psyching hawks

we survived.

we got back to cuzco yesterday after hiking thru the andes for 4 days. there are many words that describe the experience, some include... blood, sweat and snot.

i can say in all honesty, that the inca trail was the most difficult task i´ve ever put my body thru. it was very trying, but very rewarding. the first day was the easiest, but was by no means easy. we´d been told by our guide that day 2 was the hardest, and as we lied in our tent on the first night i feared the next day. i lied in the dark seriously asking myself what was i thinking, and what had i done by signing up. i didn´t say anything to jill, i didn´t want to upset her or burden her at all. so i prayed, i talked to God about all my fears and anxiety, and about my inability to meet the challenge ahead of me. i felt calmer after that, and when morning came i felt better. day 2 was just all climbing up, and with the altitude oxygen was scarce, plus there was a danger of getting altitude sickness (nausous, headaches, etc). we walked slowly, took frequent stops, listened to our ipods, and before we knew it we were at our first break. the rest of the day progressed similarly, and we quickly felt that it wasn´t as hard as we´d imagined, because we paced ourselves. i´d had visions of myself lying on the inca trail while weeping and vomitting, so i was quite relieved that i was managing ok. by the end of day two we were in good spirits, and managed the rest of the walk quite well.

how it worked was we basically walked for 2 hours, had a break, walked another 2, had lunch, walked 2, break, walked 2, end of day (tea time, followed by dinner) then in our tents sleeping by 8:30. along the way on days one and three we stopped at various old incan ruins while whats-his-face gave us a talk about the people who once lived there.

we had two guides. julio and whats-his-face. we would also sometimes call whats-his-face "julio´s friend" or "the other guy/guide". the funny thing is that "whats-his-face" was our main guide, while julio was just the sidekick and his role was just follow along at the end to make sure everyone was ok. whats-his-face did everything else, and inspite of our friendship with him, we actually went 4 days without knowing whats-his-faces" actual name. we´d sometimes ask someone, but they wouldn´t know either or we´d just forget because it was too hard to remember. on the 3rd night we lied in bed trying to come up with it, possibilities ranged from javier to jaffer to jhad to gerard, the list goes on. in the middle of the night i rolled over and said to jill... "jill? is his name.... j... jiar?" she said "yes! it is! it´s like giant ear, just without the nt". so that was our memory aid for the last day giant-ear = jiar! he was a really nice guy, funny, and fun. the only awkward part in our guide-guidee relationship was on the first night, while i was alone waiting for jill who was in the outhouse, he and i had a semi-lengthy conversation about whether or not i have a boyfriend, which ended with him telling me "you are a very special girl". hm, a bit of a conflict of interest.

there were 13 people in our group, 5 from norway, 4 from france, 2 from the usa, and jill & me from canada. the norwegians were hard-core hikers, the french didn´t speak much english, and we got to know the 2 from the states the best. they actually got engaged at the top of dead-woman´s pass (the highest point on the trek which is 13,830 ft above sea level), which is interesting because it was so freaking cold and wet up there at the time that it was snowing, but it makes for a neat memory.

during the trek our weather sucked. it rained almost every day, but cleared up a lot on the 3rd day, and was mostly dry on the 4th. that´s strange because it´s the dry season, but whats-his-face said the climate is changing and becoming unpredictable.

after spending 4 days with people who speak broken english our ability to speak our native tongue has disintegrated a little bit. it´s quite entertaining. actually, jill and i don´t lack entertainment, we were the most laughy people in our group and regularly had ourselves in stitches. she´s good company.

oh my goodness, i have so much more to say. but i´ve already extended my time on this computer 2 times, so i should wrap it up. more to come later for sure.

i really like peru. after returning to the city after the trek, jill and i feel quite at home here, we know our way around and have made friends who we saw in the square today. we´ve found a little cafe that we really like, and sat people-watching for a long time this afternoon. we leave for lima tomorrow, i´m both excited and a little sad to be moving on.

i brought you something close to me.