It was well after dark on Thursday 5 April when our train finally arrived in Aguas Calientes train station, the end of the line. We had learned on the journey that there may only be a limited number of entrance tickets to Machu Picchu per day, so we immediately headed to the ticket office. Fortunately we were able to get tickets without any trouble. Next we walked to the bus station (still with all our things) to buy tickets for the bus to the ruins. Only then di...

So it turns out that "direct bus" doesn't mean much around here. We ended up having to change busses twice - the second time in the pouring rain?? We eventually arrived in Cusco latebit in the evening on Tuesday 3 April. The bus terminal was a crazy, but we managed to get a taxi to the main plaza. By that stage we were both starving so we were quite stoked to find a not-too-expensive italian restaurant just off the plaza. After supper, we got another taxi to o...

It was 2:30 am on Monday 2 April and we were both wide awake - a sure sign that we were back at altitude (about 4000m.) To make things worse it was freezing cold, even with two thick blankets and a duvet we were struggling to keep warm. After a bit of a sleep-in, we strolled down to the lake for lunch. The lake is really big btw - it feels like you are at the sea only without any waves. We were also surprised at how many tourists there were :-/ - it looked liked ...

Ahh, the much anticipated Santa Cruz... let me explain: A while back we met an Aussie couple that told us about this Bolivian city, but more importantly the hostel they stayed at which had a tame pet toucan. I (Monique) got myself so excited about the possibility of playing with the orginal Toucan Sam but as the days ticked on we realised that we were running out of time and we didn`t think we would be able to make it to Santa Cruz as it involved traveling East f...

We were woken from our uncomfortable sleep by the shout of "Kevin, Samaipata!" It was just after 4am on Tuesday 27 March and it was pitch dark, freezing cold and drizzling outside - a fitting end to the worst bus journey we had yet undertaken. We were hurried off the bus, where we waited outside a 1-pump petrol station for about 30 minutes to get a taxi to our hostal, La Posada del Sul, about 5 minutes drive out of town. We then waited outside for another 2 hours...