Times have been flying by….the seasons should have changed, but they have not. Christmas time came and left, yet the blistering jungle heat and humidity is still the same. It was hard to get in the Christmas spirit without the cold and the snow. But the great thing about the coming of Christmas was some free time. Lucky me got the chance to travel down south with none other than my brother, dad, mom and Andrew Vizcarra. We had a crazy fun time. The first episode of our trip was eating fresh granadilla (slimy fish egg looking fruit, that is uber delicious) from my very own back yard jungle here in Pucallpa. Then we boarded a bus and headed for the colder regions of Peru. We had some crazy bus experiences, including a few pointless bus rides and ended up flying down south, rather than taking 4 days to travel there by bus. But the experiences were all dandy. My family got to see Cusco, Machu Picchu, Arequipa, and lots of random country in between. Cusco was a classic historic city with a delicious restaurant named Jack’s. Machu Picchu was better than it is hyped up to be. When we first arrived it was completely fogged over. Needless to say we were a bit bummed. But then the fog lifted and the architecture of ages past was revealed - green grassy fields, stone remains of stone houses, llamas…and tourists. We stayed in Machu Picchu all day, walking among the ruins, chasing llamas, climbing up WaynaPicchu (the big tall mountain behind Machu Picchu) for an amazing view of Peru’s most famous tourist trap. It was absolutely amazing to be seeing, touching and smelling one of the 7 wonders of the world. Andrew, Jonathan and I had a crazy adventure trying to get to Bolivia so that I could renew my visa (My parents camped out in Cusco for an extra day) To make a long story short, we crossed the border illegally at least 5 times in the process of just trying to exit Peru and enter Bolivia. Then to add to the excitement, after successfully exciting Peru and entering Bolivia, we walked back into Peru and stayed the night there, returning to Bolivia the next day to leave the country officially. Then since it was Christmas day we decided to seek out a decent Christmas meal. So we found a local street vendor. I had some sort of warm tea (it was quite cold down south), not sure what kind, but quite delicious. Some sort of tasty tea, was my Christmas dinner, which I drank while staying illegally in Peru. What a Christmas! All too soon Christmas break was over and it was time to go back to Pucallpa. Traveling around was an epic experience. I made friends with people from Spain and Argentina and other random places in the world. It was amazing to be able to talk to people in Spanish.
One of the crazy things we did during break was go to the local market and buy bread, cheese, basil and avocado and sit and eat it in the main plaza in Arequipa. Take note that this is not something that anybody does…especially not tourists. We had some people that stared at us the entire time we were eating; others who would walk by and look, only to turn around and look again and again then proceed to laugh at us. We were definitely the most entertaining thing in the square. Nobody could figure out what on earth Americans were doing sitting on the ground, eating avocado and bread. Try it sometime…it is more fun than you think…and quite delicious. (Uncle John…next time you visit a foreign country I want to see a picture of you testing this out…)
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