Exploring Cusco

A Quick Summary

Thank you for all the support and prayers! I spent the first few days this week recovering in Cusco and then felt well enough to go hiking. We spent 3 days hiking to some Inca ruins called Choquequirao, and then returned to Cusco afterwards.

Highs and Lows

Choquequirao:

The Choquequirao hike had so many photos that I decided to make a separate post about it!

Melted Underwear:

One funny thing that happened was when we arrived at the trailhead to the Choquequirao hike, I discovered that my bag had been sitting on something hot in the taxi. It had melted through two layers of my bag, and through 2 pairs of my underwear. Since both the bag and underwear were synthetic materials, it actually melted the underwear and fused it to my bag. I spent a while trying to patch the hole and cut the underwear off, but I now permanently have part of 2 pairs of underwear fused to my backpack! 

Holey bag

Cutting around the fused underwear 

Extra ventilation?

Adventures in Cusco:

I have really enjoyed getting to wander around Cusco by myself and explore! It has been neat to see all the different things happening around and I've also had some fun little encounters with locals too. Here are a few I took pictures of.

In this plaza I came across this crazy "parade" for lack of a better word. There were about 15 guys all carrying this massive white block while being followed around the square by a marching band and a crowd of people. The guys carrying the block seemed to be struggling with the weight. They would keep switching out, and occasionally one of them would lose control. When this happened, the group would quickly shift to catch the block, and sometimes crash into a member of the marching band or a distracted tourist trying to take a video!

I had to buy some new underwear, so I went to the local markets. It was super fun wandering around street after street of little stalls with people selling all different kinds of clothes. All the shop owners were out on the sidewalk trying to drag you into their store, and it was fun seeing a slice of Peruvian culture - I barely saw any other tourists there!

I also went to the local food market which was really neat, it had people selling all sorts of different foods and goods. Since all the stalls of the same type are clumped together, this meant that there was about 15 or 20 juice stalls all selling the exact same thing in one section. They all even had the same sign! When I walked down the isle, all the stall owners would start yelling in spanish and waving their menus out for me to grab to try to get me to come to their stall.

I also bumped into this big group of friends who seemed to be interviewing people for some sort of tiktok video. I got interviewed by these two girls except it was in Spanish so I didn't understand the questions. Then, when I finally figured out what they were asking, I didn't have the vocabulary to answer. Thankfully they were pretty patient with me and were just laughing the whole time (probably at me and not with me) but that's okay. 

Random Review

Since I was sick, I didn't eat anything interesting this week. I thought I'd change it up and review our hostel instead.

Kokopelli Hostel: 9.5/10

Honestly, this is one of the nicest hostels I've ever been in. They have lots going on, really nice staff, and cool mural paintings all over the walls. My only (minor) complaint is that the breakfast is the exact same thing every morning.

My favorite part of the hostel though is this couch, where I spent almost 4 entire days lying on while I was sick. It was comfortable, had a nice warm alpaca blanket and a charging outlet. I couldn't ask for much more. 

Reflections

On self compassion:

Something I had been learning before the trip was to not be as hard on myself, similar to how I'd treat a close friend. Being sick this week really forced me to be patient with myself. It was so frustrating being in such a beautiful place, trying to do everything to get better, and having my body just not responding well. Looking back, it was only for 4 days but in the middle of it I was often wishing my body would just heal faster. Recovering from the illness was a good chance to practice being more okay with my body's limits. 

Extra notes:

The extra post on the choquequirao hike is here!