When I didn't survive the inca trail but found my love in Macchu Picchu

This photo below was taken about an hour before my body decided to break down and not do the inca trail, which I had looked forward to since October. 

I really tried to power through but after 5km I had to realise that I had to give up, I felt too ill to walk even the way back and could not have walked about 15 km a day for 3 days in that condition. I felt really sad and dissapointed that this bad luck that seems to hang like a grey cloud over me wouldn't just leave me alone. Not only that - I knew I had paid like 650 US dollars for this and that I would probably never see that money again. What I had to do instead was to go back to the nearest town to where the inca trail starts (ollantaytambo - which I never will be able to pronounce) and check in to a hotel for a few nights to just rest instead. 

However, I am very very very proud over my other half who actually manage to survive the whole trek. It wasn't easy for him at all (especially since I kind of had to force him to go on without me), especially since the weather on this trail is very unpredictable and can be very rough (which it was apparently, around 0 degrees at night and lots of heavy rain). 

After those 3 days in bed I did feel much better and could at least join our group and see my love for the first time in what felt like ages in Macchu Picchu.

I had to learn the hard way how expensive it is to visit Macchu Picchu without doing the inca trail. And to be honest, seeing Guy was the best part of Macchu Picchu, other than that I just think everything is way overpriced. I had to pay 68 US dollars just to get the train from Ollantaytambo to Aguas Calientes, also known as Macchu Picchu town. Then I had to pay 12 US dollars for the bus from Aguas Calientes to Macchu Picchu. I was meant to walk this road there, but my guide Jimmy protested because the rain was way to heavy that morning. 

You also have to pay for entrance and probably a guide aswell if you want one, but since I met up with the inca trail group and had already paid for the tour, at least I got to take advantage of the last part of the inca trail and experience the Macchu Picchu tour with them, where our tour guide showed us around.

About Peru Trek - this is the cheapest company we could find who are serious and have had good reviews and since I didn't actually do the trail I cannot say too much about them. But from talking with Giy we have agreed that the whole administration am side of it all and like the office people are pretty bad as they are not very flexible what so ever. You pay a deposit when you book the trek months in advance and you can do that via credit card, but you have to pay the other half cash - this is a lot of money to take out from the ATM since you cannot take out that much at the same time and since it charges a high fee every time you take cash out.

Even worse, when I asked for vegan meals they simply just said "no, not possible" because it was gonna be too complicated for the chef so I just thought, alright - I just have rice and veggies or whatever I can have. As you know it never came to that, but Guy said that he was the only vegetarian out of 16 people, so you may think it could've been as easy to do all of the vegetarian food vegan instead of doing 3 different dishes. I also find it hard to believe that they would have been so strict with their anti-veganism if intolerance to certain foods was the case..

Saying that though, the actual staff (guides etc) that comes with you on the trek are absolutely wonderful! We had two guides with us and one of them, Jimmy, became like my best friend when he helped me through my sick fase. He went back and got me a hotel room, took the train with me to Macchu Picchu town, showed me where to go and was a real rock in the moment I needed it the most. Thank you Jimmy!

Like I said, I still get dissapointed when I think about it all but I am happy that I got to see Macchu Picchu nestled between the mountains anyway, but like I mentioned, it does bother me how much you have to pay to see it. There is not really any ways around it. I actually enjoyed the view from Macchu Picchu more than the actual ruins (yeah I mean it is still really cool how this was just like a hidden abandoned city for many many years and all the history behind it of course)

The weather up here changes worse than the Swedish summer does. One minute it was raining loads and the next it was hot and sweaty, in that tropical way. Unfortunately it was really cloudy when we were here, so the views weren't as great as when you google time. But still, I guess it's pretty cool to be up on clouds aswell.

To be able to say that I've done some walking around Macchu Picchu, me and Guy took yhe tropical forest walk downhill back to Aguas Calientes, which took like 40-60 mins and got treated to a papaya juice for the effort from the their guide Freddy (probably because he didn't have to pay 12 US dollars for us to go on the bus back instead)

Aguas Calientes is small and it just screams of tourism. The whole town is evolved around pleasing tourists, there are spas, markets and restaurants everywhere you look and it is e-x-p-e-n-s-i-v-e because everything is imported from Cusco. 

We managed to find a restaurant on the outskirts of the busiest area which did a vegetarian set menu with starter, main and drink for 20 soles anyway. And it was probably one of the best meals I've had (probably because this was my first steady meal in about 3 days) - rice with spinach and avocado. It is always the most simple things that taste the best and that makes my heart go boom.

After many hours of just being bored again and waiting around in Aguas Calientes, we were finally back in Cusco for our last night on these high altitudes. I do blame the altitude for our bad luck and can already feel our luck changing here in Lima. But more on that later.

A vegan in Cusco, Peru

After a few days in Cusco, I think it's safe to say that this has been my favourite place we've been to so far. The town is so beautiful, with small cobbled streets and really nice open squares in the center. Also the fact that there have been no problem at all finding vegan food is of course a huge bonus. I mean it's almost like it's been too many choices!

Most people come to Cusco to learn more about the inca culture, see all the ruins and of course go to Macchu Picchu as this is the historical capital of the Inca Emporium. And so this is the reason why we've come here aswell; to chill out for a bit before starting the inca trail. Cusco is a good place to spend a few days before doing this, to get used to the altitude and all. To do the inca trail though, you have to book it faaaaar in advance. Unfortunately you can't just turn up in Cusco and expect to be able to do it. Not at all. We booked our inca trail with Peru Treks in October.. And for now I think they are fully booked until September even.

Many tourists buys a weekly pass which enables them to go and see all the museum, see all the inca ruins and everything culture there is the see here. But we thought that we're gonna see a lot of stuff when we do the inca trail so we passed on this pass and have had a few adventures on our own.

We went on a walk uphill to the Cristo Blanco statue for example. The view from up here is stunning, and may I add, free. We continued to walk a loop around the Sacsayhuaman, an inca ruin which is often referred to as a fortress up on the hills of Cusco. They charge you to get in on the actual ruins, but we found on our own walking tour that if you just take a loop around the whole thing you can see it really clearly and close up anyway. 

We also went to the Animal sanctuary in the Sacred Valley one day. The animal sanctuary arrange buses from Cusco out to where they are (about 22 km from the city), but we found it to be much cheaper to just get there on our own. We just took one of the local buses both there and back for 20 soles in total for both of us. You just have to be patience and wait a little bit for a bus to come by on the way back

The sanctuary have staff working there who seemed really happy to show us around a to all the animals. They don't charge any fees for visitors, but they do rely on donations to be able to do the work for the sick and/or wounded animals here. When we visited we saw an Andean bear cub that had lost his mum, condors, lamas, dogs and, Guys new best friends, the naked dogs.

Besides these things, we have strolled around on the streets of the town center (which are by they way the most slippery streets ever, be sure to ware good shoes. I've lost count on how many times I've almost slipped and fall!), we've seen the crazy fruit markets where all juice ladies are nagging you to buy THEIR juice cause that is the best one even though all of them seem to be exactly the same for the same price..

We've gone to the coffee museum (free entrance and you learn loads about coffee) and we've tasted chocolate tea and chocolate marmalade at the Choco museum (also free entrance, but if you wanna do a workshop it costs loads, so no thanks)

Oh, and the best thing is oficurse how I've started the days every morning here in Cusco; by going to the Yoga Room on Carmen Bajo street (in a bohemian area called San Blas that is so pretty). I bought a 3 class pass for 50 soles and I'm so glad I did. The yoga room only have a small studio, but the atmosphere is so warm and welcoming and Kat, who started it and who has been my teacher was really great! In the down stairs but they also have a juice bar which was unfortunately on holiday when I was there, but usually they have vegan ice cream and burgers etc, wow!

Just opposite the yoga room, you'll find my favourite place in town: Green Point - the popular vegan restaurant. As I mentioned in the beginning, being vegan in Cusco is a piece of cake (literally), but it's been hard to not spend too much money at Green Point. The prices here are pretty moderate for being Peru, but oh my gosh, the food is absolutely amazing and the staff is really friendly aswell. 

The big menu makes the food-decision-making almost overwhelming. They have breakfast, lunch and dinner and if I could've afford it I would've gone here three times a day, without a doubt. But unfortunately I've had to pick and prioritise. 

We went there for coffee one morning (yep, they have every kind of plant based milk you can imagine, so I tried the cappuccino with Brazil nut milk, yum). It wasn't that yum that I felt like paying 9 soles for it though, but still, it did the trick.

 

We've also had dinner there two times by now and both times we shared a banana, chocolate, maca, coconut shake (sharing it was really enough, they don't charge you 10 soles for it for nothing!)

For food we've had the lentil burger and the seitan sandwich and they are both divine. All the sandwiches and the burger comes with you choice of mashed potato, fries or mashed sweet potatoes or sweet potato fries. For only 15 soles I got pretty darned full, even though these were the cheapest main on their menu.

Next to the restaurant, they also have their store "Green Stop" with many different vegan items, books and more. We bought the tomato-onion freshly baked bread there one day (one loaf for 4 soles) and it was just bliss. Almost tasted like pizza!

Because of their popularity they apparently also opened up Green Point II in the San Fransisco area. They are only opened for breakfast and lunch though, so we haven't had time to go there just yet.

But if you want to find a little bit more wallet friendly vegan food in Cusco, it is not a big of a challenge (expect for Sunday's when many restaurants are shut). Another favourite restaurant of mine is El Encuentro. Now, there is two of them and I don't know if they are like a chain or anything. But the one we went to was slightly cheaper and is on Calle Tigre, just a few (read long and steep) stairs away from our hostel. 

This is a vegetarian restaurant so they do have a lot of cheese and eggs on the menu, but are very vegan friendly as well. It is here we have continued going for coffee every morning as they make lush coffee with soy milk. Like every other restaurant they have set menu for lunch (not only for lunch, you can have to set menu all day which is a two course meal with salad  buffet for only 6-7 soles! They offer about 2-3 options for main). But since I am a pastaholic, I immediately chose to go for the vegan bolognaise for 14 soles - a lot of food for a very reasonable price! Guy tried their vegetarian double cheese burger which he really enjoyed aswell.

One day we accidentally ran into another vegetarian restaurant; Mamma Mia. Everything is really cheap here aswell - you get a main for about 12-18 soles, they have pizza, pasta, burger etc and they do breakfast, lunch and dinner. We went there for a little breakky and had coffee (unfortunately no soy milk) and a tofu sandwich. Very yummy, but not too filling.

 

And for a Sunday dinner, when almost everywhere we actually wanted to go was shut, we tried one of the many small falafel gems (unfortunately we realised afterwards that we could've walked up the street a bit more for a much cheaper falafel deal, but oh well, at least the falafel was amazingly good) at El Durum. For 13 soles we got a filling falafel wrap each with both hummus in the roll and even more to top up with on the side. One cannot complain when one gets so much good hummus in one meal, right?

Now we only have a couple of days left before we get picked up at 4:30 in the morning to start the Inca Trail. So next time you hear from me will have to be when we're done with that. Hopefully we've succeeded as well. Love love and love to you all.

Road trip around lake Titicaca: From one country to another

So we finally left La Paz with bus (bus company Lake Titicaca, which was kind of cheap but also not very comfortable) and headed on a three hour journey on a very cramped bus, this included a boat ride over The biggest lake in South America; Lake Titicaca. It felt so, so, so nice being close to water again and getting away from the busy city.

We finally arrived to our destination; the little village of Copacobana. It's so small so we were able to walk from the bus station to our hostel, where we ended up on the top floor and had the nicest view over the gorgeous town.

The lady who owns the hostel we stayed at was soooo nice and friendly, and she said that we can feel safe here. "La Paz is loco, aqui es MUY tranquilo" to quote what she said when we told her about our misunfortunates in La Paz.

Unfortunately, just a few hours in our stay in Copa I started to feel ill (seems like the altitudes finally got to me with strong power) which affected our remaining days here and led to some very, very chilled days. I guess it was a good place to chill, so I guess I was lucky in a way. We didn't have to go far to find food, but since Copa is a town surrounded by its tourism industry, it was pretty expensive to eat out but we managed to find some pretty good deals in the end (you just have to make sure not to eat on the Main Street and by the beach to keep the costs low)

Almost all restaurants here looks the same. They all offer sandwiches, pasta and pizza and all have set menu for lunch. Most of them 20-25 Bolivianos. We tried one of them one day, where we actually managed to get a vegan three course meal which to be homages, was pretty bad, but it did fill me up. Quinoa soup is always a winner in that way!

We also found an expensive (in Bolivian terms anyway) restaurant called Thai Palace with sushi (!) and tofu. Even though most of the things of the menu was pretty prices, we managed to find the meals with lowest price that still filled us up. I had a lentil Dahl with tofu and it was lush! Especially the tummy rice that came with it.

And you know how they say that soup is healing food for your soul? (Or do they, I don't know but it feels like something someone wise would've said). With plenty of coca tea on the site and a big bowl of soup I did feel much better that night we went to veg-friendly restaurant La Orilla (which is also pretty privet for Bolivia! But you do get a lot of food as well and the daily soup is vegan and cheap!)

Guy went all in here on our last night in Copa and ordered the veggie tacos which was a lot of food even for him. (And yep the hand sanitizer comes along to all of our meals of course!)

After three nights Copacabana, we jumped on the next bus and left this last village by Lake Titicaca before the Peruvian border. So with this bus we left Bolivia and had a four hour journey to Puno in Peru.

The bus journey went fine. I've never done a boarder crossing like this before so it was definately an experience. The border control was only like a 10 minute drive from the bus station in Copacabana and went fairly smoothly. First we had go check-out from the Bolivian side and all we needed to do so was our passports, the little visa note we got when we entered Bolivia and a form that the bus staff provided us with to fill in. After that we walked over the border where our bus was waiting to go into the border control on the Peruvian side and the same stuff applied here really. 

After about an hour of queuing and waiting for everyone else on our bus be done, we could jump on the bus again and continue the journey. 

We arrived to Puno where we only had two days and started to explore the town straight away. We went nuts on shopping and ended up buying loads of DVDs and a Rubik's cube.. Now I just need to find the patience to actually learn how to solve it.

There is not much going on in Puno, unless you want to go on the floating islands which we didn't really feel like as we heard they're just a tourist trap. Another popular thing to do is to go up the the condor view point, but after reading reviews about people getting robbed there we turned that down as well and decided to have another few chilled days, which I think was necessary aswell.

This is gonna sound really sad, but the best things about Puno for me was the food we were able to find. First of all, we numbed into a funny place called MachuPizza, which was actually a really nice restaurant with really nice food and that was actually really cheap compared to many, many of the other restaurants around downtown Puno.

And I mean. Their pasta pesto was made with avocado, for only 10 soles, so how can one NOT be happy here??

The biggest joy for me though, was to find a Loving Hut that was actually opened! Loving hut is a vegetarian restaurant chain and I been wanting to visit one for ages but always when I've been in a city that has one it's either just shut down competent, or it's simply been closed. But this one wasn't so yay!

The guy working there who I guess was the manager was super friendly and explained they're complacent menu as if he had never done it before. They have sooo many different options to choose between that you almost get dizzy. I settled for the daily set menu, but was still couldn't decide at all what to get for a long time as it was many different choices there aswell!

In the end I had the quinoa soup for starters, BBQ seitan for main (and it was so incredible har I kept eating even though my stomach couldn't take it anymore) and a vegan quinoa cake & cheesecake for dessert. Mamma Mia. I wish there was a Loving Hut in every town!

And so on our last morning in Puno it was time to take yet another bus, this time taking us to Cusco. We went with bus company Cruz del Sur, which was really good. The journey took about 6-7 hours and was really comfy, since it wasn't many people on the bus, the seats were really comfortable and they showed movies the whole way which made the time go really quick. 

I'll be back with a Cusco-update soon my lovers.