Getting to Aguas...

Lima to Cusco. Now on to the exciting part... PERU! Arriving a day late to Lima I met a girl on the plane who was traveling alone. We had a strange amount in common and decided we shall stay in the airport together until our 6am flights to Cusco the next morning. Verging on delirious at about 4am (we´d been in the Lima food court for almost 6 hours now) we check in at our respective airlines. Those who dont know my peru adventure was rebooked from the original trip in March, so I had to go to a special counter to pay the difference in fare and $30 fee, totaling to over $200. More than the price of the flight itself. To make it even better, you can only pay in cash and the ATM has a limit of 400 soles (around $120). Right. Another hour of airline negotiations and she finds a way to charge my card. I arrive in Cusco around 7;30am... jump into a sketchy taxi that I later find out charged me about 500 times what he should have to rush me to the train station. But our train is leaving at 8:15am and I care only about getting there in time.


I arrive at the PeruRail station and start pacing frantically waiting for Jon to arrive. I have not slept in 40 hours or so and must have looked and smelled like something very special! I still got big hugs and slept on his shoulder for the next hour and a half on the bus. Due to the floods in Jan of this year, half the rail system was washed out. We took a bus down a very windy scary mountain to the next train station. Luckily I slept through most of it. The hour train ride was even more frightening as the sides of the mountains had washed away and the rails were SO close to the edge. We arrived in Aguas Calientes mid day. Luckily I was moving too fast to have the chance to get altitude sickness, though I dont think it would have been a problem.