Today we were up bright and early ready for our home stay in a small village called Raqchi.

We left Cusco around 8am on our new truck-Cindy! Not as cool as Elle but she did the trick!

When we arrived a group of local ladies met us.They were all dressed in traditional clothing and all wearing funny hats!

Myself, Nikkie, Dee and Vicky were introduced to an older lady who then led us to her home which was down a long path and up a rocky hill! It was cute though, made from mud bricks and there was a cow in the garden!

The ladies daughter and grand-daughter who was only two maybe three were there when we arrived. We split up into two rooms and myself and Nikkie made ourselves at home in our room whilst Dee and Vicky went to theirs. Then it was time for lunch! Bean,onion and chilli salad (eek) followed by soup then meat and potatoes ( I say meat because I'm not entirely sure what it was, the cow however was still moo-ing in the garden! Phew!)

After our 3course lunch we headed back to the main square and met the rest of the group ready to be shown around some unique inca ruins and then have a pottery demonstration at one of the ladies homes.

They make all kinds of pottery themselves, plates, bowls etc and they make them so quickly!! One of the ladies showed us how they were made first and then Kelly and Neilo had a go -they were pretty good! I would have been useless!

Afterwards we had free time before we went back to our homes for dinner. We decided to go to a cafe and have hot drinks-worst hot chocolate in the world!! Bless them!! Felt bad but it was grim!!

Dinner was another interesting 3course occasion and afterwards we were given these traditional outfits...I actually loved mine!! It was all sparkly and full of sequins!! My hat was annoying it was like having a giant frisbee on your head but the skirt would hide a cake belly anyday!! It was a right heavy puffball job!!

Once we were all dressed we headed about half an hour across the village in the dark to another house where we met the rest of the group (thankfully dressed like us!!) the evening was really cool, they started with a traditional ceremony which was about making offerings to the mountains and Pachamama (mother earth)

We were all given two coca leaves and one by one we got up, made wishes, blew on our leaves and put them in these pots. It's known as an act of love/thanksgiving and gratitude.Once everyone had finished, the leaves were burnt and buried in the ground.It was a cool experience and interesting to see!

After the ceremony the party started! A cute old man was singing and playing his guitar and we all had to dance in partners! I was with Nikkie and we soon livened the place up and decided just to dance like crazy people! The local ladies loved it and found us highly amusing!! We also tried some local beer which was warm, it's only like 3% and it tasted like warm apple juice! It was quite nice!!

Then it was back to our homes for bed! Although when we got there the grandma had fallen asleep and the door was locked! her daughter (who had taken us to the ceremony) had to throw stones at the windows hehe it took her like 15minutes to wake her up!! Highly amused!!

The next morning the little girl was up bright and early and so were we! She was hyper and we gave her some balloons to play with which she loved! She only had like 2/3 toys which was quite sad :-( she was adorable!! And she didn't want us to go!

Breakfast was huge again! (these peruvians eat well!) and then it was time to say thank you and goodbye. We headed to the square to meet everyone else and all our mums (thats what we called them!) gave us gifts :-) really cute of them! (But unfortunately mine has now been robbed!!!) They were still laughing and dancing at me and Nikkie! They loved our moves!!

Then it was back on the truck and on the road again...