Adios Tony and Good Riddance

Well it´s all going on at home by the looks of thing´s..
Wimbledon, The Weather, No Smoking in pubs (3 days to go) and the departure of Mr Blair at long last!
It seems ironic that he is set to become the Middle East peace envoy, I suppose if anybody can do it Big Tony can, after all he´s behind most of the trouble out there anyway! One things for sure, he´ll never be unemployed!!

Anyway.. enough politics!

So were still in Cusco, Peru and are now fully acclimatised and marching about like the locals, it took a few days but we got there in the end!!
Yesterday we went to see some more Inca ruins (Sacsayhuaman if anybody wants to look it up)
It was a steep forty minute 2 kilometre climb, and it was a really nice sunny day too, if we´d have attempted this on Sunday I think we would have died!!
The views and ruins were amazing and we have posted lots of pics on the blog.
There is also a FANTASTIC picture of a small Peruvian girl cuddling her Llama, check it out, it´s brilliant.
There are so many FAB restaurants here that you are spoilt for choice, last night we had Asian in a trendy Peruvian Bar, the night before we went for an Indian.
The Indian was ok, we had craved one since we left Ecuador, we waited almost an hour for our starter, the restaurant was freezing, and then when our main dish turned up they missed two of the dishes off!!
Everybody is touting for your business though and it gets a bit annoying as you get tired of saying "no gracias"

We have booked our train tickets to go to the Machu Picchu tomorrow, as I mentioned previously were not really into the hiking, only day trips.
We catch the train at 7am Thursday morning and it takes about 4 hours to get there, we then spend all day there and get the train back at 5pm, were both really looking forward to it.
On Friday we take the overnight bus to Arequipa, which is the 2nd biggest city in Peru, also quite a wealthy city too so that should be good, we will spend a few days there where we will visit the Colca Canyon and then head for Puno where we will visit Lake Titicaca.
Lake Titicaca is the world´s largest high-altitude body of water at 284km deep and more than 8500 square kilometres in area (15 times the size of Lake Geneva in Switzerland)
It is 70% owned Peruvian and 30% owned by Bolivia.
After Arequipa we will be heading to Puno where we will be suffering from altitude sickness again as it is 3870 metres above sea level (Cusco is 3500!)
It´s not a very good journey either (9 hours through the windy roads and through the Andean Mountains)
The days are also very hot but the night temperatures drop below freezing, so we have invested in some winter woolies from one of the locals in Cusco.
We are both proud owners of Llama woolen jumpers and hat´s (pics to follow!!)
Needless to say they´re not exactly the cutting edge of fashion but if they´re good enough for the Peruvians then they´re good enough for us tourists!!

The hostal were staying in at the moment has got a bath, complete luxury, it´s the first one we´ve had since we left my parents house in May, no wonder we stink ;-)
We seem to be spending plenty of money here in Peru despite it being so cheap, we can´t fathom what were spending it on, although beer and food seem to be high on the list!!
There is a great Irish Bar here that does Guiness (obviously) and great food (Shepperd´s Pie, Homemade Chips with vinegar) so we have been in there a few times.
There is also a local beer called Cusquena which is lovely and dirt cheap, look out for it in the supermarket and treat yourself.
Put on a big woolly jumper a silly hat and get yourself a bottle of Peruvian ale you can´t beat it :-)