Texile Collective and Trekking Orientation

One of the reasons for the Peru trip is that Julia has become very interested in the weaving hobby.  She is on the programming committee  for the Madison Weavers' Guild.  After our Cusco guided tour, we walked over to the Textile Collective.  In truth, I stayed outside on the sidewalk and people-watched on the busy downtown street, which is more interesting to me.  But I took no photos, and Julia did, so here we go:

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 Here is the website link, if you want to read and see more.

That night, we met with Freddy, our Inca Trail Guide, and met our companions for the Inca Trail hike, which was to begin two days later.

P&G are a male couple from Scotland who had been enduring travel hell for the last few days.  Their suitcases, and all of their gear, were still lost somewhere in Europe.  Two different airlines were blaming the other.  

What made things interesting was that P's bag had an Apple AirTag in it, so they knew that at least one of the bags was somewhere at the Madrid airport.  The end result was that they had spent the last few days in Lima, buying all new trekking gear at the North Face store at very high prices. 

During the orientation, Freddy explained that the porters would be carrying our tent, sleeping bag, sleeping pad, and 7.5 lbs of our personal gear. We would be carrying day packs only.  The hotel desk had a scale, and I was well under the limit; Julia was exactly at the limit.  The van would pick us up at 4:30 a.m. for the two hour drive to the trailhead.  

Freddy then turned very serious and said, "I have to talk about something that nobody wants to talk about.  I have a first aid kit and an oxygen bottle for emergencies, but sometimes it is necessary for people to stop hiking and be evacuated for any number of medical reasons.  This will be very expensive, especially if it's a helicopter evacuation.  You will be transported to the nearest town and then it will be up to you to pay for any medical care and to get back to Cusco.  Again, this will be very expensive.  Carry extra cash and credit cards for this purpose."

We kind of all looked at each other,  hoping that this would never come to fruition. During the actual hike, events ensued that reminded us of this part of the part of the orientation.

Justin's Shower and the Zoo

 Now that Julia is back home, we have been working to get Justin's apartment shower to be accessible.  There is a lip of four inches outside of the shower and a drop of about three inches into the shower.  The space in front of the shower is tight and faces his laundry closet.  

We bought a curb ramp to address the outside lip. It's a short and steep up for a shower chair moving sideways.  For the inside, we are trying out a perforated rubber mat on the bottom, paving stones on top of the rubber mat, and then another rubber mat on top.  This still leaves a way for the water to drain.  

His staff has been doing sponge baths for over a month, but the house manager isn't happy about that as a long term plan.  Justin is fine with the sponge baths and isn't thrilled about the potential bumpy ride in and out of the shower.  Even when he had a walk-in shower in the dorms, he was only showering once per week to supplement sponge baths.

Sunday morning, we will try it out and see if the plan (and Justin) works. We will go slow.  We practiced with the empty shower chair, but adding 180 lbs to the shower chair will be a significant change. 

We dragged Justin out of his apartment yesterday and walked over to the nearby Madison zoo with one of his caregivers.  Justin never wants to leave but is usually happy when he finally gets outside.  Yesterday was a nice sunny day in the 60's, and he didn't get too cold (Justin never wears long pants or shoes--even in the middle of winter).

We then ordered a Wisconsin fish fry for carry-out, and then watched some of the Milwaukee Bucks' basketball game at Justin's apartment.  Watching tv sports and playing video games is how Justin currently spends most of his time.  

I have to say that he has been doing a better job of managing his personal finances.  He successfully negotiated  receiving both energy and internet subsidies for low income folks.  Justin also has an appointment next week with Wisconsin Department of Vocational Rehabilitation to see about part time job options.  And he figured out a way to get an absentee ballot for his new address and voted!

Cusco Tour

 Julia and I generally do not sign up for tours, preferring to look things over on our own.  In fact, on the day before our guided tour, we went to the market on our own and and enjoyed that experience.  

 

But when you are in a foreign land, there are some questions that you just can't answer without the help of a local.  Like what the heck is that?

As I mentioned before, one doesn't hike the Inca Trail solo.  The Peruvian government requires that foreigners be escorted by a licensed guide, who is almost always employed by the tour companies.  We chose our tour company because they received excellent TripAdvisor reviews and also are known for smaller groups.  We expected our trekking group to be about 8-12 people.  When our guide showed up at our hotel, we learned that our group was four people, and the other two people were working out some travel issues.  As a result, we would be receiving a private tour.

Freddy turned out to be a great tour guide: down-to-earth, low key, relaxed, and not afraid to express his personal opinion or to ask yours.  

That gray stuff in the pic up above taken from the public market?  Julia and I speculated that it was some kind of weird seafood.  Nope, Freddy said, it's yerky.  Julia and I looked at each other before it clicked:  jerky.  In Peru, meat is heavily salted for preservation.  After it's salted and dried, and salted and dried, and salted and dried, that's what Peruvian jerky looks like.  It did not look like something that I wanted to put in my mouth.

During the first part of the tour, Freddy took us up into the hillside to the ruins near Cristo Blanco.  While we learned a lot about the Inca culture, Freddie was blunt about the fact that so much is still unknown.  The stones used to build the temples and government buildings were moved long distances and up steep mountainsides.  The Inca had no horses or oxen.  There were no steel tools for cutting or shaping stone.  

Experts today can only hypothesize how the materials for construction were transported and then used at the building sites.  And the hypotheses keep changing as more ruins are uncovered and analyzed. 

 

Sacrifice Altar for people and animals

Window to a window to a window

Why can't we look back at the Inca written history to answer some of these questions?  Because there isn't any.  The Inca depended upon an oral history.

When the Spanish arrived during the 1500's, they killed off all of the leaders and educated people among the Inca.  The Spanish also destroyed many temples.  As a result, their history was mostly lost.  The Spanish didn't care much about learning the Inca construction techniques, but they were seriously focused about learning where the hidden Inca gold was.  As it turns out, there is very little gold or silver in the Cusco area.  The precious metals mined from other places in Peru were carefully hidden away  in the jungle--and only the elite knew the hiding places. 

When the Spanish demanded to know where the gold was, the remaining Inca honestly answered that all of the people who had the answers were dead.  To this day, treasure hunters are still trying to find the Inca gold.

Until we talked to Freddy, we had admired dozens of large Spanish churches.  Freddy told us that the Spanish destroyed the Inca temples in Cusco,  and replaced them with Catholic churches on the same sites.  Somehow, the cathedrals didn't seem quite as beautiful with that knowledge.

Freddy left us around noon, letting us know for the first time that he would be our Inca Trail guide also.  We would meet that night with our fellow trekkers and for our orientation. 

 

Peruvian Dining

The place that we heard and read about was called Chicha.  One doesn't get a table for dinner there without reservations.   And there were simply no reservations available before our Inca Trail hike, unless we were willing to eat at 9:30 p.m.  I'm not one for eating a meal right before bedtime.

Instead, we ended up at a place called Morena Peruvian kitchen which overlooked the Plaza de Armas. Peru is well-known for delicious food, and this was probably the best dining experience that we've had in many years anywhere for less than the price of Olive Garden in the U.S.

It started with a Pisco Sour.  Pisco is a grape distilled spirit.  The cocktail is generally made with Pisco, lime juice, egg white, and bitters.  Mine had some other fresh juices in it and was made table-side--something new to me.

Julia and I shared an appetizer:  grilled alpaca on a skewer, along with  potatoes and vegetables.  Peru has over 200 varieties of potatoes. 

Yes, the flowers are edible

Julia had a non-alcoholic drink made from purple corn and a chicken dish.

I had what they called beef stir-fry, but that doesn't do it justice. The marinated beef was flavorful and so tender that you could cut it with a fork.

 

Next up:  our guided tour of Cusco's public market and historical sites.

Summer has moved to October

After about a week of lighting up my fireplace insert to keep warm in the house, summer came back with 80 degree temperatures over the weekend.  

Justin is all moved into his apartment.  In fact, he is so moved in that he almost never leaves.  Justin has a very narrow temperature range of comfort.  Above 80, and he's too hot.  Below 65, and he's too cold.  So when he called me up and asked me to take him to the Madison Farmer's Market today, I was glad to oblige.  

Justin lives only a couple of miles from the state capitol where the market takes place.  So he rolled out the front door, and I got some additional steps in after my early morning walk with Callie. Justin's chair is rated for 8 miles without a charge, but the battery is reaching the end of its life so we kept an eye on the battery.  Before we finished, we picked up some buffalo beef jerky for Justin and a big bag of Thai chili peppers for me.  

Justin wanted to watch the Wisconsin Purdue game in his apartment, so we parted ways.  I went over to the patio of Working Draft Beer Company and sipped on "Dad Bod" Stout, which Bill from Nebraska would have loved.  A simple oatmeal stout with chocolate malt (dark roasted barley).  Simple, full-bodied, flavorful and not too much alcohol.

 

Julia has been visiting our daughter Allie in California.  She should be returning home on Tuesday.  I better get the house cleaned up.

Peruvian Chocolate Factory

Long time readers will recall that Julia and I took a tour of a chocolate factory in Belize in 2019. It isn't a coincidence that we toured one in Peru.  First, I love chocolate.  Second, there is a roasting process for cocoa beans (technically, cacoa seeds) that is somewhat similar to the roasting process for coffee.

When I roasted coffee commercially, I was approached by an investor in a Hawaii chocolate operation  He wondered if there might be a way for me to roast cocoa beans in my Lodi shop. Meh, it wouldn't really be practical.  The temperatures are much lower for roasting.  And coffee beans and cacoa seeds don't mix very well on the same roasting machine in terms of odors and the clean-up.

But I'm still very interested in the process.  The chocolate factory was around the corner from our hotel and offered a free self-tour.  We feasted our eyes on the process but didn't buy anything here due to the "special" gringo prices.  We later bought chocolate at the general market (more on that later).

Cacao Seeds and Sugar

This photograph shows the seed grinder and the mixers for the cacao and sugar.  Factory workers are shaping and packaging.

Roaster is upper right

 

Final product

Sunday Morning Coming Down

When Julia and I came down the steep stairs from Cristo Blanco, we were greeted by all kinds of festivities in the Plaza de Armas, which take place every Sunday morning.

Girls Middle School Band

 

The photo above shows both the adult band and the local officials under the red tent presiding over the flag ceremony.  On every Sunday morning, hundreds of local people in Cusco come to the plaza to watch the raising of the Peruvian flag and the flag of Cusco.  Patriotic songs are sung to cheers.  The flag ceremony takes well over an hour, including speeches.  All of that time the flag raisers must stand at attention.

Elections were to take place the following Sunday.  In Peru, voting is mandatory.  There are no alcohol sales on the day preceding the election, the day of the election, or the day after the election.  Voter id cards are required.  There are stiff fines for not voting.  Because so many people had their voter id card expire during the pandemic, there were long lines of people wearing masks to enter buildings in order to renew their voting cards during the week before the election.  The reason that elections take place on Sundays is because that is the day off for family.  Work is not an excuse.  If one is required to work on Sunday, employers are required to let employees have time off to vote.  

Food for thought. 

 

Cristo Blanco

 From Sept 25th, 2022

We were both feeling pretty good when we went to bed on the previous night.  However, morning came at 4 a.m when the hotel kitchen staff started getting ready for breakfast, which is available from 4:30 a.m. until 11 a.m.  Our room was across a small courtyard from the kitchen, but we made the mistake of leaving our windows open.  

After breakfast and coca tea, we left the hotel  at 7:30 a.m. for our self-directed hike to Cristo Blanco, the most famous monument in Cusco.  Make no mistake about it:  this was not a nature hike.  We would walk on pavement across the city, past the tourist areas, and up into the mountainside where working class Cusco lives.

The Spaniards built cathedrals everywhere in Cusco, so I guess it's no surprise that a huge white Jesus overlooks the city.  There were some other interesting sites along the way.

 

We were so focused on getting to the top of the mountain that we took a wrong turn into some ruins.  

A very upset parks employee came up to us and demanded that we buy $40 tickets to keep looking at the ruins.  When we asked where Cristo Blanco was, she gave us a disgusted look and pointed to where we had missed our turn.  I think she said "gringos" under her breath but it could have been something more colorful.

I can't say that I was impressed with the 26' tall White Jesus, but I liked his view.

 

We took a different way back down.  I don't think Julia liked these steps.

But she made it without blowing out a knee. We survived our first steep hike above 11,000' and experienced some  breathlessness but no other side affects. We didn't know at the time that these stairs were a very good introduction for the Inca Trail later that week.

It was only 9 on a Sunday morning.  The city was just beginning to wake up. More on that in the next post.

A Peruvian Dinner

Our tour guide gave us several instructions for the first couple of days acclimating to Cusco's elevation.  Avoid physical exertion.  No alcohol.  Stay with safe foods.  She recommended the chicken soup and no seafood or red meat.

After five hours on the ground without eating, we sat down at Los Portales, a restaurant facing the Plaza Kusipata, and started breaking the rules.

Julia ordered trout soup, and I ordered seco de cordero (lamb in cilantro sauce).  To drink, I ordered a Cusquena Dorada, which was a malty pilsner that came in a 620 ml bottle. The entire meal, including tip, was $25.  Everything was delicious. The fruits and vegetables in Peru are more flavorful than the genetically-engineered stuff in the U.S., designed for maximum shelf life.  Our stomachs survived the adventurous meal.

Naughty rule-breakers

On the next morning, we would break the remaining rule and go for a rigorous hike.

Cusco: Starting to Explore

Fortified with our coca tea, Julia and I headed out into the streets of Cusco.  A city of about 500,000 people, the tourist areas of Cusco are relatively safe and easy to find one's way around. 

Cusco has two seasons:  wet and dry.  We were there at the end of the dry season, so it was appropriate that it rained on the day we arrived.  It's rare to rain all day, so after an hour or so, the rain stopped, and the streets dried up.

 

Arriving in Cusco

When we arrived in Cusco, a representative of Sun Gate Tours was waiting for us at the airport with a sign that said "Julia."  This was very exciting to me because I've seen many folks with signs at airports but the sign was never for us before. 

That's because we've never booked a tour like this before.  Our normal way of travel is to explore the area on our own.  However, that's not possible if you want to hike the Inca Trail.  Peru requires all hikers to be accompanied by a government-licensed guide and to have an Inca Trail government permit.  These permits are highly sought-after, and one generally needs to get a permit months in advance.  

The easiest way to get a guide/permit is to sign up for a tour package. The tour company then handles everything: airport transfers, booking the hotel, booking day excursions, hiring Inca Trail guides, cooks, and porters, transfers to and from the trail, and transfers back to the airport at the end of the trip.

Isn't that expensive, you might ask? Probably, yes.  However, to pay for this trip, Julia used credit card points that she earned from paying for stuff over the course of thirty years of operating her business.  Peru was on her bucket list, so my frugality had to be set aside.  Besides, I was getting to hike in some very cool mountains so I kept my mouth shut about costs.

Flying from Lima to Cusco, we were changing in elevation from sea level to over 11,000 feet.  We immediately noticed the thin air, and our tour company representative advised us to avoid any alcohol, to take it easy for the first couple of days, and to drink lots of coca tea.  One makes coca tea by dropping whole leaves of the coca plant into hot water.  Our hotel kept a big glass container of leaves in the lobby, along with hot water.  When we arrived at the hotel, we did as we were told.

While the leaves of the coca plant are the base for making cocaine, coca tea is only a mild stimulant.  I'm not sure how much it helped us to adjust to the elevation, but it tasted pretty good--much like green tea.  After a  long travel day to Lima and only a few hours of sleep, the tea was just what we needed before heading out to explore Cusco on our first day.

Peru: the Backstory

When I was in middle school, a young couple moved in next door.  Dick was an instructor at the local technical college.  Dick met his wife, Chi Chi, while serving in Peru for the Peace Corp.  

Normally, I wasn't all that interested in who the neighbors were, but Dick and Chi Chi were looking for a babysitter on date nights, and my mother volunteered me to serve in that role.  It was my first and only baby-sitting job, but it was generally a good gig.  They would put baby Pablo to sleep and go out on a date, while I would listen to tunes on their nice sound system in the living room and hope that Pablo slept the entire time until his parents came home.

I had no idea how to change a diaper or quiet a crying baby.  My   mother was next door to bail me out if necessary, but Pablo was a very good sleeper.  The first diaper I ever changed was many years later for my daughter Allie.

A second baby Mark eventually arrived, and he was not as good a sleeper as Pablo.  My time as a babysitter ended.

Later, I got to know Dick a little better.  We played one-on-one basketball on his garage roof rim, and I also played pick-up games on  Sunday mornings with Dick and his friends at a local playground.  Somewhere along the line, I learned about cuy (guinea pig), one of the national dishes of Peru.  Dick and Chi Chi would have family/friends gatherings when they grilled cuy  in the backyard.  I would peek through the fence in mixed horror/fascination.  

Dick and Chi Chi would go back to Peru every couple of years. Chi Chi was from the city of Arequipa.  If I recall correctly, her father owned a big factory there. 

In college, I had a friend named Daniel who was Jewish but born and raised in Peru.  Daniel aspired to be a novel writer, but I don't think that ever happened. For some reason, it sticks in my memory the day that he told me he had his first dream in English.   I ran into him years later when my kids were young.  He was married and working for a tech company in Madison.

After that, I didn't think much about Peru until Julia began weaving with a loom that a friend owned but didn't use.  There are weaving villages in the mountains of Peru, and Julia put it on her bucket list to visit a weaving village in the Sacred Valley, the Inca Trail and  Machu Picchu.  That trip was supposed to occur during the year after Julia retired, but the pandemic shut down Peru's tourism economy in 2020.

In fact, the Inca Trail itself was shut down during the pandemic, and the jungle started to take the trail back.  Our guide told us that when hiking resumed, two porters died after separately being bitten by very poisonous snakes who normally avoid he trail.   

Inca Trail hiking slowly resumed in 2021 with just a few small groups.  Our guide told us that things were pretty much back to normal in 2022.  The government allows 200 hikers per day to start the four day trek to Machu Picchu.  By contrast, 5000 visitors per day are allowed to travel by train and bus to Machu Picchu. 

On September 24th, we drove to Chicago and took American Airlines to Dallas and then to Lima.  Our flights were perfectly on-time, and our luggage arrived safely.

 

 

We slept for a few hours at the hotel across from the Lima airport and then boarded a smaller domestic plane to Cusco, elevation 11,152 feet.  Here, our Peru adventure begins. 

Back from Peru

Yesterday was a very long travel day, starting at 3:30 a.m. in our Lima hotel, flying to Miami and then Chicago, and then driving back home, arriving at 10 p.m.  

But the time we spent in Peru met all of our expectations and more.  I'm beginning to organize my thoughts and the photos from our trip, and the blog will focus on that content for awhile.  

In real time, we will be moving Justin and all of his possessions tomorrow to his new apartment in Madison.  We had time for a short hike late this morning after retrieving Callie from the kennel.  

Hopefully, this weekend will be a time to decompress and put together the first post about the Peru trip.