My last tale from the traveler’s beard involved the events that occurred on my Inca trail adventure. You may recall that after the annoyances of my trip back from Aguas Calientes, I had consumed a curry and headed off to bed.
Not for too long it seems. For the first time in my South America trip, I encountered some form of food poisoning or sickness. My body began to reject food, and thus, trips to the bathroom to relieve my stomach of food matter became frequent. It was hard to eat, and it was also hard to stay up late. I would frequently head to bed at around 9pm, only to wake at 6am. This debacle went on for two or three days, though it wasn’t too bad thanks to the huge amount of pharmaceutical drugs that Doctor Stephen Hogg M.D had managed to procure prior to leaving Australia.
Steve, Moss and I ended up spending about four or five more days in Cusco after the trail. We had originally planned to go to Araquipa or Nazca, but we soon realised that these side trips would involve more sitting on Peruvian buses, an experience that we did not want to repeat in a hurry. Cusco was a great town; we decided to stay a bit longer. We moved into a bigger dorm in the Loki hostel – this time with about twelve or thirteen people. Steve got into a fight with an Irish girl on the first night in the dorm, and decided to look elsewhere for more privacy. I was fine as usually I was drunk to the point of passing out (and earplugs did a fine job of keeping out unwanted noise).
We went out for some meals with some of the people in our Inca Trail group – or at least, I tried to. The plague was preventing me from staying out late and eating a lot. Still, I’m told it was fun! Moss began to show similar symptoms to me , and eventually came down with the same thing. It seemed to be rife through the Loki hostel. I blame the curry. We sampled some fine cuisine at places like Café Muse, Victor Victoria and Paddy O’Flahertys (get the shepherd’s pie – it’s awesome). One day was spent with Kiet and Dave (from our Inca trail group) sitting in some Australian themed bar playing shithead and 500 rummy for about eight hours. Many beers were consumed and by the end of it we were a total mess.
One of the best things about Cusco is the sheer amount of fun activities that can be done for relatively cheap. For example, the boys and I (including Kiet) went white rafting for $30 US dollars (unheard of in Australia for this price). The rapids, we were told, were about class 4, and were quite treacherous in some places. Our boat consisted of myself, Steve, Moss, Kiet, our new friend Priscilla, and some other random American dude who kept falling out of the boat. At one stage, Steve and I got pummeled by a rock, and I got trapped under the raft. I thought I was going to die – but the guide pulled me up fairly quick smart, and thus I lived to tell the tale.
We ran into old friends from our previous stay in the Loki hostel including Harry, Yianni and Jamie – a trio of crazy Englishmen with a inclination for copious amount of drinking – something that we had in common. Many nights were spent either in the Irish bar, Loki Hostel bar, or Mama Africa’s, a gringo filled danced bar that occasionally played good music. At some stage during my second Cusco experience, I swapped my At The Drive-In shirt for an Evo Morales shirt (the president of Bolivia!) with Rob, one of the Loki hostel managers. Definitely a highlight.
Anyway, Steve left for Australia (via Lima) after several all night drinking sessions, and Moss and I were to continue to Quito in Ecuador for the next stage of our journey. More to come.
