errr..

Ive tried writing this SEVERAL TIMES! so im just going to do bullet points now and give u details on them later and i wont do it in order haha SORRY!

- colca canoyon amazing and a lot of great scenery1 managed to see some condors aswell! hiking was great and the hotel was right by the mountains although was the home of a very angry lama that spat on me several times!

-inca trail so testing ( we camped not everyone does so no toilets or showers for 3 days!) and had many problems with the group and the guide (the canadian woman sufffered from altitude so she struggled a hell of a lot, i dont feel bad for her though as she bragged about climbing mount kilimanjaro and havign all the right equipment and when I said well I'm not going to rent anything cos I'm poor and I'm just going to "rough it" she rolled her eyes at me..pah! and so the guide had to stay with her and we wondered off) and the german girls refused to eat and drink as they didnt want to go to the "squatters" haha. We played 20 questions to keep on going and distract us. The porters carried our stuff (25 kilos each) including food and our tents and everything and ran the whole way in sandals even when it was pooring it down with rain! The food was great and abundant an they pput little bowls of water outside our tents in the morning to wash (so sweet!) they also gave us happy hour at 5 (popocorn and hot drinks!!!) the record of the inca trail is held by a porter (3.30 hours AMAZING!) Anyway so lots and lots of drama with diane (canadian woman) and the guide because we were left without one which we totally understood but apparentely we were ment to have an assistant guide (assistant guides are ment to be there in case these situations arise!) so we didnt feel as if we shoudlt ip nancy because she was never with us and she was a bloody annoying woman all she di was say CHICAAAAAAAS HIGH FIVE U MADE IT. and asked me if I wanted  a picture when she woke me up at 5 oclock in the morning to which I replied are u crazy? She tried to make us wait for diana but we were jjuust getting soaking wet and there were no shelters so we told her we HAD to keep on going just to be warm again! But then diane made a huge deal saying we were accusing her of ruining our trip but we werent christ anyway BIG DRAMA but I LOVED IT! because i pushed the group to the max I was the exact same as my mum HAHA! i wwas going positive energy guys bottttoms in!!! stomach in and lets go! dont think about the cold POSITIVE ENERGY PEOPLE and i just pushed on. me and rachel became very very close during this trip as we shared a tent! Also we met a crazy guy called Jack from england who was 29? and ran the whole way and then back again because he was bored..he overlapped us about 3 times CRAZY! we called him eager beaver jack! he went back several campsites and did it all over again hahaha!!!!
Macchu picchu was incredible and the feeling of having achieved something was even greater!

- after macchu picchu and inca trail the main thing was CUSCO cusco is gorgeous such a great town but especialy great night life hahah! and seriously drinking in altitude is not a good idea as after one pisco sour your head is spinning aslready! we went xlubbing 3 times in cusco with our guide aswell and he gave us free drinks cos he knew all the owners of the club!

-JUNGLE! so hot and humid and impossible to get to (also we were all hungover after cusco!!) we had to get a flight then a bus then a boat! VERY LONG! we got there in the evening but the boat ride was fun!  we got ther ein the evning and we chilled in the lodge which was gorgeous but all open...a bit scary ahaha!! as BUGS EVERYWHERE. no hot water or electricity which was fine it was more worryig we had no glass around our rooms or a wall or anything all very open and we could hear what everyone was doing next door (even when they were in the toilets!) i the evning we did a night walk which was scary but very fun! and a night boat ride! next day we fed pirannas on a boat then walked around a while climbed a tour for a ncie view and saw some monkeys tucans and also the biggest rodent in the world (cant remember the name) and also some wierd birds! then we walked around a farm and tried some fruits from the jungle and then saw some of the biggest trees (one of them is this special tree that growns from another one and eats it up very wierd so you walk into it and its a tree thats eaten another one up hard to explain!)


- next main thing is lake tititaca we did this through PUNO! a very small town and pretty dead but as it was one of our last nights we decided to go CRAZY! i swear the bar we were in never saw anything like that before.

running out of time to BE CONTINUED!

Nasca, Night bus, Arequipa.

Right I have been offline for a while because every hostel we seemed to go to the computer doesn't work or the germans sit infront of it for hours!! Anyway so I left you at Nasca. We woke up the next morning quite early because the hotel had a pool and we thought we could perhaps have an early morning swim as rachel daniel and josh got up to go running and skipping we wanted to feel fit aswell (me jess and lindsay) buuuut the pool ws under maintenance in the morning (haha) so we ended up lounging about getting ready sitting in our rooms and the hotel (wasnt a paticularily nice one but nasca is a bit of a dump...still was 3 stars!) anyway so then  around 8.30 we got picked up with a little private bus with a tour guide to take us to the chauchilla cememtery I can tell you this I am soooo mummied and skulled out. I have never seen soooo many skulls and bones in my life I was like ENOUGH ALREADY....all the same..and they were very wierd because they all had reallllyy reeallllly long hair...and in some parts of the cememtery there was a random hand emerging from the sand in a claw like position with the fingernails and everything STILL INTACT i could noooot beliiieeeve it haha CREEEPY. And all the mummies and skulls were amaizingly kept (ew)...It was boiling hot and the guide told us that it gets up to 52 degrees in summer (ouch). After the looovely visit to the cemetery we got back on the bus and for those who wanted to they could get a plane ride over the nasca lines (for 86 dollars NOOO THANKS), go to the museum (which is like one tiny room apparentely for like 10 dolars (ahahaha pleaaseee) ooor the ption we went for (the three girlies) potter round the centre and buy some fruit to eat..and flip flops for me as my primemark pumps were slowly melting in the heat. We got picked up with the bus and the people from the museum but the people who were doing the flight were still at the airport. We got to go back to the hotel and sunbathe by the pool...This is when we met the man who owns a pub in whitney(jess and lindsay's village) what a small world!! anyway so we loungewd around by the pool until about 3.30 when we got picked up again to go for a a late traditional lunch called pacamancha it is literally food burried underground and cooked underground between banana leaves it was very cool!! and before we unwrapped it we had to do a small ritual throwing cocoa leaves and dropping some special drink on the heap of food made out of red corn??? apparentely its good ah well and all sorts of stuff then the man unwrapped it brought it all inside and we had a mini buffet. The food was actually increaaadible and probably the best dinner so far!! we went back to the hotel had a lazy afternoon evening getting ready for the hurrendous bus journey. At about 9 oclock we had to leave the hotel to go to the bus station where we found outttt that there were 4 places left in frist class and we could get upgraded for free. the canadians got 2 (because apparentely they are tall- watevs they annoy me) and the other 2 we had to play a game for me and rachel ended up winning (SOOO LUCKY I KNOW and also hilarious as we are the shortest ones in the group - rachel is shorter and a lot skinnier than me she is tiny yet EATS LIKE A MACHINE!!) and it was WONDERFUL we got bigbiiiggbigg leather comfy chairs...although both in first class and second they insited on playing the worst kind of spanish music you have heard in your life all night loing!!! and very loudly aswell...the speaker was right infront of us it ws awful but i was so tired i fell asleep pretty quickly (I have been sleeping like a log!!).

We woke up in AREQUIPA! the white city (because everyone used the volcanic rock - from the volcano misti how cute i know - for buildings so all the buildings were white, but also because the people who lived there had paler skin) ANYWAYS...arequipa is beaaautiful a very small city but very verrry populated. We arruved in our hotel a gorgeous hotel aswell basci but very pretty and put our stuff away cleaned our faces got changed and went on a little tour with daniel who showed us the main sights and were to go...then we all split up. We went to look for a caffee to have some coffee and maybe a bite to eat and found a really small caffee in the centre where they gave us a small glass of hot apple juice very nice I satisfied my coffeeee cravings and had a cappuccino which was lushhhh (they out cinnamon on top i do not understand theyir OBSESSION with the stuff its friggin everywhereeee) and other people had a strawberry juice and rachel had a huge slice of cheesecake which was nice..we then wondered round the city looking at the cathedral and the main square which is gorgeous. It ended up with just me jess and  lindsay going to the supermarket to get some lunch together we ende dup buying pitta breads some cream cheese (the cheapest we could find) and some ham (which looked a lot like bacon we were scared it wsnt cooked but it was nice in the end) and ate it all on a bench in the main square...after that we wondered round some more looked at shops. it started getting quite cold though so we went back to the hostel and lounged around there went back out to get some water but generally was a lazy day. We were all meeting at 7 back at the hotel to go our for dinner, we were there earlier sitting in the lobby and one of daniel's friends comes in, louisa from australia, shes in her late 20s? anyway she was SOOO COOL, shes been travelling on her own for a very long time and meeting her made me feel so much better immediately and funnily enough shes doing roughly what i did but backwards and she gave me LOADS of advice and told me not to worry and talked about her travels. She was soo outgoing and so much fun I was immediately relieved and definetely a very strong perosnality I just hope that I'll cope as well as her!! (she also did patagonia and told me that its sooo easy to get to she went  all the way down with a public bus!) We all went for dinne in an italian restaurant where me and lindsay shred gnocchi with bolognese and a small pizza...wasnt very good but ah well everyone else thought it was awweeesome so i went along with it!! I also had a pisco sour and my god are they strong! after that we all went back to the hotel to go to bed as we were getting up fairly early in the morning to go to the colca canyon.. I would tell you all about that but I am on rachels computer but we have a free day tomorrow in Cusco so hopefully I will get to write a bit more. However, I will leave u with this, appart from my stomach giving me the odd pain I HAVE NOT YET BEEN ILL!!! lindsay has felt faint and rachel isnt feeling great and the germans were very ill BUT III HAVE NOT BEEN!! the altitude in colca canoyon and arequipa (2300-4910) didnt afftect me OH YEAAAAH!!! MISS YOU ALLL

3rd day pisco winery and sand buggies and finally nasca

Yesterday was such a fun day..we got up quite early (me jess and lindsay) to walk into town have a look around and maybe get sm fruit or smthing before heading off to the pisco winery. We walked around and bought some water and 2 mangos which we shared at the hostel. Pisco is a lovely little town (very smaaaalll) and we literally walked aorunf the centre in about 1 minute but its really sweet and it was nice to walk along the beach. Anyway we got into a private bus (verrrryy pooosh) that took us to the winery where they make PISCO!! (the south american brandy I have already mentioned). where we were shown how it is made and then we got to try all the different piscos...we had about 8 2 of which were 48 percent SOOO STRONG. me Lindsay and Jess were struggling a little and had to keep drinking water...daniel got us a small chocolate aswell to soak up the alcohol. some were good though...one was an already made pisco sour, the next was a sweet sort of wine and then different types of pisco and then some sort of south american baileys...ODD. then we also tried several types of jam which were quite nice. After that we got back into our bus and drove to an oasis in the middle of the dessert which was BEAUTIFUL (the story of the oasis is that a beautiful girl was running around  with a mirror and a hunter mistook her for a deer and started shooting at her..she ran away and fell from a sand dune and her mirror broke and turned into water so she could hide in it..and she became a mermaid BEAUTIFUL RIIIIGHT?) haha. Anyways it was very very very odd to see huge hugeeeeee sand dunes and then a lush green little patch...the sand dunes were amazing like beaing in a film.- We had some lunch there and then went to get in the sand buggies (massive carts) us girlies sat in the back the bumpiest part and literally it was INSANE. we went down and up sososo fast I have never screamed that much before haha!!! it was so much fun and sooo beautiful we were sorrounded by sand dunes and the view was incredible, we stopped to get a few pictures and some other people did sand boarding but it wasnt standing up it was head first with your body on the board...Most of us were not extremely up for it though because the sand dunes were sooooo high. We went back to the oasis after and had a swim in the pool...then got in the bus and left for nasca..where the nasca lines are. The view getting to nasca was insane and thank god we made it to the tower for the nasca lines before dark. Unfortunately we couldn't see them very well..and even though we had an ption today to take a flight round i was not really willing to pay 86 dollars...anyway we got to the hotel a 3 star hotel in the middle of nowehere (nasca is a bit crap) full of bugs..yum. haha i had a beatle in my room and screamed...but its fine the man who carried my bags (oooh yes) picked it up while laughing at me haha he actually came towards me holding it out and laughed even more as i ran away hahaha. bastard. We all met up for dinner in  the hotel and i just had a small sandwich shared with lindsay and some chips shared with all 3 of us cos i wasnt very hungry. Then we hung around all craving some chocolate and ice creams (we all got a little bit desperate it was very funny) after seeing the ice cream machine and the little cabinet with oreos and snickers...but apparentely the hotel had lost both keys...we got so desperate we ended up having a hot chocolate. THE MOST disguuusting hot chocolate i have had in my whole entire liiiife. it tasted of milk with cinnamon but gone bad it was awfffful...Lindsay got really excited when she discovered a stick which she thought was a cadburys flake but no....it was a cinnamon stick ahaha. After that we all went to bed....

2nd daaaay (bus to pisco and evening in pisco)

Sorry it's taken me this long to write but we've been kinda busy and the other hotel didn't have computers...anyway so I left you at Lima. That same day we got on a bus directed to Pisco at about 1.30 and we got in Pisco at about 6. The bus was a public bus and we all sat at theback together as to avoid anything getting stolen etc..as people get on and off the bus every 15 minutes about. I sat in the far corner at the back by the window so I would get the best view but also noooo one could get to me...and my bag that I was holding onto for deeeeaaaar life haha. I was so surprised at the difference there is in Lima one side is dessert and mountains and the other is lush sea with palm trees very very odd!! and Daniel our guide (he's so funny he is like an over grown peruvian teddy bear with a lisp) told us that Lima is the 2nd most desert city in the world (after Cairo of course)!!! unfortunately on the bus a woman got her bag stolen (the canadian one who annoys me intensely because her husband thinks hes indiana jones) Anyways so when we got to Pisco we settled down in our hotel which was soooo hto and sticky but not bad I'm still sharing a room with Rachel everywhere we go and we get our own bathroom which is niiice. The place obviously wasn't as nice as the first night which was luuuussssh but still not as bad as hostels!!! Anyway so Pisco is a small sea side town which is pretty much destroyed because of the earthquake in 2007 and it is also the place where PISCO is madeee the south american brandy and Peru and Chile's drink. We settled down and got ready for dinner..we went to a loooovely little restaurant and I of course had the fish (its by the seaside so of course its going to be fresh) me lindsay and jess had the same which was a mixto frito so calamari and prawns and bits of fish and octopus fried with sm sweet potatos on the side and then on top (it was a massssive dish but apparently a started have no idea HOW) there was a MASSSSSIVE CRAB. which we all looked at with erm..worried eyes and perplexed eyes hahaha...JESS became a crab expert and managed to crack it all...me and lindsay had bigger problems but I can tell you it was a FUNNNNNNYYY SIGHT. as i was trying to crack it desperately sending crab bits flying EVERYWHERE. But the fish was spectaculllaaaar so so yummy and at the dinner I also tried Inca Kola (haha) the colour of this soft drink is BRIGHT YELLOW. and it tastes like chewing gum haha but seriously it was good. After dinner some of us decided to go for a little cocktail (the german girls opted out - they are slightly quiet) Anyways we ended up going to the POSHEST hotel in the world it was gorgeous with palm trees everywhere and so so beautiful all white buildings and SOSO POSH the cocktail bar was amaaazing aswell... with sofas outside on the deck and there was even a pier in the hotel amazing! Most of us had passion fruit pisco sours and they were lush lush lush but strong strong strong and I was tipsy with one drink. We all walked home and went to bed..unfortunately there was some sort of celelbration and they amde soo much noise in the hote...i used my earplugs and even though they didnt drown the noise completely i fell fast asleep pretty quickly. anyway im being antisocial and lindsay and jess have gone somewhere (I'm so happy they are here because seriously they are fantaaastic and so firnedly and funny and I get on with them like a house ON FIRE.) I'll tell you all about Pisco and, sand buggying (awesome) and getting to nazca tomorrow..I miss you all so much xxxxxxx

forgot to mention early on i was so surprised at how slutty some peruvian girls are at the club everyone was getting with everyone and they were dressed in heels and tiny dresses and low cut tops. wierdd.

First day continued...

I'm baaaaack...yesterday was actually a lovely day I met the australian girl who is sooo lovely and I think in a way will look after me but mum she can't help me throw things out coooos she is SO MUCH worse than me..she has hair straighteners hair products a laptop a hair drier and SO much more hahaha. The tour around the city was sooo nice and I'm glad I did it (even if it was 30 dollars) for the pure fact that I dont know how I would have got to the old part of Lima because it is like half an hour away. I thought Lima was beaaaaautiful and the posh neighbourhoods are absolutely gorgeous with mansions and mansions all with different arquitecture some are cottages (so wierd), there is even a castleeee, and some loook like old victorian houses. And all around the posh neighbourhood there are olive trees that are hundreds of years old absolutely beaaaautiful. And we passed this huuge park with thousands of fountains that have lights in them videos and hollagrams (unfortunately we werre still on the bus by this time so I didn't seee it properly and didn't take any pictures) Then we got off the bus and were in the centre of lima that most guide book advise u against going on your own even though its where eveeerything is (there are loooads of pickpockets and its very dangerous although i didnt feel that) And we saw all the major buildings and churches and we visited one museum with all the pottery and gold (sounds boring but actually the guide made it sort of interesting and explained all the civilizations of Peru) and we went to a monastery (where I wasn't allowed to take pictures unfortunately....). The guide was sooo good and told us loads of interesting facts about Lima, he also mentioned that in Peru they eat guinea pigs (ewwwww) they call them cuy and the guide was like ur guinea pigs are cute and fluffeeey and smaaaaal (all of this iin a spanish gayish accent - he was awesome) buttt weee eat urrre peeets haha, he also mentioned hairless dogs haha that I'm apparentely going to see later on. Anyway after that baccck to the hotel where people were already sat in the lobby waiting for the STA meeting to start. We are mostly ALLL GIRLS there is one boy whos a bit older like his late 20s from australia going around on his own, the australian girl who im sharing a room with then a quite old couple from canada (dont let me get started on them the husband is all dressed in kaki and had the whole jungle explorer hat on he pisses me off and the woman is all like im a nurse but we traaaain to climb mountains YEAAAAH cos apparentely they climbed mount killimanjaro. BADASSS she annoys me haha) then two girls from WHITNEY!! can u believe it hahaha so funny who are LOOOVELY and I'm so happy they are on this trip. One of them reminds me so much of lara she is soo loud and quite out there and by dinner time she was already telling me her life story. the other one is a bit quieter but still so outgoing and soo sweet. And we have already decided that we are going to travel together after only briefly though because they are leaving from buenos aires 2 and a half minutes after we finish because they are going to australia and then new zeland) Then there are two german girls...they are both kindaa shy and they dont talk much..one of them smiles a lot and she seems really sweet the other one doesnt. HA. The guide HAHAHA he is bold and is a fatter version of JAVI. he taaalks soooo funnily and he acts all cool and outdoorsie but I love him already. Anyway so we got wat was ment to be a brief talk (went on forever though) on our 3 weeks together and I found out that actually there is an option on going into the jungle for 2 nights which I was not told about and apparently not booked in for...so it might be extra but hes going to tell me how much it is because I wouldn't mind doing it and everyone else is appart from the and the australian girl (but she wants to do it now) but it might be a bit expensive and we would stay in a lodge where i think everything is included anyway (mum let me know what u think and also the malaria pills I have are the appropriate ones which is good). We all went for dinner after the meeting our guide took us to this local place and I've been reading on lonely planet that if u want to eat fish u better do it in Lima cos its ment to be increadible so i chose this thing called seafood tacu tacu... it was erm INTERESTING. rice with beans with seafood on top topped with a bit of cheese... put it this way I ate about 1 fifth of it as I wasnt feeling to hungry after a couple of bites. hahah. This morning we sneaked down to breakfast me and rachel (australian girl) hoping they wont charge it up to the room but they didnt ask for our room number soo its all good and i had sm toast and veeeryy salty butter and coffee and sm cornflakes, I tried some papaya but i nearly puked. ewwww. ahahaha. Anyway we are leaving today at about 1 oclock in the afternoon I'm a little worries about money on this trip because we are going to be going out all the time to eat and It's not as cheep and cheerful as I thought but ahhh well...I think it will be my most expensive month put it that way. anyway im going to go back upstairs to get my stuff sorted have a nice shower etc xxxxx

my first day to be continued...

OMG STRESSSSSS.... basically had to get a cab but I couldn't find ANY even though the receptionist was like oh its soo easy they are just outsideeeee so I was like oh okay. Before I was told by my American friend that you had to check that the cabs had the numbers and letters of their number plates also on the actual cab itself. so anyway im walking around like a loooon sandwiched between two rucksaks all the peruvians are like OKAAAAAAAY when they see me a child actually stopped and LAUGHED. so yeaaah feeling greaaaaat...anyway can't find any cabs watsoever and´so I see someone who looks sort of official and I say im looking for a cab where can I get one? and hes like walk that way its safer so im like oooookay i do and i get onto a main road where taxis are passign by the first one stops I ask him how much blabla but he seems really dodgy to me and my gut feeling is telling me DO NOT GET IN. his sign isn't even up and i couldnt see any numbers so I was freeking out a bit and he was like get in get in get in and I asked to see his licence and he said no so I closed the door and I was like screwwwww this i am sooo not getting in that cab.. he drives off thank GOD. and I am still left sandwiched between two massive bags looking like a fool another cab drives over and another one i run to the one where there are the numbers on the side as I know its an official taxi and its a realllly reaaallly cute little man with no teeth and I do not understand a word he says. it takes us about an hour to get to the hotel cos he doesnt know where hes going i get out everytime he stops cos hes like we´re here and so i get all my bags on again but nooooooooo unfortuntely not hahaha so I get back into the cab and we end up gooing round some more we stopped in total about 6 times and asked I cant remember how many people BUT LOTS!!! anyway FOUND IT finally and its a lush hotel I'm sharing a room with a girl from australia who has been travelling for 15 months!!!! and is 28 but she is soooo nice I'm sure we're going to get on...and she advised me to book into a tour which leaves from my hotel and takes u all around lima and finishes around 6 and 6.30 is when my meeting is with all the STA people which is niiiice...soooo I'm just waiting in the lobby for the tour to pick me up. and then I'm off around Lima. Milaflores (the posh area) IS LOOOVEEEELY...

First night.

My first night was interesting but in a way reassuring. I got to Lima at about 6 oclock in the evening and it was SOOO HOT. i managed to get my bag and get out after about an hour and I had to do the funnniiieeest thing I had to go past this guard who looked at my bagage slip that i filled in beforehand saying I hadnt got anything dangerous or worth taxing me on etc.and then he told me to press a green button and if it flashed greeen i could go hahaha it did in the end and i was like yaaaaay. waiting for me was a woman to take to the hostel it took for eveeer to get there because their rush hour is around 7 oclock. We finally got there and the receptionist was sooo kind to me a young girl wearing the tiniest of shorts took me to my room showed me the hostel which is lovely its got a whole garden area with hammocs and a nice bar and internet is free, she showed me to my bed and also changed some money for me which was nice. As I was getting my stuff sorted in my room (i needed to change as it was soooo hot and locking stuff up etc..) I met this American guy hilarious guy from California we went to the bar together and just generally chatted with other people and i met this one guy from london who is also travelling by himself and is really nice i drank my first pisco sour which was luuuuush and all the boys were playing drinking games (i was literally the only girl) then the driver of the hostel gets involved and tells us he wants to take us all out I was not up for it i was going to get an early night and everything but they convince me in the end and we didnt go out for too long but it was fun we went to a club and got in for free as the driver knew the bouncers then we home to the hostel and straight to bed. The boys looked after me which was nice and I felt nice and safee. I'm happy I managed to meet people so quickly and generally people are so open and friendly. I still miss home and I'm starting to think this wasn't a good idea because I dont think i can manage for 5 months without a hug from my mum!!!  HAHA im sitting here and someone just offered me a joint i was just liek er nooo but thanks. anyway its about 9.30 here just got up and now im going to shower etc and probably get a taxi to the hotel where I'm going to meet all the people from STA. I'll hopefully write again tomorrow or tonight xxxxxxx