The Next Adventure

As the title of this blog implies, I'm bound for Latin America in 2 days hence. You can tell I've been brushing up on my Latin in preparation for this trip. Or at least my Old English. I think they are more or less the same. They do speak Latin in Latin America, right?

Nailed It.

My specific target destination, assuming I board the correct plane, and assuming the pilot flies the correct route, is Peru. Itinerary as follows:

Friday Morning - 6:00 AM. Board Taxi. Pick up Katherine Sheriff (my travel buddy on this sojourn) en route to airport.
9:00 AM - board plane
9:03 AM - fall back asleep

Friday Night - very late PM. Arrive in Lima, the Peruvian Capital, where we'll have a day to explore/get-mugged before meeting our Gap Adventures group Saturday evening.

Sunday Morning - very early AM. Again. Ugh. Board a plane to Cuzco, the ancient Incan Capital, where we'll have a couple days to explore the scenic city, visit Ollantaytambo and the Incan Sacred Valley, and generally acclimatize to the 9000 foot elevation.

Tuesday Morning - probably very early again, we set off on the Inca Trail to endure, I mean, enjoy 4 days of hiking on an ancient Incan Highway through the Peruvian Andes mountains, cresting on the 2nd day at almost 14,000 feet, before arriving at Machu Picchu. If my math is right, and there's no guarantees it is, we'll arrive Friday morning at said highlight destination. This has been on my bucket list since I first heard about it, and about bucket lists, and is spectacular enough that I decided it warranted finally buying a real camera. Real as in point-and-shoot digital, but at least no more cell phone camera.

Friday/Saturday - back to Cuzco for some R&R.

Sunday - Off to Puerto Maldonado, where we'll board a motorized canoe (seriously) and head deep into the Amazon Rainforest for some jungle adventures, including piranha fishing (seriously). I recently watched a documentary about the creatures that live in the Amazon river. Until then I had no idea that a shock from an electric eel can actually travel through water and stun a full grown alligator several feet away. Keep in mind that you can't see much in the muddy water, and electric eels are certainly not the worst thing that lives in it. I think if I so much as put a hand in the river, I'll have surpassed sky-diving for stupidest thing I've done. Have no idea what kind of wild life, native tribes, poisonous plants, and creepy-crawling bug things we'll find on land either. Wish us luck!

Tuesday - Assuming we survive the rainforest, it's another flight back to Lima for our last night. We bid farewell to our tour group in the morning, having 1 more day to explore/incite riots before boarding an overnight flight home.

Thursday - noonish. Arrive Calgary.

This will be by far the most rustic trip I've done yet, so I can't say for sure how often I'll get on here to post an update, but I'll do what I can. It's also the most ill-prepared I've been for a big trip, having to move twice in the last 8 weeks was a bit of a distraction. Fortunately, it's only 2 weeks and all just 1 big leg with the same group instead of my usual 4-5 week, multi-leg adventures, so it should be manageable. But I didn't get to do much research and prepare a TODO list like I usually do. Here's what I've got so far:

• Lima - see Mira Flores, avoid violence
• Cuzco - sounds like a cool place to just hang out and stroll the streets
  
• touch the Amazon River
• Fish for piranhas
• Eat said piranhas
• Eat a guinea pig
• Eat an alpaca
• Drink Coca leaf tea
• Not get sick
• Maybe, just maybe, I'll get lucky and see a Peruvian Condor too, but we're not getting to the spots where that usually happens.
  

Anything else I should attempt to partake of?