Our first excursion: Valle Segrado (Sacred valley)

On our second weekend in Cusco, we set off on adventure. You saw pictures of ruins in my last post, as there are a few small cool things to see very close to Cusco. However, on this trip to the Sacred Valley, we realized how much more amazing "ruins" could be. I hope you get the impression in the following pictures of how impressive and beautiful this area truly is. 

Its a 4 hr hike up to this point, or a 20 minute taxi ride for 6 dollars...seeing as though we've only been here for 2 weeks, we felt completely fine using the "altitude excuse" 

The alien antennas are hiking poles, we just got our first poles for Christmas from Tom/Nancy, and
we've quickly become believers, if you like hiking and dont like sore knees: buy some

Trying to be a cool picture-taker here, with the clouds/sun..did it work?

Just in case you had gone through withdrawal from "ben/maren pictures from the top of mountains"

This picture shows the "valley" aspect of this sacred valley

Man in picture with red shirt walked down the mountain playing a lyre, it was as if we had a live soundtrack

Cuy (guinea pig) is a delicacy in Peru, we havent been brave enough yet, and all these restaurants with guinea pig displays aren't building my appetite, I guess the idea is to prove how fresh the meat is, idk?

Our view from our hotel...its pretty amazing how just 7 days of sharing a room with a family makes you crave your own quiet space, this hotel was the perfect peaceful respite 

View of and from breakfast...

Ollanytambo below..super cool little town, we'll be back several times

Look closely...in the middle of hiking around these ruins in Chinchero, we stumbled upon these 100 or so people, sitting in big circles drinking beer...men on one side/ women on the other, what a cool sunday afternoon tradition

red crates held all the beer, wish we were invited to join this sweet hangout

Our friends directed us to this really cool woman's co-op where they make really beautiful things, we bought an amazing hand-made alfombra (rug), feeling really good about this purchase

CLICK BELOW TO SEE MORE PICTURES (this is my favorite album of the 4 I have published so far, soo....if you've been avoiding the extra pictures on my posts, this might be the one to click)

PICTURES OF SACRED VALLEY!!!! CLICK HERE

life is a blur, but super fun

Howdy,

wow, for a photo blog, i am still struggling to find the time to make this happen.

so, again, i am gonna post twice in one day, i know this isn't the most effective way to communicate, but so be it

things i want to share that might not quite be captured in my photos

1) Learning spanish is really fun, but really hard. During this second full week here, spanish has become a more serious endeavor for Maren and me. We go to class for 4 hrs each day, but then we spend at least 2-3 hours in the afternoons/evenings practicing words, making flash cards and doing homework. Sometimes its 5-6 hrs if we have the stamina. Who knows how much we'll know in 3.5 months, maybe not that much, perhaps enough to communicate with patients at the clinic. Wherever we wind up with our language skills, i want to be able to say we tried our hardest while we were here, and thats all we can do. Ive definitely gotten to the point that everything i learn is "new", i dont recall learning this stuff in HS spanish nor in Rosetta stone this past fall, so thats sweet

2) These 2 weeks have been awesome for Maren and I. Sure, we've been blessed with 7 months of traveling and quality 1on1 time (heck, marens been a "stay at home wife" since july). But, in most of the places we visited, i was working during the day and we were a lot busier in the evenings with friends/activities. But here, its just a ton of "us time". We share one small room in a small apartment with 5 other people. We dont split up to do our own thing, hardly at all. Sure, these close quarters have led to a tiny bit of stress, but soooo much more its been a huge blessing. I  love Maren more every single day and i cant say enough good things about being alone on this adventure for how its helping us grow closer. 

And now for some pictures from our first week in Cusco...

In the background you can see water that makes you "eternally youthful", so far the
preliminary results are promising, stay tuned for the next 50 yrs to see if it works

They built a catholic monastery here, in the same spot that there was an incan temple to the sun 

CARLOS, our funny tour guide, 1 tour was enough to convince us we'd rather
 check out the sites on our own, instead of herded around in a big tourist group

Cusco in the background, at night time

Richie helping us study our "fruits" in espanol

CLICK THIS PICASA LINK FOR PICTURES: 5 days in between 2 great weekends

(click the blue underlined letters for more pictures!!!)

1st weekend in Cusco, Peru

3 posts at once...must be trying to start something

One huge highlight so far: on Sunday, we woke up with a wrapped gift from Richie (11yo boy), youngest child of the family we are staying with. It was an original song that he wrote for us in Spanish, with an English translation included. The actual gift was him singing the song, i tried to upload the video but it didnt work, so instead i am settling for sharing with you the "google translator english version" (trust me it was prettier and made more sense in spanish)

Welcome to this house, really welcome
Welcome to this house, really welcome
Welcome to this house, really welcome
MMMMMM, MMMMMM, MMMM, Welcome

Today is a special day, we are all together
Come, we celebrate, you arrived
Come, we share, you came to our house
Its good to have you as guests

Mormon soccer: on my first full day at 11,000+ feet, i got invited by 2 missionaries going door to door, to play soccer. I had to wake up at 7am, and I definitely hadnt adjusted to the climate, but finding a regular pick-up soccer game was one of my "big goals" coming into this trip. So i said yes. I thought this game might last til 830 or so...NO: in classic Cusco-fashion, we didnt start playing until 845, and the 14 missionaries & 125+ "mormon youth" were still playing when I left at Noon. I really didnt know what i was getting myself into, it was a recruiting event where the missionaries were supposed to show/talk about how awesome it is to be a mormon missionary in order to get "the youth" sign up for their missionary duty when they got older. There were lots of speeches, lots of prayers, lots of spanish, and lots of soccer. Overall, it was a pretty funny/fun thing to do on my first morning in Peru. Totally not expected.

Speaking of Big Goals, in case you were not aware, the No.1 goal we have while we are here is to learn SPANISH! In two months we are going to a town 45 mins from the city center and I will be working at a Christian Clinic for our last 2 months. If i want to be able to having meaningful interactions with patients, i gotta learn spanish.

OK...and now the best part: A few pictures of Cusco to wet your appetite, if you like what you see...you can see MORE, for FREE by clicking on the link the the complete PICASA web-album. I think this is going to be my format from now on: a few pictures, with a few comments/stories/musings...and then a link to see more (for free)

A pretty view, from a pretty hotel...we might stay here when our
parents visit in March for a Macchu Piccu trek + jungle safari

The view from San Blas

The famed: "Plaza de Armas", there is a crazy amount of history here related to spanish
 colonization annihilating the Incas... its a mixture of sad, interesting, tragic, and symbiotic

Maren is a great travel partner, and even better life partner

hawaiian shaka meet cusco

The Villenas family (our hosts for 2 months) missing Lisette (the mom)

Who needs to go to Brazil, when you have a huge statue of jesus hanging out over top Cusco

Did you know: every sunday in Cusco they blow off fireworks starting at like 5am. You hear this noise that sounds like a bomb going off. It lasts for 10 seconds. In my mind, i have 3 issues with this: 1) its loud and at first a little scary. 2) its daytime, you cant see fireworks in the daytime. 3) the noises are so random and sporadic that even if you could see fireworks, you wouldnt know when/where to look, and by the time you hear the noise and go to look out the window, the 10 second extravaganza is over...my guess is that you did NOT know any of this

Alright, thanks for reading/looking, more where this came from (except hopefully even better)
1st WEEKEND IN CUSCO

1 day in PANAMA

Maren and I opted for a 23 hr layover in Panama City, Panama on our way to Peru. One of Maren's closest friends from college lives/works in Panama and she was our guide for the day.

Karen was a boss host. She took us lots of places, drove her own car all around a hectic city, and taught us lots of cool stuff, not to mention maren loves her a lot and liked seeing "her world".  Boss is a word i used to say a lot, when I went to summer camp (deerfoot lodge), but I dont say it anymore. I was reminded of this great word yesterday, when I played soccer with about 100 mormons. (more on mormon soccer in my next post, that is related to cusco)

In the wide panoramic at the top, you will see a tower, this is the same tower maren is climbing in the picture above 

Above: Panama City
Left: Panama Canal


PICASA for PANAMA

My first blog post on my very own blog

Hi Friends/ Family

Maren is a few months ahead of me with this whole blogging thing. Also, since I am not as interesting, nor as clever with my words...my goal is to make this more of a forum for my newest hobby: picture taking. (I am not skilled enough to call it photography, yet)

Of course, I will probably not be able to resist from doing a little more than picture taking, as 2 days in Peru has already produced some great stories.