Almost Heaven-South American journeys Part 1:

Being in the Andes is one of the most amazing experiences you can imagine. There is no way to describe how breath-taking it is [sometimes literally for those -like me- who suffer from altitude sickness] to see the mountains rise up from the ground. Come to think of it, no photo captures it either. It is the nearest thing to Heaven I can imagine.

Here I am at the highest point in Machu Pichu [at what is called the Guard House or Caretaker's House -depending on what map you read- about to meet the rest of the group I toured with. They walked the Inca Trail for 4 days and from what they told me, it was tough. I took the train. In retrospect, I am glad I did take the train....even though it was tempting to give myself a "trial", I realised after spending a day walking around Machu Pichu, which is filled with steep steps and trailways, that my knees would have never made it on the Inca Trail. By the end of the day in Machu Pichu, I could barely drag myself up and down the stairways. There must be something about ancient peoples and building cities on steep hillsides. Again, as in the South West of the US, the living quarters are in one area and the food storage on another hill altogether. I think I am always too close to my food source, which might explain away the condition of dragging myself up and down steep stairs.

Machu Pichu is totally amazing. It's a very spiritual place...all the important buildings are aligned with the Sun Gate, which is on the top of a mountain opposite from where I am standing in the above photo...so that when the sun comes through the "gate" [it's not really a gate it's a dip in the hillside, surrounded by trees] on the Solstices, it strikes certain formations in the Sun Temple, or the Temple of the Puma or whatever building that holds some importance, at first light. Our guide Margaret took us all around the place and explained the sacred significance of each place along with the meanings behind some of the Incan symbols. She was very passionate about Incan culture which made it really interesting.

What you are looking at on the right is the Sun Temple. You can sort of tell how steep it is from the picture, but in reality it doesn't show the spectacular heights of the mountains. To me, it looks flat compared to what it looks like in person. Machu Pichu- thank god- is at a lower elevation than Cuzco, the base town we flew to from Lima in order to start this part of the journey. Cuzco is some 4,500m above sea level, and from the minute I stepped off the plane I had altitude sickness. Native Andeans drink Coca tea which is supposed to cure the sickness, but it never happened for me. Luckily it did not affect me at Machu Pichu, but the minute we returned to Cuzco, it all started up again. As beautiful as the Andes were, I was glad to be out of them.

One of the places we went before everyone started on the Inca Trail was to the Sacred Valley. It too is filled with Inca ruins and a variety of towns that Andean people still live in -though admittedly, the towns are not dotted along the mountainsides, but rather nestled in valleys. Along the way are groups of women and children waiting to sell us anything from hand knitted water bottle holders [now here's an argument for evolution and survival of the fittest-adapting a sellable craft to westerners who drink out of water bottles] to hats and other woven things. This group are singing us a song. What I love about this is the amount of women who are carrying their babies on their backs. What's unusual about it is that they also scamper up and down the hillsides-steps and trails- loaded up with baby and crafts....how do they do it? Notice they are wearing sandals, not Nikes or Pumas designed for mountain climbing. Nor do they have walking sticks, which the rest of us need to make our way up and down trails and steps. Their climbing gear is genetically built in.


All in all, we spent 8 days in the Andes. Even though I was ill for a lot of the time, I was glad I went...it has always been a dream of mine to see Machu Pichu and I got more than I dreamed about.....which is not such a bad place to be in eh?

Part 2- the Amazon Jungle and Part 3: the Galapagos to follow.

Running through the Jungle-South American Journeys-Part 2

From the heights of Peru, we travelled down to the Amazon River and the Amazon jungle. The difference wasn't just in the terrain- now we encountered all sorts of creepy crawlies and other interesting animals which we didn't see in the Andes. Andeans are -as you can imagine- rugged and serious. Life is more casual and laid back on the Amazon [even though there are more things waiting to kill you there than in the mountains- like malaria and yellow fever, both carried by mosquitos-one comes out in the day and the other at night, I never remembered which].

We were taken from the airport to the town of Puerto Maldonado to get rid of our luggage and put what we needed into duffle bags. Then we went to the boat ramp and got on a "motorised" canoe and travelled for about 1-2 hours down the Amazon into the jungle. We stayed in a lodge which was totally gorgeous.

Each "cabin" in the lodge had a bedroom-complete with mozzie nets- a toilet and shower and a ton load of candles, because there was not electricity. Along the edge of the lodge is the jungle-just waiting. The noise the jungle makes is totally astounding.....everything that lives there is totally busy making noises. The first night we went on a jungle walk, with our torches out, looking for anything that hangs out at night. We managed to see a tarantula the size of a small plate. Our guide coaxed it out of it's hide-hole so we could all have a look. After we walked a while, we all turned off our torches and just stared up at the stars and listened to the noises-it was totally groovey.

The next day we took another canoe ride to a lake, where we paddled around looking at birds and then took a hike through the jungle to look at giant trees. At the beginning of this entry, you can see me standing inside one of the strangler figs that take over other trees and kill them from the outside in.

The Amazon River is brown and filled with Caymans, which are a breed of alligator...one night we went out Cayman spotting and found a lot of them, nesting beside the banks. After we spotted about 12 of them, the driver of our boat turned off the engine and we floated down the River with just the stars for accompaniement.

What I loved about the jungle was the plethora of life and the noise. As you can imagine, it is wet and the plant life is not only abundant, but big and beautiful. There are millions of kinds of orchids and birds of paradise, so of which I have never seen before. Our time there was short, but fruitful....
Look for South American Journeys Part 3- The Galapagos.....read on.

The Galapagos- South American Journeys Part 3

Just being at the Equator would have been enough for me...it was truly an experience, rolling around on a "yacht" [I put the quotes around the word yacht because it was a very funky boat, but more on that later].

The Galapagos are everything you've ever heard of and more....the bird life is abundant, some of the animals are weird and some are found not only nowhere else on earth, but often only on that particular island where they live. This is me with some sea lions....who are EVERYWHERE! Every beach where we landed had the colony of sea lions. The ones behind me are female- but there is a male/bull somewhere on this beach "walking" up and down roaring for us to get away from his family. On the first island we went to we witnessed a sea lion just giving birth to a cub. Our guide could tell this because of all the frigate birds that were circling around to get the placenta. Within minutes of the birth, the mother was pushing the baby down towards the water....no time like the present.

The rules in the Galapagos are: Don't go off the path and don't touch the animals. The sea lion behind me came right up to me and smelled my hand. Most of the animals on the Galapagos are fearless of humans. The birds stay right where they are and do not fly away, nor do the reptiles- who are lying all over the docks and rocks- flee on a human approach. [not that they move very fast anyway...some of them look like they have been lying there for about 1200 years] It is wonderful to see a place where the animals are given preference over humans.

Every day, we went to a different island where we went for a walk in the morning and a snorkel [or two] in the afternoon. We were snorkelling with sea lions, penguins [yes! penguins], manta rays, sharks, tortoises and all sorts of fishies. The weather was wonderful, but the sun was blazing and most everyone got fairly burned despite the sun screen.

One of my favourite birds on the Galapagos are called Blue Footed Boobies.....I swear some of them are trained to pose for photos. This one was waiting on the rocks when we landed for a walk around the dead volcano on Bartolome Island. Aren't his feet pretty? The bird life is pretty abundant- pelicans, boobies, frigate birds- who escorted out boat every day- and Galapagos Hawks. On one island we saw three Galapagos hawks feeding on a dead baby sea lion and they just sat there as we walked past...several of us were snapping away and still they didn't move. It is not unusual to be anchored at some harbour and watch the Pelicans and boobies dive into the water after some fish...they look like arrows darting into the sea. It is also not unusual to see a dolphin or a black and white manta ray leaping out of the water into the air and spiralling back down into the ocean.

Pat- who is on the right in the picture below, was our spotter for the trip....I could not imagine how she could see all those birds and tortoises and rays, but she always did and she told us it was because she played golf and had to see a little ball all the time, or she would be broke buying new golf balls. She and her other half Noel were very entertaining for me during the trip.... they had a fabulous sense of humour and Pat was wonderfully supportive of me during walks and on our landings which I got pretty good at by the end of the trip.

There are so many islands in the Galapagos and we only got a taste visiting Santa Fe, the North and South Plazas, San Cristobel, and Bartolome...I can see how you could spend weeks and weeks there. Our yacht which was very funky, had a great crew. They were all enthusiastic and made sure that we got the most out of all our dinghy trips to the islands....sometimes going out of their way to point out penguins etc along a shore line away from where we were supposed to land. I have to say they had their hands full [excuse the pun] lifting me up into the dinghy after a snorkelling session....I have no idea how they did it. It is the most ineligant position to be in. Nevertheless snorkelling was wonderful...the water was so incredibly clear and the marine life most accomodating.

The yacht was driven by a variety of people, and I swear some of them must have been in training. When Felix- who was our regular dinghy driver, was piloting the yacht, we went twice as fast and bumped over 3 times as many waves as when the captain was in control. Often we had wild rides and quite a few people [not me thank god] were sea sick. I'd had enough of altitude sickness, so I wasn't about to be sea sick. Besides I was nursing an Amazon Rainforest parasite who was assisting me to digest my food 6 times faster than normal. I am not sure that South America is the country for me.....I seemed to have been attacked by all sorts of things. Considering how long I have been travelling however, I think I have gotten off easily.

Sunset on the Galapagos

Next stop: New Zealand- almost home. I can't believe that 4 1/2 months have already zoomed by.....sometimes [like when I was floating down the Amazon River] I think about all the places I have seen in the last 4+ months and I can't believe it......Adios for now.
Genie

WAIT FOR IT....

Just a note to let you all know that I have tons of photos and stories to put up about my South American portion of this journey. However, being in South America also means that I do not have access to computers that will cope with loading up a lot of photos onto my blog entries.

Here's a recap of what I have been through in the past 3 weeks here......

1. An absolutely magical journey to Machu Pichu in the Peruvian Andes
2. A trip down the Amazon River and a stay in the Peruvian jungle-complete with creepy crawlies of all shapes and sizes
3. Yachting through the Galapagos Islands which includes swimming with sea lions, manta rays and tortoises as well as hob-nobbing with iguanas and birds of all varieties.

In about 3 days I expect to be able to load up pictures with commentary....stay tuned.
Cheers
Genie