Cuzco part 2

This post will be short, because its finals week! I've been busy preparing a presentation on Peruvian food to be presented on Thursday (wish me luck!) I can't believe it is the final week of the program, so much has happened, and it still feels like I just got here. During the second week of our Cuzco trip, we spent a few days visiting various Incan ruins near Cuzco, including Machu Picchu. The visits were all sort of rushed, which was a bummer, but I think I'll visit a lot of the same things with Annie next week when we go back to Cuzco. For now, here are a few photos of some of the ruins/Machu Picchu!

After visiting Machu Picchu, we had a free day before going to Paru Paru and Parque de la Papa. We had a homestay for three nights with quechua-speaking families in a rural village. It was a lot of fun, although we were all cold most of the time because we were not told what to wear! We helped harvest potatoes, went for a long hike, and participated in a festival on the third day (complete with a llama sacrifice). It was a whirlwind of experiences, and very difficult to summarize, so I'll try to write more about it at a later time. For now, here are a few photos:

The house we stayed in

One of our dinners

Me in "traditional"garb...haha! Okay, that's all i have time for now! Love, Phoebe

Cuzco Trip part 1

Wow. This is going to be a difficult post to write, simply because so much has happened in the past two weeks! I'll start by saying that our trip to Cuzco was amazing. We not only went to Machu Picchu and other Inkan Ruins, we drove through mountains, hiked through the jungle, saw the most amazing night sky I'll probably ever see, ate potatoes, and oof, so much more!

Our trip began with a few nights in Andahuaylillas, which is a pretty small town in the mountains. We spent the first day relaxing and acclimating to the altitude. The next day we visited a few old churches, from the days of Spanish conquest. We couldn't really take pictures inside, but the images on the walls were beautifully painted. Here's a picture of one that's being restored.

The next day, a group of us decided to climb one of the nearby mountains before we moved on to Ocongate. We got up pretty early in the morning and managed to hike pretty high up, stopping a few times along the way for breakfast and photo ops. Here is a photo of the mountain we hiked:

We climbed all the way to the letters, here's the view:

After spending one night in Ocongate, we separated into two groups. My group went to Quincemil, which is over the mountains in the high jungle. We spent the day driving, stopping for a few hours in a mountain village learning how to use a knitting machine, loom, how to throw a pot, and then got to paint them! Unfortunately, my camera's batteries died pretty early in the day, and I could not find batteries ANYWHERE! that worked. During our stay in Quincemil, we conducted a few interviews with people in the town about the impact of the new highway (the Interoceanica) that runs from Peru into Brazil. The next morning, we left for a "four-hour hike" in the jungle, to go see an Artesinal Gold Mining area. I wrote that in quotes because, due to the conditions of our terrain, we were hiking for seven hours in total. Our trail was extremely muddy and by the time we got to the mine, our feet were weighed down by lots and lots of mud. We walked back along a riverbed, so we were able to get a lot of it off, but since we were in two groups, the second group bought boots before they set out. I'm in the green and black:

After the hike, we cleaned up and returned to Ocongate for a few nights, until the other group caught up. I will post later today/this week about part 2!

Trujillo

Wowwy, It has been a while longer than I'd have liked since my last post, but I'll make it worth your time! First of all, a shoutout to Pamela is necessary since she emailed me about the food I posted a picture of last time!! YAY PAMELA!!! Last weekend, we took a four day trip to Trujillo, which is on the northern coast, about an 8 hour drive from Lima. We took a very fancy overnight bus, which felt like a spaceship. In Trujillo, we stayed in the City Center, near the Plaza de Armas, which is kind of like a square park, with a fountain and lots of space for gatherings, etc. Here's a photo of one of the churches in the Plaza that I took one evening.

Half of our group stayed at a Fe y Alegría Training Hotel, which is a program with the schools that we visited during our first week..They also have training programs for young adults--housekeeping, cooking, factory work, car painting, and they also have two sites in the countryside, a farm and a vineyard. We spent a good portion of our trip visiting these sites, which was a surprise to us, but ultimately a worthwhile endeavor! Here are a few photos:

First of all, they gave us awesome vests and hats to wear during out tours to the various sites. We felt a lot like elementary students on a field trip

Artsy shot from the shoe factory

These are the Guinea Pigs we worked with during our afternoon at the farm site. We spent an hour or so beforehand collecting Alfalfa from the fields to feed them! (And later, they fed some of us...I passed!)

Here's a photo of us looking for caterpillars in the asparagus plants, which was my groups morning activity..it was fun!! We also went to the Vineyard one day, but I was feeling pretty crummy so I slept in the bus during the tour. Here's a photo of the vineyard taken by a friend (thanks Facebook!)

The second part of the trip involved visiting the Temples of the Sun and Moon and Chan Chan, which are both pretty ancient ruins. The Sun and Moon are much much older, from the Moche people, who lived between 100AD and 800AD (WOW!!) Here are a few photos from the Temple of the Sun (Huaca del Sol):

And here are some of Chan Chan (which was built by the Chimu around AD 850 and lasted until its conquest by the Inca Empire in AD 1470):

YAYYY, Teo, I found the Fish!! Okay, that's it for now. I'll post again (sooner) with an update about my volunteer work in El Agustino. We leave for Cusco on Sunday, so I'll try to do it before then! I miss you, and love you all! Happy MAY!!!