Girls Night Out in Cusco

Keri and I woke up early on Saturday to get a short hike in before heading out to Cusco. Unfortunately, it was raining so the hike was good, but very wet. We came home and showered and packed and met up with Hallie and Michelle. Will and Jessica bailed on the trip as they are here for about a year so they will have plenty of chances to go to Cusco for the weekend.

We got in a collectivo to go to Urabamba where we would get another one to Cusco but the problem with collectivos (or combis) is that you have to wait until they fill up or the driver doesn´t leave. While we were waiting, a taxi driver made us an offer that was good (45 soles for the 4 of us to go straight to Cusco). The collectivo would have been 10 soles each, so for the ease and speed of a taxi, we took that deal.

We made it to Cusco by 11:30ish and luckily it was not raining there. We headed towards a hostal that was recommended by a different Awamaki volunteer, however, when we got there, we all agreed that we were willing to splurge a bit more than the very, very basic amenities at this place. We all wanted a nice shower, but this place was probably not even as nice as my family´s house. So there was a 3 star hotel across the road and because it is the low season and with the flooding problems, hotels are slashing prices. We were able to get two rooms for 60% less than the posted price. So we were in heaven for only $17.50 each. The hotel was really pretty with this gorgeous courtyard area. The rooms were great and the bathrooms were everything we could have dreamed of! Huge bath tub/shower and a mirror that I could actually see my whole self in and not just my face. And I didn´t have to squat down to see myself! And, they had a hair dryer! My hair has been in a ponytail for the last three weeks so it was nice to dry my hair and where it down. Plus, a huge breakfast buffet was included. Yes, we could have paid only 15 soles for a crappy hostal (just over $3), but that extra $14 was worth it.

We headed out to wander around and spent most of the day just walking. We went through the huge market where you can get everything from clothes to grains to fruit to veggies to meat. You name it. Michelle bought some fake Puma shoes. We found this awesome cafe called the Muse that an English woman owns. The food was amazing. We had guacamole and homemade chips, pesto veggie sandwiches and fresh side salads. We all agreed that we wanted nothing to do with rice or potatoes on this excursion. Lord knows we eat enough of that at our homes.

We bought some wine and went back to the hotel around 6:30 to relax and get ready. We ended up watching the wedding singer, drinking wine and talking some good girl talk. After long, luxurious hot showers, we were looking good and ready to go. We went to this funky little restaurant that Hallie had been to on a previous Cusco trip. It is owned by a Canadian woman from Montreal. We had great food and then were ready to hit the dance clubs. We started at this club called Mythology. At first it wasn´t too crowded, there was a good mix of locals and tourists. The music was good and we just danced our butts off for about and hour and a half. That place started getting really crowded so we decided to move on to another club that had been recommended.

Mama Afrika was great fun. It was much bigger so you didn´t feel like you were packed in like sardines. We got some drinks and started dancing again. The music was a good mix of American dance music and South American dance music. There was a big group of Brazilian guys there for some reason and so we all started dancing with the Brazilians. It was a lot of fun. By 2am, this placed was packed so we decided to go back to Mythology. That was a mistake. It was like you walked into a sauna it was so hot and crowded. We only stayed for about 20 more minutes because they were only playing techno music that reminded me of my senior year of college (Bets and Mare, it was like a flashback -- think Sandstorm). So we headed back to our hotel. It had been raining all night long so we were pretty well soaked by the time we got home.

We all wanted to enjoy the hotel as long as we could but they have ridiculously early check out times as most tourists come in on early flights so their check in times are really early. We had to be up by 8:30 to eat breakfast and we sweet-talked our way into a 10am check out instead of 9am. Keri and I were tempted to book the room for a second night just to enjoy the amenities one more day!

But up and off we went to do some more wandering around. Keri and I had hoped to talk to some tour companies about options for going to the jungle (Amazon) and other places, but that did not pan out. We bought some art supplies to make our health education posters and ended up back at Muse for lunch again. Unfortunately, yesterday was the last day of carnivales and the kids were out in full force with their buckets of water, squirt guns and water balloons. We got trapped on one of the tiny side streets with a group of about 7 adolescent boys. The first three girls got through without incident, but they obviously liked something about me because as I tried to get by, I was doused with about 5 buckets of water. Needless to say, I was drenched from head to toe. I also was cursing the stupidest holiday I have every experienced.

So I had to eat lunch soaked to the bone. We found out that the bar from the night before plays movies during the day so we went to the hotel and I changed into dry clothes, we grabbed our bags and went to watch a movie. We watched Precious. Good but quite intense and depressing. After the movie, we walked to the area where you catch the collectivos back to Ollanta. We got lucky and a taxi driver there agreed to 10 soles each. So we finally got home around 6:30pm. We were all exhausted but it had been a very fun weekend.

It was nice to get away from the schedule of the host family and to just have some fun with the girls.