A Todo el Mundo

wow. we really haven´t left a blog for a while now.

So we have gone and survived the Inka Trail. It was an amazing experience! But you´ll just have to ask us to find out the details!

Yesterday we headed south along the Panamerican highway to Nazca, Peru. To see the famous NAZCA LINES!

Our tour guide picked us up in his HUGE, old, stretched out car... "like Al Capone"
7 of us squished into it, but luckily we got to sit in the front.

On the way towards the Lines, the tour guide asked us where we were from. We told him Canada, and he said he had a lot of respect for Canadians... in particular, Engineers and Anthropologists... oh the irony.

Then he gave us an in depth description of the area, including every little thing we passed. Including the women... which he had a special horn to honk at them with (it sounds like a whistle). Two of the people we were with didn´t speak Spanish... and it was very obvious that they weren´t understanding anything... So Kristy started translating, and became the offical English version to the trip.

The tour guide was intensely passionate about the Nazca Lines and the Nazca Culture. When he was little the main lady who studied the lines came and spoke in his class, and since then he said he had been obsessed.

We went to a viewing tower, so you can actually see the lines (·aside· if you don´t know what the Nazca Lines are: they are huge lines drawn in the dirt from an ancient culture from around 200 BCE to 700 CE.The lines carry on for miles... but there are also figures such as a lizard, spider, condor, monkey, etc.There is a lot of mystery surrounding the lines because they don´t know exactly how they were made or why.)

Then we went to a huge hill where a lot of the lines meet. The tour guide told us that he sometimes goes out there at the end of the day and has a smoke, a beer,and watches the stars. What a funny man.

Then our hotel... aparently, since we got such a good deal on the room, certain things aren´t included... like the TV doesn´t actually reach the plug in... etc. We were worried they were going to come and take the furniture because we didn´t pay enough...

regardless, we are sitting in the hotel now until our bus comes. We are taking our first night bus at 7pm. For 9 to 11 hours, to Arequipa, Peru. Its our last city before CHILE!!!!

(we are kind of sick of being in Peru, because we are sick of people trying to constantly rip us off... although, the everyday average Peruvian is extremely nice, and always wants to help out.)

Entonces...

we have a criminal record in Peru...

we thought we would spend our last day in the Amazon, relaxing and seeing some of the sights.... BUT NO

we went to the imigration office, but the lady was rude and told us that we needed our tickets to prove when we entered the country... so we went back to the hotel and got our tickets (which luckily we actually kept).

then she said that these tickets were not valid. and we kept saying that we didnt understand... which she thought we meant that we didnt understand spanish.... but really we didnt understand her crazy obsession with the other tickets....

so we went to the port.... the SCARY port... that we dont like. As soon as we got out of the taxi, we were lost. And so the taxi driver tried to help. Then this scary guy came up and tried to sell us the usual tourist crap ie. hotels, tours, etc. And the taxi driver freaked out at him for being so scary, and they had a nice little fight.

Then the "office" we were looking for was actually a guy sitting on his boat. (we also noticed that ALL the other boats in the port were far superior to the one we took before...) So the taxi driver (who talked to the police guard that we spent last Saturday talking too, and therefore knew our life story...) talked to the guy at the "office". While he was talking, the scary guy came back and started talking to us.... and getting closer to us.... then getting closer to Kristy, and basically making things feel very uncomfortable... but then we just ignored like we didnt speak spanish and he left.

But the guy in the "office" thought it was as strange as we did, that we needed some random ticket that does not exist. So the taxi driver suggested we go back to imigration and he would talk to the rude lady. So we went back to imigration.

Then the rude lady said thats too darn bad... cept in spanish... and that we would have to go get a letter from the Boss of the port... (like he really knew when we arrived...). So we went back to the port. or least favorite place in all of South America so far... for the third time.

Then when we got there the Boss of the port, was gone... to his house... SO the taxi driver took us to the guy´s house. So we sat in some random persons house while his son tried to type out a letter cuz he wasn´t home. We sat on the couch and held their "kitty cat" which was actually a baby tiger type thing from the jungle. Finally, the Boss came home, and they wrote out a letter. But then there was no paper for the printer. Then we got some. Then there was no black ink for the printer. So we decided to print in blue. But then the printer didn´t work... and all this fun was increased by the fact that we had to be back at the imigration office before it closed at 4:00 and it was nearing 3:00.

Then we took the letters, and had to get photocopies... Then took them to imigration.

Then we had to sign a declaration saying that we are evil and entered Peru illegally. Then they fingerprinted us. Then we had to go pay a "hefty" fine... of 13 Soles... which is basically $4.

Anywayz... Then they gave us our stamps! and we officially entered the country! So we flew out of the amazon and on to Lima! Then we took a bus south to Ica, Peru.

We are now staying in a literal Oasis... in the midst of HUGE sand dunes. Today we went in a dune buggy and drove all over in the sand... it was pretty much like being on a rollercoaster... of sand... then we stopped every once in a while to go sandboarding... which is pretty much amazing... except that the guy with us dislocated his shoulder and had to go to the hospital. Then the sand got amazingly hot and unpleasant and we went home.

Then we went for lunch... which was Pollo de Vino (like wine chicken... with raisins...) and soup with various floaty pieces of chicken feet and other random organs.... Then we headed to a winery and did a tour and got to try free samples.

Then we went to an archeology museum which was intensely cool... with lots of mummies and even a parrot mummy.

Then we hiked up one of the huge sand dunes that towers over the city and watched the sun set. It was kinda funny because every picture we took looked like you took it at SEARS with a fake background. Its so incredibly beautiful and.... sandy!


Tomorrow we are going to try and go sandboarding again because its terribly fun... then we are heading to see the Nazca Lines (its an archaeology thing...)

Kristy and Nate

so we were going to leave Iquitos, Peru (in the Amazon) tomorrow morning.... but we are still not officially in Peru. By that, i mean that we dont have entry stamps... and we have tried and tried... but no one really seems to care.

we went to the migration office... which was closed, but the guard let us in and talked our ears off for ever (i think he was bored and liked the thought of having some foreigners to talk to). Then the "boss" came back and yelled at us and was all ignorant and mad because we didnt understand him...

then the people at the airport kept telling us to wait... until 3.... wait... until 5... oh. um no one is coming... but you can call them... anywayz, so we left.

so we had to change our flight to Tuesday and are going to drift around the Amazon some more... its actually a nice place to be stuck... lots of stuff to see and do.

like being on cops...

we were driving back from the airport for the millionth time (trying to get passport stamps)... when our taxi got pulled over by the cops (which is slightly concerning when you dont have passport stamps)... luckily they were only interested in the driver... a lady got out of the cop car and was screaming and pointing at him... and then they arested him. Meanwhile we were sitting in the back, and the other cop was worried about us (because you dont want tourists to think bad of your city). Eventually he found us another taxi and we ended up getting half of our ride for free. so thats happy.

Cristina y Antonio

Lima... oh Lima... how well we know Lima, after spending yet another day here. It was hot and polluted and overcrowed.... and beautiful.... now that we are staying like right near the Plaza de Armas, everything is colonial and awesome and we pretty much spent a lot of the day just watching life go bye. we also went to a museum of the Spanish Inquisition... complete with wax figures being tortured. it was pretty creepy, especially standing in the judgement room before the priests, assuming we would be accused of heresy... even though they were wax... We ate this crazy wierd fruit... its called grenadilla... its prickly and gives slivers on the outside and then is crazy hard to get into... then when you eat it, its basically like sucking snot off of seeds... mmm... we also were at the congress when some protesters starting marching and the policias were out in their riot gear... and so we ran away haha. but then a little while later there were more protestors right outside our hostel... and we took pictures. tomorrow we are flying to Quito, Ecuador. ciao Nathan y Kristy