Hola from Aguas Calientes, Peru

Hello again everyone!Our jungle expedition the last few days to the Amazon Basin in eastern Peru was amazing! We traveled by specially equipped vans along a dirt road from Cusco, descending out of the Andes into Manu Nacional Park. There were four others in our group: two people from Toronto Canada, one from Sweden, and one from Norway. Wednesday night we stayed in the Cloud Forest. Thursday we left the cloud forest lodge on mountain bikes and descended further. We rode the bikes for about 3 hours until we arrived at Pilcopata on the Rio Madre de Dios. The views of the cloud forest and transition into low tropical rainforest were fantastic. We also passed through several small villages and visited a coca plantation. In Pilcopata we transfered to an inflatable raft where we did about an hour of whitewater rafting down the river. At one point we were able to swim and jump off a 25-foot rock into the swiftly flowing river. We then arrived at another village where we transfered to a narrow wooden boat that took us further down river to a jungle lodge. I can´t wait to show the pictures. After resting a bit, we headed off into the jungle on an evening hike for a couple of hours. It was all an amazing adventure. All the food they cooked for us was also delicious. I´ve never had fried rice mixed with both soy sauce and mayonaise with lime juice before - but it was great. Friday morning we got up at 5:00 am and headed further down river by boat to visit a "parrot clay lick" - a cliffside along the river where hundreds of parrots come to eat the clay to help their digestion of seeds and things. They are beautiful birds. Seeing the rainforest come to life early in the morning was interesting as well. It sounded like nature´s symphony getting warmed up. After breakfast back at the lodge, we hiked uphill for a while to do the canopy zip line type thing. We were all outfitted with rappelling gear, and then attached one by one to a pully system on a cable, from which we went sailing from one platform to the next through the rainforest canopy. Quite thrilling!!! There were four cables and five platforms in all. The first cable was about 100 meters long and 50 meters above the ground. All the others were a bit shorter. But it was an amazing vantage point to view the rainforest as you go sailing through the air. On the final platform, which was very high in the air on a tree, we had to rappel down the tree to get back to the ground. After all that, and lunch back at the lodge, it was time for James and I to leave to head back to Cusco.Some of the animals we saw on our trip to the jungle include: the "cock of the rock" (peru´s national bird), several types of monkeys, wild pigs, baby tarantulas, other spiders (one type we saw was larger than a person´s hand stretched out - this type floats on water to catch fish to eat), snakes (we saw one very venomous type too), a slug with glowing eyes staring at us in the darkness during the night hike, many types of birds, many brightly colored butterflies everywhere, and more. After hearing and reading about rainforests every now and then all through school, it is finally neat to now have been to part of the famous Amazon rainforest. The heat and humidity reminded me of what we´re currently missing in Alabama. But it was a welcome break from the cold dry air, and lack of oxygen, of the high Andes. The air in the rainforest smelled so fresh and pure, and oxygen-rich. At night, after the 2 or 3 hours of electricity was cut off, we were able to see billions of stars and the milky way very clearly (when the clouds cleared of course). The sound of the swift river flowing right near the lodge was relaxing to fall asleep to.We got in to Cusco from the jungle very late Friday evening. We had left the jungle lodge by boat around 12:30 pm yesterday and then arrived at a village upriver about an hour later where we waited around a while and then got on a van. When we got to the village of Pilcopata, we had another pit stop to unload some rafting supplies, before continuing. Outside of that village we then ran into an accident site where a bulldozer had rolled off the dirt road into a ravine, and many people were around trying to help. And a couple of other tractors were attached to it by cables trying to pull it back up. So, we sat there for an hour or so and then finally they were able to upright the thing and clear the roadway of all the help equipment. Next, after a fast thrill ride up the dirt road into the Andes, careening around sharp curves next to several thousand foot drops into what looked like a black abyss, all the way back to Cusco, we finally arrived.Then we had to get up around 4:00 am this morning to be taken to a bus to take us to Ollantaytambo in the Sacred Valley (about one hour and fifteen minutes ride) to catch the train from there to Aguas Calientes (below Machu Picchu). We arrived here in Aguas Calientes around 7:15 am, and after some confusion as to who was meeting us, arrived at a simple hotel by 8:00 am. So, not much sleep lately, but we´re getting to see some amazing things.We´re now here in Aguas Calientes checking backed up email. Its kind of rainy here, but looks to be letting up. Might try to hike a mountain next to town this afternoon, with a good vantage point of Machu Picchu across the Urubamba River Canyon. Tomorrow we´ll enter Machu Picchu and hike Huayna Picchu (the pointed peak in the background of most photos of the place), and then return to Cusco in the evening by train/bus. Monday morning we leave Cusco by train and arrive in Puno on Lake Titicaca in the evening. Tuesday we leave Puno very early and head towards La Paz Bolivia, utilizing buses and boats, visiting an island and a village on the lake, and arriving in La Paz late in the evening.I hope all of you are doing wonderfully! Take care and best wishes to all!