Mom-chu Picchu

San Franciscan Monastery in Lima
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Peru is one of those impoverished, exotic, beautifully culturally rich countries that inspires and awes and makes you really, really glad that you're not doing it on a shoestring.  That's not to say that it can't be done, only that it would probably be dirty and uncomfortable.

Fortunately, my mother and I are doing Peru quickly, and doing it well.  To think that we've seen some amazing sights in the very heart of the Peruvian Andes and still managed to make it back to clean sheets and mille feuille at the end of the day has been a tremendous convenience, and it has really made the long and difficult trek to Machu Picchu well worth it.

Incas in the Sacred Valley
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We spent the first day or so in Lima, where we took a city tour and then made it to the Chabad House of Lima for the first night of Passover.  The service was an interesting display of multi-culturalism: displaced Israeli backpackers, displaced American students and businesspeople, local Peruvians, and the occasional South American.  Page numbers were called out in Spanish and Hebrew, and then whispered for the uninitiated in English.  Everyone managed to find one language or another to communicate in, and so it all worked out.

Sol y Luna Spa
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The next day, we were off to Cusco, where the altitude sickness is every bit as bad as everyone tells you it is.  Walking down a hallway leaves you breathless.  Sitting up in bed can even be difficult at times.  For the first day or so, my mom and I suffered from headaches.  The Peruvian response to these ailments?  Coca tea.  Tea made from the leaves of the coca plant.  Yup, the same plant that they make the white, powdery, hundred-dollar-an-ounce Colombian-puppet-government-supporting substance out of.  And it's right there in the lobby of the hotel.  You just go and help yourself.  Weird.

Machu Picchu panorama
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That first day, we managed to endure the altitude and make it to Ullantaytambo, in the Sacred Valley of the Incas.  We stayed at a great, outdoorsy lodge called the Sol y Luna Hotel and Spa, where I got one of the best massages I've ever had in my life (like I said, we were doing Peru right).  It made for a fantastic place to bed down before the 90-minute bus and 90-minute train to the distant town and complex of Machu Picchu.

Hiram Bingham, a Yale professor in the early 1900's, "found" Machu Picchu on a research expedition in 1911.  Since then, droves of people have flocked to the site, but even so, it still feels somewhat like you're finding it all over again.  It is so far removed from anywhere else, up an enormous mountain, with miles of driving or hiking in every direction.  While the constant stream of tourists climbing all over the place sort of takes away from the notion that you are the first to stumble upon this Incan treasure, the fact that the trails only seem to scratch the surface of what's left to be uncovered at this place brings it right back again.  On the two extended hikes my mom and I did (the Intipunku [sun gate] and Huayna Picchu), we saw partially unearthed rock walls and terraces everywhere.  Those things could have conceivably led to anywhere.  It was an exciting feeling.

Machu Picchu
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For two days, we traversed the mountain and took in the scenery, stopping now and again to catch our breath (which had not yet completely returned).  We made it back to Cusco yesterday and spent today on a tour of some local ruins (Saqsaywaman and a few others), which after the splendor of Machu Picchu paled in comparison.  Then again, there was really no way it could have competed.  It sort of felt like seeing Wolfgang Mozart play the Fifth, and then having his little brother Kevin run up to the piano and say, "Hey guys, watch this."

So here we are, back in Cusco, for our last night here until we fly back to Lima tomorrow morning.  From there, I've just booked my four-hour (and absurdly priced at $750 one-way) plane ticket to San Jose, Costa Rica.  No turning back now.  Nine more weeks, hopefully spent kicking up sand and wandering the rainforest with whoever I can meet there.  Game on.