Dogs Calls in Busco

The short stop in LA was not a bad one. Darren met me at the airport after I had broken the LAX world record to be off the plane and through custom es in 48 minutes and 35 seconds. We cruised and hour down the coast to a Friends place. Although only a short visit we managed to part take in all the American traditions. In and out burger for dinner. Pancakes for breakfast. we even managed to stop in a for a beer in a karaoke bar where some yokals who were either husband and wife, sister and brother or perhaps both butchered Greece Lightening. America is great place but at times it just seems a bit of a fantasy land, not all that real, including the bar ladies breasts.

It was on to Lima and then straight out to Cusco. I say straight, we had a 6 hour stay at the Lima airport. So we arrived in Cusco at 7am having not sleep for 30 hours and with the goal of making it to the evening to try and stay on top of the time difference. My first impression of the Peru was the taxi journey to the hostel. South Americans, are renowned for being laid back and easy going. After the first 30 seconds in the Taxi I learnt that this is certainly not the case when it comes to their driving. They complete nutters behind the wheel. The use the horn like I have never seen before, they use it so much they have developed into a higher level of communication than I am sure it is meant for. First there is the standard beep - which means ¨hey¨ then there is beep beep which means ¨hey, watch it¨ then there is beeeeeeeeeeep beep which mean ¨get stuffed" they also have a beep beeeeeeeeeeeeep which means initially I was just saying hey but in actual fact you can get stuffed¨. Often they cut straight to a beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep beeep beep beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep which means ¨get (something elsed)¨

The other thing that was quickly apparent is the number of dogs here. There are just hundreds of them cruising the streets looking for feeds in the rubbish and chasing cars. I guess other nations don't have this problem because most people in Western couturiers chop their balls off and in Asia the they get eaten. They would not be such an issue if they did not smell so bad. One sits outside our hostel gate and for the first time in my life I can truly appreciate what people mean when they say something smells like dogs balls.

They are into their festivals here. We keep hearing gunshots in the city plaza. Until this morning the best theory we had come up with was that they are used to scare the pigeons away. This theory was challenged a bit by the gun shoots going off at 5am everyday but then we figured it perhaps they were sending the pigeons a message right at the start of the day. The 5am shots would not be too bad because they only last for a few a seconds and returning to sleep would be possible but the problem is that they set every one of the cities 57 thousand dogs off. So we are basically buggered when it comes to trying to sleep in.

Cusco is 3500 meters above sea level, which is basically the same as Mt Cook. It feels like your lungs are operating at about 40%. Our hostel is situated about 5 minutes walk down a cliff face into town, no problem when going in but coming back is a different story. It feels like you have some how instantly been transformed into being an unfit, overweight chain smoker with Asama. Combined with the fact that every now and then you have to completely shut down the nostril component of your respiratory system either because you have just passed a raw meat store, or a smelly set of dogs balls and it becomes very challenging.

The typical day starts with us heading to Australia owned Jacks cafe where you can enjoy a decent coffee. We then have a look around turning down invitations to buy art work and Inca knit garments. Afternoons it usually hoses down and we try to stay dry and turn down people trying to sell us ponchos. The evenings have largely been spent sucking a few beers back in back packer bars keeping an eye our for talent, which is difficult when an area such as this attracts the more seasoned hard core back packers who tend to be more liberal and less well kept. As we wander between establishments we are of course constantly turning down invitations for massages.