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Final thoughts on Peru: Food: Food in Peru is extremely cheap, when you get the "menu of the day". Almost every restaurant offers a 3-4 course meal for about $3. However, we found the typical Peruvian food to be somewhat bland - included a lot of potatoes, fish or meat but not many spices. There is plenty of international cuisine in Cusco to choose from, and we pretty much stuck to that during our stay. Beer of Choice: Cusquena - but we didn't have any beer until the 2nd to last day, we wanted to stay hydrated before the trek :)
People: Everyone in Peru works really hard to make money from the many tourists, including the kids (they can be found selling cigarettes, postcards, and shoe shines on the street). A lot of locals were very friendly and tried to make conversation. Many Peruvians are very poor and the amount of competition in the tourist industry (several hundred tour companies exist in Cusco, many selling the same services) causes some to be less than honest. In order to stay on top, many will cut corners, sometimes at the expense of others. Economy: Tourism is a fast growing part of Peru's economy. Other components include fishing, mining and agriculture. We heard that only 6% of Peru's land is suitable for farming, forcing most to use terracing to make use of the many hillsides. Potatoes and corn are staple crops with 100's of different varieties of each. Climate: Mild - It never snows in Cusco despite its 11,000 ft elevation. We experienced a piece of the rainy season which included sporadic but short rain showers throughout most days. When the sun did come out, it was extremely powerful and its easy to get burned in only a matter of minutes! Exchange Rate: 1 US dollar = 3.45 Nuevo Soles Recommendation to friends: 10 out of 10. Peru is a must see, and we will definitely try to come back. There are so many other places we didn't get to experience, such as the rainforest, the Pacific coast, and the deserts (including the Nasca lines). The Inca ruins that are scattered throughout the country are breathtaking and you almost feel transported back in time as you wander through a site with the amazing view of the Andes mountains. View Inca Trail Day1 Photo Gallery View Inca Trail Day2 Photo Gallery View Inca Trail Day3 Photo Gallery Day 27 - The Inca Trail < | Index | Photo Galleries | > Day 29 - Santiago © 2007 Blue Ocean Studios, LTD. All rights Reserved. Privacy Policy | Terms of Use | Services | About | Contact Prints | Return Policy | View Cart World Travel Galleries | World Travel Blog | Links |
Glad to finally have a full night sleep after the last few in the tents, we took it easy today while waiting to catch our flight. Our clothes badly needed another washing, so we got that done in the morning. Mario spent a lot of time researching Santiago, getting us a rental car reservation, and figuring out how to get around Chile's wine region. We decided we're going to skip the city and head straight for the countryside to rest up a bit and give our legs a chance to recover. 
We had a last meal of homemade pastas at El Molino and then caught a cab to the airport. Our 1 hour flight back to Lima was over before we knew it and this time we got to experience the VIP lounge in the International terminal of Lima airport. Once we were in, we wished even more that we could have spent our night in the lounge instead of the airport lobby - there was a special sleeping room with reclining chairs, delicious food and an on-demand fresh squeezed orange juice press! Our 3 hour layover went by in no time as we enjoyed the amenities and made use of the free internet. 
The next flight, on LAN airlines, was a 3.5 hour flight to Santiago, Chile. We paid the $100pp reciprocal entrance fee to Chile and signed up for a shuttle to take us to a hotel recommended by the airport information booth. The hotel Parlamento wasn't exactly the nicest, but at 3am, we didn't have much room for negotiating and could not spare the time to go out and find another choice. What was hilarious, was that they said they had internet in their brochure, but when we got there, the guy was like, "Yes, internet, you can use a modem on the phone line" - ha! Exhausted once again, we caught a few hours sleep before beginning our time in Chile.
Memories: Jack's Cafe and El Molino (the best places to eat!), fake $100 bill, the "government" overbooked our hike, freezing night in the tent, wakeup tea time, toilets with no seats or asian style, altitude sickness and coca tea, steep stone path up 3 passes in one day, beautiful view of Machu Picchu and the Andes, porters running by us with 50 lb packs on the Inca trail, our hotel built on top of Inca walls. Exhaustion. 