Ancient History, Volume XVIII

If you missed the last installment, Mrs. Watermelon got publicly humiliated, and I saw the world's most epic rock.

Day 4 of the Inca Trail started with a 4am wake up. Yup. FOUR O'CLOCK IN THE MORNING. Don't these people know that nothing good ever happens after 2am?? (Name that sitcom!)

Anyway. We were dressed, packed and in the lodge by 4.30am, where the porters had very kindly made us pancakes for breakfast to lessen the "OH GOD, WHAT TIME IS IT???" feelings of doom. Then, after a visit to the moth-ridden bathroom (and if you think THAT didn't cause me to have a minor nervous breakdown, you'd be wrong), we set off towards Machu Picchu. IN THE RAIN.

We reached the final checkpoint at about 5.15am, which was something of an issue because they didn't open the gate until 5.30am. Nothing quite like standing around in the rain going "Dammit, I could have had another 15 minutes of sleep..."! *sigh*

Anyway, the gate was eventually unlocked, and we had a delightful hour and a half's stroll to the Sun Gate. I say 'stroll', because there were 200 people walking in a line in the dark, so it was pretty slow going. On the plus side, after the first half hour, it was getting light enough that we didn't need to use our stupid headtorches any more. Such things are always a plus.

The only tricky bit of the walk was the climb up to the Sun Gate, because you have to go up a flight of 'monkey stairs' - really steep and narrow, and basically you had to use your hands to keep yourself moving. That was followed by a couple of steep flights of stairs up reasonably big hills. We finally got to the Sun Gate at about 7.10am.

Now. The idea of getting you up at stupid o'clock and making you hike in the dark is that you get to see the sun rise over Machu Picchu and go "Oooooooh". Instead, we saw this:

Not actually from the Sun Gate. But you get the point.

Yup. More rain. We stopped at the Sun Gate for all of ten minutes before the head guide announced that he didn't think it was going to clear up for aaaages and so we may as well head down to Machu Picchu. That took about 45 minutes, because it was downhill on rocks that were extra slippery thanks to the rain. I MAY have had a couple of little "Oh crap, I'm sliding and am going to fall off a cliff and die" moments. (Obviously, I didn't fall off a cliff and die. Although being the world's first zombie blogger would be quite an achievement..........)

By the time we reached Machu Picchu, it was PROPERLY raining. So we headed for the cafeteria, and spent an hour or so hanging out under patio umbrellas, eating overpriced second breakfast, and waiting for a break in the weather. Our tour leader clearly didn't have high hopes for it clearing up - he took our passports and $20 each, and set off into Aguas Calientes to try and change our train tickets so that we could go back the next day if it didn't clear. But thankfully, by 9am, it had eased to drizzle and we were able to set off on the tour.

And because I don't really remember much of the detail from the tour (BAD ARCHAEOLOGIST), have a bunch of pictures. WHEEEEEEEEEEE:

The tour took about an hour and a half, and then we had two hours free before we had to be on the bus down to Aguas Calientes. So a bunch of us decided that we'd climb the smaller of the two peaks that rise behind the site (the one that's going off the left side of the frame in that last photo). It was only about a 15 minute walk to the top, but the trail was pretty narrow and winding, and there were occasional scrambles over tree branches and rocks and stuff. But the view from the top? Totally worth it.

When we'd finished marvelling at the view, we meandered through the site on our way to the bus.

See that little V in the mountains? That's where the Sun Gate is.

The bus ride to Aguas Calientes was a LITTLE hair raising, due to a millionty hairpin bends. And I'm sure the day visitors really appreciated how delightful we all smelled after four days with no showers. After a lunch of pizza and beer (hey, we deserved it!), it was time to head to the train station.

Oh. AND. The culmination of the Watermelons saga: after she was stretchered to camp on the third day, she declared that she would walk on the fourth day. She made it to the Sun Gate, and basically gave up. The two guides that were with them had to stretcher her down to the medical station at Machu Picchu to get her checked out. Then one of the guides had to go back UP to the Sun Gate to get Mr Watermelon. Because he'd been so worried about his wife over the past three days, that he'd forgotten to drink enough water. And so he'd basically dehydrated himself to the verge of a heart attack. So the guide had to PIGGY BACK HIM DOWN THE MOUNTAIN. And THEN? The SAME guide had to walk back up there AGAIN to get their bags. And the Watermelons spent the whole day at the medical station, and didn't get to see Machu Picchu at all. So yeah. That happened.

(Incidentally? I'm pretty sure that "So yeah. That happened" is going to be the title of my hilariously witty and completely hypothetical autobiography...)

The train ride back to Ollantaytambo ended up being kind of hilarious. Because there were lots of tunnels. And Ness and I were listening to her iPod, which decided to play "Scotty Doesn't Know". So whenever we went through a tunnel, all we could think of was "Mi scusi!" (name that movie), and we'd fall about in fits of hysterics. I'm not so sure it was particularly funny to anyone ELSE on the tour. But WE sure as hell had a good time!

That night, after quite possibly the most welcome shower I've ever had, we all headed out to Inka Grill for dinner. If you're ever in Cusco, GO TO INKA GRILL. Seriously. The food is fantastic, and if you order guinea pig, it comes to the table with a little crown made of red capsicum/bell pepper on its teeny tiny creepy-looking head (We didn't order guinea pig, hence the lack of photos. Someone at a nearby table did though). Oh. And order the warm chocolate tart. You won't regret it.

After dinner, we went out for a few well earned drinks. And several people tried to complete the Machu Picchu challenge - staying up for the full 24 hours and drinking. After one (free poured, and therefore disgusting) vodka raspberry, I caved and headed for bed. At least I got a good night's sleep before the unexpected drama (HI NESSA!!) that was to come the following day... Dun dun duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuun: to be continued.

K xx

Ancient History, Volume XVII

If you missed the last post in this series, you should probably go read it. Because Day 3 of the Inca Trail won't make a whole lot of sense if you haven't read about Day 2. Just sayin'...

Day 3 started much like Day 2 - coca leaf tea in the tent at 6am, and me attempting to convey that the smell of it was making me gag, so could they pretty please take it away now? Day 3 also started with the liberal application of Dencorub in an attempt to make my legs actually work. This had the downside of meaning that I spent the day smelling like an arthritic old lady. On the UPSIDE, it masked the fact that I'd hiked about 25 kilometres in the past 56 hours, and hadn't showered in that time...

The less than spectacular view from our tent. Those tufts of grass in the front?
That was a ledge. It was really fun trying to get out of the tent without falling off.

Breakfast was at 6.30, and we were back on the trail by just after 7am. We were heading for the second main pass, which was thankfully not a millionty kilometres uphill, like Dead Woman's Pass on Day 2. At about 7.30, we overtook the Watermelons. They'd been made to start walking at 4am again. Can we all just stop and marvel at the fact that within 25 minutes, we overtook the people who'd been walking for nearly 3.5 HOURS????? Yeah. That happened...

About half way up the pass, we came to an archaeological site. It wasn't the most fascinating of locations, but it was conveniently located at the "If I have to walk one more step, I will cry/scream/collapse" point, so the half hour break there to explore was much appreciated!

I may have gotten all "The canyon of the crescent moon"-y when I saw the shape of this.

From there, it was a fairly hard slog up to the second pass. But our tour leader conveniently located himself behind me, and may - at times - have actually resorted to pushing me towards the top. Between the crescent moon temple-y thing and the summit, we passed into the cloud forest and things gradually became foggier, which was kind of fun. Somewhere along this second slog, I located the most amazing thing I saw between the start of the trail and Machu Picchu:

"Fuck you all for walking on me" (my boots for scale)

Yup. It's a rock that looks like it's flipping people off. (No one but me noticed this. I'm so glad I took a photo.)

Eventually, we reached the top, and the head guide informed us that there was an archaeological site a few hundred metres down the other side of the pass. It turned out he meant a few hundred metres in ALTITUDE, not in distance. So it took a little longer than we anticipated to reach the site. But it was totally worth it when we got there. 

To get into the site, you had to climb up a really steep, narrow set of stairs cut directly into the rockface. We had about half an hour to explore on our own, and then the head guide gave us a talk about the history of the site. I remember it being fascinating, but not a single thing about the content. Whoops?

From there, the trail passed through a campsite, where the most spectacular thing of ever happened.

I wish I'd been brave enough to take pictures of it like someone in the group did. But I was too busy marvelling at what was happening: Mrs Watermelon - the bane of everyone's existence - was carried through on a stretcher by four of the porters. Not, you understand, because she'd injured herself. Just because she was so far behind that she was physically incapable of catching up. The porters thought it was HILARIOUS. And we, to be perfectly honest, did too.

As we finally contained our "OMG DID THAT JUST HAPPEN???"-y behaviour, the head guide told us that it was about an hour's walk from where we were to the spot where lunch would be served. And that lunch wouldn't be served until 12.30. As it was only around 10.00, there wasn't much point in walking quickly. So we took our time, enjoyed the scenery, took lots of photos, and got super excited when the trail tunnelled through a rockface.

Yup, Ness and I are wearing three day old clothes. Whatever.

After a lunch of quinoa soup and alpaca spaghetti, we were relieved to learn that the afternoon was almost entirely downhill. And rather a LOT of downhill - we dropped 800m in altitude between leaving the lunch spot and arriving at camp! The afternoon took us, for almost the first time, along old Incan roads. So that was amazing. Even more amazing, but somewhat demoralising, was the fact that you were constantly being overtaken by porters, who were carrying 25kg loads, and RUNNING along the trail. Usually wearing sandals... 

Our campsite that night was just near the Incan site of Wiñaywayna, so when we got into camp, we headed along a path to check that out. It was pretty awesome, although I didn't go down to the bottom for fear of not being able to walk back up the stairs again! 

The campsite that night had a lodge (PROPER INDOORS!!) and a bar, so we made the most of that while we were waiting on dinner. After dinner, we had a thank you presentation to the porters, in which we all had to introduce ourselves. Each of the unmarried women got a huge cheer, which was kind of hilariously awkward.  The porters who'd had to lug Mrs. Watermelon down a million flights of stairs got an extra large round of applause. 

And then it was off to bed for some well earned rest before our 4am wake up call and the final trek into Machu Picchu. But that's a story for next time.

Questions of the day: would you rather walk uphill for a million hours or downhill for a million hours? (One kills your thighs, the other kills your knees and ankles) And would you have laughed at Mrs. Watermelon being carried past on a stretcher? Or am I an evil bitch who's going to hell for laughing?

Oh, and most importantly: have you ever seen a rock making inappropriate hand gestures????

K xx

Ancient History, Volume XVI

If you missed the last episode, it featured the first day of the Inca Trail and you should probably go and read it first so that you're not horribly confused. Just saying... (Also, this is going to be light on pictures, because we've gone over our internet downloads, which means uploading happens at 2002 speed. So...sorry.)

On the morning of Day 2, we were woken at about 6.15am by the porters banging on the outside of our tents and offering us coca leaf tea. While coca leaf tea is meant to help with altitude sickness, it mostly just made me feel nauseated, so I spent about five minutes trying to convey that I wanted hot water instead of tea. We had to be up and packed and in the mess tent by 6.30, which meant it was kind of a rush to do while juggling hot beverages. But there was porridge and pancakes calling to us (not literally, because that would be creepy...), so it wasn't too much of a struggle.

We started out along the trail at about 7.15,  and even the slog from our campsite up to the control point was painful. We saw a bunch of people (note: I did not say 'passed'. We SAW them as *they* passed *us*) doing it with full packs (there were porters carrying ours), and I still have no idea how they didn't die.

From the control point, the climb to Dead Woman's Pass started. And it was absolute and utter Hell. Within a terrifyingly short period of time, Ness and I had fallen behind. The only person we saw from our group was one of the guides, who'd been sent back to walk with us and "improve his English". As his English was pretty good, that was probably code for "make sure the girls who didn't do anywhere near enough training don't die, because that would be bad". So poor Eddie had to crawl along at a snail's pace, listening to me wheeze like an old set of bagpipes.

The Andes are HIGH, y'all. (Note: we did not actually climb this)

We finally reached the first designated rest point just before 11.00. On the plus side, about ten minutes before that, we overtook Mr and Mrs Watermelon. After their less than stellar performance on Day 1, they'd been made to start walking at 4.30 IN THE MORNING. So at least after that, we knew we weren't the absolute slowest in the group!! About 15 minutes after we got into the rest stop, Mr and Mrs Watermelon arrived. They sat down next to us, and within a couple of minutes, we heard snoring. Mrs Watermelon had toppled over sideways and was fast asleep. So that was...interesting.

As great as it was to reach the first rest stop, the problem was that from there, you could see up to Dead Woman's Pass. And it was A MILLIONTY MILES AWAY. As we were leaving the rest stop, we ran into the head guide. He told us that at our speed, we were probably about another hour and a half from the summit. That was more than a little depressing. And from this point on, the trek was actually WORSE. Because you'd reach a hundred metre-ish stretch of flat ground and convince yourself that it was the top, only to turn a corner and see another stretch of uphill ahead of you. 

About half way between the rest stop and the summit, I lost my shit and burst into tears of exhaustion and pain and "I don't want to do this any more". At which point Ness demanded that I stop before she start crying too. Shortly after that, it started to get colder, which made things even more uncomfortable.

We eventually reached the summit of Dead Woman's Pass (4,215m/13,828 feet above sea level) at about 1.15pm. The head guide was waiting for us, and informed us that Mr and Mrs Watermelon were still about two hours away, so that was a small moment of smug. The summit was FU-REEZING, so we stayed long enough for a photo and a celebratory Sublime, and then headed down the other side.

Don't I just look so thrilled to have another hour and a half to walk?

The other side was straight downhill. I lost Ness not long into the downhill section, because I got stuck behind a group of rude Scandinavians. Turns out the downhill part was much easier going, but also really freaking hard, because any time I stopped for a drink or to take a photo, I could feel my legs shaking uncontrollably. And I knew if I stopped for more than a few seconds, I wouldn't be able to keep going. Basically? I have very few photos from Day 2.

We eventually staggered into camp at about 2.45pm, and were brought MASSIVE plates of food, which was more than a little welcome. The afternoon was spent playing more cards, and eating enormous quantities of popcorn. At about 5.30, we found out that Mr and Mrs Watermelon were SO far behind that porters had had to run back with food supplies. They eventually staggered into camp just as the rest of us were sitting down to dinner, and were taken straight to their tent on the verge of collapse.

The evening was spent playing more cards, including a game called 'Nervous', which involved slapping other player's hands. After several rounds resulting in bruises, it was decreed that all rings must be removed before someone ended up with a broken bone...

And so ended the second day. Well. Apart from the fact that when we finally left the mess tent to head to bed, the stars. Oh my God, the stars. I've never seen anything like it. And I imagine the only time I'll ever see anything like it again is when The Doctor turns up and takes me for a wee jaunt in the TARDIS.

So yeah. If you're wondering whether to do the Inca Trail? Day 2 will nearly kill you. But the stars make it totally worth it.

K xx

Ancient History, Volume XV

If you missed the last installment, it featured Incan sites, baby llamas, and the most annoying woman of EVER - Mrs. Watermelon.

The first day of the Inca Trail started at the ungodly hour of 5.15am. We were at breakfast by 6.00, with the intention of being on the road by 6.30. In the end, it was more like 7.00, which was extra irritating because I could have done with an extra half hour's sleep! We drove to Ollantaytambo (where we'd been the previous day) and stopped for second breakfast. Because apparently going on an epic trek turns you into hobbits?

We finally reached the starting point - Kilometre 82 - at about 10.00. There followed an enormous photo taking exercise - photos had to be taken with everyone's camera to document the event:

That's Mr and Mrs Watermelon on the far left. Some of us MAY have cut them
out of the photos to more nicely centre the sign...

From there, we headed through passport control and set off along the trail. About 10 minutes in, we had to stop and wait for Mr and Mrs Watermelon to catch up. And we were waiting longer than we'd been walking before they appeared. This proved a terrible omen for how the rest of the trek would pan out... On the plus side, it gave us plenty of time to take photos of Mt Veronica, which is 5,860m high and therefore picturesquely covered in snow:

Eventually, it was decided that we should just keep walking and one of the guides would stay behind with Mr and Mrs Watermelon. So we ploughed on without them. Eventually, we came to our first challenge: a climb which increased 50m in altitude over 200m. So basically, it was like walking up a 200m long flight of stairs. It was a test for the rest of the trek, and there was a time limit of half an hour to get to the top.  If you didn't reach the top in that time limit, they'd send you back and get you a ticket on the train to Aguas Callientes instead. Thankfully, we made it in under the half hour, and there was a nice view over an archaeological site at the top, so at least there was something nice to look at while you got your breath back!!

We walked for a couple of hours, and eventually came to a village where we stopped for lunch. Lunch was quite funny because there was a group of piglets running all over the place and tripping everybody up. Luckily they were super cute, so no one minded too much!

The afternoon was much the same, except with an increasing number of hills as we got closer to the first campsite. Ness and I finally plodded into camp at about 5.15pm, which was some ways behind everyone else. But two full hours ahead of Mr and Mrs Watermelon. TWO. HOURS. As the first day is only 13 kilometres and largely flat, this REALLY didn't bode well for the following day... Apparently the guides had tried to persuade her to get a horse to the camp site and save her energy for Day 2 (on the first day, the path goes through a bunch of small villages, so there are horses everywhere. I was not impressed by this, being terrified of them). She refused. As a result, the guides were...not impressed with what happened on Day 2 and Day 3.

Not long after Ness and I got into camp, we were called to the mess tent for afternoon tea - mountains and mountains of popcorn and tea. Once we'd run out of popcorn, we broke out the cards and played approximately a millionty rounds of Shithead until it was time for dinner, just after Mr and Mrs Watermelon finally staggered in. Dinner involved purple corn pudding, which can best be described as warm, unset jelly/jello. Mmmmmm, DELICIOUS. (Except not)

Then it was back to playing cards until about 9pm when we decided it was probably a good idea to go to bed. This involved a trip to the toilet.

Super attractive hiking fashion

See that little shack in the right top corner? That was the toilet. Getting there involved avoiding tents and trees and trying not to trip up a hill using fairly useless head torches. Using the toilet was...an experience. It was a drop pit squat toilet. And lots of people had missed the hole. The resulting smell led to rather a lot of dry retching on my part. And then, while I was waiting for Ness to gag her way through a trip to the toilet, I spotted a freaking TARANTULA wandering along the ground. This understandably caused me many panicky "MUST KEEP TORCH ON IT AT ALL TIMES SO I KNOW WHERE IT IS" feelings, closely followed by "RUN AWAY AS FAST AS POSSIBLE" feelings.

So yeah. An excellent night's sleep was had after that..........

Next up, climbing the steepest effing mountain of EVER, and everyone is grateful for a lack of tarantulas.
K xx

ABC of travel

Yesterday, the lovely Deidre of Decoybetty tagged me in this. It's totally awesome and allows me wibble on about travel, even though I'm currently freezing to death in Melbourne. (HEY MELBOURNE - IT'S SUMMER, YOU NUMBSKULL!!! TURN UP THE TEMPERATURE!) Ahem.

A: Age you went on your first overseas trip. I'm pretty sure my first overseas trip was when we moved to Canada when I was four. The longest I've gone since then without going overseas was from October 1998 to September 2002.

B: Best (foreign) beer you've had and where. Yeah, I don't like beer. But there was a moment in Guatemala when it was so hot that my brain melted out of my ears and I decided that the only thing that would cool me down was beer. So I'm going to go with Brahva (not to be confused with Brahma) in Rio Dulce, Guatemala.

C: Cuisine (favourite). Mexican. Hands down. Although I'm also partial to Thai food. NOM NOM NOM.

D: Destinations, favourite, least favourite and why. Favourite? Either London or New York. Because history and museums and nerdiness, oh my! Least favourite? It's a toss up between Salem and Philadelphia. I found both of them disappointing. Or Quito, because I was by myself for five days and was too chicken to venture any distance from the hotel for fear of getting lost and then mugged. Yeah...

E: Event you experienced abroad that made you say 'wow!'. Flying over the Nazca lines in a teeny tiny plane.

F: Favourite mode of transport. I'm quite partial to trains. But mostly I tend to wander around on foot. Because it's free and I'm a cheapskate.

G: Greatest feeling while travelling. Seeing a new place for the first time.

H: Hottest place you've travelled to. Well, technically as I was living in Canberra at the time, it would be Melbourne on Black Saturday. It was around 47 degrees C in Melbourne that day. That's around 117 degrees F. (If you want to experience it, turn your oven on to the lowest setting, and open the door.) Other than that, it would be Guatemala, where it was a millionty degrees with something like 95% humidity. It was pretty unpleasant. Luckily, the amazingness of Tikal made me (partially) forget that it was hot and damp as a fat old man in a sauna. #gross

I: Incredible service you've experienced and where. The good people at Covermore travel insurance. They were AMAZING when Ness got sick in Peru. I've never been so glad to talk to a bogan with an ocker accent in my entire life.

J: Journey that took the longest. I think technically there was a trip home from Canada for Christmas one year when I was a kid that took around 48 hours door to door. But I don't remember any of it. So I'm going to go with flying from Melbourne to Lima. Or, more accurately, Melbourne to Sydney to Auckland to Santiago to Lima. My flight to Sydney left at around 8am and we arrived in Lima at 11.50pm Peru time. Which means it was about 4pm the following day in Melbourne. Fun times!

K: Keepsake from your travels. I seem to have a habit of not really thinking through what I buy overseas. Which is how I ended up buying a blanket in Peru during the first WEEK of a nine week trip. It's really hard to pack a pack around a BLANKET, as it turns out. Guess how many times I've used said blanket? NADA. Not my best purchase ever. What I *do* buy as keepsakes that are a good idea? Bookmarks. Because then every time you open your book, you go "awwwwww, good memories..."

L: Let down sight, where and why. Anything in Salem, Massachusetts. Epic waste of time.

M: Moment where you fell in love with travel. It was either one of the millionty museums I went to as a kid, or watching movies I shouldn't have been allowed to watch because we were on a plane and it was on a giant screen. That's how I saw Pretty Woman when I was four!

N: Nicest hotel you've stayed in. I have no idea what it was called, but when I was a kid, my dad went to a conference in Zurich. And the rest of the family tagged along for the ride. When we got to the hotel, it turned out they'd put us in the penthouse. Which had floor to ceiling glass windows giving us a panoramic view of Zurich. It was pretty awesome.

O: Obsession - what are you obsessed with taking pictures of while travelling? Landscapes. And museum objects. Every time I get home, my mum looks at my pictures and goes "BUT WHERE ARE THE PEOPLE?!?!" Whoops.

P: Passport stamps - how many and from where? In my current passport? 17. From the UK, the US, Peru, Machu Picchu, Ecuador, the Galapagos, Guatemala, Belize, Mexico and Thailand. If you add in two of my three old passports (I couldn't find my very first passport. SAD FACE.), there's a total of 41 stamps, representing 16 different places.

Q: Quirkiest attraction you've visited and where: The big anything. Australia is littered with giant fibreglass crap. Here, for instance, is the big Ned Kelly in Glenrowan.

R: Recommended sight, event or experience: A Broadway show in New York. It's totally worth every penny.

S: Splurge - something you have no problem forking over money for while travelling. Once in a lifetime activities. Whether it's taking a helicopter to the Grand Canyon, flying over the Nazca Lines, riding an elephant, or going to the 20SB Summit to meet up with a bunch of random internet strangers!

T: Touristy thing you've done. Stood with one foot on each side of the equator.

U: Unforgettable travel memory. The Inca Trail. It may nearly have killed me, I may have cried like a little bitch until Ness yelled at me to stop because I was going to make her cry too, and it may have resulted in me almost getting stuck using a squat toilet when my quads cramped up. But it was totally worth it.

V: Visas - how many and for where? Surprisingly few, actually. A student visa for the UK, a residential visa for the UK from when I lived there as a kid, and a visa for France from back when Australia was cranky at France over nuclear testing in the Pacific, and so they made Australians jump through a million hoops to get into France. If I could find my very first passport, there'd probably be a residential visa for Canada in there too.

W: Wine - best glass of wine you've had while travelling and where. Much like beer, I don't drink wine. But I did have some pretty spectacular cocktails at La Boca del Lobo in Quito, Ecuador! (And if you're ever in Quito, you should check it out. It's a seriously awesome restaurant!)

X: eXcellent view and from where. Okay, first of all? Writing 'excellent' like that made me cringey. Secondly, here's a Peruvian volcano, complete with a vicuña in the foreground.

Y: Years spent travelling. 28, more or less. Sure, it may not all have been internationally, and it wasn't CONSTANT travel. But I don't think there's a single year in my life when I haven't boarded a plane/gotten in a car to somewhere or other!

Z: Zealous sports fans and where. We're pretty sports mad in Melbourne. I mean, we have a public holiday for a horse race, for crying out loud! But I'm pretty sure that no one in Melbourne has ever had to barricade themselves into their house in case the soccer hooligans get out of control as a friend had to do when she lived down the road from the stadium. So I'm giving the prize to Leicester, where I did my study abroad.

Tag, you're it! I'm going to tag some of my wonderful bloggy friends because they always seem to have awesome travel stories!
Jorah Day from Terminally Beautiful
Sweeney from Sweeney Says
Vanisha from Vanisha's Life in Australia
Kat from On Oxford Time
Lauren from The Blog You're About to Read

K xx

Picture-palooza

This time three years ago, I was on a plane heading to Peru. That nine weeks in the Americas turned out to be the best and worst of my life. Ness got sick (in a med-evac by the Peruvian Air Force kind of a way) and I got to be grateful that Guatemalan bathrooms are so small that you can (MASSIVE OVERSHARE!) puke into the shower while sitting on the loo. But I got to see some of the most amazing historic sites in the world, and I met people on that trip who've become some of my best friends.

Anyway, seeing as the trip was in my pre-blogging days, I now present the highlights of nine weeks in the Americas!

Arequipa, Peru

En route to Colca Canyon, Peru (complete with alpaca!)

Sunset over Lake Titicaca, Peru

Saqsaywaman, just outside Cusco, Peru

Ollantaytambo, Peru

Inca Trail Day 1, Peru

The best rock on Earth, Inca Trail Day 3, Peru

Inca Trail Day 3, Peru

Machu Picchu, Peru

Group 'Hurrah, We Did It!' photo at Machu Picchu

Machu Picchu from the adjacent mountain, Peru

Standing on the equator, near Quito, Ecuador

Giant tortoises, Santa Cruz, Galapagos Islands

Fur seals on Santiago, Galapagos Islands

Bartolome, Galapagos Islands

Sombrero Chino, Galapagos Islands

Sealions, Sombrero Chino, Galapagos Islands

Frigate Bird, North Seymour, Galapagos Islands

Blue footed booby (snigger), North Seymour, Galapagos Islands

Antigua, Guatemala

Flores, Guatemala

Tikal, Guatemala

Achtun Tunichil Muknal caves, Belize

Chichen Itza, Mexico

Swimming in cenotes near Merida, Mexico

Palenque, Mexico

San Cristobal de las Casas, Mexico

Cramming nine people in a tuktuk, Panajachel, Guatemala. Sara was on the parcel shelf!

Lake Atitlan, Guatemala

Teotihuacan, Mexico

The biggest flag I've ever seen, Mexico City, Mexico

Grand Canyon from a helicopter, USA

The ridiculousness that is The Luxor, Las Vegas, USA

Also, I REALLY wish I could show you the quarantine video that was screened on the way into New Zealand. The woman pulled a massive salami, an entire wheel of cheese and a WHOLE PINEAPPLE OUT OF HER HAND LUGGAGE. It was the greatest thing I've ever seen. Sadly, it doesn't seem to be available online anywhere, so you'll just have to imagine it!

K xx