LLAMAS! Part #3

So, I never really finished the post on my trip to Peru. And at this point, should I even bother?

Here's the quick wrap-up:
Day 2 on the trail was RIDICULOUS and raining all day. But we made it up and over Dead Woman's Pass, ahead of schedule and without needing oxygen. woo!
Day 3 on the trail was AWESOME. We had amazing weather, gorgeous views and were (again) ahead of schedule, giving us plenty of time for sightseeing and historical stories. We arrived at camp ahead of all other groups and settled in for the afternoon, eating candy bars and drinking local beer and enjoying the day and our hiking group. The Andes Mountains are truly majestic and gorgeous.
Day 4 started WAY before sun-up. I don't generally like to wake up before God wakes up and turns the lights on, but it was kinda worth it. We arrived at the highly lauded Sun Gate in time to see the sun rise over the ruins at Machu Picchu. At least, that's what we would have seen if not for the pea soup-like fog surrounding us. So we kept hiking and made it to the entrance to Machu Picchu in time to see the fog rise from below us and dissipate. The rest of the day was gorgeous as we dragged our tired, aching, sore, pained, exhausted bodies around the ruins and had a great time. After touring around, we headed into town for lunch and bevos (yay!) then took a dip in the natural hot springs and slept in a bed for the first time in many many days.
The next day, we tooled around Aguas Calientes, ate some delicious pizza and took the train back to Cusco.
Train ride: hilarious. We had snacks and a fashion show.
Commute from train station: bizarre. We arrived ahead of the other groups and our bus driver arranged a car for us. We piled in and rode the 45 minutes back to town at breakneck speed, up and down a mountain on a barely paved road with no lanes, with the gas gauge on E the entire time. Fritha thought she was going to die the whole time. Queenie, Midori and I were in the backseat, largely oblivious and having nice chats.

The rest of the time in Peru included dinner at Hilbert's resturant, birthday shenanigans for Fritha (ask her about the gift we got her) and an outing to a Peruvian night club, where we danced A LOT with Pixie, our new Irish friend. (ask Queenie or me to show you Pixie's signature dance move).

Delicious breakfast buffet at the swanky hotel in Cusco, followed by some time in the sun and last minute shopping and we were on our way home.

It was an AWESOME AWESOME AWESOME trip and I highly recommend it to anyone and everyone.

The end.

Questionnaire Thingy

Ok, this is a silly little thing I poached from another blog. But it's pretty fun.

***************FOODOLOGY***************
1. What is your salad dressing of choice? Ranch. On salad, on French fries, on chicken fingers, sometimes on pizza…you get the picture.
2. What is your favorite sit-down restaurant? Oh so many. Peso’s, Serafina, The Met
3. What food could you eat for 2 weeks straight and not get sick of it? Turkey sandwich…in fact, I think I’ve done this
4. What are your pizza toppings of choice? Mushrooms take the #1 spot, but basically, I like my pizza like I like my men: LOADED!
5. What do you like to put on your toast? Bacon
***************TECHNOLOGY***************
1. How many televisions are in your house? 2. I’m not the original owner of either of them.
2. What colour cell phone do you have? shiny lime-ish green
*****************BIOLOGY******************
1. Are you right-handed or left-handed? Right handed. I tried to train myself to be more left-handed once…it was kinda fun!
2. Have you ever had anything removed from your body? Wisdom teeth, splinters, stray eyebrows
3. What is the last heavy item you lifted? Printers. Lots and lots of printers.
4. Have you ever been knocked unconscious or fainted? Fainted once. Been close to it several times. I have this condition….
************BULLCRAPOLOGY**************
1. If it were possible, would you want to know the day you were going to die? Yes and no
2. If you could change your name, what would you change it to? Princess Consuela Banana-Hammock
3. Would you drink an entire bottle of hot sauce for $1000? Heck yeah! I once attempted to eat a spoonful of ground cinnamon for $50. (in case you’re wondering, I couldn’t do it and ended up sneezing up cinnamon for the next 3 days)
************DUMBOLOGY******************
1. How many pairs of flip flops do you own? Not enough!!
2. Last time you had a run-in with the cops? Define run-in? Actually, I don’t remember the last time I even saw a cop, much less had an encounter or a “run-in”
3. Last person you hugged? Fritha?
**************FAVORITOLOGY****************
1. Season? Football
2. Holiday? Christmas
3. Day of the week? Friday
4. Month? September
***********CURRENTOLOGY*****************
1. Missing someone? Yes
2. Mood? Happy
3. What are you listening to? the TV
4. Watching? Ugly Betty
5. Worrying about? my credit card bill
***************RANDOMOLOGY*****************
1. First place you went this morning? the bathroom
2. What’s the last movie you saw? He’s Just Not That Into You...with Pickle and Pie and friends
3. Do you smile often? Actually, yeah
********************QUESTIONS******************
1. Do you always answer your phone? Nope
2. You love…? poofy skirts, warm chocolate chip cookies, the beach and pink champagne
3. If you could change your eye color what would it be? Terminator Blue. Don't freak out, Wafer!
4. What flavour do you add to your drink at Sonic? Cherry…mmmm
5. Do you own a digital camera? Yes. Two actually. I think both of them have dead batteries right now.
6. Favorite Christmas song? O Holy Night
7. What’s on your wish list for your birthday? Fritha and Conan made my wish list come true: they gave me a pink flask and a Big Fat Llama
8. Can you do push ups? Yes. I’m better at the “girl” kind
9. Does the future make you more nervous or excited? Both
10. Ever been in a car wreck? Yep. I am now the proud owner of some guard rail on I-95 as a result.
11. Do you have an accent? Yes ma’am.
12. What is the last song to make you cry? Dunno, but it was probably country music.
13. Plans tonight? Update my blog
14. Have you ever felt like you hit rock bottom? Not yet
15. Name 3 things you bought yesterday: phad thai, chicken cashew nut and chopsticks? (all I bought yesterday was lunch)
16. Name 3 things from the bailout: is this like a quiz?
17. Have you ever been given roses? Yes. Some of them were even Killarney roses
18. Current hate right now? Scarlet Johannsen. She’s #1 on my list of celebrities I want to fight.
19. Met someone who changed your life? Yes
20. How did you bring in the New Year? At a wedding! With Rocky & Bullwinkle and Rosie & Sigma and a DJ who had ZERO Michael Jackson music
21. Name three people who might complete this? Meh.
22. What were you doing 12 AM last night? Eating a cupcake! Thanks Frannie!
23. What was the first thing you thought of when you woke up? Crap! I have an 8am conference call!

Old, Older, Oldest

Last week was my birthday. I turned another year older.

I loved my birthday this year. It was on Friday the 13th (which is awesome) and I got to go to work! (I love going to work on my birthday...everyone has to be nice to me!)

PattyCake wrangled a fun crew (Pickle and G-Funk and Shanks) for a birthday lunch, because she said "no one should have to eat Lean Cuisine on her birthday." We headed to Collins Pub, where my steak sandwich was fantastic, both glasses of wine were delicious and the waitress brought us a birthday dessert.

Back at the office, my Big Purple Cup was returned to me, I was toasted at our "staff meeting" and after a couple glasses of wine, PattyCake and I headed out. We got on a bus to go to my birthday party, missed our stop but managed to find our way home from wherever we got off the bus.

After changing into a Sparkly Sweater Dress, I headed to the Nabob, where Rosie, Frannie, Bullwinkle, Fritha, Conan and Pie were all waiting with gifts. I got a tape measure, a flask, a Big Fat Llama and cupcakes. Yay!

Over the course of the evening, we had a great time just mingling with each other and the other fantastic friends who joined us: Jazz Hands, Sigma, Traskinator, FrankieWayne, Pickle and Skater among others.

And since we're not spring chickens anymore, we headed home around 11:30pm and got a good night's sleep.

2009 birthday cupcake count: 9 (major improvement over 2008)

All in all, an EXCELLENT birthday.

LLAMAS! Part #2

After sleeping in a tent in a parking lot in the middle of nowhere Peru and a delicious breakfast, complete with eggs, toast and coca tea (mmmm), we began.

Queenie, Fritha, Midori and I took "before" pictures as we began and set a few goals for the hike: 1 - Be "the fun girls". Take every advantage to have a blast, enjoy each other and keep up the spirits of ourselves and our group. Oh yeah, and make sure that everyone in our group thought we were as much fun as we did.
2 - Earn "street cred". Demonstrate hiking prowess and earn the respect of our group by flaunting our athletic abilities, stamina and outdoorsmanship. Or expert-looking outfits, pretty hair and fancy (matching) backpacks.
3 - Survive.

By lunch on day one, we were making solid progress on all 3 goals. We spent most of the day in the "chasing pack" of the group and got comments from our group members on how professional we looked in our outfits. Check.

Lunch on day one was AMAZING. Or maybe we were just starving by the time we got there. Either way, it was awesome. Our totally BA porters carried the food, the table, the stools, the equipment for cooking up the same mountain up which we carried our sorry selves. To say we were humbled would be quite an understatement.

After lunch we encountered some rockier terrain and several other hiking groups, but we kept traversing onward and upward (literally) and made it to camp ahead of schedule. And I smelled. The trail was hot and dusty and despite the dri-fit shirt and zip-off shorts, we were pretty sweaty. First order of business, wash up. Fortunately our totally BA porters had set up camp already and had bowls of warm water waiting for us when we arrived.

We then led group stretches and headed to happy hour, which consisted of coca tea, hot chocolate, popcorn and cookies. We had a great time chatting with our group members and snacking until dinner. We continued bonding with our group members over dinner and beyond, until bed time. Which was approximately 6:30pm. It was dark and quiet and we were tired, so at 6:30pm we brushed our teeth with bottled water, crawled into our tents and went to sleep.

Early the next morning (by early I mean CRACK of dawn, like 4:45am) we got up, did group stretching and began to prepare for the hard day.

To be continued...

LLAMAS! Part #1

Now that I've been back in the States for about a month, I'm FINALLY posting about my trip to Peru.
The short version: it totally rocked! I highly recommend it!
The long version: We had the best time! Everything was stellar, from the first (of many) flights to the food to the trail guides to the llamas.

After a panic-inducing passport check on the way to the airport, Fritha and I left Seattle on an overnight flight and thanks to a tiring work week and some Valium, we arrived in Newark somewhat well-rested and PUMPED for our trip. Queenie and Midori arrived a couple of hours later and after hugs and squeals (we're such girls) we began the official wait for our flight to Lima. We bought journals, exchanged currency, ate lunch, browsed make-up and jewelry stores, contemplated pedicures, naps and made final phone calls. Then we got on the plane.
8 hours later, we arrived in (less than glamorous) Lima. We drank Pisco Sours and went to bed, got up early and went back to the airport. The Pisco Sours were the highlight.
Cusco, on the other hand was much better. We arrived to a chilly, clear, sunny morning with bright blue skies and big mountains. And thinner air. And we felt it as soon as we got off the airplane. That altitude thing was TOTALLY weird.
Arriving at our hotel (the Torre Dorada) we instantly fell in love: with our hotel, with Cusco and with Peggy, the hotel owner. She poured us some tea and sat down with us to go over our itinerary for the week while others carried our luggage upstairs for us. She showed us maps, gave us advice, booked us on a private tour of the Sacred Valley and basically rocked our faces off. After settling in, we headed into downtown for lunch and exploring. Between the altitude and the travel and the jetlag, we needed a nap after lunch, then headed back downtown for a lovely dinner and then early to bed. The next day we got up pretty early for delicious breakfast with Peggy, then off to the city! We saw the main square, did some shopping, visited a temple, saw llamas and really had a blast. Our definition of "blast" included caipirinhas and the best. guacamole. ever.

We went to bed early and got up pretty early the following day for our private tour of the Sacred Valley. Victor, our guide, drove us around and played classic american rock in the van. We hiked around some ruins at Pisac, guided by the lovely and talented Ruben, shopped at some markets, ate at a buffet lunch and got back to town in time for our orientation meeting for the hike.
Highlights: Kristin's nosebleed, alpaca petting zoo, good shopping, Ruben hit on Sara, Victor, "You guys know this music is in Spanish, right?"

After our tours, we arrived back in Cusco in time for our trial orientation meeting. Our orientation meeting was supposed to be informative and introductory. It turned out to be shocking and panic-inducing. Our guide comes in, introduces himself and says he has bad news. He proceeds to tell us that there are protests scheduled for the city the next day and we need to leave for the hike earlier than expected. Like that night. Like in 2 hours. We were not packed, had not showered and had not eaten dinner. Given that we'd be camping and hiking for the next 4 days, we desperately wanted hot water, good dinner and well-packed bags. But being the industrious adventurers we are, we made a plan and got it handled. We showered, packed, purchased and ate dinner, checked out of the hotel, said goodbye to Peggy and got to the hike bus early enough to play the name game with our group members before loading up.
A LONG bumpy ride later we arrived in the parking lot where we'd be spending that night. We got up the next morning, paid to use the bathroom, to which we brought our own water for brushing teeth, washing face, washing hands and flushing the toilet. Yes, we paid to use a toilet that required us to provide the water after sleeping in a tent in a parking lot.
Then we started hiking.
More on that later....

RILLA #63

Reasons I Love Living Alone: #63

If I wanted to come home from vacation in Peru and leave my suitcase unpacked in the living room while eating a BIG salad and then napping through season three of Sex and the City...I could. You know, hypothetically...if I wanted to.