It didn´t take long to sleep off Salkantay before we´d arranged to meet up with Callum and Tom the ´British lads´ from Rio. They were so keen they transferred to our hostel when they heard we were in Cuzco and even took us out for sushi. As if we hadn't done enough walking, we decided to climb to the top of the city where another big Jesus stood looking out over spectacular views. We took this as another opportunity to take our clothes off because you only live once... except this time we weren't as hidden away as we thought and earnt a cringey round of applause. The boys weren't complaining at playing photographer. We dodged past the aggressive dogs and treated ourselves to ice cream and great animal hats before settling into Paddy's, apparently the highest Irish pub in the world - another cultural experience. We started the night young and were privileged enough to see Callum's rendition of 'the llama song', complete with hand actions. Tom made the investment of an animal horn instrument which he used to assemble us for the rest of the evening. Tom was great with his horn and kept everyone happy.
After investing in a big bottle of what may or may not have been rum, we had a BBQ and beers at the rooftop bar of Milhouse. Carlos came to join us and we played drinking games in the dorm room (and some in the bathroom) before heading out to Wild Rover hostel for a bit of gringo pregaming.
The party bus was waiting to take us to the club, basically a taxi bus with no roof, so we danced our way to Temple only stopping to duck from the police. The club was pretty huge and played all the chart tunes we love and miss. Phoebe took the first chance she got to drag Beccy up on a podium, but got in a little fight with a girl who'd already claimed it as her own so we were viciously pushed to the floor! Phoebe telling her 'nobody wants to see you dance' had nothing to do with it. The night unravelled as it always does, Alice joined in dancing on the bar and Sarah ended up behind the bar giving away free drinks. Standard.
We said yet another hungover farewell to Callum and Tom and made our way to the bus station for what would be Sarah and Alice's last overnight bus to Lima for their flight home. After a cheeky Starbucks in Lima three, who became four, finally became two as Beccy and Phoebe left the girls to catch another overnight bus to Mancora. Hasta luego chicas, it's' been muy chevere!

40 short hours later we arrived in Mancora, a beach town on the north coast of Peru, to find sunshine, surfers and mucho sexy bartenders at Loki hostel. Loki is more of a resort than a hostel, right on the beach with a huge pool and a party atmosphere. After however many weeks of non-stop activities (we are action babes after all) we were so excited to just lie down for a few days! And that's what we did, alternating our days between the beach and the pool, drinking rum slushies and eating paella and ceviche, only leaving Loki to visit Angela's, a vegetarian cafe with incredibly good food. Not to let the team down though we championed at beer pong, rum pong and table tennis, and spent our nights dancing on tables, partying on the beach and skinnydipping, obviously.
Our bus to Montanita in Ecuador wasn't until 11pm so our last day at Loki was spent being taught chess, watching the amazing windsurfers, and having a sing along with Oran and his guitar on the beach at sunset.

Montanita is famed to be more of a party town than Mancora, but we really only went as it's close to Puerto Lopez where it's whale season! Spent our first day wandering the streets drinking heavenly juices from the street vendors and looking at all the hippy stalls that lined the pavement. The weather was dire so the beach wasn't much of a draw, so we spent most of our time eating (standard). We met Andres at one of our food stops, a lovely Colombian who had quit his job and sold his car to come travelling, a man after our own hearts, and went to find a tour company to take us all on a whale watching trip the next day.

We got up bright and early and after a hearty French toast and fruit breakfast found our minivan that was to take us to Puerto Lopez, a quiet fishing town about an hour north of Montanita. We thought we'd be getting straight on a boat but instead they whisked us away in the van to what they promised was the most beautiful beach in South America, for two hours. It wasn't. It was cloudy and raining and deserted, but Andres got stuck in, stripped down to his trunks and took off swimming lengths of the cove in the freezing water (or so we assumed), what a hero. We finally persuaded the driver to take us back to Puerto Lopez so we could at least have a coffee while we waited for our boat at 12. Before we knew it we were being led to our 'yacht' (definitely just a boat), the rain had stopped and the pelicans were out in their masses. The sea was rough to say the least, and for a stomach churning half hour we bumped our way across the waves in search of humpbacks. It was the beginning of the season so we'd been warned the whales would be quite placid, but when we saw the first few we realised the whole trip had been worth it. They were huge, longer than our boat by far, and so graceful and beautiful. They surfaced right beside the boat and then dived right underneath us, waving with their enormous tails. We lost count of how many we saw but we could have stayed watching them all day. Then just as we were about to head for shore we really saw what all the fuss was about. A huge humpback jumped square out of the water, twisting in the air and crashing back down right beside the boat, sending us rocking back and forth in awe. The trip back seemed nothing after that, we even saw some of the Galapagos' own blue footed Boobies along the edge of the cliffs. We arrived back in Montenita loving life and telling everyone we met that we saw a whale do a flip in the air.

Still on a whale high we met up with some of our pals from Mancora, played a round of lost in Israeli translation ring of fire, and headed for cocktail alley, a street lined with makeshift cocktail bars. We joined a team of gringos whose aim was to drink one bar dry, don't remember if we succeeded but the night was a blur of dancing after that, the Israelis can almost keep up with us Brits!
We left the hippy magic of Montaninta the next day on one of the most hellish bus rides we'd been on since arriving in South America, but arrived safe and sound, if a little dazed, in Baños.