After Machu Picchu, we were fulfilled and ready to head home.  Our international journeys were officially complete.  As always, it’s crazy how fast time goes by.  It seems like just yesterday we were taking the initial plunge to travel and were deciding where to go.  Now, almost a year later, we have been to The Netherlands, India, Guatemala, and Peru.  I almost can’t believe it myself!  We’ve gained so much - learned new things, opened our hearts, and changed our perspectives. 

For anyone considering travel, I whole-heartedly encourage you to do so.  There are few things in our life that have challenged us so completely, made us define who we are and what we believe, and come to terms with all those unanswered questions we’ve left tucked away deep inside of ourselves.  We’ve struggled with the large questions for so long – “What am I doing with my life?”, “What’s my purpose?”, “I feel like I can do something really great, but what is it?”.  Travel of course is not a magic fix-all, answer-all, but being in a new place and seeing how other people in this world live, you are forced to come face-to-face with your ideals, your beliefs, your feelings, and your desires in life.  It’s an illuminating experience.  For the first time, you aren’t hiding anything.  You meet yourself.  And it is rewarding and uplifting beyond words.

At the present moment we are back in The States, spending quality time with our New Mexican friends and family.  We just finished a month personal retreat at a friend’s cabin in Kingston, NM.  We were able to relax, reflect on the past year and all our experiences, and prepare ourselves a little for what the future holds for us.

We are happy to be in NM for our nephew’s 6th birthday party and our niece’s graduation from high school.  At the end of May, we start our journey to Columbus - Rob and Amy Expedition of 2012!  This travel blog will now be our “life” blog and I will be updating it weekly, so check back often and subscribe using the RSS feed button to receive automatic notices of new posts!  Thank you again everyone for your support during this past year!!  Abrazos grandes a ustedes!!  (Bigs hugs to you all!)

So get your laughs out now – yes, there is a lake in Peru named Titicaca.  The third grader in me giggles with embarrassment – you said titi and caca!!  Ha ha!  But in seriousness, this is one of the most ancient and sacred lakes in the world.  We stayed in the main city by the lake shores called Puno.  This city is a bit like San Francisco.  The landscape is very mountainous, so all the houses are built along the mountainsides with steep roads connecting the residential areas to the main “downtown” of the city.  To our surprise, our little canyon workout didn’t really do much to help us climb these vertical streets any easier.  The main problem was the altitude, which was about 12,400 feet above sea level.  We were out of breath just walking a couple of feet.  We felt like such fatties.

In this region the main drink is Coca tea, which is just water and coca leaves, and helps your body adjust to the altitude and prevent altitude sickness.  Coca leaves are actually what they make cocaine out of.  Of course it takes about 200 kg of leaves to make 1 kg of cocaine, so a couple cups of tea was harmless, although I kept freaking out to Rob saying, “Great, now I’ve done drugs!  I’ve done cocaine!!”  I didn’t really, but I tend to be a bit dramatic at times.  Oh, and a little fact – Coca Cola used to be made out of coca leaves, that’s how it got the name!

We had plans to go visit a bunch of the little islands around the lake, but ended up having something come up with our family back in the States and we felt like we needed to be there.  The traveling has been amazing, but at this point in our journey we were starting to get a bit run down (mostly because of all the sicknesses!) and were already feeling ready to head back “home.”

So we decided to change our plans and head back early.  However, we absolutely HAD to visit Machu Picchu before we left Peru.  We were able to cancel our Machu Picchu trek and made last minute arrangements to head to Cuzco, the base camp city to Machu Picchu and then make the trip ourselves to the mountain city.

In Cusco our time was short, but we did meet this couple from Canada at our hostel, and we out on St. Patrick’s day with them which was a blast.  One of the best parts of travel are all the amazing people you meet from all over the world!

The day after we arrived in Cusco, we started the trek up to Machu Picchu.  It consists of several combi rides (collective taxis) that took most of the day, then a three hour hike to Aguas Calientes, the closest city to Machu Picchu.  The next day, we paid a ridiculous amount to take a bus up to the actual sight, since we were toasted from all the traveling/walking the day before.  But all the effort was totally worth it.

There is this spot at that looks over the ruins of Machu Picchu and it will make anyone speechless.  Here you are at 7,970 feet, surrounded by towering mountains and floating clouds, looking upon a city built on a mountain peak in the middle of the sky.  The city is just there, like something had set it on top of the mountain.  All the sides surrounding the city are straight drop-offs.  How this location was chosen, how this city was built, and how people survived up here is unfathomable.  This place is so mysterious, like many ancient places in Peru, where there are more questions than answers.  One just has to stand in awe in the face of unbelievable earthly creations and feel the shivers run down your spine.  Beautiful, incredible, unbelievable.  How blessed we are to have been in that place and experienced it’s magic.

Colca Canyon is a little jot from Arequipa and claims to be the deepest canyon in the world.  Being a native of the American Southwest and having just recently visited The Grand Canyon, I laughed at this statement.  Oh, Peruvians, you’re so funny with your, “Mine is biggest!” claims.  But, apparently there are many ways in which you can measure things like canyons, mountains, and volcanos.  So considering that the top of Colca Canyon is at 13,650 feet, I now believe it is the deepest.  The landscape and view were beautiful, with a “quaint” feel compared to the rolling majesty of the The Grand Canyon. 

We decided to be adventurous (and also prepare for the trek to Machu Picchu) by doing a 3 day, 2 night trek in and out of the heart of the canyon.  Our group was a good size for trekking: me and Rob, two British teenagers, a German guy and Spanish guy around our age, plus our guide.  She was a cute little thing of only 20 years old that spoke pretty decent English and was very patient with the slower trekking pace of two group members…who will remain nameless. 

We hiked for about 4-5 hours each day either straight up or straight down and camped for the night at some pretty sweet little cabin setups.  The second night, our accommodations were right at the base of the river with a large grassy area for soccer and a natural-water pool.  It was awesome!  (spiders and scorpions aside – hey, it’s the wilderness!).  The treks were pretty challenging for us, but lots of fun.  I kept shouting, “I love trekking!!  Me siento viva!!” (I feel alive)  Rob just stared at me with vexation.  For me, and Rob claims for him as well, is was so fun because I really got to challenge myself and it is an amazing feeling when you look up a cliff that you’re supposed to climb and think to yourself, “Oh, hell no!” but then find yourself making that final push at the end to arrive at the top.  Of course the rest of the group was waiting and erupted with wild applause.  “Thank you, thank you, friends!  I’ve finally arrived!”

On the bus back to Arequipa we met a really cool young entrepreneur from California that had recently sold his online business for a nice sum and was doing some traveling for awhile to relax, reflex, explore, and re-evaluate.  We hope to visit him sometime in the near future!  We also stopped at a hot springs and an alpaca farm on the way back.

The trip was a great success!  Fun, invigorating, plus we could still walk (albeit with much pain and soreness).  Rob’s highlight from the trip was trying fresh, local alpaca meat, and I am thrilled to announce that I did not fall, not even once!!  Yes! (fist pump)