Happy Halloween!

Welcome to Six Months of Rain, Seattle

Well, we are poking along at our usual pace here in the J household. Fall has arrived and in Seattle that means rain. 

I’m over it. 

We are searching about desperately for some indoor activities so we don’t go completely stir crazy. 

Tonight we are going trick or treating to exactly two houses: my parent’s and Megan/Eric’s. Which also means that we get to meet Maddie, Megan and Eric’s brand new golden retriever puppy.

They just picked her up in Montana last weekend. We are so excited. Can’t wait to meet the little ankle biter. 

Megan said last night that sweet little Maddie is waking up every three hours for a little loving/potty break. It sounds just like having a newborn baby. Except that I’m not the one waking up. SCORE.

I think that must be the nice thing about being a grandparent: You get to love/hold/cuddle the wee babe, but at the end of the day it goes home with its parents and you get to sleep through the night. Sometimes, I’d like to skip directly to the grandparent part. Parenting is exhausting.

Ben, thankfully, is a fairly sound sleeper, but with a penchant for early morning risings. We were up everyday at 5am in Peru. Not my ideal wake up time. But in a new twist he’s been throwing a complete tantrum when nap and bed times roll around. I’m not a fan of the hysterics, Peeps. My little son has developed quite the pair of pipes. My lord, he is LOUD. 

In other news, Ben has his first official haircut the other day. We bribed him with a lollypop, a bobble head ghost, and cartoons. He still has the tips of both ears so I’m counting it a success. 

Poor kid, he’s got so very little hair. It took him two years to work up enough for his first official trim.

Hope you are well, and, if you live on the East Coast, safe and dry.

xxoo, 

Sonja

Traveling in Peru [Part 7]; The Sacred Valley

My Dears, 

The final leg of our journey consisted of a few days in the Sacred Valley outside of Cusco. It was nice to have some rest & relaxation time after the rather frenetic pace of the beginning part of the trip. We stayed at the Sol y Luna Hotel and it was lovely. 

The hotel has acres of beautiful gardens, a pool, and plenty of space for the baby to run around and go crazy. 

 Plus you get your own little cassita. We loved it. 

We spent a day exploring the market at Pisac:

It’s a sweet little town, full of twisty streets and gorgeous handcrafts. 

We stuffed ourselves with empanadas:

Thus fortified we hopped back into the car for a ride up to the Pisac ruins. Which were interesting, hot, and windy. My advice: see Pisac before Machu Picchu. After MP, everything else looks small and uninteresting in comparison! 

Sorry Pisac. You have very nice ruins. Really. 

After that, it was on to Ben’s favorite part of the day: The Awana Kancha llama farm. He came away with two new words: ‘Hola’ [sounds like ‘holla’] and llama!! [sounds like ‘mama’]. The kid was llama crazy.  

We also saw a gunaco. This guy leads a plusher lifestyle than his brethren of the altiplano. 

Llamas at the trough. 

We would have loved to have been able to purchase some of the tapestries crafted by the owners - they were exquisite! - but also way, way out of our price range. The quality - when compared to the stuff in Pisac - was phenomenal. 

Back to the hotel we went. By far the best part of the Sol y Luna, from Ben’s perspective, was the horse stable and petting zoo. 

We visited the horses several times a day. 

You can’t keep this child away from the animals. These two were our very favorite. 

We were also delighted to make the acquaintance of the resident chickens, rabbits, and assorted other animals that were housed behind the stable:

It wasn’t until the last day that we realized that they supplied the on-site restaurant.

No wonder the guinea pigs were so skittish! 

Sorry little guy. You sure were tasty. 

It was a great end to a lovely trip. 

As Chris always says:  'I love going off to new places and I love coming home”. How very true. 

There is nothing quite as lovely as your own bed. 

And that, my dears, was our trip to Peru. 

xxoo, 

Sonja

Previously:

Part 1 - Arequipa, The White City

Part 2 - The Altiplano

Part 3 - Cruz del Condor and Colca Canyon

Part 4 - Sillustini, Lake Titicaca, and the Floating Islands of Uros

Part 5 - Cusco

Part 6 - Machu Picchu

Part 7 - Sacred Valley and Pisac

Traveling in Peru [Part 6]: Machu Picchu

My Dears, 

There is so much to say about Machu Picchu. We highly recommend watching the NOVA program - I think they show it on PBS every so often. 

The thing that makes MP so astonishing is its location: high atop a mountain in the middle of nowhere, it is surrounded by tall mountains and has near-verticle drops down to the river below. This feat of engineering (again, watch the NOVA special!) is made more amazing thanks to considerable environmental factors such as earthquakes, torrential rains, and steep hillsides. 

Reaching MP is no easy task, even with today’s modern conveninences. We awoke early in Cusco, drove into the Sacred Valley, caught a train, arrived in Aguas Calientes, and then took a terrifying 20 minute bus ride up the mountain, finally arriving at our destination. 

It was also packed with people when we arrived, despite a 2,000 person/day cap. 

But what an experience. You could easily spend days exploring the ruins.

Right. I thought it was amazing.... Ben? He just wanted to take a nap.  Such is life with toddlers, my dears. 

Our little trooper. I was amazed, everyday, at his flexibility and resilience. 

Admiring the local fauna. 

This road may not look scary, but believe me: I white knuckled it the whole way up (and down). Not a fan of slippery dirt paths through the jungle on the side of cliffs. 

Chinchilla, anyone? 

The mountain in the back is called Huayna Picchu. There are also temples atop that peak and I’ve heard it’s an amazing climb. We decided that it wasn’t for us though, given the bambino’s presence. 

The nearest jumping-off point to MP is the town at the base of the mountain, called Aguas Calientes (Hot waters). It’s perched in a steep-walled valley on the banks of the Urubamba River. 

The only way into the town is via train. Or by trekking in from the Sacred Valley. 

Thus far in the trip, we’d been in high, arid dessert lands. Aguas Calientes is in the jungle! I loved it. Hot and steamy and teaming with exotic birds. 

We spent our second day on a hike along the river. It was nice to be away from the crowded towns and busy streets. 

And then I almost stepped on this guy. 

Yikes. 

Not sure what he is. Coral snake? Milk snake? We had this saying in Costa Rica about how you distinguished venomous snakes by the color sequence of their scales : "Red touch yellow, kill a fellow; red touch black, you're okay Jack." 

He’s got no yellow. Does that mean he’s ok? I have no idea. Either way he was in no hurry to get out of the way. It was his nonchalance that made me the most worried. 

Ok, enough reptiles. Back to pretty flowers. 

Or giant dead bugs! This guy was probably two inches long. Hello jungle insects!

We stayed at the Inkaterra hotel and by some crazy fluke ended up with a sweet casita that came with a private outdoor plunge pool and garden. The baby was in serious adventuring heaven. 

It was bird central. 

And other beasties, as well. 

 Ben made friends with this guy:

We had a great time in the jungle and I was sad to leave it behind. Two days was simply not enough. By this time, we’d been traveling for almost two weeks and our last stop, in the Sacred Valley, was meant to give us a chance to slow down and relax. We were ready for some down-time. 

xxoo, 

Sonja

Previously:

Part 1 - Arequipa, The White City

Part 2 - The Altiplano

Part 3 - Cruz del Condor and Colca Canyon

Part 4 - Sillustini, Lake Titicaca, and the Floating Islands of Uros

Part 5 - Cusco

Part 6 - Machu Picchu

Up Next:

Part 7 - Sacred Valley and Pisac