Finally, a break! A break from 3 long days of bus travel through the Peruvian and Bolivian mountains and countryside, and a break from the cold mountain temperatures. We traveled almost 8 hours yesterday from La Paz to Cochabamba, and the ride took us from the Altiplano (3,650m above sea level) into the valley (2,574m). Man, what a difference! It is almost tropical here compared to the mountain climate we've been used to (warm days and cold nights!) In Cocha...

Another early morning wake up call to back up and leave Puno this morning. We caught a 7:30am bus that brought us across the Bolivian border (surprisingly easy), and landed us in Copacabana, Bolivia around 1130am. We had an hour stop over here for lunch - we had packed sandwiches so we had a picnic on the beach of Lake Titicaca. Copacabana maybe wasn't exactly what we were expecting, but the lake was beautiful. Around 1pm we got on another bus towards La Paz....

We said our goodbyes to Cuzco this morning and jumped on our TourPeru bus to Puno. It was an interesting 6 hour ride through rural Peru. We passed through a lot of small towns and so much farm land. It is amazing to see fields being turned either by hand or with 2 cows pulling a small plow. We saw a lot of sheep (don't worry, I didn't take any home with me), a lot of cows, and some wild dog packs. We were seated in the front row of the upper level of a dou...

The open concept hallway of our hostal served as the perfect amplifier for the rain at 2:30 in the morning. It was strong enough to wake us both and was the starting point for our projection of positive thoughts on to the weather for the day. When the alarm sounded two hours later, the rain was still bouncing off of the skylight roof. We quickly packed our belongings and ourselves with all of our waterproof gear. We finished our light breakfast in the lobby d...

All great adventures start with a few challenges. The planned journey to Machu Picchu was to include a bus ride followed by a train to Aguas Calientes. Although the four of us were ready and on time at the travel agency, they were not. The travel agent did not arrive but his Father did, holding a very young infant. After several nervous phone calls, a women arrived to open the doors to the travel agency. The Father quickly ran in and retrieved our train an...