Running / exercise in Peru

Short story: Didn't happen.
Long story: I did go running once. Our second day in Cuzco, I went running in our neighborhood, up and down the narrow, steep, cobblestone streets. It was definitely difficult, mostly because I was trying to avoid slipping and falling to my death or being mowed down by a 2011 Hyundai (an oddly common car in Cuzco). I had to get an early start on our Sacred Valley tour, so the run was only 30 minutes; that was enough, though, given the steep streets and the altitude. Going from 32 feet below sea level to 12000 above certainly challenges your lungs. At the top of some of the steeper hills, I could really feel the blood hammering in my head as my heart tried to deliver was little oxygen I'd taken in to my body.

Here's a little video of the streets outside our hotel, where I was running. And yeah, I flip the camera half-way through. Sorry about that. I've actually never used the video on my phone before.

I planned to run again, but - didn't happen. It never really does on vacation. You can only pack a small bag to bring to Aguas Calientes (our next stop), and running clothes wouldn't fit. That's fine, because Machu Picchu was actually a pretty exercise-heavy visit, if you count tromping up and down steep mountainsides and stone stairways for two days. Then I wanted to run again in Cuzco or in Lima, but (spoiler) I got sick while in Aguas Calientes and couldn't.
So I packed shoes, bra, socks, shorts, etc all for one thirty minute run. I think in the future I'll just embrace vacation for what it is and forget all that nonsense; I'm just historically terrible at getting runs in on vacation!

Peru day three: Sacred Valley tour

We had nearly a full day of a private guided tour of the sacred valley on our third day in Peru. We were picked up early by our guide, an archeologist, professional climber, and local employee of National Geographic. He spoke four languages and was obviously ten times smarter than we were (combined). I have no idea why brilliant people like this consent to drive around in a bumpy van with tourists for probably little pay, but again - the dollar goes very far in Peru. We had both a driver and a guide to ourselves for the whole day and for not a lot of money, but hopefully both made a good bit off of us!

Our tour began in Chinchero, a small Inca town with ruins in the Andes. Much of the town retains the ancient streets, structures, and even cultures - of all the places we visited, Chinchero had the most original markets, farming, economics, and dress. The women, tall hats on their heads and babies in shawls on their backs, drove cows on the side of the road; families worked together making chicha (advertised by a stick projecting out of the doorway, red plastic bags tied to the end); I heard far more words in Quechua than in Spanish.

The ruins of Chinchero contain neatly-fitted stone in terraces and are situated in a lovely, if rather austere, landscape. At over 12500 feet, and dry, Chinchero isn't very lush and green (of course, it was still early Spring there!).

Chinchero is the only set of ruins I saw with multiple entire agricultural terraces made of fine cellular polygonal masonry (smaller multi-sided stones cut to fit exactly. The Inca also used coursed masonry [perfectly fitted rectangular stone] which could be encased - not aligned - or sedimentary - laid out in rows. Cyclopean polygonal masonry, like in Saqsaywaman, is made of huge stones).

See how the terrace stones fit each other perfectly?

Next, our driver hurtled our little Mercades van around death-defying curves and ledges (and one rockslide) to take us to Moray, my favorite ruins of the Sacred Valley. Because OMG. 

These spectacular terraces, believe it or not, were a clever system of microclimates used for agricultural experimentation and development. Wind and sun create a difference of almost 30 degrees F between the top and bottom terrace! The Inca were an agriculture-based society, and are known for domesticating and developing corn, various beans, orchids, and potatoes.
For scale, notice the people in these pictures:

And here we are, having walked the perimeter with slight shortness of breath! Moray is high! 

Next up were the salt pools of Maras. This just about blew my mind. The salt pools are ancient pools used to catch drainage off the mountains. Water trickles from the rocks into the pools; it's evaporated by the brilliant sun (very high elevation - between proximity to the sun, the clear air, and reflection off the white salts, we burned in under 5 minutes even with spf 85!). Salt remains, is collected, and sold. 

But where does the saline content come from?

The water leaks out from subterranean streams that formed during collisions between plates during the seismic activity that formed the Andes mountains. The Pacific ocean plates and South America crashed together - land buckled - and mountains formed. Small fissures allowed siphoning of Pacific water, and ocean water comes out of the tops of the Andes mountains. Amazing. 

Walking the edges of the salt pools (That's me trying to keep my balance; our guide is in blue jeans on the right).

A local worker collecting salt. Whoever wants to collect salt, can - they just have to join a co-op style community

These collection pools pre-date the Inca empire. 

After walking through the salt pools, we descended through the valley and town. It was a beautiful trek, but the homes and farms were very poor. Nevertheless, the kids and babies ran out to wave at us and shout, "Hola, Ingles!" Too adorable. 

The valley below

We met up with our van after the walk, and had to wake our driver, Sebastian, up. He spoke to our guide and they both laughed. Our guide explained that Sebastian hadn't expected us so soon; he'd told our guide, "German speed!" They do plenty of tours with German tourists, since our guide spoke German, and all the German tourists walk and climb quickly. Apparently David and I do, too - and for the rest of the trip, all pace was measured by "German Speed"!

Our final stop was Ollantaytambo, a fascinating archeological site. It was apparently an Inca ceremonial center, and contains a few points of incredible interest:

- A large unfinished area that shows stones in the process of moving and carving. We still aren't sure how the Inca carved their stone.

- A pink granite quarry over 5k away and across the Urabamba river. Complex roads, ramps, and bridges allowed transport of gigantic stone blocks to the building site.

- Sunken terraces to allow farming of plants not suited for the cold and altitude of Ollantaytambo; the bottom area is 30 or 40 degrees F warmer than the top! 

- Ventilated mountain storehouses for produce

- The face of pre-Inca god/messenger Wiracochan carved into the face of the hill opposite the temples. Interestingly, this figure is bearded, and the Andean people do not grow facial hair. 

See the face in the center? It is in profile. 

The Inca trail starts in Ollantaytambo, and so does the train: next, we board the train and head to Aguas Calientes for our two days at Machu Picchu. 

Peru: day two Cuzco tour

Over one afternoon and the next morning, we toured Cuzco and the sacred valley. Our sacred valley tour was private and very informative. The Cuzco tour was a rather cumbersome group. About twenty or twenty five people from different tour groups or travel agents climbed into a bus and saw:

1. The Cuzco cathedral
This was a long tour inside the cathedral (which did not allow photographs, sorry). The tour was kind of...well, sad. The cathedral, like much of Cuzco, was built over Inca sites on Inca foundations, and was used as a training area for Andean artists. The Spanish dominated the Quechua, and their art appears forced and stilted. Pagan symbolism peeks out in different areas of the church as the Inca tried to hang on to bits of their culture.
The Spanish demolished the Kiswarkancha temple and built the cathedral on the site; they also used sacred sands of the temple yard in their mortar and stones taking from the fortress Saqsaywaman in construction.
The hand-carved choir chairs in the cathedral are stunning examples of Inca art. Also notable is the famous Señor de los Temblores, the "black Christ", patron saint of Cuzco. They make him different skirts to wear for different occasions! I was also tickled to see Marcos Zapata's Last Supper in person; Jesus and his disciples drink chicha and eat guinea pig, and the Quechuan Zapata snuck a little jab in at conquerer Francisco Pizarro by giving Judas his face.

The flag of the Andes (R) outside the Cathedral

2. Saqsaywaman
An amazing, massive Inca fortress with Cyclopean masonry (basically, gigantic rocks). The enormous stones are fitted together perfectly, without any mortar.

The stones are even carved to create the corners. 

The design of the fortress is clever; the entrances are all narrow gaps that force an enemy to squeeze in single-file and immediately confront an arrow from a defender from above or behind a corner.

At the bottom you can see the narrow doorway; also notice the huge stones! 

The fortress walls zig-zag so that anyone climbing the walls would be an easy target for an archer tucked into another corner.

Atop the fortress walls

Doorways in typical Inca shape

3. Pre-Inca or Inca grave sites
We don't have a lot of information on the grave sites outside of Cuzco, but there appears to be platforms for body preparation along with burial niches in a system of caves. The area was hit by grave robbers before discovery, so it lacks archeological details, but it is thought to be older than the Inca civilization.

In a burial cave (it was pitch black - that's the flash doing the work!)

Our guide by a platform for mummification

It was hard to take pictures in the dark caves, but outside the grave site was beautiful.

After the tour, we were dropped off at the Plaza des Armas and walked back to our hotel. We stopped for dinner at a little restaurant for alpaca steaks and potatoes and some chicha morada, a sweet drink made of purple corn and spices. Alpaca is surprisingly good and tender, and we both enjoyed it. 

He certainly looks doubtful, but his nearly empty plate tells the truth. He ate that alpaca up.

Next up: our private tour of the Sacred Valley! 

Peru: days one and two

We're back from vacation in Peru, tired but invigorated from the break. Our trip to Peru started with our first experience with TSA precheck, which I think was worth the money: we went from entering the airport to sitting at our gate in under 15 minutes- and that included checking bags. Security took only a minute with the nonexistent line and no need to remove shoes and layers. Our connection was in Miami, and since I'd run far that morning ad hadn't had time to eat more than an apple I'd grabbed on the way, I planned to grab lunch there. No such luck: our plane sat on the Tarmac for close to two hours because a power outage earlier necessitated a computer reboot, and we had to wait for an IT tech. By the time we got to Miami, our plane was already boarding. And then its takeoff was delayed, too - never did airplane food taste so good as when they fed us dinner on that flight! We arrived in Lima late, and our travel agency, Andean treks, picked us up. By now we were so late we went straight to sleep in our kind of dirty hotel, which did not have hot water! 

It appears that the base of the sink was an after-thought

Our complimentary breakfast, though, was my first introduction to Peruvian style coffee: a hot coffee concentrate that you dilute as you desire with hot water. Since I drink my coffee pretty strong, I loved it. I was looking forward to good, strong mountain coffee on this trip and I wasn't disappointed. 

We took a cab to the airport and far the  first time I noticed how far a dollar goes in Peru; the Peruvian currency is the Nuevo sol, and the 30 minute ride to the airport was just s35, or a little over $12. We flew from Lima to Cuzco on a short flight, noticing at once how efficient and polite the Peruvians were. Throughout this stay, I kept observing that workers in Peru 1. Work hard and 2. Are trusted to make autonomous decisions to improve crowd control, traffic flow, service, etc.  

Cuzco is at 12,000 feet of elevation , which is 12,032 feet higher than where I live, so obviously I was concerned about altitude sickness. To prevent it, David and I asked a doctor friend of ours to prescribe acetazolamide. We took it two days prior to travel, and for the first day in Cuzco. When I arrived at our hotel, I was slightly out of breath, but we didn't have any headache or nausea, and in an hour or two I was breathing just fine. Perhaps the coca tea helped: it is a local remedy. 

 

Hopefully I won't have a random drug test at work, since coca is the source for cocaine and will show as such on a u-tox!

Coca tea = leaves in a cup

We checked into the he TikaWasi hotel, which was a mid-level option from our agency, but the cutest little place ever. We had a room with a great view of the city and the lush hotel gardens. I definitely would recommend this hotel- we loved it. 

View from our hotel

As soon as we checked in, we were picked up for our Cuzco tour. And that's another post, because this post is long enough! 

I've been absent...

... Because I've been in Peru! In fact I'm still there - we fly out tomorrow morning after an amazing week in Cuzco, Machu Picchu, and Lima. More later, once I've sorted through the nine thousand pictures we took. 

More where that came from, coming up soon!

Miles, broken up.

I hit 32 miles last week! Over thirty, OMG!
The problem with that is that many were walking miles. I've been cleared to not take walk breaks, but I found that when I did that, I was having pain with walking later in the day. So the breaks came back - every mile, 2 miles, or 3 miles, depending on the day.

I am probably going to call my doctor after I hit the 16 week post-op mark. I haven't been progressing lately: I felt better, starting running, felt ok, but had pain later...and there it has stayed. I did talk to him while at work, and he seemed to think that was fine and normal, and reminded me that I may still have pain for months, years, or forever. But I have to know that I am not damaging anything in this hip. I don't want to blithely run it into ruination!

Could the pain be nerve damage? Sure. I already had nerve involvement before surgery.
Could it be residual surgical pain? Definitely.
Could it be continued pinching and catching of the labrum? It could, but I need to make sure it's not!

Until then, I'm still breaking the miles up a little with walking. It's a smart way to ease back in anyway.

Project Lazarus Bon Appétit

This weekend David and I volunteered for one of my favorite charities, Project Lazarus. It's an AIDS service organization that provides housing for HIV+ patients who would otherwise be homeless. The program encourages patients to graduate through levels of assistance until they are ready to live on their own. I volunteer with them regularly to teach classes at their Wellness University; I lead the team-taught Medication and Wellness class.

Only two bracelets left. We had over 30 guests when the RSVP count was 16!

But this weekend we did something different, and - kind of more fun! We volunteered to be Project Lazarus greeters for their dinner party event. For Bon Appétit, donors volunteer to host dinner parties at their homes and "charge" guests (most send out invitations with suggested donations). We were assigned to a dinner party, and collected guests' donations and information. In exchange for a donation, they got a bracelet that got them into the after party. 

Once our donation-collecting duties were complete, we mingled with guests, enjoyed a gourmet dinner cooked by our host (including ceviche, deep-fried mac and cheese squares, and miniature chicken and waffles), and listened to a short talk about the program from one of Project Lazarus' board members (one was assigned to each dinner party). 

As dinner concluded, all the parties converged upon the Project Lazarus grounds (which are beautiful) for a fantastic champagne-and-dessert after party. We drank too much. But it was fun! 

I wore a lace shift cocktail dress with navy snakeskin heels and pearls. I have no good pictures, which is too bad, because the lace overlay on a short skirt is what makes the dress, not the plain top. David wore boring boy clothes. 

It was a fun and clever fund raising idea, and I think it was a huge success. I love to see causes close to my heart succeed!