Hello from Iguazu National Park where we are spending the last couple of nights before heading home. We have had a spectacular storm this morning and we sat in bed earlier watching the lightening over the waterfalls.

We left the Sacred Valley and caught the Vistadome train to Machu Picchu. The journey was memorable and we met a fun gay couple from Sao Paulo on the train and spent a bit of time with them over the next two days. One was an English translator and his English was better than ours…I always feel that being humourous in a foreign language is a measure of ability and he was hilarious! The other guy was a consultant haematologist working in bone marrow transplantation who seemed to spend most of his working life attending foreign conferences!! They were welcome and interesting company. There is little I can write about Machu Picchu….it is, quite simply, one of the most moving places we have ever visited. We went later in the afternoon when everybody had pretty much gone and were back in the park the minute it opened at 6am the next day to watch the sunrise. The photos say it all.

From MP we went back on the train to Cusco. The weather on the first day was cold and wet. Actually, it was very cold and I even had my gloves on. We covered quite a lot of this enchanting city but felt we weren´t seeing it in its true light. The meal out that evening was, again, nothing short of outstanding. Peru is the place to visit if you want consistently high quality cuisine. Pay little or a bit more…..it doesn´t change the experience. The next day dawned bright and sunny and we ambled all over the city soaking up a real sense of Inca history. There are remnants of an Inca settlement that the Spanish did their best to destroy by building a large cathedral and monastery on top of it but the Incas knew how to build and the walls of their buildings have survived endless earthquakes and are still visible today. The quality of the masonry is awesome. The city also has a very large holistic community with Shamans, yoga retreats and every therapy imaginable. The streets are a real mix of artisan workshops, therapy clinics, tatty, tourist goods, dodgy massage parlours, shops selling religious paintings and icons, truly breathtaking tapestries and food. Cusco is unashamedly a tourist mecca but rightly so. We had some problems with the altitude but the city just kept on pulling us to see more. On the last morning we watched an enormous parade and display celebrating the Peruvian Police. It was a very weird thing involving thousands of police…..mounted, riot, dog, terrorist, patrol cars, police with bayonets, police with swords…….and hundreds of children in scary mini police outfits. Yep, quite strange.

From there we overnighted at Sao Paulo airport before heading here, to Igauzu. This is our big treat and we are staying at the only hotel in the National Park. We have a view of the falls from our bed! The falls throw 2 million litres a second into the abyss and are very extensive. We had a great time yesterday getting very wet indeed. Today we had thought of going over to the Argentinian side but it´s a long journey and immigration can be a pain, especially if there are any Americans on the bus! (You´d think it would be the Brits but it isn´t!) So, with the storm forecast, we have decided to stay put. Our package includes deep tissue massage at the spa and that´s what we´ll be doing this afternoon.

We leave tomorrow for Sao Paulo and then home on Weds overnight. We can put some MP photos up but are, once again, having issues with the camera being read by the computers. We put the MP ones on a stick the other day and so can read those. If we get it sorted then we´ll put a last few up of Cusco and Iguazu. If not, then we´ll bore you with those when we get back………………..oh, Paul´s just come back from asking at reception and the guy there worked in IT in the UK for 7 years and he´s sorted it all out so photos to follow!!

Yesterday we received a message with a photo attached of Beth, sitting in my washing basket in our garden, and it felt time to head home. J and P xxx