I’m
in Lima and have just booked my 22-hour bus journey to Cusco today. So I spend
the morning packing, changing money and figuring out if there’s a place that I
can get my haircut. A couple of blocks away there’s this barber amongst the
many expensive-looking salons around. So I step inside and use the few Spanish
words I know. But he doesn’t seem to be listening. I point to the side and say
‘corto’ which is ‘short’ and tug the
hair on top and say “No Grande. No Corto. Medium”. By the time I finish the
sentence, he takes the electric razor and whoooosh… the side is 1mm.
Whooosh… there’s more gone on the other side. He then takes the hair on top
and cuts it randomly at a length, it seems, that only his scissors know.
The bus is fantastic. It reclines fully. There’s wifi, and a TV
screen that plays movies with English subtitles. And they serve meals. We
needed it because our 22-hour road trip that snakes around hills turned to 26
hours.
If you enjoyed reading this article, you can help support our journalism by adding OHeraldo as a preferred source.
I’m now in Cusco which is my gateway to Machu Picchu. Cusco is absolutely stunning
and nobody seems to notice my rat-nibbled haircut. Old cathedrals and
cobblestone streets everywhere. You’re literally walking around in a city stuck
in time with renaissance-styled architecture everywhere. We weren’t aware
that Cusco is surrounded by hills on all sides. Which means that if you’re not
in the centre, you’re walking uphill. I’d met a funny Italian chap on the bus,
Guillermo, who’s bright idea it was that we see the Christ on the Hill, which
is sort of like Christ the Redeemer in Rio. So we walk. And walk. And walk some
more, give up half way and turn back. Till we meet other people who were on our
bus, who are also walking up to the point. Not wanting to look like the wimps
that we really were, I pipe up and tell them we were just resting, and we turn
around and walked back up with them. There’s something to be said about these
people I’ve met. Four out of six of them were vegetarians or vegans. Don’t
get me wrong, they’re nice at heart. But this gives me very little say on where
we should eat. So at lunch, when were having zucchini and quinoa, I’m forcing a
smile. What the hell is quinoa anyway? It tasted like punishment, I can
tell you that.
Later
someone suggested we see the stone with 12 angels. Like winged angels. Turns
out there weren’t ‘angels’ but ‘angles’. It was just a stone in a wall with 12
sides. How is this a landmark? It’s a bloody stone!
We
then spend the rest of the day trying to figure out the cheapest way to visit
Machu Picchu. A tour costs around 150 dollars. But we decide
to book our entry by ourselves as well as bus tickets and stay. This was
actually a good idea because it saved us a big chunk. My word, Machu Picchu
makes you earn what you will see. More on that next time.
