Machu Picchu

Machu Picchu Log (2008-07-11 --> 2008-08-03)

Leaders: Alex Cullen and Molly Damm

Students: Hadley Henry, Ali Herman, Nancy Holmes, Andrew McConnell, Fraser Parker, Raphael Shejnberg, Alex Shin, Adele Walter, Christian Wash, Henry Weatherly

We apologize for the delay, but communication is tough here.  Hope you enjoy hearing what a great time we are having.

Trip Update 7-16-08

Greetings friends and family,

After a smooth arrival into Lima followed by a short flight to Cusco, the Peruvian Moondance team was fully united and our trip began. We spent our only night in Cusco preparing for our rafting section - which left the following morning, exploring the city, and eating a delicious lunch and dinner at two local restaurants. It should be noted that the pizza at El Tunki is possibly the best pie in town. After a good Moon-Up session, everyone finished packing their bags for the river and climbed into bed for a good nights sleep.

We left for the Apurimac River at 8 am. The road was long - 5 hrs - but the tunes were jammin´ and the views of the mountains and valleys were spectacular, giving everyone their first taste of the beauty of the Peruvian countryside. We ate a solid lunch by the river, which danced and gleamed under the mid-day sun. Soon our wet-suits were on and we were all aboard our giant blue plastic boats, heading into the canyon.

The first day of rafting was mellow. A good day to practice our paddling strokes and get used to being out on the water. We arrived at camp and soon we had a beautiful fire raging. We sat around the fire for hours, telling stories, playing games, eating dinner, and sharing a great Moon-Up, where we discussed our greatest fears - a topic chosen by our first two leaders of the day - Adele and Raphael.

We slept blissfully, below an almost full moon and a sky full of stars, and awoke to a Delicious breakfast of fruit salad, yogurt, granola, bread, jam, and tea. Yummy!!! Following breakfast, we began what may prove to be the most important group activity of the trip - playing ridiculous, yet amazingly fun, games. On this fine morning, we busted out Dip-dip-dip and Big Booty, two games that have long been a part of the Moondance repertoire, and within minutes the entire group became a wild ball of excited voices at echoed through the 1,000 ft deep canyon. Henry and Christian lead the charge, jumping up and down as they progressed towards multiple victories. The whole group was yelling and laughing and only one day later, these games have already become an integral part of this trip.

This day was our full day on the river and it was amazing. Class 3, 4, and 5 rapids. Big waves and white-water and splashing and laughing and swimming in the smooth sections. We walked around 3 rapids that were too dangerous to run, climbing over rocks and battling the fierce river mosquitoes, but most of the day was spent in the water, paddling through narrow straits and gazing up at water-polished rock formations that could have been pulled from a Dalí painting. The sun found its way into the canyon around 10 am and it was a glorious moment, but not nearly as glorious as the pasta and vegetable feast that some people called lunch but that others called ´Heaven´. Guacamole, cucumbers, hard boiled eggs, tomatoes, carrots, onions, fried chicken, cheese, fried yucca . . . . . . I have seen the light!!!! We took our overflowing bowls of healthy goodness and climbed up a giant rock sculpture and sat, in peace, and enjoyed one of the best lunches in the history of the world, according to Fraser and my high-school text book.

Following lunch . . . . you guessed it . . . . GAME TIME!!!! Again, we filled the canyon walls with our joyous laughter and, again, Henry and Christian dominated the pack until Nancy made a sweet drive to the basket and took over a game of Dip-dip-dip.

The front of the boat is the most important position. They set the paddling pace and receive the bulk of the splashing water. Ali and Raphael took the helm in Molly´s boat while Andrew and Nancy headed up Alex´s. Daniel, the captain of our river adventure, said that he had never lead a trip with people this young, but that he loved working with them and that they paddled better than most of the 20-somethings that he normally takes down the river. ´They are good listeners, ´ he said, ´and when you are on the river, this is very important.´

Soon after lunch, we reached La Mesa, the table - a campsite named for a large flat rock in the middle of the beach. We began to set-up tents and unpack our dry-bags when Rambito, one of our guides, called out ¨Condor!!!¨ and we all followed his gaze up into the sky. There, circling the mountain peaks above us, were a pair of condors. Their flight was mesmerizing, never flapping their giant wings, they soared thousands of feet above us, floating in the sky. Slowly, evening drifted into night and we sat in a circle playing Mafia and sipping cinnamon hot cocoa and munching on popcorn and cookies and wafers. Somewhere during the evening, a large gust of wind carried my (Alex´s) brand new thermarest into the river. As it blew by, Hadley cried out, ¨That’s a thermarest! ¨, and without a moment of hesitation, she ran into the water and saved it. For this amazing and heroic feat, I am eternally grateful. A scrumptious pasta dinner was followed by a camp fire and the classic marshmallow roast was in full force. It should be noted that Peruvian marshmallows taste like piña coladas and that due to this somewhat poor choice of artificial flavoring the last 4 mallows were thrown into the fire where their destruction proved more enjoyable than their taste.

This night, our Leaders of the Day - Ali and Alex, chose a great Moon-Up topic, if you could meet anyone from past or present time, who would it be and why. The answers and conversation that this topic generated were great, and kept us all quietly talking around the fire deep into the night.

Morning Light!!!!!! Pancakes!!!!!!! Jam!!!!!! Another delicious breakfast and we were back on the river, starting with Wake Up, a class four rapid that lived up to its name. The other rapids were incredible, including one more class 5, and by mid-day we had reached our take-out and were soon sitting down to another wonderful meal. Everyone changed into dry clothes and we piled, tired and happy, into the bus for the 2 hour drive back to Cusco.

Tonight, we head to Excel Language School to talk through the coming week of classes and community service, and then the home stays families will come to the school to pick-up their new children. Everyone is very excited about this section of the trip, about the chance to become emerged in Peruvian culture and get a chance to speak in Spanish with their families. A new adventure awaits . . . . . .

-Molly and Alex

 Trip Update 7-21-08

 Just touching base from Peru. Internet access is tough.  We just finished our homestay section and spent all day on a bus from Cusco to Puno.  Other than that, everyone is doing great and having a blast.  We are all doing well and are too busy having fun and traveling to post the log. Molly and I will write a complete log on Friday, when we return from Lake Titicaca.

-Alex

 Trip Update 7-24-08

Dearest Friends and Family of the Peru Crew,

Greetings from Puno on the shores of dazzling Lake Titicaca, where I am here to give y'all the latest on the happenings of our amazing Peru adventure.  We have just finished almost a week of magical days spent in the bustling city of Cusco, also known as the ¨navel of the world¨, for its vital location as the capital of the Inca Civilization.  Our time in Cusco was busy and rewarding, filled with the kind of bright eyes and huge grins that come with helping others and being immersed in a totally new culture for the first time. Here is a glimpse of how it all unfolded...

Our first night back in Cusco from whitewater rafting, we headed down to Excel Language school to take a placement test for Spanish classes and most importantly, to meet our host families for the next week! Before the families arrived, there was an understandable bit of nervousness mixed in with the excitement..Questions such as, what will my family be like?, and if they don't speak English, how will we communicate? Seemed to flutter through the night air.., but as soon as the mothers or fathers came to pick up their two new sons or daughters, all apprehension seemed to slip away as fears were calmed by the incredibly kind and welcoming Peruvian greetings the parents gave to the students. And we were off like a flash! Hugs goodnight to everyone with plans to meet in the morning to walk together to Spanish school...

Our first true day in Cusco dawned cool and bright, with the promise of a hot sun slowly peeking up over the horizon...Cusco is famous in this season (their winter, our summer) for gorgeous warm, blue sky days and freezing cold nights as soon as the sun disappears, due to its high altitude up in the mountains. It is the sort of place where you always need to be ready for the temperature to soar or plummet, depending on your location in relation to that of the suns! Anyway, this morning we journeyed together into the center of town to begin Spanish classes and to hear about everyone’s first nights and first impressions of their Peruvian families. Everyone seemed to be full of stories and laughter, and really happy to have been taken in so warmly to their new homes and to already have connected with their host parents, brothers, or sisters, despite any language barriers. One delicious thing to learn was that Adele and Christians host mother is a pastry chef!! mmmm.... 

So after the morning of Spanish, which was a review for whizzes like Ali, Andrew, and Alex, we headed back up home to have lunch with our individual families. In Peru, and in most South American countries, lunch, or almuerzo, is the largest and most important meal of the day.  Parents and children (sometimes grandparents, cousins, aunts, friends, etc!) come home from school or work around 1 pm to sit, relax, chat, and enjoy a hearty meal with their families...We fit right into this schedule, and loved the typical Peruvian soup, along with some sort of meat, rice, potatoes, vegetables, and desert! That fills the hungry mid-day belly...After lunch was time to meet up again to head up to the community of Tica-Tica to begin our service project.  For the next 4 days, we would be spending the afternoons at a Community center in an after-school program for children in a very poor neighborhood located in the hills around Cusco.  From the minute that our kids met the 25-30 children who frequent the center, it was clear that the time we spent there would be a very powerful experience for everyone. It was very beautiful and touching to be able to stand on the sidelines for a moment amidst the whirlwind of children, and watch the instant connections and friendships that formed.  Whether it was Fraser sitting with a table full of kids teaching them to draw, Henry helping his two new buddies with their homework, or Raph in goal out on the soccer field defending against the little kids incredible foot skills, everyone was immediately drawn in by the huge smiles, hugs, and giggles of the Tica-Tica kids and leaving that afternoon was not easy! But luckily, we could promise that we would be back the next afternoon...

The evenings during our homestay section were a great opportunity for everyone to spend some more time with their families around the dinner table, relax a bit, and do Spanish homework! We also met at various families houses to have our nightly ¨Moon-Up¨, where our leaders of the day would come up with a topic to talk about, a wonderful opportunity to quietly reflect on all the days happenings and get to know each other even better...as well as to listen to Alex Cullen and Andrew jam us some beautiful tunes on their guitars, with a special appearance one night by Alex's new friend, the tiny sweet Peruvian guitar, called a Charango.

After well deserved glorious sleeps and dreams, we met on another lovely morning to begin our second day of Spanish and an afternoon at Tica-Tica.  With the Spanish classes, we took a field trip to a nearby museum of pre-Inca and Inca civilizations, which was a really cool chance for everyone to learn more about the history and culture of this fascinating region of Peru, as well as to get a beginning glance and context to start thinking about the incredible life-ways, knowledge, traditions, and systems of those peoples who also built the great Machu Picchu. After another heart-filling almuerzo with our families, we headed up to Tica-Tica to greet the grins and songs and squirrelly piggy-back loving faces of our friends. Today we had some guest speakers, a nurse and a dentist, up to the center with us to do some lessons in basic first aid and oral hygiene for the group. We would like to give a big thanks and shout out to Adele’s dad, Jimbo Walter, for stuffing Henry, Andrew, and Adele’s bags with toothbrushes to bring down to Peru for the kids!! After the lessons, all the Moondancers took charge of a few young ones to go outside and practice brushing their teeth...Nance and Hadley were especially awesome at this and a joy to watch as they helped make toothbrushing really fun for the kids.

After some more play time, romps on the soccer field, playing on the slide or swings and smiling at how Adele, Nancy, and Christian always had at least one little girl in their arms, another great afternoon was fading and we said goodbye once again. We filled a similar Friday with Spanish and helping with the kids at Tica-Tica, and then on Saturday morning had the privilege to fill an early morning bus with us, the kids, and a few chaperones to head up to the nearby Inca ruins of Sacsayhuaman, which translates to mean ´´satisfied eagle´, in the native Quechua language. This was an amazing morning for everyone.  Not only did visiting Sacsayhuaman give everyone a beautiful view of the Cusco valley and mountains beyond, but we learned a ton about this intricate and fascinating ancient fortress made of giant, smooth stone and why it was so important to the Inca. And we got to go on a fun adventure with our friends, having the chance to lead all of the kids through a small, cave like passageway that is a part of the ruins, as well as play on a smooth, inclined expanse of stone that rises up from the ruins to make two wonderful natural slides.  Needless to say, it was hard to pull everyone away when it was time to head back to Tica Tica!

For our last day with the kids, we planned a little carnival as a goodbye party. Christian and Hadley did some gorgeous face painting, Andrew and Henry took charge of games, and everyone had a blast!! All too soon, it was time to leave, but not before we pulled out some outdoor games of the Moondance favorites variety...A giant round of ´´birdie on a perch´´ and a classic cereal box Piñata helped sweeten our goodbye and keep the laughter rolling till the last minute...With Ali on the Piñata and Henry and Raph there to give the kids a good spin, the little ones had to work to get that Piñata cracking! After a billion hugs and final goodbye pictures, we sadly left Tica-Tica behind...It is clear that everyone of our Moondance family has a truly great way with children, and it was very inspirational to watch the way each Adele, Henry, Nancy, Ali, Christian, Frazer, Andrew, Raph, Alex, and Hadley interacted with every child, each one like a warm beam of light shining onto the other..And, of course, the amount of Spanish practice happening was out of this worrrrrld. We thank those kids for their amazing spirits and friendship and I know that none of us will ever forget them!

Before heading down to the lake on Monday, we luckily had a full day to do some more exploring in the Cusco region.  So on Sunday, we headed down into the Sacred Valley to the town of Pisaq.  When we got there, our first stop was a bit of a burly hike into the mountains outside of town to visit the ruins of Pisaq.  These ruins are vast and amazing and were definitely worth the high-altitude shortness of breath on the way up! We rambled and explored all over, with Alex explaining that the ruins would have been a village primarily for artisans and agricultural people...Always heading up up up, we saw the incredible stone construction of the ruins temples, sundial, and further up the valley, a glimpse of rows and rows of holes bored into the steep mountain walls that corresponded to the largest Inca burial site in the valley. Perched high up over the Sacred Valley on a windy knoll, with deep views to either side, we ate some tasty lunch our host families had made us before hiking back down to the little town to spend some time at the huge artisanal market that fills the main plaza every Sunday. More Spanish practice abounds!

Back in Cusco, it was time to enjoy the last dinners and nights with our host families, and have a chance to present them some small tokens to thank them for all of their hospitality! One last sleep of Inca-delic Cusco dreams, and we hit the dusty trail through the countryside to check out the wonder that is Lake Titicaca... 

Thanks so much for reading. From everyone-We miss you and love you and send lots of good wishes from the South! More soon on our sea kayaking journey... 

Best,

Molly and Alex

Trip Update 7-26-08

Just returned from 3 glorious days on Lake Titicaca and everyone is showered and happy, currently relaxing here at our hotel in Puno. Lake Titicaca is the highest navigable lake in the world and looks much more like an ocean than a lake. Its vast blue waters stretch out towards the horizon, where - with the right kind of eyes - you can spot Bolivian snow capped mountains.

We began our adventure with a solid 3 hour tandem sea kayak from Llechon to Taquille Island. The water was calm and the views were superb. Everyone cruised across the wide channel with ease and we soon found ourselves on the shore of the island. From there, we climbed a set of steep stairs up to a beautiful ridge that gave us an amazing view of the lake and that gave way to a short decent to our lunch break. Fresh grilled trout, french fries, and quinoa soup . . . . . yes!!!!

Afternoon was already upon us, so we spent the next few hours playing cards, drinking tea, and singing songs - for Andrew and I, our guitars are a must. It was a slow night that gave us time to talk and play and a sky full of stars. Christian spotted 3 shooting stars and Alex saw the first of his life. We all stood spellbound and then let sleep take us to our soft beds and dreams.

In the morning we hiked up to a Tiawanaku ruin and then ate a delicious pancake breakfast before packing up our bags and heading back down to the port. After a short boat ride, we arrived in Llechon where we were greeted by a small fleet of sailboats. We boarded these boats - most of which were built by the men that were steering them - and spent the next hour cruising along the coast, breathing the cool air and gazing out over the rippling water.

Our hostel in Llechon was perfect. It is the home of a sweet, kind man and the small square of rooms are framed with flowers which grow from beds outside the rooms and hang on strings over each doorway. We ate lunch and then headed to the local kindergarten to do our community service work. For the next 3 hours we sanded and painted all of their tables, wooden blocks, and chairs - red, yellow, and blue. During breaks, people jogged down the short hill next to the school and dunked their hands in the cool lake or just stood on the shore. The sun was high and the work was tough, but everyone enjoyed the opportunity to help the school and we left there with smiles and multicolored hands.

Today was our third, and final, day on the lake, but it promised to be a magical one because today we were going to visit the Uros - the floating islands. We awoke early and ate another delicious pancake breakfast. This was accompanied with peppermint tea, made with an herb called muña that is grown on the island. As we prepared to leave, a handful of people of the town - who had gathered around the hostel - gathered in the courtyard of the hostel. In turn, they came up to each student and placed a necklace of flowers around their neck, a way of thanking them for their visit and their work at the school.

The boat ride to the Uros was 2 hours and soon we were cruising through shallow waters, where the reeds grew up as high as our boat. And then the Uros came into view. Everything there is made from reeds. Everything. Houses, boats, giant sculptures, lookout towers, and, most importantly, the islands themselves. It is surreal, absolutely surreal. But there we were, cruising through these open waters, surrounded on all sides by floating islands.

We docked on one island and were given a brief explanation and demonstration of how the islands are made. The people there showed us their homes and explained how the islands are always sinking, so they have to reconstruct their homes every 6 months and the islands themselves about once a year. It was like walking on a water bed.

We explored one island for a few minutes and then took a boat-ride in a 2 story reed boat. Our entire group climbed up onto the second story and sat in awe as two men rowed us in a wide circle around this reed city. The boat dropped us off on a different island, and here, we found our most amazing surprise to date. A condor. Yes, the people on this island had a pet condor. It is about 18 months old, just a baby, and has a wingspan of about 7 feet. When it is full grown, this will max out at about 9 feet. It was beautiful, incredible, and huge. The people said that its mother had left it and they were helping it grow into adulthood. Standing in the presence of this majestic bird was truly profound. Some of us got up and petted it - the look on Ali´s face was one of sheer wonder, as she touched those soft feathers. Many pictures were taken and then we were back on the boat and headed back to Puno, where we were greeted with a delicious pizza lunch and hot showers and soft beds.

Tomorrow morning we will leave for Cusco, where we will arrive by 2 pm. That night we will eat a delicious meal and prepare to leave for our mountain hike the following morning.

We are on the last leg of the trip and the Moondance magic is strong. Machu Piccu awaits . . .. 

-Alex