Caye Caulker

One of the reasons I chose Caye (pronounced: key) Caulker as our first destination in Belize, is because it was the only island I really remembered anything about from my Fodor's book. I knew it was small and there were no cars on the island (which makes it seem not quite so overwhelming on arrival) and that it was less expensive overall. Since it was the first stop on the Water Taxi it also seemed to make sense to visit here first.

There are three "main" streets to the island, appropriately named: front (or beach street), middle and back. The front and middle are the only two that you really need to worry about as a tourist because the back part of the island is more housing for the locals and as far as I could tell there weren't really any restaurants there. Our summer is their rainy or green season which means mosquitoes, humidity and not many tourists. Their main tourist time is christmas through Jan. although in talking with a few locals they said there hasn't been many tourists visiting with the economy being in a downslide. Bad for business but good for us looking for a deal.
(picture: conch ceviche)
One of the most popular dishes in Belize is conch ceviche. You can get it as an appetizer at any restaurant and it was even given to us free for one of our meals (as a way to lure the tourists in I'm sure). It's basically conch, peppers and lime juice and I'm sure a few other spices depending on who makes it and tastes like a salsa. Conch is a little chewy but fairly tasteless (I'd compare it to a scallop) so it takes on the flavor of whatever it's prepared or cooked with. We grew very fond of conch and really hated to have to come home where we knew there would be a fat chance of finding it in your local restaurant. What impresses me about conch is that the whole thing can be eaten and then they use the shell for decoration, sell it whole or carve the pink inside out for jewelry. Since conch shells are illegal to bring into the united states I opted for a nice necklace made from the pink part of the shell.

The best meal I had on Caye Caulker was at a place called Rose's (we were told if you miss eating here you miss the best part of the island). They had fresh caught snapper, barracuda fillets, conch kabobs, chicken kabobs and pork chops laid out and before you entered the restaurant you picked what you wanted and the guy threw it on the grill. Then you got to pick your side items to which I had mashed potatoes and gravy and cole slaw. The kabob was excellent (as was Chad's snapper I might add) because it took on the smoke flavor of the grill and there was really almost too much for me to eat.
(picture to left: dinner at Roses)


This picture of Pirates of the second best place we ate at on the island. I have learned through my travels that hole-in-the-wall places are some of the best kept secrets and serve, often, better food than sit down restaurants. I think because they don't have to pay waiters and have all those operating costs they can better focus on the food. We decided to order the fried chicken here for lunch and opened our to go box at the hotel to find half a fried chicken. I was a little skeptical at first. I don't like the drumstick and pulling chicken apart and all that mess. But this chicken was amazing. All white meat and almost a tempura fried quality so it wasn't super greasy but perfectly crispy. These people know how to do chicken at this place. My best advice, if you see locals eating there, then follow suit.

The best part of our stay on Caye Caulker and especially for my birthday (to which I had no birthday cake but I did have ice cream) was snorkeling. If you visit here I highly recommend using Carlos as your tour guide (located on middle street he runs a hotel too). What we learned in Thailand about these snorkeling tours is this, most of these guys you see set up with their shops boasting about taking you snorkeling, diving, whatever, all work together. They have too. There aren't enough tourists on these small islands to just take one or two people out alone (Carlos will take a minimum of two) daily so they will group you together. You sign up with one group because you like the guy standing there telling you about the tour, etc. and end up getting handed off to a bigger group once you show up. A good snorkel guide will only take out 8 and have at least another person with him to split the group up. If you have more than four in a group you end up on top of one another kicking each other in the face with your fins. Carlos will actually get in the water with you as well, something I had never heard of. You snorkel as a group and he shows you the fish, tells you their names and points out things you would otherwise miss. We saw lobster, angel fish, parrot fish, and even a moray who he made mad so the thing would come out of his hiding spot!
On our snorkel adventure we went to three spots with the first being the deep part of the reef (Belize has the second largest in the world next to Australia) and then to stingray alley which was my favorite and finally a shallow part of the reef where he lets you swim the channels by yourself as long as you want. Stingray alley has turned into such because it's where the fisherman go to clean their fish and the stingray caught on and started breeding there and so now they just hang out there all the time. I was a little nervous getting in at first, the water is really shallow, but there were about 30 of these stingrays swimming around and I didn't want to have a Steve Irwin type accident or something! They were curious about us of course so they would come up and touch you and one even nibbled my leg. Carlos was cutting up fish in the water for them to attract them closer to us which is how I got the nice picture above of me touching one. The area also draws barracudas, which in reality are probably more terrifying to see up close than the stingrays but Carlos said they would only try and go after you if you were wearing shiny jewelry which they might mistake as a fish. I have heard that it isn't a good thing to touch the string rays because it rubs the mucus off their body and can cause infections so I just tried to let them swim around me and do their thing. I highly recommend doing the Hol Chan Marine Reserve and their stingray alley (which we thought we did but apparently it's another separate part of the reef) with Carlos because there are sea turtles and nurse sharks there as well as the stingrays.

The one downfall to having a reef is that it doesn't make for a good beach. Since the reef catches all the waves and protects the island, there isn't much sand on the waterfront and a lot of sea grass. A hurricane came through several years ago and split the caye into thus giving a deeper area off shore to swim. This area known simply as
"The Split" is pretty much the only place to swim on the caye and as a bonus they have built a bar on the end which makes for a great relaxing, apres snorkeling afternoon. Hotels down by the split are a little more pricey as well and you will hear locals or websites referring to it when referencing areas (as in: oh yes that hotel is down by the split). I wish we had taken advantage of the swimming here more because there is no area like this on Ambergris Caye.

I'd have to say overall I enjoyed Caye Caulker and think it's a good introduction to island life. There aren't any hagglers here trying to sell you things on the beach meaning you can take a nice walk and enjoy yourself and everyone on the island is friendly and helpful. The food we had here was excellent and there were some good drink prices like 2 for 1 beers and pina coladas and half price pizza. No one rushes you in or out the door at the restaurants so you can stay as long as you like (half the time we just had to go up and ask for the check or we'd have been sitting there all day!). I would definitely recommend a second level room at any place you stay to avoid bugs and the only drawback to staying directly on the beach as we did was our room flooded one really stormy night. It was nice to have a fridge in our room to keep drinks in although we did discover that beers (which aren't sold in 6 packs only individually) are cheaper not bought in bulk and better off left to be bought at the bar to get a real deal. There are little grocery stores all over where you can buy whatever you need and don't ignore the guys riding around on bikes selling meat pies and banana bread in the morning, those are a specialty and delicious. There's also one gift shop on the island so you can buy whatever souvenirs you need and they happened to be cheaper there than Ambergris.....which leads us to our next adventure.....

Don't Stop Belize'in

This picture of my husband and I should have a background of Machu Picchu seeing as that's where we were headed a week ago yesterday. However, the life of a standby is an unpredictable one at best and the one direct flight a day from Atlanta to Lima, Peru last Sunday was full. Since I had bought plane tickets from Lima to Cusca to get to Machu Picchu it was pretty pointless for us to try and go if we couldn't get there by Tuesday. The flight Tuesday looked oversold as well and being that it left at 5pm we decided we were done wasting time in the airport. It was time for a backup plan. So we chose the somewhere else on our never ending list of places to visit and that place happened to be Belize.

For my birthday two years ago we had gone to Costa Rica and after we got home I started researching other places in Central America I wanted to go. Belize, with it's laid back people and Caribbean waters and "go slow" attitude on it's cayes seemed like a perfect fit. I even bought a Fodor's book on the place and started saving money for the trip which I planned to take that September. However, my husband asked me, would I rather get engaged or go to Belize? Because we didn't have the money for both at the time. So I put Belize out of my head and never imagined going there again until last Sunday. After talking to customer service and seeing that Peru wasn't an option I had them list us for the flight to Belize City. I hadn't paid for anything but the Taca plane tickets in Peru so we weren't really going to be out any money by switching destinations.

We showed up at the airport Monday morning and were given our boarding passes for Belize City. The sane logical side of my brain was screaming, "What the hell are you doing! You are going to a country you've never been too and have no idea what to do when you get there!" Chad and I had no place lined up to stay and no plans upon arrival except get the hell out of Belize City and head to Caye Caulker. If you have never been to Belize City it's basically like Detroit or a slum of New York City. It's poor and there's a lot of petty crime and it's not a place you dare walk around by yourself at night. While the government says they are trying to clean it up, it still looked pretty bad to me and I was glad we weren't spending any time there.

Upon clearing customs there was a travel center in the airport and Chad went and talked to the lady and asked her about Caye Caulker and where we should stay and if we needed reservations, etc. The lady told Chad that since it was the off season (read: rainy season) that we could walk around the island and have our pick of a place to stay. So we hopped in a cab and headed for the San Pedro Water Taxi pier. Here you buy tickets for $10 per person us one way to Caye Caulker. We were fortunate our plane arrived in enough time to take a cab and get us on the noon boat so we didn't have to sit around until 1:30pm. We boarded up and said goodbye to Belize City and headed out on the water. It was raining when we arrived and I hoped that wouldn't be a sign of the weather for the week to come but at least it was warm!

On Caye Caulker there are no cars, only golf carts to get around. You can rent a golf cart or bike or take a golf cart taxi but the island is only 5 miles long and about 2 miles wide so that's pretty pointless. We declined a golf cart taxi when we arrived because well, we didn't even know where we were going to end up.
(picture: Chad upon our arrival at Caye Caulker)

There are multiple Cayes off the coast of Belize but only Caye Caulker and Ambergris are inhabitable for tourists (there are some smaller ones that have dive huts where avid divers can stay but the water taxi only goes to Ambergris and Caulker) and Caye Caulker is the smallest of the two and also the cheapest. We were told that heading left from the pier we would find cheaper rooms while to the right, down near the Split (pretty much the only area to swim on the island) were more expensive. So we walked all around the island checking out spots that looked suitable until we found The Popeye. The Popeye was right on the beach and looked like a big safe place to stay. It was also close to the pier so when we had to leave it would be a short walk with our backpacks. The cool thing we found out on our travels down here was that the hotel staff always show you the room before you have to buy. So the guy showed us a few rooms and we ended up getting a discount of paying $50us for a waterfront room. This is the bonus to traveling in the off season and also for waiting in person to pay. If you suggest you might look elsewhere they are more likely to bargain with you. Then when you agree to the room they hand you the key, let you get settled in and then you get to go down and pay. A great system for travelers if you ask me!
(picture: the popeye hotel)










(picture: our room at the popeye which was very pink! It had air conditioning and a fridge which was a bonus. The downside, on a really stormy night the rain flooded our room, not terrible but enough to have water all over the front part of the room)








So that's the start of the story about our week in Belize. I will have to break it up over a few blogs because each caye was so different and had so much to offer and I want to focus on both separately. Check back for more of to come!

Everything but the Kitchen Sink

Ever since I became a flight attendant I have become an extraordinary packer. Of course, when I first started this wasn't the case. I'd pack extra uniforms (waste: I'd wear the same dress every day), an outfit for every day (wear the same thing over again, no one cares especially not your crew) and a variety of shoes (tennis shoes are all you need). In fact, packing only pj's and workout clothes has often saved me money by giving me a great excuse NOT to go out to dinner with my fellow employees. When I travel for leisure I only take a roller board now and a purse. Checking bags is a waste when you fly standby because if you don't even know if you are getting to your destination chances are your bags may or may not go either. I wear my bulkiest pair of shoes and jacket or sweater and bring items that can be worn over again or layered. I find I rarely change outfits in a day (although somewhere in my subconscious I believe I will which is why I pack multiple outfits for one day thus weighing me down) and a pair of flip flops and ballet flats always work and pack well. I don't bring a laptop, dvd's, dvd player, or anything bulky because really who needs all that when you have the iphone? When we travel to another country, Chad and I always use hiker's backpacks. Trust me you don't want to be schulping through the beaches of Thailand or climbing up a hill to your bungalow in Costa Rica lugging a roller board behind you. The plus of backpacks is they fit easily in overhead bins and all the weight is on your hips leaving you hands free. The downside is, being that we always have to non-rev in business casual clothing, well you kind of look ridiculous. Ever seen a guy in a coat and tie with a backpack strapped to his back? Yeah it sounds about as bad as it is.

I recently rented Up in the Air with George Clooney and was pleasantly surprised at how the movie portrayed the business traveler. After all, even though I'm working the flight per say I consider myself a sky warrior as well. In the movie, Clooney's character, Ryan Bingham travels around the country representing the company that other companies use to fire their employees. Although I don't get the frequent flier and hotel perks his character receives in the movie, I definitely related to the loneliness that comes with traveling and staying in hotels night after night. The movie does offer some good advice to travelers though which I thought I would borrow and post here for all of those out there who just don't get "it."

Rule one: Always carry on your bag. As Bingham says:
"You know how much time you loose checking in? Thirty-five minutes a flight. I travel 270 days a year. That's 157 hours. That makes 7 days. You willing to throw an entire week on that?"
And really you DON'T need 6 pairs of shoes, 2 outfits a day, full size shampoos and lotions, and the various other things you always think you will use but don't. The hotels have hair dryers. Seriously not worth the trouble.

Rule two: Pack your belt; don't wear it. You're holding up the security line for an accessory. The same is true for watches, fancy jewelry or anything else. Pack it and wear it later. Or don't pack it. I always pack jewelry and rarely ever change out my earrings...

Rule three: Please stop waving goodbye to your family as you are going through the metal detector. Say goodbye at the curb and be done with it.

Rule four: Tourists are amateurs. They carry way too much electronic equipment and their brains are on vacation. Steer clear of anyone in a hawaiian shirt or sun visor in the security line.

Rule Four I can attest too first hand. When I travel to foreign countries I try to look as not out of place as possible. This means no camera around my neck, no tennis shoes (in Europe at least because no one wears tennis shoes out or yoga pants for that matter) and of course luggage to match the local. When we went to the Phi Phi Islands from Phuket we had to climb across three ferries to get onto ours. Once we arrived at Phi Phi we had to disembark down stairs then walk down a dock and take a long boat over to our side of the island. Of course if you know anything about long boats you know you don't really dock so when we arrived at our final destination we had to get out in ankle deep water, then walk up the beach to our hotel. From the lobby we had to hike up a hill to our bungalow. Was it worth it? Yes. With a roller board, can you even begin to imagine? I saw several other tourists dragging their suitcases all over the place and as you can guess, wheels and sand don't mix.

When we head to Peru in a few weeks we will once again be toting our hiking backpacks. I have learned to pack all my clothing (which isn't much these days) in ziplock bags then bring extra ones for wet or dirty clothes. I also like to google appropriate clothing before I go so I don't stick out too much. In Peru, apparently the clothing choices for locals is very casual so I'd probably look out of place wearing a fancy dress and the roads and walkways there are rocky which means no high heels. I've learned to love wearing hats as they are always good to cover up bad hair days, block the sun and you bonus you don't have to pack them...they just sit on your head.

A little advanced planning means a restful vacation, and as I've learned the less you bring with you the more you can take home :)

Ziplining the C's

(photo: Brandy and I getting ready to zipline in Costa Rica)

For my birthday two years ago, my husband and three of our friends decided to travel to Costa Rica. It was a place I had on my check list to visit (my never ending Have-to-travel-there-before-I-quit list) and since my friend Casey had gone before I decided to include her which then quickly turned into inviting our close friend Jason and another friend Brandy. Granted, I will never volunteer to plan another trip for that many people again (Hello getting everyone to agree on a hotel nightmare) but it was an amazing adventure. We flew into San Jose then had a five hour shuttle ride and one half hour ferry trip to get to where we stayed for the week in Santa Theresa. It's a really small beach town where everyone drives 4-wheelers or walks to get from one place to another. Costa Rica is all about surfing and enjoying the beach but they also have a few activities to enjoy in the area one of which is a canopy zipline tour in Mal Pais, Santa Theresa's neighbor.

I really wanted to zipline even though I was scared to death. When I was younger the camp I went to had a zipline, which was really just a cable attached between two trees, and I was terrified every year they made us do it. The worst part was climbing the ladder then climbing these pegs nailed into a tree which basically led to a tree stand. The concept of wearing a harness that cut off your leg circulation and having it being the only thing keeping you attached to a rope that attached to a cable that suspended you over the ground was not fun to me. Of course once I did it I loved it, but the ride was hardly long enough to even be worth all the anxiety and trouble.

Casey had already done the zipline in Costa Rica so she decided it wasn't worth the money to spend. At $40, it was the most expensive 2.5 hours we spent in Costa Rica but it was worth it:

photos from our tour:












Jason coming in for a landing:













If this dog wasn't scared I shouldn't be right?
The tour went so fast it hardly seemed like it lasted 2.5 hours. Of course they have a safety course in the beginning where they put your harness on, explain what to do and have a mini cable set up between two trees to practice on. There were probably about 10 of us and there were the zipline guys stationed at each post to catch us coming in then send us on our way down the next one. If you have ever been, you know it's a system of cables stretched between trees and once you get to the next one the guy catches you, unhooks your rope, hooks you to the stationary cable, then unhookes you from that once you are locked in to your next zipline. This is basically so no matter if you fall or not you can't get hurt. Comforting in a foreign country being hundreds of fee above the tree tops right? I have no idea how they put these ziplines up but it was awesome.

Which brings me to the inspiration for this blog. My friend Malia, happened to find a place in Salida, Colorado where you can zipline as well! I can't believe they have a place like this in my own backyard I didn't even know about! The company is called Lost Canyon zipline tours and promises sites of 14er mountains and the Arkansas River. Zipline over a canyon? Sign me up!
Looks like fun from the photos huh? At $89 it's almost double what we paid in costa rica for the same amount of time (and I'm sure the views aren't quite as scenic...I mean c'mon it's costa rica) but then again Salida is only 3 hours away and their times coincide which rafting tours so you can easily fit both into one day. I'm sure it would be an awesome trip and though it wouldn't be as risky as not having hardly any of your guides speak English or being in a foreign country, I'm willing to give it ago. Now if I could only find time to fit it in this summer....

Weekend Mind Erasers

I'm as much a fan of "stay"-cations as I am about vacations. To be honest the thought of getting in my car and going on a road trip excites me. Perhaps it's because it reminds me of my high school and college years where we were limited to traveling wherever we could get by car when it came to spring break or a weekend getaway (one such spring break involved driving 18 hours to key west thus proving you aren't as limited as you think when driving). Maybe it's because I spend so much time in airports and flying around the country, packing and unpacking my suitcase week after week. There's something freeing about being able to take whatever you want (Hello full size shampoo bottles!) and as much as you want (4 pairs of shoes and 5 jackets? Yes please I might NEED those). Whatever the case may be, when I do have the wanderlust urge creep into my veins, I seek out engaging places that happened to be in my own "backyard." Which led me to find The Great Stupa of Dharmakaya, a Buddhist Destination here in Colorado (pictured above).
Last year, about this time, Chad mentioned he wanted to take a spin class. It was just in passing, and to tell the truth, I don't even know why he said it because he truly hates spin (as I later found out) but it sparked something in my brain. I began frantically searching for a place to take a class where I didn't have to sign up for a gym membership (24 hour fitness? no thanks) which lead me to find Qi Fit (seasonsfit.com). The spin class was a combination of half an hour of spin and half an hour of yoga. My first class, killed me. I swear I tasted blood during the biking part. During the yoga I was awkward, had no idea what the poses were and spent half the class facing the wrong direction. Yet, I was hooked. And with a wedding 5 months away, I signed up for unlimited monthly classes and began my obsession with yoga.
The challenge of yoga turned into a love for the practice which in turn sparked an interest in Buddhism for me. This is in part, why I picked our honeymoon in Thailand and what led to this tattoo:
Which is my first and only tattoo ( so far at least). Om is where I draw my strength from and practicing yoga taught me about Om and I feel, saved my sanity and my life. I was so stressed out about our wedding and so upset by people and things happening in my life, but after an hour on the yoga mat I forgot all my worries and could focus on what was really important in life.
"Let go, open up and create space for something new.." was a quote I heard quite frequently from one of my instructors and I took it to heart.

So all this realization has led me to be interested in visiting this Buddhist Retreat. The Shambhala Mountain Resort is located in Red Feather Lakes Colorado and has been around for 30 years. People come from all over the world to see The Great Stupa of Dharmakaya which transformed the site into a pilgrim's destination. Stupa's are related to ancient Asian burial grounds. When Buddha was dying his disciples asked what they should do and he told them to build a Stupa for his remains. Since then, these Stupa's are erected to signify the remains of a great teacher. The teacher buried within is Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, who died in 1987, after establishing several Tibetan Buddhist communities in the United States with The Shambhala Mountain Resort being one of them.
There are yoga and meditation programs and visitors can stay anywhere from nice lodging to tents. You can hike the surrounding property, eat vegetarian dinners, meditate or practice yoga or simply talk to many of the Buddhist teachers around the campus. While some of the weekend programs are pricey ($445 for a weekend Yoga retreat which is equal to about 4 months of classes at my studio) but I would like to go up for a weekend just to visit the center and see this amazing piece of architecture in Colorado that I had no idea even existed. It's amazing you don't have to travel half way around the world to see something of this magnitude. Being that I am more spiritual than religious I can respect the Buddhists and their dedication to meditation and reaching a higher level of enlightenment. Many times in spin or yoga class I have to "quiet the chatter" or turn my brain off so that I can power through the intense workout. Your mind gives out long before your body does and you have to silence that inner voice that says "you can't do this." I am always open to new experiences and learning so I think this place would make an ideal weekend retreat....
http://www.shambhalamountain.org/

Hiking a Colorado 14er

I've lived in Colorado nearly 5 years and I'm sad to say I've never hiked a Colorado 14er . Colorado has 54 peaks that are over 14,000 feet with Mount Elbert being the highest at 14,433 feet. I decided, when making my new years resolutions this past year that I would try to hike at least two a month during the summer which would hopefully mean I'd hike at least 6-10 depending how long the season lasts. I have done plenty of hikes in the flat irons but 14ers are a world apart. Most aren't even available to hike until late June depending on the snow melt and even then there will still be snow on the peaks. As you can imagine at 14,000 feet the air thins out a lot making it difficult to breathe and the terrain gets pretty rocky making for a good chance of twisting an ankle. Not only that but the conditions at the top can change so drastically you have to be ready for rain, hail, snow storms or anything the mountain throws at you.
Still, I'm determined to do it this summer as one of my main challenges and weekend activities. I know this means waking up at 5 am and driving up to hit the trail head early but I can manage. Given the fact there are so many peaks in Colorado to climb I started researching which ones were more geared toward beginners and which climbs were advanced. For Quandary Peak (14,265) the Summit County Explorer's website said, "if you're intrigued by the challenge of bagging a
fourteener and interested in experiencing oxygen deprivation, then this is the hike for you. Quandary Peak located south of Breckenridge will provide an exhilarating, lung-popping experience for all who conquer its summit." Well I like my lungs in my chest. So I've decided to start with Torrey's and Gray's Peaks. As you can see from the photo they are practically side by side which means I'll knock down two of the 54 in one long hike! Gray's is 14,270 feet making it the highest on the continental divide in the United States and Torrey's is 14,267.
(photo of Gray's peak) Now I'm not sure why, at 14,270 (about 5 more miles higher than Quandary) that Gray's isn't considered lung popping according to the website, but whatever. I am in good shape and so is my husband and our dog can definitely kick both our asses so I'm sure the three of us can handle the challenge. I know people train for these hikes and go all out with the fanny packs and leki poles and all that other fancy equipment but really for me the best way to do something is to just do it. I can't see how training would make this hike any easier and it's not like I'm going to die hiking (unless I fall off the cliff that is) so I might as well go for it. Besides it's only 8.5 miles round trip...piece of cake right?

It's Official we are headed to Peru

In less than a month and a half I will be seeing this amazing site in person. This is, of course, a photo of Machu Picchu. Every year I take a trip for my birthday which usually is some place involving a passport. Last year, with the wedding two months away from my birthday we decided to stay in the state to save money so we drove up to the hot springs for my birthday. This year, however, my friend Casey is getting married in May in Birmingham and so I decided, as long as we are going we might as well plan our trip to Peru because we can fly from Birmingham to Atlanta and then on to Lima. Conveniently Casey's wedding is May 15th and my birthday is May 18th which means I'll be in Peru on my actual birthday. I hope they have cupcakes for me (haha).
Being that I am the flight attendant of the family and it's usually my crazy idea to travel to these far off destinations, it usually falls on me to plan everything. I use to view this task as an annoyance but now I love it. I have control of all the details and get to pick where we stay and what we do so at least I am assured I will have a good time. Whenever I start to plan a big trip like this, especially to a place I don't know, I always look up flights first and see how I'm going to get where I want to go. Lima is a big city and easy enough to get too from Atlanta but if you want to see Machu Picchu you have to travel to Cusco. As with Bangkok and Phuket I first wanted to see how far apart Lima and Cusco were and the easiest way to get there. I do not do foreign buses and especially long distance foreign buses unless they are a private charter (as we did in costa rica to get from san jose to santa theresa) because there is too much opportunity for things to go wrong and if it's a 26 hour bus ride that eats up most of your day. So I did some researching and found TACA airlines which operates out of Lima to cusco and the fare was only $66 round trip per person. I booked a 5:45am flight which is so early but my research suggested earlier was better because the area is so mountainous that the weather can turn bad and flights later in the day will often get canceled.
Since we are flying standby from atlanta to Lima I wanted to give ourselves a cushion in case something happened. I bought the plane tickets on TACA and I don't want to risk rebooking in case we don't make it that sunday night. As with most international destinations there is only one flight in to Lima so if we don't make it sunday night we have to try again Monday. This is also why I booked a considerably cheap hotel for Sunday and Monday, the days we will be in Lima. Since Lima is such a big city I didn't want to spend too much time there but we are staying in Miraflores which is a safe part of town.
(photo: the Kokopelli hostal we are staying at in Lima) When I book hotels in foreign countries I truly have no idea what I'm getting into. So I try to narrow it down to the few things I know I want: hot water, an airport shuttle, cheap, free breakfast, within walking distance to things. I usually just google "places to stay in (insert location)" then once I find a few cool spots I'll plug them in to trip adviser and see what people have to say about them. I found this place and loved the pictures of the lobby and it's owned by some Americans so I figured I couldn't go wrong. Plus it's only $30 a night and there is a bar. If nothing else it's always good for your hotel to have a bar that way if you feel to unsure about going out or the weather is crappy you are at least entertaining yourself.
Finding a place to stay in Cusco was a bit more challenging because it's a smaller town so prices are more expensive. They have everything from luxury resorts that are $100+ a night to hostals where you share a bathroom for $8 a night. You can't actually stay in Machu Picchu because it's a protected park (which is great because it means no one hawking you junk once you are inside the gates) so you have to stay in Cusco then take a train up into Machu Picchu. I figured we would buy our train tickets once we got down there. If it's anything I learned from Thailand is that it's much easier and cheaper to book once you get there and since almost everyone staying in Cusco is making a trek to Machu Picchu it won't be hard to figure out where to go. I'd like to visit Lake Titicaca as well so I'm hoping we can take the train in for a day and visit. Once again, details I'll figure out when we arrive.
So knowing we would spend the bulk of our trip in Cusco I wanted something a little nice but still affordable. After reading many reviews and looking at various websites I booked this place: Hostal Llipimpac
It's $40 a night and includes breakfast and airport pickup. It also has this sweet courtyard and is in a more quite section of the city which is great because we will be having some early mornings if we want to get a day of hiking in. Apparently there are also some Aquas Calientes nearby (hot springs) so I'm hoping we can make it over there too. The flight back from Lima to Atlanta leaves at midnight and our flight from Cusco to Lima gets in at 9am so I'm thinking we may just have to take a taxi from the airport to the beach or something and kill some time. Chad and I always travel with our backpacks so it makes it really easy to jump around and go from city to city because you aren't worried about lugging around a roller board. Plus it considerably makes you look like less of a dumb tourist.
I'm really excited about our trip to Peru. I know a week won't be nearly enough time to fit everything in but I'm going to try to see and do as much as possible. Chad and I were discussing the problem with us is that we travel to all these great places we'd love to go back to and yet there are so many new places we want to discover as well. And as Chad says, "you've only got so many years to live how do you do it all?" I guess the answer is you probably can't, but what's to stop you from trying?
(picture: Cusco, Peru)













(picture: Lake Titicaca)