After my jungle adventure deep in the Amazon rainforest, I boarded a plane back to Lima, where I met up with Steve and his son Zach.  We got on yet another flight, this time to Cusco, where we would hopefully be hiking the famous Inca Trail and see the ruins of Macchu Picchu.

I noticed two things when we got off the plane:  1) Damn it's a hell of a lot colder here than the jungle, and 2) Why am I so out-of-breath after climbing a few lousy stairs?  Well, at 3360m (11,024 ft) above sea level, it's twice as high as Denver - the piddly little Mile-High City.  Not only was I out of breath doing simple exercises, but I also had to deal with an altitude-induced headache for several days. 

We checked into a hotel and looked into hiking the 3-day long Inca Trail, but our complete inability to plan ahead bit us in the ass.  The next available spot on the roster wasn't for another month!  Sadly, we booked tickets on the backpacker's train to Macchu Picchu - the wimpy way to get to Peru's greatest ruins. 

Teatime for two. I should emphasize that although we slept in the same room, we never spooned each other. 

Cusco's main square.
With a few days to kill before our scheduled trip, we took in some ruins around the city. It was a dreary, cool day, but I still managed to get a sunburn.  The combination of high altitude and proximity to the equator makes for brutal UV radiation with any weather.
 

Steve and Zach in front of the main cathedral.

A bit of a killer climb, especially when not used to the altitude....OK, so we were out of shape.

The ruins at Sacsayhuaman

"Is this the land Down Under?"

We left Zach as an offering to the gods, but they wouldn't take him.

"How hard would it be to get this couch into my house?"

Your typical llama store

That night, we all slept as our freshly-washed clothes dripped all over us.

The next day, we headed off by train to the famous  Machu Picchu.  There would be no Inca Trail hike for us.

Scenes from the train
More scenes from the train.

The famous Machu Picchu

We actually made it here!

"Tina, come get some ham!"

Steve had to hold onto Zach because he was afraid of the heights.

It took both of them 10 minutes before they realized the windows didn't open to anywhere.

"Can we keep him, Dad?"

On the grueling hike up to Huayna Picchu (the mountain in the background of every shot of Machu Picchu).

The view from the top.

"Difficult hike?  Hardly!"

Early the next morning, we went back up to Machu Picchu to see the sun rise.

Unfortunately, there wasn't much sun to be seen.

Probably a fantastic view.

Fortunately, the mists cleared on occasion to reveal the ruins once again.

I hiked alone to the other side of Huayna Picchu to see the ruins of the Temple of the Moon.
Upon our return to Cuzco, we came up with the brilliant idea to rent a car for the rest of our trip.  It wasn't cheap, but it freed us from bus travel and gave us the ability to go wherever we wanted, whenever we wanted.  What we didn't consider at the time, was what to do with the car at night in a country where most of the population doesn't drive.

Our first trip took us out to see some more ruins.  Even though they were much less popular than Machu Picchu, they were much more extensive.

You know those signs that warn about falling rocks? You really should pay attention to those in Peru.

Running low on gas with nary a gas station in sight, we stumbled upon a store that sold gas...out of a bucket. We weren't in a position to be picky.
After driving around for many hours looking for a place to stay that had secure parking, we finally settled on a dump of a place in a small city we never heard of.  The next morning, we set off to Lake Titicaca.  The main reason I wanted to go there was so I could say I went to a place called Lake Titicaca.

We were going to tour around for a while, but between having to bribe a traffic cop for disobeying him (he was just sitting there not doing anything you'd expect him to be doing....like DIRECTING TRAFFIC!) and having some shifty characters offer to "watch" our car for us, we decided to bail out of town. 

This picture cost us hours of driving.  We couldn't even find a sign saying "Welcome to Lake Titicaca" for me to laugh in front of!

We decided to take a "shortcut" to our next destination.  However, it was a rough, slow, pothole-ridden journey.  The sheep were making better time than us.

Whenever we saw someone walking along the road, we'd give them a ride.

The air was crisp and cold at this altitude.  We stopped in this town for directions....

...and naturally had to give someone a lift.  Zach was great backseat company.

After hours of dirt road driving, our gear was a wee bit dusty.
 

Here we are at the highest point in our journey: 4528m (14,856 ft).

Even though we were close to the equator, it was quite chilly at this altitude.  Steve and I tried to see how long it would take to run out of breath.

  

Since we were already stopped, Steve decided to have a bit of "quality time" to himself, much to Zach's amusement.

Watch out for llamas!