Monday 28 December 2015

Beach Park!

Cooper. 

Fortaleza, a city of 2 million in north-eastern Brazil, is home to one of the best water parks in the world and the best in Brazil. The whole reason we visited Fortaleza was to see the water park of course (how could we not?) called Beach Park. It has 26 slides and spans 12 city blocks along the beach! One of the 26 slides is the Insano, a slide with a near-vertical drop that gives you a second of free-fall and goes 105 kmph!!!  They also have a massive tube ride called Vaikantudo, made in Canada! It's a HUGE rainbow toilet bowl that flushes you down the drain! 




It was so much fun to be here for four days after Christmas! Here is a picture that I took of my dad going down Insano!  My mom went down, too.  But I was *just* too short :( .  Luckily they have a smaller version of Insano which was also awesome for me. 




Carolyn.

Yes, it was tons of fun here.  The 'best' thrill was the capsule slide, where the floor drops out from under your feet - I'd never done anything like that before...





To see more pictures from our world trip so far, click this link:

Thursday 24 December 2015

Wednesday 16 December 2015

Argentina

Nov 24 - Dec 20.  Time in Buenos Aires, then travel to Mendoza and Salta and surrounding areas, then onward to Iguazu Falls.  Details will follow later.

To see pictures from our world trip so far, click this link:

  

Wednesday 9 December 2015

Foodie Corner: Mate (Ma-Tay)

Vern.

Almost every nation or culture has a trademark food or beverage.   Often these are regional specialties, at other times they are national icons.  When it comes to Argentina and Uruguay, there is no doubt that the national beverage is the ubiquitous mate (pronounced ‘ma-tay’). 
    
Simply, mate is a tea-like drink comprised of loose, crushed leaves from the ‘yerba mate’ plant, mixed with hot water and consumed from a small cup through a ‘bombilla’ -- a metal straw with a filter.  The water cannot be boiling; it must be exactly 85 degrees Celsius.  (There are public hot-water vending machines labelled “85”, where for a few centavos you can fill your thermos.)

There is no ‘buzz’ effect, no chemical high, no hallucinogenic properties. It is a cultural phenomenon, surpassing addiction, drunk by both young and old, and it is everywhere.  At work, at home, in parks, on the beach, on buses; locals are to be found with a thermos in one hand, mate cup in the other, regularly topping up with leaves and water.  We witnessed one man on his bike in downtown Buenos Aires, thermos wedged in the crook of his arm, pouring into his cup and sipping while riding.



Mate thermoses, cups and bombillas come in endless varieties of designs and colours, from plain to ornate to customized, allowing a full range of self-expression.   Mate is often shared, with the pourer offering his/her cup to a friend, who is expected to drink the full cup before handing it back.  (From which I concluded colds and flu must spread very quickly through the country, but was later informed that it is polite to let others know when you are ill and need to stick to your own mate, thank you anyway.)

Always eager to explore culinary highlights, Carolyn and I signed up for “The Argentine Experience”, an evening of immersion and instruction in Argentinian food and drink.  We sampled wines, learned to make popular cocktails, created our own empanadas (a meat- or veggie-filled pastry), and feasted on Argentinian beef.  The evening concluded with a “how-to” session on mate, where we learned the ins and outs of this all-important pillar of Argentinian tradition.

We were cautioned that the first sip is “somewhat bitter”. 

When I stopped coughing and my eyes finished watering, I offered the half-full cup to my wife, eager to have her share in this newfound experience.   With Carolyn subsequently wiping the tears from her cheeks, face stuck in a painful wince, our host suggested that as first-timers it would be permissible to add a little sugar to the mix.   Thanks for coming out.

I believe that something less potent might be more appropriate, such as turpentine or undiluted sulphuric acid.  Apparently, flavoured mates are available, but are strenuously denounced by purists.  These non-lethal, pale substitutes for the real thing are relegated to young children, the socially inept, hapless tourists, or ostracized wimps.


Mate will be added to my list of “must be an acquired taste”; one that I am likely to never, ever acquire.




To see more pictures from the trip, click here:  Trip Photo Album

Monday 7 December 2015

Carolyn in Buenos Aires & Uruguay

Carolyn.  We all landed in Buenos Aires, Argentina on November 23 – and two days later, Vern and Cooper left for Antarctica.  Brrr!  I decided many months ago when they booked this 10-day voyage that I was not going to join them for this - I would rather enjoy the heat of the southern hemisphere summer instead of donning my winter weather gear.  (see their fantastic Antarctica updates below)



So I spent 7 days in Buenos Aires (population 11 million) enjoying many things it has to offer:  tango lessons, milongas (tango dance halls both small and large), polo match, bike rental to explore city parks and neighbourhoods, late dinners with new friends from the B&B where I stayed (the Argentina lifestyle is for restaurants to open at 9pm, and it’s totally normal to still be out eating dinner with friends at midnight), and visiting museums (which we tend to avoid or rush through with Cooper, so it was admittedly nice to be on my own adult schedule) and a tour of the famous Teatro Colon (#1 in the world for opera acoustics)…and nice summer weather…temperatures every day around 30 degrees.

This is a big, beautiful city, with excellent public transit, amazing architecture, and ample green parks and huge tree-lined streets.  They say it’s the ‘Paris of South America’.  I loved it.  Everything except that there are LOTS of smokers here.  Also like Europe, apparently.  Cough.  One challenge is that the Spanish they speak here is a little different from the Spanish we have been learning and using in Ecuador and Peru for the past 3 months.

After a week in Buenos Aires, I decided to explore the neighbouring country of Uruguay for 3 days – easily accessible by a 1-hour ferry across the river.  I loved the small town of Colonia, it was very quaint for 1 day & night;  and then a 2-hour bus ride took me to the capital of Montevideo for the other 2 days.  This city has many beautiful white-sand beaches, and I enjoyed renting a bike and riding the 20 km of beach-front trails all along the coast.


But my #1 mission in Montevideo was to bring back US cash to Argentina.  There’s a crazy “alternate” economy in Argentina called the “Blue Market”.  I don’t fully understand the economics at work here, but it’s something about residents trying to hoard US dollars, in anticipation of a looming collapse of the Argentinian peso (apparently something like this happened in Venezuela in recent years too).  Practically, what it means for tourists is that you can increase your purchasing power by 50% if you have US cash:  instead of getting the ‘real’ exchange rate at a bank which is about 9.75% in the international market, you can go to a Blue Rate vendor and get between 13.5% and 14.8%, depending on the quality and size of your bills, and the amount you want to exchange.  If you come here on a typical vacation, just bring as much US cash, in new & large bills, as you need and you’re comfortable carrying.  But if you’re a long term traveller like we are, you simply don’t arrive with lots of cash in your pockets – usually we just use our debit cards in the local ATM and withdraw whatever we need in the local currency, which will automatically convert to CAD and debit our Canadian bank accounts at home, easy.  But in this case, it makes a lot more financial sense to take advantage of the USD.  Anyway – mission successful, I was able to visit the National Bank in Montevideo (the hugest retail bank location I have ever seen, with many hundreds of people queued in dozens of places for their different banking tasks – very overwhelming!), and I withdrew a large sum of US dollars as a cash advance on our US credit card (did you know if you move $ onto your credit card and keep it at a credit balance, you can take cash advance withdrawals with no fees, no interest – it’s a good way to access larger amounts than an ATM will allow you to withdraw).

So with Vern and Cooper soon returning from Antarctica, and us planning another 3 weeks of travel through Argentina together, I returned from Uruguay appropriately equipped with enough $ to finance our upcoming Argentina destinations optimally.  The trick is to not convert more USD to pesos than you need, because it is impossible to convert pesos back to dollars later.  And by the time you read this, the cash will all be gone, because we will be on our way to Brazil, where we will return to “normal” travel financing with ATM withdrawals and credit card purchases!

If you want to know more about all this, feel free to email us with questions – especially if you plan to travel to Argentina soon, we will happily share what we have learned in greater detail.



To see more pictures from our world trip so far, click this link:

  

Sunday 6 December 2015

ANTARCTICA

Cooper. It’s the end of the world! Antarctica really is the end of the world. In Canada, it is winter now, but down here in the southern hemisphere, it is summer. However, when you usually think of summer, you think of a nice warm day, t-shirts and shorts, but in Antarctica, you’re wearing all of your layers to keep warm. My dad and I took a boat down to Antarctica, while my mom stayed back in Buenos Aires, Argentina, because she made a promise that she would go nowhere near winter during our year of travel, and Antarctica in the summer still counts as winter.

To get to Antarctica we flew to Ushuaia, which is the southernmost city in the Americas, so that was already cool (both types of cool). From Ushuaia, we then took a ship two days across a stretch of ocean called the Drake Passage, which is known to have horrible conditions at certain periods of the year.  Luckily it was good for us on the way there. And then we were in Antarctica!

While we were in Antarctica, we set foot on land six times.  At other times we cruised around in a small boat called a Zodiac to get up close to water wildlife and icebergs. Each time was fantastic. We were guaranteed to see two types of penguins: Chinstrap penguins (my personal favourite), and Gentoo penguins. But we were lucky and saw two more types of penguins: a Macaroni penguin, and an Adelie penguin. Here is a picture of the Macaroni penguin (which the staff on our boat have named Kevin) 


Along with the different types of penguins, we also saw many different types of seals (no, not sea lions). One type was the Elephant seal, and the baby ones are so cute with their big eyes. 


On the last day of our Antarctic stay, before we went on the Drake Passage, we visited Danco Island, which had a very long, and very steep hill on it, and we all hiked to the top. After we spent some time up there, we had to come down, which would take about 10 minutes to walk, so my dad and I took the quickest, most direct, and awesomest way down the snowy hill: on our bellies like a penguin! It was so much fun!

After sliding like penguins, we got back on board and set off to a bay where we anchored the ship. With icebergs all around, the bitter cold air, a thin amount of ice covering the surface of the water, and lots of snow falling from the sky, it was the perfect place to go jumping into the freezing cold water. My dad and I did it of course, along with about 60 others (with a total of 170 passengers, lots of them were chickens for not doing it). The water was COLD, only 1 degree above freezing! Here is a picture of me jumping into the bitterly cold Antarctic Ocean!!! 


The Drake Passage was not nice to us on the way back, and my dad, being prone to seasickness (along with 100 other people) really didn’t feel that great. I even got seasick, and it’s rare for me to get seasick. After our survival of the two days across the Passage, it felt really good to be back on solid ground in Ushuaia.


To see more pictures from our world trip so far, click this link:




Vern.  Our voyage to the 7th Continent aboard a Quark Expeditions ship was outstanding.  The Antarctica landscape is amongst the most stunning I have ever visited.   We saw dozens of glaciers, hundreds of icebergs, and thousands of penguins and not once did I tire of the sights.  (Well, OK – a lot of the penguins do look alike.) The Quark staff were truly phenomenal, and they all paid special attention to Cooper (the only minor on board).  The food and service were top notch.  Our waiter, Vlodomyr, performed a different magic trick for Coop almost every day.  The expedition staff (and most of the passengers) all knew Cooper by name and on the last night he was brought up on stage to be a part of the nightly entertainment, participating in “The Ice Show”.

Yes, travelling aboard the Ocean Endeavour in cruise ship cabins is a long way removed from the forays of Amundsen, Scott and Shackleton.   Plenty of smoked salmon and fresh-made omelettes; no need to consider eating sled dogs, staff or other passengers.
The only (slightly) negative part of the trip was the crossing of the Drake Passage; that dreaded stretch of sea between the tip of South America and the Antarctic Peninsula.  As I wrote parts of this entry, my chair often slid away from the table and I had to fight my way back to the keyboard.  Despite the seasickness pill and my wristbands, I was still a bit off.  The laptop was facing the window, where I could type while staring at the horizon; it helped.  The ship was very quiet and few people were in the lounge, which was telling.  Even Cooper was feeling ill and laid down in our cabin, barf bag on hand, waiting for the seasickness tablet to kick in. 

We had several good whale sightings of humpbacks; well worth getting geared up and braving the wind and cold on deck.  We’d also been very lucky with penguin species – we saw four out of the eight species in the Antarctic:  Gentoo, Adelie, Chinstrap and Marconi.   Plenty of Gentoo (i.e. thousands), same for Chinstraps (though their colonies are only in the north), and a single confused Marconi along with a single Adelie spotting.  Happily, I have pictures of all.  The tall and colourful Emperor and King penguins live further south than we’d travelled.

Cooper and I partook of the “Polar Plunge”.   Staff and passengers alike were once again impressed with Coop; however, there was no question that we were going to do it.  And yes, the water was very cold.  For safety reasons, jumpers are harnessed should they need to be pulled out of the ocean.

I would do this trip again and go down to the South Georgia islands.  A longer trip, but the scenery and history are worth it.  And the food isn’t half bad either! :)



To see more pictures from our world trip so far, click this link:




Saturday 21 November 2015

Foodie Corner: Astrid y Gaston

Vern.  

Chef Gastón Acurio is a legend throughout South America, and his “Astrid y Gaston” establishment in Lima, which takes Peruvian cuisine to five star heights, is currently ranked #14 amongst the world’s top 50 restaurants.   It wasn’t the ONLY reason to spend time in Lima, but it was high on my list! :)    

(Note:  I'm adding this entry in late December, sorry for the delay, we are now a long way from Lima.) 

Planning two months ahead, we reserved a lunch seating featuring Head Chef Diego Muñoz’s 10-course tasting menu.  I opted for the wine pairing to complete the culinary experience.

Astrid y Gaston lived up to reputation and expectation:  the food was spectacular and the service impeccable.   Each course was exquisitely presented.  Even Carolyn, a fan of neither fish nor seafood enjoyed the first half of the menu, which was largely ocean-based.
I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves, including the one of the menu. 

Had we not sold the house so as to remain unencumbered throughout our voyage, the visit might have prompted a second mortgage… and it would have been worth it! 







Amazon Jungle

Cooper. The Amazon Jungle is the biggest rainforest in the world, and it is very, very hot and humid too. We flew to Iquitos, Peru which is a city in the middle of the Amazon Jungle - and it is also the biggest city in the world that you cannot reach by road (only river and plane). It has a population of 800,000 people. We arrived in Iquitos on November 12 and left a week later on November 19, staying a total of 3 nights in Iquitos, and 4 nights in the jungle itself.

To get to our lodge in the jungle, it was an approx 2½ hour boat ride down the Amazon River. We stayed at a nice place called Otorongo Lodge which, in the high season, has about 30 people there at one time, but we were there in the low season, so there were only 5 of us. We saw many different animals, like: sloths, caiman (a small crocodile), many different frogs, pink river dolphins, grey river dolphins, wild dogs, monkeys, lots of birds (parrots, toucans, and too many others to list), tarantulas as big as an adult’s hand, capybaras (like rats the size of beavers - they are officially the biggest rodents on the planet), and lots of fish (piranhas that we caught, catfish also that we caught, and other types of fish we saw in the rivers).

The Amazon River is about 2 kms wide where we were, which is already VERY wide.  It can get much wider in the rainy season (3-4 kms wide) as it floods into the surrounding forests every Feb-May; and it also gets much wider as it goes toward the ocean (in some places we're told you can't even see across to the other shore, the distance is so far). The length of the whole river is about 6450 kms.  Sometimes it doesn't feel like you're on a river, it feels like you're in the middle of a big lake; but when you get nearer the shore to see how fast the water is moving past, then you realize how fast the current is, and you remember that you are on a river, not a lake. The only down side about the jungle is the malaria mosquitoes, but we are taking medications to help prevent it.

There were many activities to do (and we did them all). We swam in the river, all 3 of us! We also hiked through the jungle lots, including a trail to see a huge tree, visited local villages (including a school), and saw giant lily pads that are bigger than me! We took our boat to see if we could spot the unique river dolphins, and then also saw them every day on our boat trips to see other things too. We hiked through grasses taller than me - it felt like a scene from the movie 'Honey I Shrunk the Kids'. My dad and I even went out camping in the jungle for one night. We used real machetes to chop jungle vines out of our way.

We went fishing twice while at the lodge, once for piranhas, and once for stingrays. We all successfully caught a piranha (12 keepers big enough to eat). When we went to fish for stingrays, no luck, but my dad and I caught a catfish each, big enough to take back to the lodge to eat. The cool thing that the lodge does is that if you catch some fish, they cook it and put it out to eat on the table for lunch or dinner. Here is a picture of me catching a piranha. They have very sharp and pointy teeth!


The meals in the jungle were great. At breakfast we got eggs, bread, cereal + milk, and a local type of bacon. For lunch there was chicken or fish, bread, potatoes, and rice. For dinner: catfish (which was really good, even though I don’t like seafood/fish), bread, rice, and potatoes. Our room was a family cabin behind the main lodge, because the main lodge rooms were all for only 2 people each. Here is a photo of our room. 


After our 4 nights, 5 days in the jungle, we headed back to Iquitos, which was an approx 3½ hour boat ride up river. Out in the jungle, it’s full of peaceful, natural bird sounds, so it’s a big difference to go back to the city again. In Iquitos, their local ‘taxi’ is called a ‘moto-taxi’ (and in India, the same vehicle is called a ‘tuk-tuk’). It is a small 3-wheeled motorcycle with no doors. There are also LOTS of motorcycles. It is not very common to own or see a full-sized car in Iquitos, because it is so hard to get vehicles into this city - they must be shipped on a plane or by river. Here is a picture of us moving in one of their moto-taxis! 



Also, to see pictures from our world trip so far, click this link:
Trip Photo Album


Thursday 19 November 2015

Piranha: Eat Them Before They Eat You


Vern.

Fishing for Piranha in the Amazon. The logic is simple:  eat them before they can eat you.   


We settled into ‘the perfect spot’ along one of the Amazon's tributaries.  Our trusty guide Goseis (ho-see-us) got each of us set up with a fishing pole – a simple stick with string, a hook and a weight - along with raw meat for bait.   Our patience was tested, but after an hour I pulled a small piranha from the river.  However, as with a number of our other near-catches, it detached itself from my line while still over the water.  Not about to give up, I reached over in a reflex reaction and batted the falling fish into the boat.  The piranha was not about to give up either, however, and sunk its teeth into my pant leg in passing.  Goseis, who had seen the whole thing, was in stitches at the front of the boat.  The fish held on long enough for Carolyn to get a picture of my unwanted hitchhiker before it fell to the floor.  The half dozen or so piranha that we brought in made for a tasty lunch.





To see more pictures from our world trip so far, click this link: Trip Photo Album  (more pics from the Amazon to be added soon)



Sunday 1 November 2015

Halloween in Arequipa, Peru

Cooper.  During the week before Halloween, we were surprised to suddenly see a few plastic jack-o-lanterns for sale in some corner stores; but we didn't see much anything else being sold for Halloween, and so we weren't sure that Halloween would really be here.

When we asked our teachers at our current Spanish school (mom & dad who have 4 kids), they said that Halloween in Arequipa has only become popular in the last few years. Because of that, the city hasn’t really got a good idea of what Halloween should be quite like other than ‘the kids want candy’.

Our instructors invited me to join their family on Halloween night, which was really nice of them to do and it was fun.

Instead of like it is in Canada, where everybody goes from house to house and says “Trick or Treat!”, in Arequipa no houses have any candy, in fact many households don’t even believe in Halloween. But families and kids can go around from store to store, restaurant to restaurant, and barber shop to dentist office on all the busiest roads in the city. It's a little crazy, with lots of people trying to cross these busy streets and there are hardly any traffic lights that work - but it is like this every day! 

For Halloween, my original plan was to get my face painted, but then I decided instead to get a small costume at the local market. My rainbow wig has multi-colours on the back (which you can't see very well in this picture). Observe its awesomeness:



I don’t know how much trick or treating you do, if any, but in Canada I always get lots of candy (spending about 3-4 hours doing it). It's really different here! Unlike at home, where I need 2 large bags to hold all of the treats, here my one small bag isn’t even a quarter full (for about the same amount of time) - and I even got a few flyers and coupons from some of the businesses.



These things aren't bad, just differences in another country, as we knew there would be. The next holiday is Christmas, where we plan to be in Rio, Brazil. We’ll see what the differences are then, too.


Carolyn.  As Cooper mentioned, Halloween is new in Arequipa;  our Spanish instructors explained that it has only come about from local people seeing North American movies and TV shows...and actually Vern and I think it's sad that this outside influence is now shaping Peruvian culture.  We would have been content, even pleased, to learn that Peru did not have Halloween (even though Cooper was VERY happy to go out trick-or-treating!).

Having said that, the major missing thing here is the lack of packaging and marketing of specialized Halloween candy. Any of the candy that was given out by the participating businesses is only the 'normal' candy that can be bought here - generally they had a bag of individually wrapped hard candies on their counter, and would then give out ONE candy per kid.  No mini-chocolate bars, no mini-packs of Skittles, Smarties, etc, no small bags of potato chips or cheezies.  All these candies/snacks exist here in their full sizes in the corner stores and large supermarkets, but it obviously has not occurred to any manufacturers or distributors to bring the Halloween merchandising of their products here.  Good.
    


Friday 30 October 2015

Questions Asked by my Class in Calgary

Cooper. On October 29, I Skyped with my class at school in Calgary, Canada.  It was nice to see my school friends and teachers from last year.  Here are the questions they asked me, as well as my answers to them:

List of Questions Asked by My Grade 7 Class in Calgary

-  Question: Do they celebrate Halloween where you are?
Answer: A little bit of Halloween is happening, but it’s not as big a deal for kids here as it is in Canada. (Update: see my separate blog entry about Halloween)

-  Q: Where are you now?
A: I am in Peru, in a city called Arequipa.  It's about the same size as Calgary (a little more than 1 million people)


- Q: It's 9:30am in Calgary, what time is it there?
A: It's 10:30am in Peru (Update: Calgary has now turned clocks back an hour for Daylight Savings Time, but Peru doesn't do this, so it's now 2 hours difference not just 1 hour different)

-  Q: What were your favourite experiences so far?
A: Machu Picchu and hiking the Inca Trail, also the Galapagos Islands.

- Q: What is the weirdest or most different thing that you have seen so far?
A: You have to throw all of the toilet paper in garbage cans beside the toilet, it can't be put into the toilet because if you flushed the paper, it would clog the plumbing.  Yes, this means the little garbage cans in every bathroom everywhere stink.

-  Q: What’s your favourite food so far?
A: The things that I also like in Calgary. :)  I don't like finding chicken feet in my soup, and I don't like eating guinea pig (common in Peru)

-  Q: Where are you going next?
A: We are going to the Amazon Jungle, still in Peru, on the Amazon River near to a town called Iquitos and we are going to see pink river dolphins.

-  Q: Are you excited to see the pink river dolphins in Iquitos?
A: Yes, I am!

-  Q: How was it swimming in the Arctic Ocean?
A: Surprisingly, it actually wasn’t that cold, because there is a warmer river (the Mackenzie River) that is flowing into it where we went in. 

-  Q: Can you say some things in Spanish?
A: "Mi nombre es Cooper" or another way to say it is "Me llamo Cooper".

-  Q: Did you know that Justin Trudeau is Canada’s new Prime Minister?
A: Yes I did.

-  Q: Have you been following the current events in Calgary and Canada?
A: Yes, we try see what's going on in Calgary and Canada.

-  Q: When are you coming back to Calgary next?
A: Next summer (in 2016)

-  Q: Do you have any questions for us?
A: Yes:
My question: Does Calgary like that the new Prime Minister is Justin Trudeau?
Class answer: YES!
(editorial note from Mom:  teacher Ms. P clarified that this answer from the class might be different than the answer from the majority of Calgarians)

My question: Are there any new people in the class?
Class answer: Yes, 3 people (quick video introductions – nice to meet you!)

-  Q: Can we Skype with you again sometime?
A:  Yes, when we are in Buenos Aires in about a month, we will hopefully have a good enough internet connection that I can Skype again!

Thanks for the questions!


Saturday 24 October 2015

Our Digestive Health

Carolyn.  Shhh!  Can't talk about this out loud, in case it jinxes us.  But so far, after 3+ months of travelling and living in Costa Rica, Ecuador and Peru, we have not had any stomach issues or diarrhea - maybe a little constipation now and then - but really, we are all in good shape, digestively speaking.

The reality of eating and drinking in Central and South America is that foreign travelers have to be careful.  It is not possible for us to safely drink the tap water (actually, we did every day in Costa Rica - but not wise in Ecuador or Peru).

The caution about tap water also extends to anything it might have been used to wash or mix with.  For example the fruit juice on a menu may be mixed with tap water, and the crushed ice in the yummy-looking slushie drink that Cooper desperately wants is almost certainly made from tap water.  It's also not recommended to eat a tossed green salad or any other raw fruits or vegetables that have been washed with tap water and not cooked or peeled.

On the restaurant scene, there are generally two options:  tourist restaurants and local restaurants.  The general thinking is that tourist restaurants will use purified water to wash their salad veggies, etc...while the local restaurants will not.  (Because the kiss of death for a tourist restaurant would be for a customer to get sick from eating or drinking there, and then report it on Trip Advisor).

So one could argue that the safe bet to protect delicate tourist stomachs is to eat at the safer tourist restaurants.  But you miss a lot of local culture and yummy different food that way.  And the cost?  Eating at a tourist restaurant is expensive, no surprise.  In Peru, a full dinner at the little place around the corner filled with local folks will cost 4 soles, or $1.60 CDN per person.  Whereas dinner in a tourist spot will cost 40-50 soles or more per person...over ten times as much.  

We try to balance both.  After all, we like to think we are travelers, not tourists.  So we don't want to stick with the standard tourist fare, we want to be more adventurous.  And for our year-long travelling budget, it's certainly more affordable to eat at the small local places.  We really like working on our Spanish language skills in the local places too.  But to eat here means we knowingly restrict what we will order, avoiding any food or drink that might be connected with bad water.  After a while, Vern and I get really desperate for a crisp green salad (Cooper not so much, though he's thrilled at the prospect of chicken fingers and fries on a tourist menu), so off we go to a touristy place where we feel we can trust their water practices.

Which brings us to Arequipa where we are renting an apartment for a month.  Because we want to "live like a local".  Except that we still can't drink our own tap water like the locals do. (We chatted with an American ex-pat who has lived in Peru for 8 years - and he said it took him 6 months of being sick, drinking the local tap water, before his stomach got used to it and now it's OK for him).

So our kitchen routines here have an extra step:  I boil big pots of water daily, for about 10-15 minutes.  Then let them cool.  We've got room temp pitchers, refrigerated pitchers, and ice-cube trays all with 'good' water.  When we wash lettuce for salads, we pour water from the pitcher on the counter into a bowl, instead of running the tap from the sink.  It's great - still no digestive issues!

It's been SO NICE to prepare our own food, in our own kitchen.  Great to explore the local grocery stores and markets;  we've tried some new fruits and veggies that we've never seen or heard of before, and we always wash them carefully in our purified water!  We've also enjoyed trying to re-create some of our favourites from home (eg: How to make tacos when there are no Old El Paso taco kits on the shelf?  Where is the bacon...plenty of other pork cuts, but no bacon?  There are no salad dressings in the grocery store, so oil & vinegar should be fine - but the 'veggie' oil is made from cotton?  All the milk is on the shelves - not refrigerated - with expiry dates in 6 months?).

We leave our Arequipa apartment in 10 days to resume our travels in Peru and beyond.  It will be good.  It will be a return to the restaurant scene.  We'll continue to make good food and water choices, and fingers crossed, our stomachs will remain healthy!



Thursday 22 October 2015

Foodie Corner: Unusual Eats - Guinea Pig

Vern.  Cusco, Peru

You know guinea pigs:  those cuddly little balls of fur that make such cute pets in North America. 

Well, it turns out that guinea pigs have been gracing the tables of Peru for centuries.  Easy and cheap to raise as livestock, ‘cuy’ (pronounced ‘kwee’) is a popular regional dish served either roasted or grilled or even deep fried at many restaurants in Peru.   Staying true to my philosophy of “if it moves, it can be eaten”, I needed to try it. 

In spite of the plethora of restaurants serving guinea pig in Cusco, only a few came recommended.  We opted for Kusikuy, an establishment specializing in the traditional cooking of the dish.  

Cuy takes about an hour to prepare; calling ahead greatly reduces the in-restaurant wait time.  I sat in great anticipation, willing my dinner to appear, and I was not disappointed.  The cuy is brought out fresh from the oven, head to tail, though it was explained that this is strictly for a Kodak moment.   Serving staff then whisk the dish back to the kitchen where it is cut up for eating.

The cuy meat itself has a delicate, slightly gamey flavour.  I found that the dish didn’t loan itself very easily to consumption with fork and knife and the proprietor actually come over to our table, all smiles, in praise of my ‘traditional’ pick-it-up-and-eat it approach.

I enjoyed the novel culinary experience.  I would recommend Kusikuy for the dish itself; however, the restaurant was lacking ambiance.  Though nicely decorated, the temperature within the restaurant was cold enough to warrant a scarf and sweater, and there was only one other table of diners.   Our drinks – maracuya (passion fruit) sours, normally excellent concoctions - tasted primarily of alcohol with little other flavour.  I hope to get the chance to try cuy at other locales throughout Peru and will compare the experience.


Friday 2 October 2015

Inca Trail & Machu Picchu (Peru)

Cooper.


Inca Trail Day 1 – Starting the Hike!

Hiking the Inca Trail and going to Machu Picchu is very exciting, even when you have to get up at 4:00 am to get there. On September 27, we got up, took a 2-hr bus ride to pick up the rest of our hiking group (already in a nearby town), and went on our way to the start of our 4 day, 3 night hike. On the first day, we were supposed to walk 11.3 km to get to our first camp site. However, the road was under construction, and our bus had to drop us off earlier. So we ended up hiking an additional 3.7 km. Our group started out with a total of 16 members but we lost 2 members to altitude sickness.  The first one turned back early because he wasn't fit enough to do the hike (he was breathing so quick and hard we all thought he was going to have a heart attack), and the second guy was throwing up all the way for 3 hours and then turned back. We got to see them again at Machu Picchu on Day 4. The first day was very flat compared to the rest of the days. We start at the elevation of 2400 meters above sea level and ended at 2950 meters above sea level. Here is a picture of me hiking. 



When we reached our tent site, one of the houses in the town of 24 people below was BLASTING music until really late.  And dogs barking all night.  None of us had a good sleep that night.  We were happy to learn there would be no more towns along the rest of the trail.


Inca Trail Day 2 – Climbing a Vertical Kilometre

All the people we know who have done the trail said that the hardest day was the second one, and they were definitely right. Starting at 2950 meters, hiking to 4215 meters and ending at 3600 meters. That means climbing up 1200+ meters, more than a whole entire vertical km! At least the climbing was worth it for the wonderful views. 



We woke at 5:00 am on day 2 and 3, and had breakfast at about 5:45 am. You may think that hiking up is a lot harder than down, well… you are wrong. With the uneven stones laid out by the Incas and the steep steps they made, it’s just as hard going down. My legs are still aching a bit. When we arrived at our camp site, it was also our 1:30 pm lunch. You would assume that the meals they provide are simple and small, like bread, ham and cheese, but the meals were just the same that you would buy at a restaurant. They even took it a step further on day 3!


Inca Trail Day 3 – The Longest Day

Waking up at the usual 5:00 am, today we arrived at our camp site 12 hours later. That means 10 hours of hiking, with a 1:30 pm lunch. Fortunately, it’s pretty much all down. About one and a half hours before lunch, there was a neat cave we went through! Our guide is fun and he uses a small dark corner in the cave to scare people in the group. I got them all on video. :) For lunch, we had a feast, including a surprise for dessert! A big cake! As a group, we had picked a name for ourselves: the Hungry Hikers! And the cake had that written on it. What a treat! 



Also during lunch, it started to rain a lot. So I got on my rain jacket, rain pants, gloves and pack cover and we set out in the rain. It lasted for about an hour and then it became sunny. Right before our campsite for that night, there was a huge Inca ruin that went up the mountain. Here is a picture of me sitting at the edge of the ruins. 



Inca Trail Day 4 – Machu Picchu!

We had to get up at 3:00 am, but it’s all worth it for the final destination: Machu Picchu! The trail was going down a bit at the start, but then became flat the whole way until right before  “The Sungate”, where you first see Machu Picchu. There we had to climb a very steep staircase called the monkey stairs. I’m already a very good monkey, so I got up in less than 10 seconds, but everyone else took a minute.



After The Sungate, it’s about another half hour to Machu Picchu (depends how many times you stop to take pictures!)  When we got to Machu Picchu, we were at the place where all of the postcard pictures are taken. Here’s a picture of us finally at Machu Picchu. Maybe our photo is also worth a post card! ;)




When we got a chance to explore Machu Picchu, we went to some of the places sacred to the Incas, like the Sun Temple, the Three Windows, the Three Doors, and a few other popular sites.

After our time was finished in Machu Picchu, we took a bus to a small town nearby called “Aguas Calientes” (Hot Waters in English) and ate lunch there.  Then we took the train back to Cusco.


Thank you Inca Trail and Machu Picchu, you were awesome!


Vern.

While there is no doubt that Machu Picchu is a spectacular finale, the Inca Trail truly lends credence to the quote “it is about the journey, not the destination”. 

The Trail was a rite of passage for the Inca elite, the road to the seasonal retreat of Machu Picchu.  Over the forty kilometre section of Trail from the town of Ollantaytambo to the “Lost City of the Incas”, the stone path undulates through mountain peaks and valleys.  Rising from 2,400 m above sea level to 4,215 m and back to 2,430 m, the Trail leads past ancient ruins on green mountainsides, affords hikers with vistas of snow-capped peaks and waterfalls and descends into lush jungle: it is a journey through quintessential Peruvian Andes.  

The final hours of the 4-day trek are consumed by the descent down to the city and the awe-inspiring tour of Machu Picchu itself.  I found myself lost in thought walking between and through the almost-intact homes and temples and picturing lives lived 500 years ago. For most, and possibly all of our group, the pinnacle of the ancient Incas was a major bucket-list item, and there were no disappointments.   

Our entire group -- guides, porters and fellow hikers -- were very impressed by Cooper’s enthusiasm, positive attitude and physical stamina throughout the trek.  (And his parents are equally proud of him.)   The question now is:  what do you do next when you’ve successfully tackled one of the world’s most sough-after destinations at the ripe old age of twelve?  



(Also, our Finca Bellavista "Living in a Treehouse" blog entry is finally up from Costa Rica. Galapagos posts also coming soon!)


Sunday 13 September 2015

Galapagos: The Enchanted Islands



Vern

The Galapagos Islands are probably best known for their endemic wildlife, the inspiration for Charles Darwin’s “Origin of Species”.   In our eight days of island hopping aboard the Estrella del Mar with G Adventures, we visited five of the archipelago’s thirteen main islands and got up close and personal with creatures found nowhere else on the planet.  Highlights from our adventure include snorkeling with sea lions, sea turtles and marine iguanas, encountering Galapagos penguins and the aptly-named blue-footed boobies, walking alongside giant tortoises and watching a pod of dolphins cavorting alongside our boat.  Kudos to the folks at G Adventures and the crew of the Estrella del Mar and a huge thank you to our fellow passengers with whom we explored the wonders of the “Enchanted Islands”!



More pictures of the Galapagos (and the rest of the trip at https://www.flickr.com/photos/vbolinius/collections/72157651783383305/