Cusco

Hello All!

We've arrived safe and sound in Cusco, Peru. It was a long, over-night flight but we managed to push through it. We had a four hour layover in Mexico City and we almost missed our flight to Lima. The screens kept saying that our flight was delayed. When Peter went to inquire about them (for the 3rd or 4th time) the agent told him our flight was boarding! The screens were apparently on the fritz but they kept displaying the flight arrivals/departures? Anyway, we're just glad we got on our flight. We arrived in Lima about 1 a.m. and our flight to Cusco was scheduled to leave at 5:20 a.m. So, we hunkered down in some chairs and managed to sleep a teeny bit. We arrived at the gate for our hour-long flight to Cusco with time to spare. About five minutes before they were going to begin boarding, they canceled our flight! We were tired and a bit confused. Apparently, they had another plane going to Cusco at about the same time that wasn't full. So, they cancelled our flight and put all the people from our flight on the fairly empty one. It was minorly nerve wracking only because it was so early, we were exhausted and everything was in Spanish.

We arrived here in Cusco at about 6:00 a.m and were whisked away to our hotel by a nice travel agent we found through some folks we met in Oaxaca. Madeline was patient with our tired Spanish and she got us our first cup of Coca Tea (NOT drugs!) which helps with the altitude sickness. We feel tired, a little nauseous, and light headed, but, that could just be from not sleeping much and needing a good meal. After filling out a few papers, we were sound asleep in our corner room that has an amazing view of the city, valley and surrounding mountains.

From what we can tell so far, Cusco is a fairly large city of 300,000 people. It is full of colonial architecture mostly in the way of grand churches and modern-day hotels. The city climbs up into the green hills. Things are a bit damp here as this is the rainy season (apparently we didn't read the tourist guides much before booking our trip!?) but the landscape is quite beautiful. The Plaza del Arms where we are now is full of cobblestone streets winding up into the hills. There seem to be a lot of travelers here and locals alike. It made Peter's entire trip to Peru just a few moments ago when a shortish woman dressed in very colorful clothing and a typical bowler hat walked by because she had a baby alpaca tucked under her arm. I'm hoping that being here doesn't further one of his dreams of owning an alpaca farm. I feel about full grown alpacas the way I feel about horses - scared! Anyway, I guess I can put my fear aside and focus on my talent in Mexico and now in Peru - being "tall." I'm sure I'll be recruited for the Peruvian National Basketball Team any minute now. Probably as center.

Hope you've all had a super weekend. We miss you a lot and we'll keep you posted on our upcoming travels.

We would appreciate any and ALL prayers to the sun gods since we leave on Tuesday for 4 days/3 nights on the Inca Trail. Did I mention it's rainy season?! As my very wise mother always said "You won´t melt." but the sun wouldn't hurt!

Love,
Kerry & Peter