cuzco 1st day

my cheeks are on fire!!!! but more on that later.

first off, correction: cebiche/ceviche is made with lime juice, not lemon.

also, i forgot to mention but it appears it's practically impossible to get pulled over by a cop in lima. our cab driver even honked at a cop, and nothing!

also, last night we had chicha morada which is a sweet drink made from purple corn. there's also another chicha which is made from fermented corn, fermented by spit. i don't plan on having that.

okay, so we got up nice and early at 6:30 am this morning to catch our flight to cuzco. it was pretty straightforward and we were even able to bring water on the flight so we didn't dehydrate. they also fed us some snacks of mini muffins and chocolate. as soon as we landed, i could tell when the plane doors opened and let in the "natural" air. i had on both my backpacks and was sitting on the armrest, and suddenly everything felt heavier. apparently, there is less than 50% less oxygen in the air here than at sea level. we weren't huffing and puffing or anything, but man did my limbs feel heavy. also, i think my heart is beating faster. mostly, i get the same weird sensation when i've swallowed a huge vitamin and it's like stuck in my esophagus. i just have trouble swallowing or something. however, now my face is like on fire. you know how all the photos of the highlanders show people with bright red cheeks? well i'm apparently turning into them or something. and it ain't from the sun.

anyways, so we arrived around 11 am and got picked up and dropped off at the casona les pleiades in san blas, which is unfortunately on a hill. getting up this hill from the main plaza is hard. and it's all cobblestone. i hate cobblestone. it's awful on your feet and super slippery. i saw two poor burros being driven down a steep hill by a muleteer, and i was so afraid one would slip.

another thing we noticed. while lima had a very similar look and feel to mexico city and the yucatan, cuzco definitely felt more like the small towns we hit in extremadura, spain. quaint with cobblestones.

so we were immediately served some coca tea when we arrived at our hotel and sat around in the courtyard for a while. finally we were let into our room and just laid in bed for a few hours. i'm not sure if i actually fell asleep, but we both had to jump out of bed every 30 minutes or so and pee. not sure if that's the altitude or the coca. all i know is the first time i jumped up i nearly ate shit and fell. kinda loopy i guess. oh and the hotel is super cute. i'll have to post photos later. it's all natural woods and pretty new and modern.

so at around 3ish, we finally decided to head out, mostly cuz we were hungry. we also found out the owners of the hotel are on vacation and won't be back till tomorrow afternoon. that kinda sucks since i was hoping to have someone recommend stuff for us. a bit disappointing.

anyways, the lady at the front recommended some place we couldn't find, so we then decided to head to peru treks and finalize our trek. the lady at the front had to run out somewhere to xerox our passports, and i guess she really rushed cuz she came back totally out of breath. i felt bad for her. she looked like she was about to puke. i guess the locals have some problems too.

the stupid trek place was closed for siesta so we had to sit around for a while. then at 4 they reopened and we took care of all that stuff. by then we were starving. we'd only had bread and jam for breakfast and then the few snacks on the plane. we tried to go to this one restaurant they recommended, but they weren't serving food till 6:30. finally we ended up at inka grill, which was super fancy and totally full of rich old white people. i've never felt so yuppie or white, but unfortunately it was practically the only place serving dinner at that point. peruvians eat dinner really late like 8 or 9 pm.

i should mention i got to pet a baby alpaca! there were two super traditionally-dressed women with babies on their backs standing on some corner, and one had a baby alpaca. so i sat down with the two and nick took a photo. unfortunately i gave one of the ladies a tip thinking they worked together. of course, as soon as i paid, she ran off and the other lady stood there clearly waiting for hers. i barely had any change left so i felt all crappy. then again, they probably do it on purpose and pretend not to know each other so they get more. who knows. it was awkward though.

with that said, i ate alpaca for dinner! i had three alpaca medallions with quinoa (this local grain like cous-cous). it was pretty good actually. kinda like beef i guess but more gamey. nick had aji de gallina which was chicken strips in a creamy aji pepper sauce. also very good. after we ate it, we were both like, it seems really familiar. then it hit me. he ordered that exact same dish at this new peruvian restaurant in LA near where we live. he says the one he had tonight was a little better. it's supposed to be a very traditional dish. for dessert we had ponderaciones con manjar de yemas, which was a crispy spiral cookie in a condensed milk sauce topped with vanilla ice cream. again, very good. i had inka kola and nick had orange fanta. it doesn't taste like the stuff in the US or Spain, more diety. nick wants me to mention the music in the place was totally lame.

also, massages are all the rage for tourists here. it's kinda indecent, like chicks on the corner ask you if you want "2-for-1 massages."

so now that i've eaten alpaca, we are going to an alpaca farm tomorrow to pet them :)

nick believes that the alpaca can sense his kin in the stomach of another, a realization which often provokes an intense existential dread. we'll see if i get spit on tomorrow.

lastly, both of us can't remember shit today. we both couldn't remember where we put our hotel key. i hope i'm closer to normal tomorrow. and as much as nick may like my flaming cheeks, i wish they would return to a more normal hue.