As our taxi driver approached our new hostel, he warned that the area can be dangerous at night. Hostel Piuray was a couple of blocks past the edge of the Centro Historico, but we had booked it partly for this reason, and because the online ratings were good and mentioned pancakes for breakfast.

When we checked in the owner Aydee was really lovely, allowing us to choose our room. She mentioned one had a new mattress so we took that. Aside from a few passing trains in the evening it was nice and quiet, so Fergus was able to get some more sleep, still not feeling well. Aydee made him some coca tea to try and alleviate the altitude effects.

We hung out in our room for a few hours trying to give Fergus some recovery time before we left for our Inca Trail trek in a couple of days. Unfortunately though we did have to venture out later in the day so we could pay the balance of our tour and collect our tickets to climb Huaynapicchu, one of the mountains overlooking Machu Picchu.

Our first stop was the office of the Cultural Ministry where we went to collect our tickets for Huaynapicchu. When we handed our reservation confirmation to the guy, he told us that our reservation was invalid because you had to pay for it online within 4 hours of booking! Unfortunately we hadn't seen this bit of information, and the tickets were all gone.

A little bit upset that we were missing out on this we then went to the Peru Treks office to pay our trek balance. After handing over an awful lot of money, they told us they wouldn't pick us up from our hostel as it was too far away. We were not pleased at this news, and in the end they gave us money for a taxi to their office. We were then given a briefing of what to expect on the trail, what we should pack, etc.

We then decided to grab some dinner on the way home. We stopped in at a pub overlooking the main square called Norton's, even though we didn't feel like drinking we had heard they have good food. Fergus ordered a burger and Lindsay a vegetarian burrito. Fergus' burger was ok aside from a real tasteless patty, but Lindsay's burrito was barely edible. Sometimes eating can be really hit and miss!

The next morning we set off to get some essentials for the Inca trail. Fergus needed new sunglasses as his were being held together with super glue and electrical tape, plus we needed socks, snacks, sunscreen, a poncho and the like. These tasks took us quite a bit longer than we hoped, and by the time we got back to the hostel, made dinner, packed and got into bed we ended up not having as much sleep was we would have liked before our early morning start for the Inca Trail, but we were a little excited anyway!

LAPFWT