South America, Days 6-7: Cusco & Aguas Calientes, Peru

South America, Days 6-7:
Cusco & Aguas Calientes, Peru
by Oliver Butterick

After another short night of sleep, I woke up completely wiped out, but excited, since our plans for the day included my first experience with white-water rafting. We walked down to the tour office and caught the bus. The bus was too loud and bumpy for me to try to get back to sleep, so I just put on my headphones for the two hour ride. Since I was anxious to try rafting, it seemed to take forever.

When we got to the river, we changed into the gear, feeling a little nervous at the state of disrepair of some of the equipment. Surely, in the States, there are volumes of regulations that would never allow such a thing. Needless to say, it was a little late to turn back, so we divided into three groups and boarded the rafts.

Our first task after learning the basic commands was to come up with a name for our group. The two wankers who had taken the front two seats of the raft decided that we should be called “Los Gringos Locos.” These two British guys failed to do even a brief survey of demographics, as aside from themselves, I was the only other white guy on the raft. We were accompanied by two South Asians (Tesh and Rocky), a Peruvian (our faithful captain), and a Brazilian (another employee who was in training). Why do stupid white people always seem to find me?

We get underway and the Brits continue to prove their utter worthlessness. Their job is to row in unison as the captain barks out orders. They fail miserably, causing the rest of the crew to row haphazardly, without the grace and elegance one would normally expect.

Despite the wankers, the trip was a lot of fun. We had a few class 2-3 Goldilocks rapids (not too small and not too big), so it was thrilling without seeming dangerous. Each of us got the chance to captain the raft, which was the highlight of the adventure for me. It was very intuitive- I could see myself doing that again.

We finished with the rafting and ate lunch. The food was not great, but we were all really hungry, so it didn’t matter. We boarded the bus and headed back to Cusco. Despite the noise and bumpiness, I napped quite well on the way back.

We got back to the hostel and each took showers, which was very nice. The river had been rather cold, so the shower warmed me up. Furthermore, it’s more like we went “brown-water rafting,” since the river was filthy. More than once, I had to resist the gag reflex when some of the chum-like water splashed into my mouth. Cleaning the muck residue off my body was refreshing.

After relaxing for a bit, we went to a vegetarian restaurant run by Hare Krishnas. The dinner special was cheap and plentiful. Unfortunately, it was also rather bland, so I didn’t finish it. I guess there’ll be no dessert for me.

After dinner, we returned to the tour office to view the pictures they had taken and bought several, which they burned onto a CD for us. By then, it was nearly 9pm, so we headed back to our beds for a good night of sleep before waking early to catch the train to Aguas Calientes, the town just below Machu Picchu.

I woke up the next morning feeling rested and refreshed. I don’t know if I slept well because I was so exhausted from rafting and getting little sleep the previous nights, or if it was because of the Ambient I took. Who cares? I slept well!

We had arranged with our hostel in Cusco to leave most of our belongings there, which allowed us to take only our daypacks for our one night in Aguas Calientes. I pretty much just brought my bathroom kit and a change of socks and underwear. I think I could live with wearing the same clothes two days in a row.

On the train, we met a family from Australia: the parents and their two grown sons. One of the guys talked to Tesh for most of the ride. His dreadlocks were intriguing. Apparently, he had spent the past few years working three or four jobs for six months or so, and then traveling until his money ran out, at which point he repeated the process. He was an interesting fellow.

We arrived in Aguas Calientes, a town that is populated almost entirely by tourists. A census on any given day would reveal that over 90% of the people in the town were (mostly) foreigners visiting Machu Picchu.

We walked up to our hostel- somehow we had the incredible luck of finding another hostel that was located at the top of a long set of stairs. We checked in and went to our room.

Now, up to this point in the trip, pretty much everything had been peaches and roses. But, as you know, every good story has a conflict. We have just reached that point in this story.

Oliver can be reached at oliver@babblog.com.