Wednesday 24 / Thursday 25 September, 2014

Wednesday we explored Lima, walking to Kennedy Park, where we saw heaps of cats wandering around. They were in the gardens, on the grass and on the paths. They also had lots of shoeshiners polishing men's shoes while they read the paper!
We then walked down to the beach, sorry, Lima, no comparison to our beaches. The waves made really interesting patterns of the rocks. Except for the rocks instead of sand, the coastline looks very similar to Santa Monica. We stopped for a coffee at some shops set below the level of the street. Very nicely set out.
Early in the afternoon we had a bus tour of the city taking in the pyramids that they have just discovered. It is so wonderful that these countries are continuing to explore the ruins in their area and taking the time to preserve what they find.
They have an area in the middle of the city that they use for people to be able to protest. This time they were complaining about the cost of housing for older people. We then visited the St Francis Monastery, one of the oldest churches in the area before we toured the Larco Herrera museum. This museum has the largest private collection of Pre Columbian Peruvian art in the world. The tour guide was very knowledgable but I just do not enjoy museums! We had dinner at the museum!
Thursday we flew to Cusco, the capital of the Inca empire, where the altitude was over 8000 metres. We are not staying in Cusco but in the Sacred Valley so that we can acclimatize better and wont be so affected by altitude sickness. That would have been nice if it worked but it seems that I picked up a bug and I'm finding that I have a bad headache and am having trouble breathing. We are all drinking coco tea hoping that will help.

We visited the Puca Pucara ancient site where we saw the Temple of Sacsayhuaman. It is made up of these huge stones weighing 350 tonnes and they were even brought over from the next valley! How they ever moved them was anyone's guess.

We were also fortunate to participate In a Mother Earth Ceremony done by the local shaman, a well respected person in the community. In the ceremony thanks and offerings are given to Mother Earth to ask for good health and safe travels (well needed in this group with so many bugs going around)