Cuzco - Peru

First stop on my summer break is Cuzco, Peru. This was the capital of the Quechua culture, and the gateway to Machu Picchu and other archeological sites. It is a very busy town surrounded by mountains, and lies above 3000m.
The city was very different to what I expected. I pictured a small town in the mountains, only having an airport to service the tourism industry. But the city is really quite big with traffic jams everywhere, and warnings to not work outside the tourist area after dark.
The first day I just wandered the central area for a little bit, acclimatising to the altitude and getting a feel for the place. I learnt I came at the most popular time of the year, during Inti Raymi, a sun festival celebrating the winter soltice, so the town was full of stadium seating and locals practicing for the day.
Day 2, and i decided to check out the local area around Cuzco, so did the sacred valley tour. This took me to Pisac, Ollantaytambo and Chinchero to see old Quechua (Inca) sites. What is interesting about these places are that they are mainly terraces built into mountains, and then either store houses or temples. They are also built in the shape of animals, such as llamas, pumas and condors. A long day spent driving through a beautiful valley going from one site to another.
The next day resulted in getting my baggage back, so I chose just to do an afternoon trip, where I went to the town of Maras to zipline. This was a series of 4 zipline, zigzagging across some hills overlooking the valley. It was something I thought I'd be a little nervous about, especially knowing that there was a 1.2 km line where it is possible to reach speeds of 100km/h. But once there I felt no apprehension at all, so did not get the adrenaline rush I was expecting, but the views made it worth it.
The last day full day I had in Cuzco was spent being apart of the Inti Raymi festival. In the morning I watched the parade of local people dressed up in their tribal costumes and dancing. In the afternoon I went with the hostel up onto the hill near the sacred site that the festival moved too. On this hill outside the sacred site (sacsayhuaman) was a carnival atmosphere with rides, markets, games and lots of locals drinking and cooking in mud bbqs. As the hostel had a spot in a corner far from the action, a group of us left and hung out in the area where all the locals hung out. This made the day much more enjoyable. Then we celebrated late into the night.

South America Intro

Again the summer holidays are here, and I've never been more excited for the end of the school year.
This summer I decided to finally get to my 6th continent, and the one I have talked about going to for years, South America. My first 12 days are in Peru. The home of the Inca's according to our western history books. Although the word actually means king. These are the Quechua people.
After Peru, i head north into Ecuador on a 27 hour bus ride, before flying to the Galapagos. After Ecuador, i travel up into Colombia, spending most of the time on the Caribbean coast. From Colombia I fly to the Yucatan to see what the Aztecs got up. Then to Cuba before the country is opened up to the USA. Finally I spend just under a week in Florida to unwind before my flight back to Stockholm.
The start of the trip was quite eventful, with the airline losing my luggage and taking 2 days to get it to my first destination, Cusco. I was then required to go to the airport to collect my bag, where they took my passport and lost my immigration card. This meant spending a morning in the immigration office getting a new one. But all good, I was due a challenging situation while traveling since it has generally been 7 years of travel without any difficulty.