Watery times

I have been passing watery times lately, which might sound a bit off, but let me explain. Last weekend I finally went to Machu Picchu, the world famous Inca excavation site in the mountains surrounding Cusco. The company was: Roy and Juan Carlos (friends who I met through Andrea, my host family sister) and Mario, Roy’s brother. After going out on Friday night, none of us had very high energy levels and instead of our original plan of leaving Cusco at 11.00, we left a few hours later. On our way to Ollantaytambo (the village from where the train to Aguas Calientes- the village of Machu Picchu - leaves). On our way we stopped to see a friend and by night we arrived to Ollantaytambo, where we first saw the heavy rain that would faithfully stay with us for the rest of the weekend. That night we agreed to be out of the hostel before 6 the next morning to go to Machu Picchu. That turned out to be harder than expected since the guys had decided to buy a bottle of rum and finish that between the three of them (I was smart enough to pass). In the end we were out by seven and for some reason decided to not take the bus up to Machu Picchu but to go walking. Already after only 15 minutes of climbing the steep stairs in the rain we all fiercely regretted that decision. One and a half exhausting hours of rain and feeling-bad-ness later we arrived at the entrance. Kind of disappointing because the rain and clouds, mist, made that we could barely see anything of the surroundings – that what you always see on the photos. And it kept on raining. The good company however made up for it and we still had fun but still, my advice for everyone: if you want to go to Machu Picchu, do it outside of the rainy season! Oh and advice number two is to bring enough cash cause we didn’t and then the two ATMs in the town turned out not to work. Creatively and intelligently we solved that problem till the next one came up: the train back. I already had my ticket for 15.30 but the guys couldn’t buy it for that time cause it was already full. Also solved that and changed my time to the next one: 22.30 which meant that we had lots of time to kill in a village with rain, cold and wet, and no place to stay. Again, genius as we are, solved that and slept in a hostel room that afternoon.

That was watery adventure number one. Number two happened this morning when I was woken up by Lucho knocking on my door – after which I opened my eyes and the floor seemed kind of shiny, but I wasn’t wearing my contacts so I couldn’t see why. That was figured out fast enough though when I stepped out of my bed and into bout 2/3 centimeters of water. Turned out that I, but honestly I think a friend that I had over the evening before, had left open a tab and since they cut off the water at night, probably forgot to close it again. So it had been open for half the night. After about an hour of cleaning and taking out all the soaked stuff that I had left on the floor (almost electrocuting myself by touching the plug), Lucho and Rossana went up to prepare some breakfast and I entered the bathroom to get ready. After which the door wouldn’t open. Great, just what I needed after the whole swimming pool situation. Luckily Lucho came to free me not too long after and even though my intuition told me to stay in bed to not attract more bad luck, I left to my work in Inca Educa and hopefully will survive the rest of the day.

NP photos will follow, if the internet is willing to work with me!