye-catching, fabulous, fantastic, grand, impressive, magnificent, marked, marvelous, miraculous, prodigious, razzle-dazzle, remarkable, sensational, splendid, staggering, striking, stunning, stupendous, theatrical, thrilling, wondrous. They all fit (with the possible exception of razzle-dazzle, but I just couldn´t delete it) though all together they may be a bit over the top.

While I was planning this trip, I talked to a woman in my school, Amy, who is also from San Francisco, and she said something about her ticket to Machupicchu. I asked her for more specifics, because nothing in my travel guide*, or online said anything about needing a ticket only about paying to take the bus up there. She said she didn´t know since she went through a tour company - I planned my own trip.

The bus up to the top is $12 roundtrip and takes about 20-25 minutes on a road that winds up the mountain, not really switchbacks, but serpentine. When I got there, I went through the checkpoint and there was a book that looked like a sign-in book and I asked if I need to sign and they said no. Guess Amy was suckered by a tour company! I spent a few hours there, took a LOT of pictures and really marvelled that they didn´t charge to get in. There were llamas grazing all around. And though there were a lot of people there, it was pretty easy to get nice shots without the crowds, it was just a matter of waiting.I decided to go back the next day to do the big hike to Wayna (or Huayna) Picchu, which is at the top of the mountain that you see towering over Machupicchu. It´s an hour-long hike each way and the for the last part you have to crawl. It sounded like a whole day in itself, not something to add on and I had 6 hours the next day and that was leaving myself plenty of time to get lunch and go to the train station.

On the bus ride back down to Aguas Calientes, there was a boy in traditional dress who ran down the steps that go in a relatively straight line that crosses the road on the way down. He met us each time the steps and the road intersected. The was a group of kids on the bus who were thrilled with this! At the bottom of the mountain, but still a few minutes away from Aguas Calientes, he got on the bus for pictures (and payment).

*I only have experience with this one, but it seems like "Globetrotter" guide books suck - it´s the worst one I´ve ever had. Yea for Lonely Planet.

Mis clases en español

I am in my 4th and final week of Spanish lessons and I´ve learned a lot. Actually the "new information" part of my brain is overflowing a bit. I´ll still be in Cusco for 3 more weeks, but will now have more time to do the tourist thing. I have a trip to MachuPicchu this coming weekend and later in October will go to Puno for 5 days. Puno is on the shores of Lake Titicaca.
In my time in school, I´ve had two teachers and both of them are in their early forties - I think. The first week, with a classmate, I had Sylvie. She is very nice, but doesn´t speak English well, and wouldn´t say she didn´t understand a question, which made asking for clarification difficult. For weeks 2-4, I´ve had Ana Maria. The first week with her I had a classmate, but for the past two weeks I´ve been the only student.
On our very first day with Ana Maria, the first thing she said was,¨Look at my lips, I have herpes on them¨which was true. I always wonder when I´m in a different country if certain personality quirks are cultural or specific to that person. I consider opening a conversation with "Look at my herpes" a personality quirk. She is very nice and outgoing and I´ve learned a lot from her; some things I´ve had to unlearn from my time with Sylvie (for instance, empézar does not mean "to star" as in a movie, but rather "to start" as in to begin).
Today began with Ana Maria telling me that she now has blisters on her vagina. She told me in Spanish, but no doubt that is an exact translation of what she said. Again, is this a normal thing to share or does she just give too much information? The best part is that she blames the coldness of the room we are in for the blisters. I think it´s probably more in the STD category, but didn´t say so.