!Peru es increible!

One time I went to Peru, and it was awesome. I had such a good time, I thought I should blog about it. So here it goes:
After a flight to San Francisco and an 8 or 9 hr flight to Peru, we arrived in Lima at midnight, exhausted. I had gotten about an hour of sleep before we had to leave for our flight from Seattle, and I didn't sleep very well on the plane. We luckily got transportation taken care of for the majority of our transfers, so it was nice to not have to deal with the mob of taxi drivers outside the airport begging for you to take their cabs. Our driver took us to our hotel in Miraflores, and we had a nice double suite, with perfect hearing to all the honking outside. Unfortunately, we didn't figure out the air conditioning situation until our second night, so the windows were open all night. Thank goodness for earplugs! After some sleep, we got up to go see the temple in Lima.

I always love visiting the temples.

Meet Becky and Rachel. My travel buddies. They went and did a temple session while I took a nap after walking around the grounds. I was still tired and didn't sleep well from all the honking cars the previous night. But I also got the chance to chat with a youth group while they were still in their session, so it was fun to start practicing my Spanish again. After our temple trip, we spent the day in Lima, visiting the sights of downtown. Mostly in the Plaza de Armas:

We toured a new Cathedral, an old Cathedral and some catacombs, which were kind of cool. We also got swarmed by pigeons. Yuck.

We also got to see a processional in front of the governer's mansion. I tried uploading a video, but blogger wouldn't let me, which I'm kind of bummed about, because I wanted you all to hear the Rocky theme in the music (OK, not really, but kind of).

It was fun to watch the trombone players ride and play at the same time. :)

That night, we went to the Parque de las Aguas, which is kind of a cross between New York's Central Park and the Bellagio fountains in Las Vegas and a touch of the Gateway fountains in Salt Lake. It's pretty cool.

Our next stop was in the Sacred Valley:

Rachel and I at our hotel. Where our space heater sparked and started smoking. Also where Rachel got sick. I'm not sure the dining staff thought she liked their food. Well, it wasn't the best food we had on the trip...

OK, now is where the picture selection gets difficult for the rest of the trip. Bear with me. There are lots of good pictures, but not enough space for a decent post. We went to Urubamba to see the ruins of Ollyantaytambo. Oh, it was so ridiculously cool. I loved exploring the ruins. Some pictures:

Don't mind the fact that my shirt is hiked up a bit. What's a vacation without a few stupid ridiculous photos?

Perfect resting spot.

Don't fall!

I *almost* fell in.

And then we finished off the day with some of the most amazing hot chocolate. Yum! So delish!

The next day was MACHU PICCHU!!

Stay tuned...