Tuesday, September 13, 2005
DAY 7: Toronto and Peru
Well it´s day 7 and I´m writing the second blog update... that´s a pretty decent timeframe, if I do say so myself.
We flew into Toronto last Wenesday and to our surprise, found out that the International Film Festival was there - supposedly it is ¨second only to Cannes¨. So while we walked around what felt like all of Toronto and the surrounding area, and visited the Casa Loma (a castle-like estate built in the early 1900´s) we spent the majority of our time at the film festival, aka. celebrity stalking. We went to three red carpets premieres, including the American films ¨Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang¨ and ¨Thank You for Smoking¨ AND got to see Val Kilmer, Robert Downey Jr, William H Macy and Adam Brody. I realized that being a paparazzi is not a career for me, when tons of teenage girls, screaming for the OC star, elbowed me out of prime location and left me with some ¨creative¨ shots of him. But we also took in some culture and saw a Tiawanese film, ¨Three Times¨. While it will probably not be coming ot the local AMC theatre, it was pretty interesting, and definitely made us a part of the film community:)
We came to Peru on an overnight flight with under 5 hours of sleep combined and flew to Cusco to meet my friend John. Sleep was not in John´s itinerary as he had planned a 4 hour tour of the city for us, while he conveniently napped from the night before. But the tour was amazing and we were introduced to the Incan culture after visiting a few temples, churches, and Saxsewama (pronounce it ¨sexy woman¨), very impressive Incan ruins. Eddie, our tour guide (my guess is that isn´t his birth name), had a strong grasp of the English language and definitely taught us a lot, even with the sleep deprivation. We decided to make our first day count and tried the local specialty ¨cuy¨- or guinea pig. None of us would recommend it - think no meat, skin as hard as a rock and the meat you could find was pretty oilly like duck. We decided guinea pigs are definitely better as pets (yeah - kinda gross that we ate our first pet - but it´s ¨the culture¨). The next day, we again woke up early to take a tour of the Sacred Valley (with John in tow this time) and visited a few cities and markets. We then had our first face with death when we took a cab ride out to Moray, some concentric circles of farming land groomed by the Incas - this was our first location that basically had no other tourists around and it was really amazing.
Racing at 100 KMH through hilly turns while you're in the wrong lane is quite exhillerating, as is narrowly, and I mean narrowly, missing dogs and CHILDREN in the city streets. But we survived the ride (as did the innocent townspeople and dogs) and ended up on a train to Aguas Calientes, our starting point for MachuPicchu.
After attempting an early night's sleep, we woke up at 4:30, ate a hearty breakfast and set out to hike up the 1000 feet to the top of MachPicchu. Now, my original thought was ït´s supposed to be a 90 minute hike up, how hard can it be?¨. At the 500th stair (I had told Meridith and John to leave me on like the 59th), when I saw that I was only about 1/4 of the way up, I realized this was going to be "an experience". While still making it up in the average 90 minutes, I think I have experienced the feelings of a heart attack. On top of the mountain, MachuPicchu was amazing. An entire city built on a hill, that is not viewable from the ground, and still here after 700 years.
We snapped some good pics then headed up Waynapicchu - I think it translates to ¨more steps and death-defying hiking¨. There were definitely some hairy moments and when the sign stated ¨not for the weak of heart¨, it should have included ¨or those with common sense¨. After probably 1000 more steps, more similar to a ladder than a staircase, we were at the top and viewed all of MachuPicchu and the amazing scenery surrounding it. We explored Waynapicchu, including wedging ourselves between rocks and crawling through ridiculously small spaces (if only I hadn´t been laughing so hard at John´s attempt, there would have been a very good picture) to get the perfect pictures. We definitely got the money shots, as well as a few ¨we could fall at any minute shots¨for our mom - which also scared the bejesus out of John as a secondary benefit. Once we hiked down Waynapicchu (much more terrifying than the walk up), I manipulated both John and Mer´s sense of competition and we set up on an additional climb to the Temple of the Moon or the Great Cave (I think it was called both, otherwise we only saw one of them). The cave at the end was relatively exciting but the hike, which led us below MachuPicchu (only of course to have to climb back up to it), only served to use up the energy I had reserved for breathing. Meridith´s motivation to make it back was the burning need to take off her right hiking boot, as well as documenting the hysterical picture commentary she had come up with for our futile attempt at on the Natural Stairmaster from Hell. With our legs like rubber, or Mexican jumping beans for Mer and John, we decided to take the bus back down (I know, pathetic) and nurse our bodies with food and drinks before we headed back to Cusco. And with another, and even more life-threatening cab ride, we made it to our hotel. So today we are off to Lima to visit my friend and see what else this adventure has in store for us.
As a final sign-off note, it is day 7 and Meridith and I are on speaking terms and have amazingly not even fought once. Thanks to John for starting us off on the right foot. I mean you can´t kill your sister with a friend in the room, right?
We flew into Toronto last Wenesday and to our surprise, found out that the International Film Festival was there - supposedly it is ¨second only to Cannes¨. So while we walked around what felt like all of Toronto and the surrounding area, and visited the Casa Loma (a castle-like estate built in the early 1900´s) we spent the majority of our time at the film festival, aka. celebrity stalking. We went to three red carpets premieres, including the American films ¨Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang¨ and ¨Thank You for Smoking¨ AND got to see Val Kilmer, Robert Downey Jr, William H Macy and Adam Brody. I realized that being a paparazzi is not a career for me, when tons of teenage girls, screaming for the OC star, elbowed me out of prime location and left me with some ¨creative¨ shots of him. But we also took in some culture and saw a Tiawanese film, ¨Three Times¨. While it will probably not be coming ot the local AMC theatre, it was pretty interesting, and definitely made us a part of the film community:)
We came to Peru on an overnight flight with under 5 hours of sleep combined and flew to Cusco to meet my friend John. Sleep was not in John´s itinerary as he had planned a 4 hour tour of the city for us, while he conveniently napped from the night before. But the tour was amazing and we were introduced to the Incan culture after visiting a few temples, churches, and Saxsewama (pronounce it ¨sexy woman¨), very impressive Incan ruins. Eddie, our tour guide (my guess is that isn´t his birth name), had a strong grasp of the English language and definitely taught us a lot, even with the sleep deprivation. We decided to make our first day count and tried the local specialty ¨cuy¨- or guinea pig. None of us would recommend it - think no meat, skin as hard as a rock and the meat you could find was pretty oilly like duck. We decided guinea pigs are definitely better as pets (yeah - kinda gross that we ate our first pet - but it´s ¨the culture¨). The next day, we again woke up early to take a tour of the Sacred Valley (with John in tow this time) and visited a few cities and markets. We then had our first face with death when we took a cab ride out to Moray, some concentric circles of farming land groomed by the Incas - this was our first location that basically had no other tourists around and it was really amazing.
Racing at 100 KMH through hilly turns while you're in the wrong lane is quite exhillerating, as is narrowly, and I mean narrowly, missing dogs and CHILDREN in the city streets. But we survived the ride (as did the innocent townspeople and dogs) and ended up on a train to Aguas Calientes, our starting point for MachuPicchu.
After attempting an early night's sleep, we woke up at 4:30, ate a hearty breakfast and set out to hike up the 1000 feet to the top of MachPicchu. Now, my original thought was ït´s supposed to be a 90 minute hike up, how hard can it be?¨. At the 500th stair (I had told Meridith and John to leave me on like the 59th), when I saw that I was only about 1/4 of the way up, I realized this was going to be "an experience". While still making it up in the average 90 minutes, I think I have experienced the feelings of a heart attack. On top of the mountain, MachuPicchu was amazing. An entire city built on a hill, that is not viewable from the ground, and still here after 700 years.
We snapped some good pics then headed up Waynapicchu - I think it translates to ¨more steps and death-defying hiking¨. There were definitely some hairy moments and when the sign stated ¨not for the weak of heart¨, it should have included ¨or those with common sense¨. After probably 1000 more steps, more similar to a ladder than a staircase, we were at the top and viewed all of MachuPicchu and the amazing scenery surrounding it. We explored Waynapicchu, including wedging ourselves between rocks and crawling through ridiculously small spaces (if only I hadn´t been laughing so hard at John´s attempt, there would have been a very good picture) to get the perfect pictures. We definitely got the money shots, as well as a few ¨we could fall at any minute shots¨for our mom - which also scared the bejesus out of John as a secondary benefit. Once we hiked down Waynapicchu (much more terrifying than the walk up), I manipulated both John and Mer´s sense of competition and we set up on an additional climb to the Temple of the Moon or the Great Cave (I think it was called both, otherwise we only saw one of them). The cave at the end was relatively exciting but the hike, which led us below MachuPicchu (only of course to have to climb back up to it), only served to use up the energy I had reserved for breathing. Meridith´s motivation to make it back was the burning need to take off her right hiking boot, as well as documenting the hysterical picture commentary she had come up with for our futile attempt at on the Natural Stairmaster from Hell. With our legs like rubber, or Mexican jumping beans for Mer and John, we decided to take the bus back down (I know, pathetic) and nurse our bodies with food and drinks before we headed back to Cusco. And with another, and even more life-threatening cab ride, we made it to our hotel. So today we are off to Lima to visit my friend and see what else this adventure has in store for us.
As a final sign-off note, it is day 7 and Meridith and I are on speaking terms and have amazingly not even fought once. Thanks to John for starting us off on the right foot. I mean you can´t kill your sister with a friend in the room, right?
# posted by Mer and Les @ 9:53 AM 
