Hey,

Let ‘s start again. Actually 5 days ago I wrote few lines, a bunch actually; but the electricity went down and of course didn’t save; but we were in Ecuador, so you have to take it with a smile as it is obvious they can lose electricity most of the time. So Tonight I am writing with word so I can save from time to time.
So yes we are still alive and we are doing really well, we didn’t really write before ‘coz of course we are busy but we have as well a Spanish and a French log to maintain; so today is the day to summarize Ecuador.
Arriving for Boston to Quito has been pretty smooth; we spent our first days visiting Quito and its surroundings.
La mitad del Mundo, 2 hours north of Quito, is actually the 0,0 point on the Ecuador line, if you take your gps and come here you will read latitude and longitude 0,0. Actually the French found this point using triangulation, in 1794 but those freaking French did an error of 300 meters, so the monuments Mitad del Mundo is 300 meters away from where it should be, the most amazing thing is few years ago they found some ruins on the top of a mountains dating from the Incas, the ruin look like a circle where the center of the circle is the exact mitad del mundo, the real 0,0 point. Amazing no?
Same day we did a hike to the crater of a volcano where a community is still living, a guide explained us their way of living and explain us about each plant we could see, their effect, their use, we saw many orchids, the hike was pretty hard for our first days as the altitude was around 3000m.
Another excursion from Quito was to Otavallo, one of the finest market in Ecuador, all the indignes come from the mountains around to sell hats, nice indigenes clothes, full of colors and some long discussion with people from the market, most of them speak the Quechua, but they do speak Spanish too, some even worst than me.

Latacunga, city really close form the highest volcano still in activities, at more than 5800 m. Around ten volcanoes are more than 5000m and have a glacier. We wanted to do an excursion over there, not till the top as you have to use climbing equipment and you need to be used to that altitude, but things didn’t go as we wanted and we skipped this excursion. We end up to a nice market in Latacunga where people were teasing us a lot, a nice couple pretty aged already, married and with no baby, they couldn’t quite understand that, a lot of laughing as 2 women wanted to give us some of their child, just joking, we did discover as well at this market some volley ball game. The Ecuadorian way, a net much higher, and with a soccer ball, I would have joined them, but a soccer ball would killed my poor hands. They had some pretty good techniques.
Next day we took a bus on a unmade road to the lake of Quilotoa, in the way we slept to Zurangua, to see the early market. An amazing market with only indigenes, nice hat, some pork cooking, people selling fruits vegetables, animales, cereales……a nice walk in this market and some pictures too. After the market we took this van, where 15 people were standing up, some boxes of egg, veggies, 2 sheep, chickens, and both of us with our bag pack. 1 hours ride the wind in our face. Quilotoa is actually a lake in a crater at almost 4000 meters high. Cold and windy yes it was, oh my god we got really cold, a nice lake but not emerald as the sky was grey, it took us a bit of time to get back up 400m and a short breath. And freaking cold. A nice night in those cabanas with good music and good food.
Good food, hmmmmmmmm the day after back to Riobamba, the city of the Chimborazo, the highest volcano in Ecuador 6300m. But good food????????????? Mickael is sicked, fever, stomach……..bad. In bed for 2 days. And the exursion to the Chimborazo???????? Arhgggggggggggggg.
Carmen took a nice care of me, and the third day I was up and running ready to go to the glacier of the highest volcano. 6am and we take a car to the first refuge at 4800m, misty, cloudy and freaking windy we can’ t see anything. We walked 300m more to the second refuge, the sjy was starting to clear up giving us a nice spectacle, we’ve decided to walk a bit more, our breath was so short each step was so hard to make at 5300 we almost arrived to the glacier, but it was so windy, that it was starting to be bit dangerous, and then you would need climbing equipment to go to the top 6300. which would take a climb of more than 9 hours up. We meet some italians that ahd to give up, but they had their smile still.

Bye Riobamba and hello Banos, city in the orient, just a the beginning of the Amazon, still which is pretty far. The landscape there is much more exotic, warmer too and humid. Banos is actually a thermal city where some water come at 70 degree C, We did enjoy those bath, and nice relaxation, a lot of local people, and so much happiness in those baths. The day after we took some bikes to visit a bunch of cascade, a nice blue sky, a nice ride. On the way back we stopped to a view point to see the Turunguawa, a volcano in activity since 1999. We saw some big smoke going out at sunset. Amazing.

From Banos to Cuenca, a nice colonial city, really nice, really European too, it is nice to walk in this city, some good restaurants, then the day after we did an excursion to some small villages to see how they were weaving ponchos.
And Guayaquill the biggest city in Ecuador, was one of the most dangerous in south of America at some point. Carmen gave a talk there. But honestly we didn’t this city, couldn’t find good food, everything was fast food, a weird feeling there. Las penas were nice, but so many guards and police with their gun, that you don’t feel comfortable there. After 2 days and the talk done, we had some hard time to decide what to do next, how to cross the border to Peru, but we ended up deciding to do the more adventurous ways. Through Zumba. To resume. 12 hours buses to Villacamba where we rest one day. Then 7 hours bus on unmade road, 2 hours of rancheras, little van where we sat on benches, pretty hard, crossing the border, a car for 3 hours on such crap roads, a night in San Ignacio. Then more crappy road, more and more and more. But now we are in Chachapoyas, in Peru. And still some crappy roads…………………..

Ciao ciao, and see you for the next adventure

Mickael & Carmen

Hola Amigos,

This email to give you some of our news. We are actually doing really well and are enjoying our trip everyday. I think the last time we wrote was in Ecuador, the time is passing so fast and we are seeing so many things that it would be so long to tell you everything, but, we have been in Peru for more than a month and went form norht to south, visiting many pre Inca ruins in the north, Trujillo, Chiclayo, Chachapoyas, pre-Inca and Inca ruins and handcrafts, paints, potteries could be seen in some really deserted places. Actually the cost of Peru from north to south is only desert, desert, desert, miles and miles of sand.

Just to give us some fresh air we spent around a week in the Cordillera Blanca, where we did some nice trekkings to se some beautiful and colorful lakes. An amazing landscape and some beautiful pictures. It was kind of hard sometimes to breath, the altitude makes it hard all the time, at more than 4000m, your strength is not the same, but the experience is amazing. We were really glad to come back in the Andes as we could meet a lot of indigenes people. Always fun to speak with them, sometimes trying to understand them speaking in Quechua. The market were are always a place we love to wonder as all this indigenes people were such colorful clothes and sell some fruits, handicrafts etc that give some amazing colors, specially around sunset.

After just two days in Lima, we ve headed to the Sacred Valley, Cusco and its surroundings. An Amazing cities, were the Spanish built their architecture over the Inca ruins. Simply, beautiful. Then of course we did an excursion to Machu Pichu, not the trek as it is really touristy and expensive now, and you need to book 6 weeks in advance. But the site is just amazing and beautiful, in the jungle and where the mountains look so sharp and green. We spend around Cusco few days and visiting as well the Salinas de Maras, a pre inca place where there are recolting salt coming form a small river.

We continued our route to Puno, city of the Lake Titicaca. We have visited there the island of Uros, floating island built with straw and roots, there are more than 40 island, and the people now live a lot from tourism, it is pretty amazing to live and such floating island at more than 3800 meters. This lake is really big, and the water so blue, and the sun so strong, too strong. After the Uros island we spent the night on Amantani a real island 3 hours away form Puno, we have been received there by a family and spent some good times with them, no electricity no shower, a little kitchen built form adobe and a little fire to cook the delicious soup, and dishes. Our mother was really nice and she dressed us with typical dress from there to go to the village party for some dancing.

A lot of fun and next we’ve visited on the way back the island of Taquille. We came back pretty brown with such a strong sun, sun block is a must.

THen we took a bus to Arequipa, from there we ve decided to visit the city later on and take a new bus to the Colca Canyon, one of the deepest canyons in the world twice of the height of the Grand Canyon in the US. Simply beautiful not only the canyon but the surroundings, we did some nice trek around there and went down the canyon to sleep in an oasis, but one more time I guess I ate something not good and had a terrible night, the day after was really hard too as we had to climb up to the top of the canyon, 1500m up and up and up, and sick. It has been a really hard time for me that morning; finally up we took a bus for a crazy bus ride for more than 7 hours. I can assure you once we arrived in Arequipa I was dead.

Arequipa, the white city. Beautiful convent, with some amazing blue, red and yellow painted wall, where more than 450 nuns (sisters) lived from 1600 to 19something. And some walking down the street. Our trip was arriving to the end, and our plan was to go to Bolivia. So we ve decided to go to Bolivia passing by Chile.

Arica in Chile was the first city we ve met, a really good lunch at the harbor where we could eat our good fish watching sea lions and birds, before taking at night our bus to San Pedro de Atacama, 12 hours of bus at night with enough space for my big legs to have a decent night. Compare to the one in Peru.

Arriving in San Pedro, a city in the desert and the altiplato, some beautiful views of the Valle de la luna, and some beautiful geisers, not as impressive as the one in Yellowstone (US). Really expensive village, as expensive as Europe, it is time for us to go to Bolivia............

Un recuerdos a todos,,,,,,,,,,,,,

Mickael & Carmen

PS: Hey what are u up? We would be glad to get some of your news.......................

PS2: Plenty of pictures can be seen, click on the following link: there are not in order but we hope they will give you some good feelings about Peru......http://www.tusti.net/photo_perou/jolies_photos.htm

Hellow my friends,
it is my turn to write as I have been relieved from negotiations with the Marie Curie to finally get the grant successfully. Yupiiiiiiii! Consequently I quickly passed Mickael in my Spanish weblog writing as he was busy with the pictures stuff.
Here you are, he has posted new pictures in our website http://www.tusti.net/photos_amerique_sud/photos_perou_chili_bolivie.htm Enjoy them while reading a bit of our adventures as follows...
"So we crossed unpaved road of the border between Chile and Bolivia, already at 3000 m, in a van to quickly change to a jeep for the most fantastic adventure we ever thought.
Here we were in the middle of nowhere, the dessert of Southwest Bolivia Altiplano. We took a tour to cross this part of the country till the Salar de Uyuni and visit amazing volcano lakes, fantasy Dalí landscapes (literally- they are actually called like this) of rock formations, one of them incredible defeating the gravity in a tree form and more. Not possible to describe, the beauty. I will mention the Laguna Colorada, called like this for its intense red color due to the algae microorganisms that inhabit its waters. The flamingos eating them acquire the beautiful colors of their feathers, one captured in the air by Mickael was given to my always wearing Ecuadorean hat and remains there. We slept in a hotel made of salt during the second night, an awesome idea, isn’t it? Everything made of salt till the bed, but not the mattress of course, we are not so sadomasochists. Next day we visit the salt Lake, the biggest in the world of 12000 km2. The jeep could easily ride on it compared to the rough road we were so far. It is an amazing place popped with little surprisingly green islands. We visited one of them, it was populated for immense cacti even besides the Arizona saguaro, the biggest 12 m, is supposed to be 12000 years old (they grow 1 cm per year!).
Next to this trip we thought nothing would surprise us until we took a trip to go in the deeps of Cerro Alto also called the Mountain Hell in the city of Potosí. This is a 3400 m mountain filled with silver that the Hispanic discovered during the conquer times and exploited with the most advanced methods of that time and have remained nearly unchanged or even going into worst because apparently the ventilation is not so well cared nowadays. Miners work in asphyxiating conditions with archaic methods, but are reluctant to change because this way, impeding big companies to take part in exploitation, they are owners of the mines. They work as they want, when they want. Still they calculate silver will last only for 60 years more. Otherwise, for 20 years.
Well, at least hundreds of young man have been able to work here for 2-3 years to earn money to pay their university studies. We experience a day in the mines and went deep till 100 m, visiting the miners, offering them refreshments, dynamites and coca leaves that we chew ourselves to keep us going for 7 hours in this tour. Coca nuns your senses and is legally consumed in Andean countries. It needs to be left in the mouth, more than 50 leaves and a little piece of catalyze to make it work. This catalyze is just leave ashes prepared in a special way, it works, we could feel in our mouths. It keeps miners without hunger and able to work so hard.
Sucre was our next destination and I will mention the dinosaur fingerprints that we saw in a cement factory, discovered only a few years ago. Hundreds of them and even some not knowing the species they belong to. Sucre is the capital of Bolivia, even if a book says the contrary, only the government is set in La Paz and here is the confusion. This city has beautifully annually maintained white houses from colonial times that we appreciated. Only the poor "campesinos" begging money because Bolivia was badly castigated by the US a few years ago.
Impeded from cultivating coca to see if this would decrease cocaine consumption in Europe and US, they have been left with poorly working alternatives. Of course, cocaine is used even more in occident and its production is now deviated towards Colombia, where the fight of US is now tried by fumigating the fields indiscriminately with chemicals that are killing the human beings as well as the coca. It is pretty sad.
This crisis has even extended towards the national parks, that are abundant in Bolivia. Of this we visited Amboro. Shrinking day by day due to the burning action of indigenous people that are looking for the promised alternative in illegal places. This park holds a great biodiversity. We visited only the buffer zone, where other more lucky indigenous have changed cultivation by ecotourism quite successfully. We were guided by one of them to their place, 2,5 hours from the next town, his children have to leave during the week here under the care of the oldest 23 year old daughter. We enjoyed this place as well as the cloud forest that we visited next, with immense fern, 2-3 meters high and involved in mist on a full day hike.
Finally we are now in Cochabamba next to the end of our trip, no regretting anything of it and we hope it will be like this till the end.
We hope to see you all soon, we will be visiting US from the 9-11th before going to see our families in Europe, of which we are also excited about.
Big kisses to all
Carmen&Mickael