Sad to say but our photos were inadvertently erased so we have no more to add to this adventure.

Nov 20 2012

Our flight to Yangon was 1 hour 15 minutes. We flew Air Asia, the budget airline. You paid for water if you wanted it. Nothing was free. When we booked our flight they showed the fee for the tickets, then you were to choose your seat.  Hey, guess what? You added a fee for your seat. Depending on which seat you chose, the fee varied. Exit rows cost more, for example. Well it ended up being less regardless of its additional costs but it was deceptive to see the initial price.

The Yangon international airport was bright and looked up to date. As we drove to town the area close to the airport looked quite nice if not prosperous but the closer we got to the heart of the city, the dirtier and more dated it looked. Buildings were tired and needed repainting or remodeling. Sidewalks here are covered in red spittle from betel nut chewers. Gross. The area where we walked near the town center was densely populated and quite crowded. There were lots of street vendors, particularly food vendors selling produce or prepared food which looked unappetizing. We also saw lots of meat and fish being sold, no refrigeration or means of cooling the products.

Everywhere we went in Burma there were bright smiles all around. We were humbled by the warm welcome. Obama had visited the day before and everyone seemed thrilled with the visit. The newspapers and BBC news had his photos in abundance. Many women, small children and some men wear a face ‘make-up’ which is used both for beauty and sun protection. It is made from the bark of a tree which is ground into a paste, mixed with water and smeared onto the face, mostly the wide swabs across the cheeks but sometimes all over the face or some other variation. It is extremely hot and humid here.

All of our arrangements we made through a travel agency because when I tried to book hotels online two and a half months prior to leaving the US, the hotels were booked! A friend recommended a travel agency in Yangon. Our hotel was 100 years old and had not been undated since the 70’s I would guess. They are in the process of painting and added new curtains in the rooms and there was scaffolding on the exterior. However it was a dump. Internet was rarely available, the stoppers in the sink and tub didn’t work, the light switch in the bathroom didn’t work, the lighting in the room was awful, etc. Because Burma has opened up in the past couple of years, tourists are coming in droves. We met a woman in Bangkok who works here with refugees and said her hotel that used to cost $32 a night is now over a $100. So at some level we were lucky to have a place to stay. Ron and I have traveled to areas in Ethiopia and eastern Sri Lanka that made this place seem like a palace so we mustered through.

We took a walk our first day as it was an open schedule. We went through a market area which was extremely crowded and dirty. It started raining hard so we ducked under an awning of a wire/cable shop and the manager/owner (?) grabbed two stools and invited us to sit inside. Once again we were touched by the reception. We spied a Christian church, many Buddhist temples, some mosques and a Jewish synagogue. We saw older buildings like the immigration office and railway buildings being renovated. These are colonial era buildings. The renovation of city hall has been completed. Burma is the poorest nation in Asia after 50 years of military rule and being isolated from the rest of the world. There were lots of cars and like many places we have visited pedestrians have no right of way here.  Our first dinner was in a biryani joint, complete with florescent lights, plastic stools which are ubiquitous in Asia. The chicken fell off the bones and was flavorful. I only got a couple of bites complete with grit. Our dinner was under $5. We walked back to the hotel as it wasn’t far. There were no street lights which made walking difficult as sidewalks were not even, sometimes there are lids off manhole covers, etc. We need to take our flashlight with us in the future.  We came home to our room and the AC was leaking water on the floor.

We got up at 4:00 a.m. to catch our 35 minute flight to Bagan. The domestic terminal was much more humble than the international terminal. There were two gates, side by side. When we arrived in Bagan we were directed to an area to wait for our luggage which took around 40 minutes, longer than the flight. Everything is done manually here, a sign of the poverty of the nation. So men hand load and unload luggage. There are no conveyor belts into and out of the planes. They load the bags onto a cart that is then pushed back to the terminal and there are none of those fancy retracting gateways that snug up to the planes like we have in the US.  For some unknown reason they parked the cart a block distance from the terminal and ran back and forth to retrieve the bags, one at a time.

Since we arrived quite early we started our sight seeing immediately. I failed to mention working through the travel agency we arranged for a car with driver and guide in each location, something we don’t normally do but it seemed the wise move given the situation in Burma. Our guide took us to the morning market where locals shop. Oy! We walked through narrow spaces with people on the ground, chopping fish and chicken on small wooden boards. We were close enough to get splattered but fortunately didn’t. It was gross. You can’t imagine how crowded, dirty and confined the spaces were. Flies were everywhere. We saw all kinds of produce and fresh meats/seafood and it mostly was unappetizing if not nauseating so early in the day.  There was lots of dried fish for sale, my least favorite part of Asia.  We saw all kinds of dried fish like the snake fish. YUM! It smells so bad that I have to hold my breath. The vendors were aggressive and I assume this is due to their poverty. Women selling wrap around skirts made for tourists to resemble the native dress would rush up to me and start wrapping a skirt around me. I resisted (I can’t wear this type of skirt due to my body shape). One woman actually knocked me off balance. Another one walked right up and applied the face make-up used here hoping I would buy a jar from her. Betel nut stands with all the paraphernalia was in abundance as were the chewers, men and women. If you have never seen this, it looks like the chewers mouth is bleeding profusely: the entire cavity is blood red as are the teeth. Eventually the teeth are permanently stained.  And so it went.  We then visited three Buddhist temples. This region is renowned for its temples: 3200 in all. Our guide was quite knowledgeable and detailed and both of us got overwhelmed with the information he was giving us. I asked him to be a little less specific.

We had a classic Burmese lunch of chicken curry. This consisted of stewed and somewhat tough and dry chicken, and about four or five side dishes, about twice what either of us could eat. Then we checked into our lovely hotel. It was small with about 15 rooms wrapped around a courtyard. The breakfast was served on the roof top terrace. We had booked this room as the agency was having difficulty finding one in our range in Bagan. It was spotless and everything worked and it cost $30 a night as opposed to $84 in Yangon where very little worked. The breakfast here was to order and far superior to the place in Yangon. We rested in the heat of the day then went to a lacquer ware showroom and workshop. We purchased a tray and headed out to see the sunset over the river. It was a perfect ending to a long day. We stopped at a restaurant on the way home and had a good dinner. We were asleep by 9:30.

November 22

Today is Thanksgiving. We have so very much to be thankful for and it is abundantly clear when you visit other parts of the world just how good we have it in the US. We were picked up at 8:30 and drove to a famous temple (Shwesandaw paya-golden holy hair, one of Buddha’s hairs is enshrined here) where we climbed up five levels to catch the view. Bagan is located on a large plain and many temples were visible from this vantage point. The steps were so steep and high (not to code mind you) that I had to literally pull myself up hand over hand using the railing. Coming down was even more difficult. But it was worth the view. Most of the temples here were built in the 11^th-13^th centuries. We sat on the wall on the top level while our guide regaled us with stories of the history here. The hair was presented to King Anawrahta by King of Ussa Bago in thanks for his assistance in repelling an invasion by the Khmers. But we also asked about life in Burma today and Soe Wen was happy to answer our questions. He said teachers make $80-$100 a month. It is not enough to support a family but a couple could eke out an existence on that amount. Soe Wen’s wife works full time for the government and he works full time during the tourists season, about six months a year. They have two children and he said without his wife’s income they could not make it. She lives with her parents and the children. He lives with his parents and when they can get together they do. They live where their work is and they are about an hour away from each other.

We visited Htilominio pahto,150 ft high, built in 1218. It marks the spot where King Nantaungmya was chosen (by a leaning umbrella-that timeless decipher), among five brothers, to be the crown prince. Ananda Pahto was perhaps the most impressive. It was thought to have been built in 1090. It contains 1000 Buddha images most of which are small and way above eye level but there are four that are each 31 ft high made from a single piece of wood. Two are from the11th century and two are replacements from a fire in the 1600’s that destroyed two of the originals. They were magnificent.  They are in the process of restoring some wonderful murals with the help of archeologists from India.  Every temple we visited in Myanmar had vendors in the entrances to the temples. They were selling religious items as well as souvenirs and trinkets. It is interesting how the commercial and religious are blended here as in other parts of the world.

Afterwards we went to get cash by exchanging dollars as there are no ATMs, no credit cards and no travelers checks used here. We had to carry cash in US dollars and the bills had to be new, with no creases, no marks, stains or tears. They also had to be certain serial numbers. We went to three banks in the US before we were able to get the required money. While changing money we bought a nat (spirit being) mask to add to our mask collection. Worship of nats predates Buddhism in Burma. Nats have long believed to hold dominion over a place, person or field of experience. Afterwards we asked to see a village away from the tourist area and walked around. As we passed by homes our guide would ask if we could enter the yard when a family was outside. Each time we were welcomed in so we felt like we got a small taste of family life in this village. The first place was a farm family and they were poor. The second home we visited was a family who has a rice noodle business. Everyone, men and women, are involved in this two day process of producing the noodles. Their business was a successful endeavor and their home had more amenities. Keep in mind they live close to the ground literally and figuratively. The people in this village have outhouses and drink river water which is pumped to the houses. The homes we saw were mostly made of bamboo woven mats for the walls and no foundations. The wealthier families might have brick walls but by our standards these people were living in shanties. Soe Wen said there were no TVs in his village until 1996. Today we saw some satellite dishes on bamboo mat walls. There were only a very few cars in this village. Horse carts are still in use. All farming is done as it has been for centuries: oxen ploughs, hand harvesting, hand threshing, etc. We saw a grandmother lighting up a cheroot.

Nov 23

We left for Mandalay, another 30 minute flight. Again luggage is hand carried from the check in counter to the area where it is scanned then carried to a roller carts then rolled out to the tarmac and loaded onto the lane, all manually. No moving machinery here. Four flights arrived within 25 minutes and four departed. There is lots of room to make a mistake with the luggage given the system here which is hardly a system but we did just fine. There are no computers in the airport either. Boarding passes are hand written with no assigned seats. As we were driving around I saw a billboard with two photos of motorcycles accidents. Each one featured a bloodied (dead?) body and a crushed motorcycle. Our guide said there is a real problem with motorcycle accidents and deaths in Mandalay. That evening we saw people driving their motorcycles with no lights on!

That morning we visited the world’s longest teak foot bridge which gently curves 1300yds. across a swallow lake in Amarapura. A 17 year old girl approached us as we got out of the car and followed us across the bridge and back to the car asking us to buy her necklaces. I told her as soon as she asked that I would not buy her necklace. She persisted and was disappointed when I got back into the car. Again I think people here are quite poor and probably desperate for money. Ron asked to take her photo then gave her some money as a thank you. As we crossed the bridge there were several beggars on the bridge: an elderly woman, a woman with an infant and a woman who appeared to have leprosy. We then went into Mandalay and saw artisans: wood carvers, tapestry makers, marble carvers, silk weavers, and gold leaf pounders. The gold is first flattened with a small machine that is manually cranked but the final process is a man who uses a heavy wooden mallet to pound the gold leaf for five hrs. Because the gold leaf is used in temples this final step is required as using a manual machine would not meet the requirements of the temple.

In the afternoon we saw a replica of the royal palace which is located on a military base. The sign at the entrance said “We and the people cooperate and crush all enemies of the Union”. I aaume this is a remnant of the previous military junta. The original palace was destroyed in a bombing during WWII. We visited a highly carved teak monastery, a teak pagoda and the world’s largest book: the holy Buddhist scriptures that are inscribed onto 729 marble slabs, each housed in its own small stupa. The evening ended with a ride up Mandalay Hill. Many walk up the hill as a ‘pilgrimage’ of sorts. I could never have made it and was thankful to be in a car. The view from up top which includes two or three escalator rides is a 360 degree view of Mandalay. We arrived in time for sunset.  Mandalay, like Yangon has many unpaved roads and is dirty consequently. There is a litter problem here also. People sit on the ground or quite close to the ground to do their work whether they are washing dishes or clothes, sewing tapestries, or carving marble or wood. Many homes have no foundations so the dirt easily enters the home. Some homes have dirt floors. Although there was less begging here than in India  it seemed poorer to me than India.

The majority of people in Burma dress traditionally. Men and women wear sarongs, long length of tubular cloth that is tied at the waist. It requires constant retying throughout the day. All of our guides wore sarongs. One guide told us they wear them because they are cheap and fit the weather here. We frequently saw men riding on top of crowded buses. There is a growing disparity between the wealthy and the poor. The military has been in power for over 50 years so many of the military are cronies and are quite wealthy. We would see very nice homes built right next to a shanty or a small business. People use horse carts, bicycles, bicycle rickshaws, motorcycles and cars to get around along with buses.  Many of the temples are decorated with mirrored tiles, garish to our tastes but quite popular in Burma. What was peculiar was that drivers ride on the right side of the road British style but the steering wheel is also on the right side. They cannot see to pass the car in front of them without getting completely into the opposing lane of traffic. We had a very nice accommodation here, a suite in a new hotel. Such a contrast to Yangon.

Nov 24

Next morning we flew to Heho and were met by our next guide to took us to the boat launch for our stay on Inle Lake, my favorite part of the trip. The lake measures 13.5 miles long by 7 miles wide. The elevation here is 3,000 ft so it was cooler. The communities here are prosperous as they grow 85% of the potatoes for Burma as well as many other crops: rice, corn, cauliflower, sunflower seeds for oil, tobacco and bananas. It is the breadbasket of Burma. The population of Heho is 13,000. The homes were better constructed of stucco, cinder block or brick instead of bamboo. We saw crops being dried on tarps in front of homes. Gas stations were small stands that sell gas in liter bottles. Still we saw no foundations on structures. They are built at the ground level. Many residents wore broad brimmed straw hats for sun protection. I saw women washing clothes in the irrigation ditches. Our trip on the boat was an hour and we spied the leg rowers that Inle Lake is famous for. Men standing up use one leg to row their fishing boats to leave at least one hand free to manage their gear. The lake is surrounded by stilt house villages and floating vegetable gardens. The lake is 3-4 meters deep and rises to 4-5 meters during the wet season. Some houses sit on small dirt ‘platforms’ and would be sitting in water at 5 meters. Boats are the main means of transport here and it is a busy lake as this is one of Burma’s top five attractions for tourists. Our hotel was fabulous. It is built in the water and rests on stilts. Our cottage included a large bedroom, a covered veranda facing the sunset with deck chairs and a small table and chairs and a large bathroom with a tub and a shower. It is rare to find a tub in Asia. The houses on the lake were much larger than we saw anywhere else in Burma. Our guide said one family lived in each house but I am not sure if there were two generations as she said that the older people lived upstairs. Almost all the houses were two stories. We visited a silver smith with a very large showroom, a weaving studio where we saw lotus weaving, something I had never heard of and that I was totally fascinated by. The weaver takes a lotus stem and scores it about three inches from the bottom. She then carefully breaks the stem and gently pulls it away from the main stem and tiny threads are visible which she twists and lays onto a board and uses her hand to rub the threads together. She repeats this process working her way up the stem adding the new threads by rubbing them into the former ones. Needless to say the scarves made from lotus were more expensive than silk. The resulting cloth is like linen or flax, a somewhat coarse fabric and most attractive. We visited a boat builder. The boats are made of teak and it takes four men working 20 days to complete one boat. These are simple albeit long boats with outboard motors. It takes twenty men to haul the boat into the lake. The builder also does yearly maintenance on the lake boats as they require resealing yearly. We stopped by a blacksmith shop where knives were made as well as something that looked a lot like a scythe, farm implements and gongs which are used a lot here. We watched cheroots being made. All the people doing this were young women in their early 20’s. They make 1,000 cheroots a day and make about $3.80 a day. Oy! I loved watching paper being made with bougainvillea blossoms. The paper was made into wrapping paper, lamp shades, hand held fans and parasols. A woman can make three parasols a day. We ended the day looking at floating gardens where we saw a ton of tomatoes being grown as well as cauliflower. As we drove around in the boat we saw women washing clothes and dishes in the lake from their docks. I didn’t want to know about how residents dispose of sewerage. I was surprised at how little debris we saw in the lake. Only once or twice during the day did we see a collection of trash (plastic items, etc) floating in the lake. Each time we arrived at the hotel, staff and two little kids greeted us with a loud welcome of banging gongs and other percussion instruments. When we arrived at the end of the day there was a Pa-O couple there in their traditional dress of black clothing and red turbans.

Monks in Thailand mostly wear saffron robes while in Burma they are burgundy. Several times we saw fisherman slapping the water with their oars. They do this to stun the fish in hopes of making it easier to catch them. We saw beautiful and large poinsettias here about four or five feet in height. Because this is poor country I twice got shopping bags made of newspaper.

Nov 25

Yangon

Our first day in Yangon we visited the national museum and a 70 meter long reclining Buddha (the longest reclining Buddha I have ever seen and I have seen a heck of a lot of Buddhas in my travels throughout Asia). We had lunch at a traditional Burmese restaurant and visited a park in the afternoon that had a ‘hamsa bird shaped floating barge on the lake. Later in the day we visited the famous Scott’s market with its 2,000 shops. I had read about a shop that sold ethnic textiles and other items. Our guide knew the shop and took us there. The owner quickly figured out what I was looking for and sent us upstairs to her mother’s shop which was floor to ceiling in tribal goods. The guide and Ron sat down while I ogled the goods. We ended up purchasing a tribal ceremonial belt from the Naga tribe that lives on both sides of the border of Burma and India. The belt is leather about 5 ½ inches wide and covered in cowry shells. In the mid back there is a carved wooden piece that holds a knife and it is decorated in pinkish hair but we don’t know what kind of hair. There was no knife with the belt. We were thrilled with the purchase. We admired a magnificent headdress piece with orange beads. The price of $500 was beyond our limit. We ate dinner at an Indian restaurant that was overpriced (the menu prices were listed in US dollars) and the food was nothing special.

 The next morning we walked around downtown admiring buildings built during the colonial era. Amazingly they all still had their same original use: the immigration office was still the immigration office, etc. Most of the buildings have not been updated but there are beginnings of historic buildings being preserved. City Hall for instance has been refurbished, at least on the outside. We did not go inside. We visited one of the famous downtown temples, Sule pagoda which is 2,000 years old. It is a beautiful octagonal golden stupa. We visited the lone Jewish synagogue built in 1890. During colonial times there was a vibrant Jewish community here. Jewish merchants had migrated here, from Bagdad and India when it was under British rule. The community grew to 2,500 and lasted until World War II. There is only a handful left in Burma today.  We then visited the bustling harbor. What a sight. Everything is done manually here due to the poverty. Men haul all sorts of cargo off of ships and onto smaller craft that will take the goods to various parts of Burma. Some were lifting 50 kilos of rice. That’s over a hundred pounds. They run down the gangway and onto the boats. They are given a tally stick when they pick up a load and give it to a tally man who tracks how many sticks each man hands in and that determines one’s pay. The pay is low and our guide said most of the men drink their wages nightly. At sunset we visited the Shwedagon pagoda, the most sacred of all Buddhist sites in the country. It is huge and we almost had a full moon to boot. The place was swarming with people. November 28^th will be a full moon which is a  Buddhist poya day and a big celebration will be held. Many preparations were underway. Our last night we dined at a fabulous restaurant and ate a delicious meal. We carefully ordered our meal to use up all our Burmese kyat.

Upstairs was a quality handicrafts shop. One of the volunteers who was staffing the store strolled through the dining room wearing/carrying some of the handicrafts and encouraged diners to stop upstairs before leaving. I had read about the place and told her we would come up when we finished eating. We had no intention of buying anything for two reasons: our suitcases were bulging with other purchases and we had just spent all our money except cab fare back to the hotel. Up we went. OMG what beautiful crafts. I was immediately drawn to some exquisite weavings. The volunteer came over and said ‘you realize you are looking at our most expensive items’. I said they were so beautiful. I couldn’t afford them but loved admiring them. We took our time and oooohed and aaaahed over the various items. Then we spied some used items that were woven and couldn’t resist a head scarf that a tribal woman would wear somewhat like a turban. We had seen various tribal women in different towns with the turbans. Fortunately the shop took US dollars so we were in luck and the item was small enough to squeeze in our luggage. We were thrilled.

Nov 27-29

Bangkok

We flew back to Bangkok and I made no notes of what we did but mostly we relaxed. The following day we had planned to connect with a young Thai friend for Loy Kratong, festival of lights, that is related to poya. She hadn’t heard from us so made other plans. She recommended a good spot to watch the activities. What a mistake to stay in Bangkok for Loy Kratong. It is a city of 14 million people and I think everyone one of them was trying to get to the river for Loy Kratong. The metro was crammed. We tried to walk down to the water and it was impossible so we circled around and went up on a bridge to watch but there wasn’t much to see. We were worn out from just trying to get there so after about 90 minutes we decided to go back to the hotel. As we reached the metro the fireworks started but by then we were tired and just wanted to get away from the throngs of people and off our feet.

Nov 29-Dec 2

Phetchaburi

The next morning we headed to our house where we relaxed for three days. We had no car so we ate what was left over in the refrigerator from when we had been there 10 days before. Our family there asked us when we needed food and someone would take a motorcycle and go pick up a take out meal as needed. We celebrated our 27^th anniversary on Nov 30^th. I offered to forage in the refrigerator for dinner and we dined on grilled cheese sandwiches with two olives each. Ron looked hungry after finishing this repast so I offered him a grilled peanut butter sandwich with the last two pieces of bread. He had never had one and was quick to say yes. Each night we played Scrabble and Ron was the constant winner. We also played rummy and enjoyed each other’s company while jointly working on a crossword daily. Two days we walked up to the little ‘community’ near our house. There is a small grocery store, a laundry, an internet café and a seamstress. We stopped by for lunch at an outdoor ‘eatery’. This is a palm leaf covered  roof on an open sided structure with no floor other than the dirt. Cooking is done in a wok over a gas burner. We ordered pad kee mao and as I was eating it tears rolled down my cheeks due to the chilies. I turned to the cook and said ‘phet, phet’ which means hot in Thai. The woman almost died laughing at me.  The next day I ordered pad Thai and fared much better. We hired a private car to take us back to Bangkok to catch our plane. We checked into our hotel and rested. After spending a month off and on over the seven week trip at this hotel, they upgraded us to a bigger room. Oddly enough the smaller room was better because the TV in the big room was so far away you couldn’t see it that well. Too funny. We went to dinner with Thai friends and met some family members we had not met before. We had a fabulous Thai meal and headed off to bed. We went to bed around 11 and got up at 4:00 to catch our flight. All in all it was a great tip. It was also our longest trip where we are just ‘vacationing’. We have been on longer trips where Ron was working but this trip was strictly a vacation from retirement.

Back in our little Thai home

Nov 12

James left for home in the wee hours of Nov 9^th.  Ron and I left Bangkok on Nov 9 by renting a car with driver to take us to Hua Hin to pick up a rental car. Our last two days with James we went to Wat Pho to have his horoscope/fortune read and to see the incredible reclining Buddha. The statue is 150 feet long and is gilded brick and plaster. It really is quite spectacular. The following day we went to the National Museum and got caught in the pouring monsoon rain. The museum occupied several buildings and while in the last building we waited for 45 minutes for the torrential rains to slacken up in order to leave. We looked like the ‘three drown rats’. The museum itself was a disappointment. It was not well maintained and had a limited collection.

We are thrilled to be in our little Thai house. Phetchaburi is a small town and is so much calmer than Bangkok with its 14 million residents. There is little to do here. We decided to rent a car to give us more freedom and to impose less on our Thai “family” here. Our house is part of a family compound. Pa Cha An is the lovely 89 year old matriarch of a large family. She is now blind but still gets around her house. Lin, her daughter in law lives with her to help out. Our house is at the other end of the property, a quick walk down the driveway. Noi, one of Pa Cha An’s sons lives next to us. Noi takes care of the property in our absence.  Ron has busied himself with home maintenance: he bleached the stucco foundation of the house that gets lots of black mold, he is currently carving out a wedge in the foundation where there is a large crack. The crack isn’t structural, merely surface. He started by using a power tool and now is using a hammer and chisel to get a bigger wedge that he will later fill with concrete. Next will come repainting the surface. It is hotter than hell here so he works in the early morning before the heat becomes unbearable.

Today we woke up to a terrific tropical monsoon rain storm, complete with thunder and lightening. We were able for the first time to turn off the AC in the bedroom, the only room that is air conditioned. It rained most of the morning so we ran errands after breakfast then came back to the house. Since it is still cool due to the weather Ron is now carving away outside making a great racket. It is also quite humid here so even with the cooler temps it is still easy to work up a sweat.

Our second day here we drove to Hua Hin  about an hour south of here to have lunch with our friend Bill, a retired builder from Bend OR. He now lives about five hours south of here but was in Hua Hin for some appointments. We enjoyed some fabulous duck soup with egg noodles and got in a good visit.

I have spent my time organizing our closet which was a jumble. I did some ironing and rested from the heat when possible. I am such a light weight when it comes to the heat. We now have a TV and DVD player so in the evenings we usually play Scrabble which we bought for this trip or do a crossword puzzle together and then watch an episode of Mad Men, season 5. We are limiting ourselves to one a night so we won’t run out before we leave. The TV only gets Thai stations and since we know about six words in Thai, we don’t watch the programs. We are happy to have Scrabble and the DVD player. In the past we played rummy until we got rummy!

Seeing Thailand with James -

Nov 3

Ron and I got up early and caught a plane to Chiang Mai in northern Thailand, about 1.25 hours from Bangkok.  Chiang Mai is known for its hill tribe crafts. We checked into our hotel then walked to a shop where I hope to find a wall hanging that friend’s in Portland has requested. Unable to find what was needed, I spoke with the shop owner who offered to have his daughter work up a couple of ideas and email them to me on Monday when she returned to work. We agreed this would work. If Gary and Edmund approved the design, I could wire the money from a Thai post office and he would mail the item to me at ‘our home’ in Phetchaburi. The house actually belongs to our friend Nattawan but she has offered use of the house to us for years.

We grabbed some lunch by the river. The setting was nice but the lunch was a disappointment. We grabbed a cab and went to a fair trade hill tribe shop, again looking for wall hangings. No luck. We went back to our room and rested then headed out to the Saturday night market. It was overwhelming, combined with the nightly night market. We grew tried of walking in the heat on concrete. We grabbed a quick bite and were refreshed. Back to shopping. I did find a great indigo batik tablecloth and some placemats but no napkins. We decided we could use the placemats if all else failed. On the way home we found a great massage spa and stopped in for an hour foot massage. Off the bed we went.

Nov 4

We had a great buffet breakfast of granola, fresh tropical fruit, bad coffee, juice and bread before heading out to Doi Suthep and a Hmong village high in the mountains above Chiang Mai. First we visited the village. It was small but we were surprised at the size of the commercial center. There was an are where we walked in a semi circle passing by vendors on each side, most of them selling the same items: traditional dress, bedspreads, and packets of Thai silk woven and cut to the size for a long straight skirt and jacket. We went through the crude little hill tribe museum that had a few items such a farm implements and several poster boards describing the various hill tribes. 

As we exited the museum we were in a lovely flower garden area so we walked around he garden for a while, spying a huge poinsettia ‘tree’. Ron said he had never seen any except those small potted varieties available in the stores around Christmas time. On the edge of the garden was a woman who was selling old traditional dress items and some new items. I found a traditional dress ‘apron’ and a new traditional hat from her. She was totally unwilling to bargain so I paid her full price and was delighted to have the tow items. As we neared the ended of the walk I found an older woman who was selling indigo ‘yardage’ by the rolls which were perfect for my needed napkins so purchased one of her rolls.   

Back into the cab we had hired and back down to Doi Suthep where there is a wonderful wat sitting among the trees in the mountains, a very picturesque setting. We rang the bells for good luck, lit some candles and placed a lotus on a reclining Buddha in memory of James deceased wife Heloise. One of my favorite sights were some little ‘monk gnomes’ we spied in a garden at the temple. They made me laugh.

We came back to town and went by the Hmong market, again in search of wall hangings. No luck. We ate lunch at our hotel and rested until time to go to the Sunday market. After venturing into the market I turned to Ron and told him I was tired of markets. SO we grabbed a tuk tuk and went to a lovely restaurant we had read about on the river. It was lovely setting with a chedi across the river reflected in the water. As we were dining a  small traditional boat drifted by with two tourists. It was quaint and fun to watch. We stopped by our massage place to take in a Thai massage before heading back to the hotel.

Nov 5

We flew back to Bangkok early in the morning. On the way to the airport our taxi had a flat tire so he flagged down a songthaew, a small pick up truck that has two bench seats and that are used as transportation. We moved our luggage into the truck and off we went. We found our friend James in much better health and had lunch across from our hotels. We went to our hotel and unpacked and rested briefly. James and I went to see the latest James Bond film then the three of us went to a new to us restaurant that was delicious. We went to bed early.

Nov 6

Today James invited us to breakfast at his hotel. Afterwards we went to see the Golden Buddha. It is solid gold, is 15’9” high and 12’5” wide and weighs 5 tons. It is 700 years old. The Buddha was discovered by accident in 1955. While extending the port, workers unearthed what appeared to be a plain stucco Buddha. The imager was kept at a wat under a makeshift shelter for 20 years until arcane dropped it while moving it to a more permanent shelter. The plaster cracked, revealing the gold beneath. It had probably been encased in stucco to hide it from Burmese ransackers.  Afterwards we had lunch and a rest. It is quite hot ad humid here so afternoon rests are a great way to get refreshed.

From Sri Lanka to Thailand

Oct 28 

Today we headed out to Galle, on the coast south of Colombo. I had been told that with the new highway it took an hour to get there. Well the truth is once you get to the new highway it take an hour to get to the exit. Getting to the highway took 45 minutes and getting to Galle took another 15 minutes. This cut into the time we had for sight seeing. So we didn’t get to see much. We went to the town famous for the Sri Lanka carved wooden masks. Unfortunately the driver took a wrong turn cutting into our time for sight seeing as he drove for close to 30 minutes before he realized his mistake. James bought a great mask. 

We had a date at Shilpa Children’s Home so had to get back to Colombo to eat lunch, change clothes and make a quick stop on the way. We ate lunch at 4:00. Once we arrived at Shilpa we chatted with three trustees then the girls offered a performance of signing and dance (Bollywood style!) 

Afterwards we had five of the girls who speak English come and tell us about their lives. One is a successful flight attendant flying to places like London and Paris. She has saved money in a very disciplined way and plans to buy an apartment. Another is a travel agent, one is an auditor, another is a graphic artist. All these were success stories that inspired us. What great role models for the girls who grow up in Shilpa. The fifth girl dreams of being a human right attorney and takes her A level exams soon which will determine her path.

We ate at a well known seafood restaurant and had a horrid experience. The noise level was awful and we sat near a waiter station that had a phone that rang throughout our meal with a shrill ring. It was answered only once. We couldn’t get out of there quick enough.

Oct 29

We departed for Kandy and Nuwara Eliya which is in the high country. Kandy is famous for a Buddhist temple that contains a tooth of Buddha’s. We stopped at an elephant orphanage on the way  then headed for the botanical gardens but it was filled with thousands of Sri Lankans taking advantage of poya day, a religious holiday. James opted out of seeing the gardens so we headed to lunch. James was starting to feel really bad from what he thought was a cold so we skipped seeing the temple and headed for Nuwara Eliya. It was pouring rain from a cyclone out of Bengal Bay. We checked into our hotel and James headed for bed and we headed to town to look for a jacket. They sell irregulars from the factories here. It is difficult shopping to say the least. Ron found one that was satisfactory and we went back to the hotel and ate a light meal and headed off to bed.

Oct 30

We headed back to Colombo, a six hour drive on extremely busy two lane roads. We stopped to use the bathroom at a tea house and I exited laughing from a posted sign in the toilet: Ladies please remain seated during the entire performance. Men please stand closer. It may be shorter than you think. We ate a wonderful last meal in Sri Lanka at our hotel.

Oct 31

We got up at 4:00 a.m. to catch our plane to Bangkok. James didn’t feel well so I had emailed a friend who owns a hospital in Bangkok. He offered for us to come there as soon as we landed. We grabbed a taxi and it took about an hour to get there. They were waiting for us. The parking crew spied our taxi and waved us into the garage. A nurse greeted us and escorted us into the hospital and James was seen immediately. BY now it was 4:00 and none of us had eaten since the flight breakfast around 8:30. I asked  if there was a cafeteria and she said no but we could order from the hospital. The next thing I knew three plates of chicken fried rice were delivered to us. Then doctor Krishrat arranged for a staff member to drive us to town to our hotel as the hospital is north of town.

Nov 1

It has been days since I have written so the events will be sketchy. I don’t remember what we did on Nov 1 as I am writing this on Nov 5. James got sicker with whatever has felled him. He rested on Nov 1 and Nov 2. On Nov 2 Ron and I met with a friend’s cousin’s wife who does development work in this part of the world. She was so inspirational and so dedicated to her work.

After meeting with her we had lunch with James then he went back to bed. Ron and I went to find a booking agency to try and get a refund for James as he will not be able to make the Chiang Mai trip with us. This took several hours but we accomplished our goal with the help of Dr Krishrat who wrote a medical certification for James.

That night we were to have a river dinner cruise with Duang Chai and Dr Krishrat. At 6:30 Dr Krishrat called to say the traffic was very bad and he would not be able to pick us up and for us to grab a cab. We did as instructed and shortly we too we struck in really bad traffic. The driver suggested we jump out, grab the metro then grab a cab to get to our destination in time before the boat was launched. We did as instructed. Once we emerged from the subway we couldn’t find a cab so flagged a tuk tuk, a small three wheeled vehicle which is open to the elements. Our driver was a young man and we dubbed our ride “Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride” as our guy sped through the streets and made turns at full speed. I was sure we were going to tump over. Alas we arrived at our destination and I was reduced to giggles over the ride and patted the driver on the back for getting us there in time and safely.

Shortly we hooked up with our friends. Their son Om joined us. Om graduated from USC (Ron’s alma mater) about a year ago. So he spoke great English. It turned out that Dr. Krishrat had to park his car and grab a motorcycle taxi in order to get to the launch site in time. We were all lucky to have these alternatives. The cruise was lovely, seeing temples, hotels, etc all lit up. The buffet was endless and delicious.

Back to Sri Lanka... Again

October 24 2012

Ron and I went to bed on Tuesday ready for our departure for Sri Lanka. Ron set the phone alarm to go off at 5:45 but for reassurance I called the front desk and asked for a wake up call at 5:45. The call came and we hopped out of bed from a deep slumber. We showered and dressed and as Ron put on his watch he noted the time was 5:10. Our call had come at 4:45 not 5:45! We were wide awake and dressed so no need to head back to bed. We ate a light breakfast at the lovely Bangkok airport, one of the nicest we have traveled through. Our flight on Sri Lankan Air was good: we had plenty of leg room, it was a short three hour flight and the food was much better than United’s international flight. We were met by Kelum, a former driver for the Asia Foundation with whom Ron worked when we lived here. We checked into our hotel and went to lunch at a nearby food court that has a great veggie Indian restaurant. We ate a masala dosai and loved it. Then we headed to Ajith’s, my favorite jeweler, where I ordered some pendants then onto the Asia Foundation to see old friends. We went back to the hotel and rested then went out to dinner with another friend that Ron had worked with. We dined alfresco at a great Italian place. Back to the hotel to bed as we were tired from our early rise in Bangkok.

October 25

We had a great breakfast in our hotel. The hotel is quite new and very sophisticated in design. The rooms are concrete: floors, walls, bed platform, bedside tables, built in desk, sink stand, and shower stall. It may sound weird but the work is beautifully done: stained concrete and all the edges are rounded like bull nose tile. Our former driver, Mr. Kularathna picked us up promptly at 10:00 and we headed to Barefoot, my favorite place to shop. I got new cloth napkins, a table cloth for the outdoor farmer’s table Ron built this summer, a few clothes and two ceramic plates. We went to another store to get some excellent Sri Lankan tea then headed over to the Asia Foundation to give friends gifts before a luncheon at a nearby restaurant. Unfortunately, many people who had been invited were not able to come as it is a big four day holiday weekend.

Afterwards we took a trip down memory lane and rode over to Thimbriagasyaya, the street where we lived in 2005-06. They are widening the street and it was amazing to see the changes. Speaking of changes we have been surprised at many positive changes since our last visit in January 2011. The city is considerably cleaner than before, there is a lot of remodeling of older colonial buildings that are quite beautiful, the roads appear to be in better shape and new roads are being built or have been completed to improve traffic from the airport and to Galle, another major city here.

October 26

I got up at 2:00 a.m. to go to the airport to welcome James Wall, a friend of mine since grade school. About a year ago James and his two brothers-in-love made a very generous donation to Shilpa Children’s Home in Colombo in honor of James deceased wife, Heloise. I had volunteered at Shilpa when we lived here. When James expressed an interest in traveling with us to Thailand I suggested we also come here so Shilpa could thank him for what he and his family had done for them. So James arrived and we agreed that we would meet at 2:00 p.m. so he could sleep in. I managed to go back to sleep around 6 and got up at 7:15. Sleep has been elusive since I have been in SE Asia. We had a great day seeing a Buddhist temple, another temple on Beira Lake (literally on the lake) designed by Sri Lanka’s well known architect, Geoffrey Bawa. Afterwards we walked along the Indian Ocean at Galle Face Green before coming back to our hotel and getting refreshed before going out to dinner with Veena Durgabakshi, our former landlord. Veena brought her brother, his wife and charming two daughters who have grown so much since we last saw them in January 2011. We ate a wonderful Sri Lankan dinner with many different dishes.

October 27

Today we did some touring of Pettah, the heart of old town where the market thrives. Because today was a Muslim holiday there wasn't a lot of activity. We visited a mosque that was built in 1908 and is being expanded to more than double its size. Now that the civil war has ended we suspect that a lot of pent up development is occurring. Next we visited a Hindu temple and there was a lot of activity here. We removed our shoes once we were inside the temple grounds. I realized what a tender foot I was. 

From here we went to the Dutch Hospital. Sri Lanka was invaded and ruled about 150 years each by the Portuguese, then the Dutch and lastly the Brits. The hospital has been redeveloped into a very upscale area of shops and restaurants. There was an outlet of our favorite store Barefoot so we popped in and picked up a few gifts. Then we ventured into Colombo 07. This area is graced with colonial mansions, tree lined streets and more redevelopment. We visited the Independence monument and the former race course where there were horse races back in the day of British rule.

Next stop was lunch at Barefoot and some serious shopping for James. He found some great hand loomed fabric to recover some chairs, shirts, silk scarves, etc. We picked up the table cloth we had hemmed from fabric we had purchased earlier in the week and Ron found a great bathrobe. All cloth items at Barefoot are hand loomed, hand dyed and hand made. We walked through the art gallery there then headed over to Paradise Rd which sells household items such as ceramics, table linens and the like. James found a few more items then we headed back to the hotel as jet lag had caught up with James. We headed over the Odel’s, Sri Lanka’s sole department store in hopes of finding winter jackets. Neither of us found anything that appealed to us. Many manufactures have clothes made here then shipped overseas so you can get a bargain if you can find what you want. The only place in Sri Lanka that anyone would wear a jacket is in the high country.

Oct 21 2012

It took about 30 hrs going from door to door from LA to Bangkok. We woke up at 4:00 a.m. about 30 minutes before our alarm went off. We arrived in Bangkok around 11:00 p.m. and got to bed around 2:00a.m. We went to our favorite breakfast place in a garden setting and discovered it had moved out of the neighborhood, a big disappointment. We settled for a muffin at Starbucks.

We took it easy as we hadn’t slept well and it was a short night. We ate lunch near our hotel and then had an hour long foot massage before taking an hour long nap. We met Marilyn Prekup, a friend from the Rep of Georgia who now works in Bangkok at the US embassy. It was fun seeing her again.

Today is now Sunday and we ate breakfast (chicken slices with rice and stock) at an outside stand next to the hotel. We walked around trying to find a Jim Thompson shop but it also has left the neighborhood. Now we are heading out to see a Thai friend and her daughter whom we befriended when she did a high school year in the Portland area about four years ago.

We went to a Chinese restaurant with Nutt and Noone and they opted for the buffet. OMG Nutt ordered dim sum for all of us and her eyes were bigger than our stomachs. Much food went uneaten. Afterwards Ron and I headed to Wat Pho to have our fortunes read but realized we had forgotten to bring our exact times of birth so headed back to the hotel, then realized we were still having jet lag and rested. After our rest we went to the Jim Thompson Outlet Store in search for a particular scarf a friend asked me to pick up for her if I could find one. The shop was five stories high. We enjoyed a mango lime smoothie before heading back to our hotel. YUM! It is quite hot here and extremely humid so no matter what time of day it is hot or very warm.

After having eaten a mega lunch we opted for a light dinner then headed over to our neighborhood massage parlor and enjoyed a relaxed foot massage for an hour. We went to bed early.

Monday

 Today we went to Wat Arun with Noone and Nutt. Arun is named after the Indian god of dawn and is a striking Bangkok landmark. In 1767 King Taksin arrived here at sunrise from the sacked capital, Ayutthaya. He later enlarged the tiny temple. Later kings, Rama I and Rama II further enlarged the temple then in the 19^th century King Mongkut (Rama IV) added the ornamentation created by broken pieces of porcelain.  The architectural style, deriving mainly from the Khmer architecture is unique in Thailand. It was fascinating to see the millions of pieces of porcelain embedded in the exterior. Much of the porcelain was donated by local people.

We spied little dishes as well as many pieces of broken porcelain. I could just imagine a family choosing which pieces to donate then being proud once they saw part of their china set on the temple façade. Afterwards we walked to a nearby eatery and enjoyed pad Thai. Next we boarded a ferry that took us to Wat Pho across the river where Ron and I have gone many times when we are in Bangkok to have our fortunes read. We always go to the same man, Mr. Sawong Kontong. He is 83 this year and unfortunately while reading my fortune he got distracted and started on Ron’s. He then came back to me and kept going back and forth between the two of us and never  finished Ron’s. While we were with him, Nutt and Noone went over to the massage school housed here and enjoyed a massage. Afterwards we met up and said our goodbyes.

Ron and I got on the river taxi then on to the sky train and went to Jim Thompson’s biggest retail shop and bought a scarf for a friend in Portland. We next rode the subway home and decided we prefer the sky train over the subway. As it had been quite hot today we came back to the room and showered before heading out to a fine dinner at a nearby Indian restaurant. We ended the day with another massage! Life is good.

April 23 2012

We’ve been home for a few days and it is time to finish the blog of our S American adventure. Sorry for the delay but we were quite busy as ‘tourists on speed’ and with limited access to a computer.

I left off with our arrival in the Lake District of Chile which is in south central Chile. We stayed in Puerto Vargas which is located on Lake Llanquihue, an enormous lake. We spent the first day walking around town. Puerto V is a small town of about 35,000. It has many attractive shops for tourists and several great coffee shops. It was sunny and warm enough to sit outside while we ate lunch overlooking the lake. In the afternoon we took a self guided tour of historic homes. That night while walking to a restaurant that we never found, we happened upon a delightful museum put together by an artist, Pablo Fierro. It was filled with his paintings and all kinds of objects he has collected. Many very large heavy metal objects like a cast iron postbox, standing four feet high. Ron moaned in envy. The artist spoke Spanish and we spoke English and had a fun conversation. We walked back to town and ate at a very mediocre restaurant.

The next day we rented a car and drove all around the lake, visiting various towns and taking in the scenery. Gees there were lots of cows, eating…grass! How refreshing. No feed lots with corn fed cows. This region is noted for its lake and extinct volcanoes. We loved the views and seeing all the greenery. There was the beginnings of fall color on some of the trees. We saw waterfalls, llamas, lush vegetation, pastures. We had good roads and no traffic to speak of. This region was settled by Germans in the late 1800’s and consequently the farms are very orderly and the area has the feel and look of Europe. Many of the Catholic churches are painted pale yellow and the outside is covered in corrugated metal siding. Not particularly attractive up close. We visited the German Colonial Museum and Teatro de Lagos in Frutillar. That night we ate in the restaurant we couldn’t fin the night before and it was fabulous. We both had seafood. We met a couple from Portland at our guest house, the second person we have met from Portland in Chile.

On day three we drove around the fjord in the Cochama District. Here we were mostly on gravel roads but what scenery. It was absolutely gorgeous. From where the banks had been cut for the road you could see multiple layers of colored sediment from previous volcanic activity. The vegetation was quite dense with bamboo, conifers, wild fuchsia, pampas grass, giant ferns and eucalyptus. It was a narrow valley with the fjord and very steep mountains that come right down to the water. We passed a car with Oregon plates! The fjord was incredibly beautiful. We took a ferry back to the mainland to get back to our guesthouse. We saw fish farms almost the entire trip. After two full days in the car, we decided to relax our last day. I got a manicure, we went window shopping, had lunch, spent time on the computer at the guesthouse and went to dinner up the street at a delightful place that was decorated with Salvador Dali’s work. The meal was lovely.

The  next day we had an all day bus ride back to Santiago. We left about 8 a.m. and arrived around 9:30 p.m. We had packed a lunch and brought water so did just fine. They showed American movies dubbed in Spanish We skipped dinner however. There was a full moon that night over the Andes. Perfect! We had a short night and then up early to the airport to fly to Lima.

In Chile and Peru we spied street performers at busy intersections, working for tips. Break dancers were a big hit.

Lima

Upon arrival at the airport we saw a rather strange sight: a tourist taking a photo of his luggage on the baggage carousel. OY! We arrived early, checked into our $46 a night guesthouse. It was basic, clean and had a very accommodating staff. We were in a good location in Barranco. Peru by contrast seemed more colorful to us, definitely poorer and more affordable. We saw more people in native dress. Vendors in Peru will ask you to buy their products or to come into their restaurants and when we declined the response was always ‘maybe later’. We also found tri-shaws here; small motorized vehicles that are basically built from a motorcycle frame and that will hold a driver and two passengers. These are common in Asia. We also witnessed a lot of road construction throughout our travels in Peru. Villages are in sad shape for the most part with much more poverty than the cities. The roads are mostly two lanes with no shoulders. We saw many unfinished homes where construction probably occurred when money was available so it was a long process. We also saw lots of dogs in Peru and frequently people had ‘dressed’ their dogs in simple t-shirts. We walked around the neighborhood, ate at a pizza place overlooking the ocean and playing god awful electronic music. Most of the patrons were older tourists like us. Afterwards we visited the Museo d’Osma housed in a lovely old colonial mansion just a couple of blocks from our guesthouse. No taxis have meters so you must negotiate the price before entering the taxi. Ron did well with his high school Spanish! We ventured into the next neighborhood, Miraflores and found some great shops here with alpaca sweaters, pottery and textiles. We got a small diorama with figures made from potato starch and chalk dust. Alpaca sweaters and wraps abound and they are gorgeous. I couldn’t get in the mood to buy a sweater in April however. Ron got one right before we left Lima to come home. We found a shop that specialized in items made by the jungle tribe, the Shipibos. I got two skirts which we will use as wall hangings or table covers. These are simple lengths of cloth that are appliquéd and embroidered. We also got a clay figure made by the same tribe. After walking around for a long time, we sat at an outdoor café and had lemonades. Yum! We spied a crafts fair in the nearby park so went there afterwards and I got a lovely small olive wood bowl. Then we went to dinner at one of Gaston Acurio’s restaurants. I must say we loved Peruvian food. We shared a crisp suckling pig with tacu tacu, a dish we hope to be able to replicate when we return home. It is made from lima beans that are mashed and mixed with rice then sautéed until the outside is crispy. YUM yum!! The next day was Sunday and we went into central Lima and watched the changing of the guard at the presidential palace complete with a brass band and drums. Simultaneously across the street the Catholic church had its own band playing as they paraded around the front of the church with a huge structure with a portrait of Mary and laden with flowers. There was a wonderful woman in her 50’s who danced the whole time we were watching the changing of the guard.

We walked around the area after seeing the Presidential Palace with the changing of the guard and the large Cathederal.  Then we visited the Museo of Minerals and Chancay Ceramics in another beautifully restored colonial house. We struck up a conversation with a Peruvian woman who had lived in the US for 30 years and worked as a pharmacist in N.J. We ate lunch is a famous old restaurant near the presidential palace. We took a taxi back to our guesthouse afterwards. That night we walked to a nearby restaurant that was listed in our tour book. OMG is was fabulous Italian. We shared a rabbit risotto then ate a dessert described as orgasmic in our book. It was a typical Peruvian dessert called churro. It is fried dough shaped in a long tube and filled with dulce de leche and sprinkled with sugar. There was six of these. Good lord, thank god we had had a small dinner. We left in a sugar coma.

Cuzco and the Sacred Valley

The next day we flew early to Cuzco, elevation 11,000 ft. It was the Inca capital. Today there are about 600,000 residents and 1.2 million in the region. The only industry here is tourism as most people going to Machu Picchu travel through Cuzco. We got headaches upon arrival as a result of the altitude. We decided to take it easy. We ate lunch nearby and rested all day and scheduled massages for the afternoon. A nurse came to our room with her massage table and gave us wonderful, deep tissue massages. We walked to a nearby restaurant for dinner and after three bites I got altitude sickness in the form of nausea and lightheadedness. I put my head between my legs but couldn’t sit upright again. I got sicker and sicker. Ron had them pack up my dinner and called a cab. I was sitting at the front of the restaurant by the door and I am sure wasn’t doing the establishment much good. I couldn’t walk unassisted so Ron helped me out and I had to sit on the curb until the cab arrived. Oddly enough once I go in the cab I could relax and sit back. I must have freaked myself out thinking I was going to pass out in the restaurant. 

Both of us had recovered by our second day and went exploring. Cuzco is filled with steep hills. Our hotel is at the near top of one of them. We discovered we were short of breath often. We went to the Inca Museum and in the courtyard there were several women who were weaving. A representative from the non profit that promotes traditional weaving was on hand to help us with buying four pillow covers for our new couches that need some color to brighten them up. After lunch we went to the Temple of the Sun that had remnants of the incredible Inca masonry. The original structure had been mostly destroyed by the Spanish and the Dominicans had built a structure on top of the remains. Afterwards we went back to our digs and rested until dinner time. Cuzco is a lovely town with the feel of a small town. We saw women in traditional dress frequently: a gathered skirt just below the knees, sometimes with bright embroidery, several different styles of hats, hair in pigtails, knee socks and flat shoes.  Some were with llamas and for a price would let you photograph them. All over rural Peru we saw more women in traditional dress than modern dress. They wear hats in the summer to protect them from heat stroke and in the winter for warmth. The textiles here are incredible. Women carry all manner of things with a woven ‘back pack’, a small of cloth they tie under their chins or across their chests. Vendors will carry their goods this way, all babies and toddlers are carried this way. It is so colorful to see these brightly woven cloths everywhere you look.

We visited a non profit that had a three room museum of children’s art. The NGO goes into the most remote parts of Peru to let children have the chance to express themselves in art. It was quite touching. They had another room filled with woven bags that are traditional gifts for men to carry their coca leaves in. Coca leaves are used to help with altitude sickness and used as a stimulant for workers. Men traditionally carried their leaves in these small woven bags. A man would be given his first bag made by his mother when he was 18. His wife would also weave him a bag and present it as a wedding gift. We got to see over 300 of these bags with all kinds of weaving techniques and colors.

Adobe is the building material here: houses, fences etc. Many houses are painted on the street side only as the owner cannot afford to paint their entire house. When we drove out of Cuzco to the Sacred Valley where there are Inca ruins in the form of terraces left over from when the Incas built them 500 years ago.  There is a lot of agriculture here but much of what we saw was small subsistence farming. Once we saw heavy farming equipment but mostly we saw simple ploughs with oxen. We hired a guide to take us through Pisac ruins. He played an Inca pipe as we strolled though the ruins. The climbing was difficult at times. Those Incas only built on the top of the mountains it seems. The Inca descendants are the Quechua people. They are abundant here. They have high cheek bones, are short in statue and have dark skin. They still speak Quechua language and there is no written language, hence most of what we know about the Incas is from what the Spanish recorded. Sidewalks in Cuzco and other parts of rural Peru are about ½ person wide. You often have to step into the street to let someone pass. We noticed that many houses had stenciled political ads on the side of their homes. No lawn signs here.

The Incas were buried in the fetal position. The belief that we came from the earth and returned to the earth is the reason for this practice. We came back to Cuzco and ate at a local restaurant. It was a roasted chicken place with a salad bar. I woke up the next morning with food poisoning. I couldn’t eat breakfast, tried to vomit but was not successful. We left for the Sacred Valley and had a day of sight seeing. I tried to walk up to the first ruin but couldn’t handle it so sent Ron on and waited on a park bench. On one or two of the sites I was able to walk to view the site. We stopped at Salinas where there were some fascinating salt evaporation beds.

We also saw some very impressive agricultural test areas where the Incas experimented with various varieties of corn, potatoes and cocoa to determine optimal growing elevations, orientations, and other factors.

Ollantaytambo

We arrived at Ollantaytambo in the afternoon and I crawled into bed. Ron hired a guide and climbed around the Inca ruins and I slept off and on and finally lost the contents of my stomach late in the day. The local church was built over the foundations of Incan buildings as you can see from the picture.  The Fort at Ollantaytanbo was important historically as when the Incas were defeated by the Spaniards at the Red Fort near Pisco, they retreated to the fort here.

Ron had dinner alone and I continued to rest. The next morning I still was not able to eat much so nibbled a piece of dry toast and sipped a little tea. We boarded a train for Agua Caliente and as luck was on our side we were in car A in seats 1 and 2. This meant we had a picture window seat on the train and the scenery was drop dead gorgeous. 

We had a sunny morning in a narrow valley with cacti, gladiolas, three or four different yellow flowers in abundance. The river Urbamba was on our left almost the entire trip. For a solid hour we watched the rapids with no still water and talked about running various rapids. Obviously this river isn’t raftable with no break for over an hour and many spots were not passable due to the large rocks. But it brought about much discussion and excitement remembering our white water rafting days. The Andes were spectacular, rising straight up before us, some mist clinging to the peaks. The vegetation was changing into jungle. Machu Picchu is the end of the Sacred Valley and the beginning of the jungle. We passed Mt Veronica at 5,000 meters, around  16,400 ft. It was first climbed successfully in 1957.

Agua Caliente/Machu Picchu

We arrived in Agua Caliente around 8:30 a.m. and checked into our eco lodge. They prepared a box lunch and we left around 10:30 to take the bus up to Machu Picchu, a 25 minute ride up a series of switch backs. Our guide met us there and we had a couple of hours with him. Wagner gave us a very technical tour and it really helped to see how incredibly intelligent the Incas were. Their calendar is accurate for 11,000 years! Machu Picchu was magical and is much larger than I had anticipated. It is estimated that 800-1,000 Incas lived there. It was never completed. Scientist estimated the number of residents based on the amount of water that is available there and the size of their grain storage area. The Spaniards never found Machu Picchu which is why is has been so well preserved. Many Inca ruins were destroyed by the Spaniards. Machu Picchu was rediscovered by Hiram Bingham, a Harvard professor in 1911 with the help of a local farmer. 100 % of the profits from Machu Picchu are sent to Lima and 10% of that is returned to Cuzco and 2% of the 10 % is returned to Machu Picchu. This is very little money to maintain this most important site. We ate our box lunches and stayed a while longer. We were blessed with sunny weather. It often rains at MP but we were prepared with rain gear and umbrellas.

Our eco lodge had gone to great lengths of make the building eco friendly. They built with used wood, the roofing material was some sort of compressed cardboard that had been treated to withstand the rain. Unfortunately when it rained that night it sounded like elves having a hammering contest on the roof, making sleep all but impossible.. Ron tried to take a shower before dinner but quickly ran out of hot water. We informed the night receptionist but couldn’t understand anything she said. The next morning Ron again had no hot water. He got up at 5:00 in order to get up to MP to take sun rise photos. Needless to say he was pissed about no hot water. Since I still was not feeling 100% I agreed to meet him at 9:00 at MP. I also had no hot water. I ate breakfast at the hotel then caught a bus to MP. I went to a view point that required a bit of climbing, gasping for breath. Fortunately just about when I was ready to give up someone passed me and told me I was quite close. I reached the view point and wept at the beauty. Again we had a sunny day. I hooked up with Ron who told me MP was totally engulfed in morning fog until about 8:30 so his getting up early was a waste of his time. We sat for a while at another view point and talked about how impressive the Incas were and how incredible MP was. After a while we headed back down to our lodge. When we complained to the day receptionist about no hot water, she said there must be a problem and offered us a free salad for lunch. We tried to get earlier train tickets to return to Ollantaytambo but were not successful. Our train was to leave at 5:30 p.m. so we walked around town and scheduled a massage for after lunch. We ordered two salads at our lodge but they got Ron’s order completely wrong so we switched salads as his was full of tiny pieces of cucumbers which he hates. I had ordered a red quinoa salad with duck prosciutto. Afterwards we went for our massages. The massage salon advertised free hot showers. Ron had an oil massage so jumped into the shower which was adjacent to our massage room. No hot water. I asked the owner why there wasn’t any hot water and she said he had to go out of the building and upstairs. Ron tried to rinse off the soap and oil in the frigid water and then went upstairs. He declined to use the shower as it was not clean. By then he started feeling badly and he the discovered he had food poisoning. Great. All the way on the train that night he thought he would vomit. But luckily, nothing happened.

Ollantaytambo

We checked into our previous guesthouse and he went to bed. I ordered dinner and ate in our room. The next morning I walked around the beautiful grounds of our guesthouse while waiting for our driver to take us to the Cuzco airport, about two hours away. The sun was out and I was glad to have seen the grounds of this lovely place. Above me were the Inca ruins of Ollantaytambo. Ron still wasn’t feeling well. We went straight to the airport and saw more wonderful scenery during the drive. We were able to get on an earlier plane and had to dash to make boarding in time. We were grateful to not have to wait in the crowded airport. Our short flight to Lima was uneventful then we grabbed a taxi to our previous guesthouse. By dinner time Ron felt better and we walked to a neighborhood place and had a simple sandwich.

In the morning Ron was back to normal so we went shopping in Miraflores and found a great Diablada mask from the Puna region. These masks are made for a festival dance and we were thrilled to have found one we liked after looking in three countries for a mask to add to our collection. That night we dined at the great Italian restaurant in our neighborhood and I had the most delicious pasta with veggies. We struck up a conversation with the Peruvian couple sitting next to us and had a great time chatting.

On our last day we decide to relax. We read, did emails and went out to eat. Our plane was leaving at midnight so we paid for an extended checkout and had our room until 7:00 p.m. It was great to shower before boarding and to have the day to put our feet up. United had upgraded us to business class but the seats did not have a place to put our feet up. We had a 6-7 hour flight to Houston, dashed through customs and caught our next leg to San Francisco then another plane to Portland. It wasn’t as grueling as flying halfway around the world but we were tired from having been sick. Fortunately Lima is only two hours different in terms of the time zones so we had a minimal adjustment.

When people asked us what part of the trip we enjoyed the most, we responded ‘every minute of it’. We couldn’t believe how wonderful the trip was. We have never taken a trip like this, seeing so many countries and sights over a five week period. Each place was unique with wonderful memories.