Cusco Part II

We got back to Cusco and got showered ready for a few celebratory drinks. In retrospect, this was all a bit hazy as you have to remember that very morning we'd been stumbling down the Inca trail at 2am! 

Henry promised he would take us to a place in the square where you could learn to salsa dance so we were all determined to power through the night. Running on pure adrenaline, accompanied with Maryanne and Ryan, the Aussie cousins, Swiss Thomas, Melissa and Susan, we went to a small burger joint as we all just wanted food! We had huge burgers and got a few strong drinks flowing as it was happy hour! Henry showed us pictures of his little boys at the top of Macchu Picchu, and said one day they would trek it as he had done many times!

With tummies full and a few drinks down, we headed across the square to the salsa bar. We entered into a large room filled with men chucking women around. It was like a scene from 'step up' or 'dirty dancing', as these people were seriously skilled at dancing. Before we knew it, a few men started to offer to show us how to dance the salsa. With a small word of warning from Henry to watch our back pockets for salsa dancing pick pocketing, Elanna, who was a confident salsa dancer was on the dance floor in a heart beat showing us how it was done.

Before you watch this maybe turn down the volume a bit, Steph screams with excitement. A lot.

With her skills filling everyone with confidence, the girls one by one took to the floor with a dance partner. Steph looking particularly awkward, looked at the floor the whole time and hysterically laughed as she was swirled and hurled under, over and around her partners arms. Even Henry got down and partnered up with some of the more nervous girls in the group.

At exactly 12am, the salsa music stopped, and some normal club like music came on which we were more familiar with. It was like Cinderella going back to her normality, and the group could finally feel comfortable on the dance floor. A few of the group started to tail off, but Henry was still on loyal guide/ dad duty, and would abandon his night temporarily to escort any of the girls to the taxi rank. He would give a word of warning to the taxi driver to make sure they were delivered home safely, and would continue to take pictures of the driver and his license plates. Even maybe a little pissed, Henry was very sensible and precious of us which was really lovely to see.

At about 2am, we realised we had been awake for a full 24 hours, and thought it would probably be an idea to go home! With Henry, we got taxis back to the hotel with Susan and Melissa, and fell asleep into a mild coma.

The next morning we were all feeling a little sensitive. We think it was actually more of a sleep hangover as none of us had actually needed to drink to much the night before due to lack of energy and being fuelled on pride. Nevertheless, we didn't want to waste our last day in Cusco, and decided we would do a little more site seeing and perhaps some shopping, as Henry has assured us the quality of souvenirs here would be the best.

Along with Melisa and Susan, we groggily stepped onto the streets of Cusco, and made a bee line for the highly cultural fast food chain 'Mc Donald's'. Back in the square, there was a large festival going on with lots of street dancing and live music. We would have appreciated this more if it hadn't been for our heavy heads.





We went round all of the markets that looked like small shops from the outside, but opened up into huge underground markets. Everyone found stuff they liked, and Tom and Steph bought present for family, and Stepg a handbag and craxy bolivian style shoes. They also both bought some traditional jazzy knit wear.

hmmmmmmmm... Tom questioning if he could get away with
 this jumper in England....He bought it anyway.

Steph like a little girl, chuffed with her llama zip up

We carried on exploring through the city, looking at the beautiful architecture and decided we needed to go back to the hotel for a nap before we headed out to dinner!

Tom in Cusco square chuffed with his new t-shirt he got for
his birthday. Thanks to Aunty Stephanie, Uncle Stephen
and Tasty Palace. The first clean top he had worn in 6 weeks.

Steph under one of the many fountains.

As we went back to the hotel we bumped into Elanna and Kate, who had had to buy separate suitcases JUST for the stuff they'd bought in Cusco! We suddenly felt like we hadn't bought enough, but with more travelling to do we knew we had to limit ourselves. We went back to the room and slept.

That night we went to a restaurant which the rest of the group had been to before whilst we were away. They assured us it was the best food they'd had the whole trip, plus Henry said it would be a good place to try guinea pig.

Cusco after dark

As we sat down, and Henry came round and gave us all medals to say we had achieved the inca trail. They weren't official medals, and we think Henry might have bought them himself which was sweet. Unfortunately, he was called up by his boss to be told he had to attend an important meeting there and then. He apologetically left the restaurant and left us in the hands of the waiter. Tom and Steph along with Kate and Elanna, decided to give the the guinea pig a try, so we ordered one as a side to accompany our mains.

It arrived and we were all quite horrified at the blatant little guinea pig in front of us.

Weeeep weeep weeep weeeep! Sorry.

Steph tried a tiny bit and decided it wasn't for her, especially as the 2 Guinea pigs she had as pets at home were in the very forefront of her mind! Tom, along with the other girls decided it wasn't great, and a lot of the dish was skin and lacked in meat. Unfortunately poor Ryan down the bottom of the table who had ordered the guinea pig as a main course agreed it wasn't the best! Steph's main was a steak in a 3 cheese sauce and tom -who was feeling adventurous that evening- went for alpaca. The meat was tasty, but both our dishes were slightly cold and accompanied with a cool mash that tasted like vanilla?! 

The cheesy alpaca

We didn't know if this was an experimental mash or whether someone had picked up the wrong bottle of seasoning in the kitchen, but we were slightly disappointed as the group had raved about how good their meals had been before.

On the walk home, we snuck into a off licence and picked up a couple of snickers bars to eat back in the hotel room! We got back and packed and got ready to fly to Lima the following day.

Thanks for reading the post maaaaaan!