Cusco, Peru - part III

first i want to mention of how incredibly cold it gets in here during the night.. i´m all bundled up and i still can´t stand around for more than 20 minutes in one spot, gotta walk around to keep warm. nuts i say.

little bit about food.. i´ve eaten at ´polleria´ which is a place where they serve grilled chicken with fries only :) then last night I had this typical andean food ´pollo saltado´ it was spicy chicken strips with vegetables and french fries, all mixed together like stir-fry and it was served with rice on the side. it was delicious, but i´ve never eaten french fries with rice before :-P now famous Peruvian food is guinea pig served in many different ways.. i have not had the courage to eat that quite yet, but i´ll get there. i also had ´roccoto relleno´ which is spicy bell pepper stuffed with ground meat, mine was served with somehow glazed potato chunks.. good stuff! i also had pancakes with caramel sauce, hot chocolate and some delicious cake which name i don´t remember :) anyhoo.. the food is very good here... and i think i will also go to ´chifa´ here which is chinese restaurant. oh i also had typical salad here, it consisted of green beans, carrots and peat which all had been boiled but were served cold and it was all topped with many slices of avocado.

fruits.. well there are the usual fruits like lime, oranges, pineapple, watermelon, bananas (mini and normal size), papaya and so on. but they are not sold at the streets very commonly, except for pineapple, they can be found from the stores though and are available at the restaurants.

drinks... i had pisco sour when i was in lima.. this is made of pisco (locally produced white-grape brandy) blended with lemon juice, ice, egg white, syrup and topped with bitters. i drank about 1/4th of it as it was incredibly strong stuff. i already mentioned the ´mate de coca´ (herbal tea of coca leaves).. it is like green tea :) and no it does not get you high at all. the famous soft drink here is Inka Kola... it is this yellow very sweet syrupy tasting soft drink.. kinda like sprite but yellow and very sweet. another famous non-alcoholic drink here is ´chicha morada´, it is made of purple corn (yeah, had no idea that purple corn even exists), it is non-carbonated drink and is very sweet and has a distinct taste... kinda like drink made of sweet berry syrup but twice as strong or concentrated as it should be.

now about my future plans :) i already wrote that i will go on the Inca Trail as planned (27-30th of June) then instead of leaving to Puno on the 1st of July I´ll postpone it till the 6th of July which is Saturday. meanwhile i have decided to take 5 days of Spanish lessons :) ... it is 4 hours a day.. taking spanish lessons is very common here... met a guy today who has been in cusco for 6 months, in the same school learning spanish :) they also provide home stay, but i decided not to do that (although it would be fun as it is kinda like small campus and lady who runs it refuses to speak english :)) one reason is that the provided home stay is 20 minutes walk from down-town and the other is that it is quite pricey - 130$ for 5 days, it does include 3 meals though, but most likely i won´t feel like walking 20 minutes 3 times a day :) .. instead i have booked 5 days in a hotel that charges 20 Sol (1 Sol = 3$) and the owner speaks no english :D

the spanish school also arranges trips around cusco... Pisac-Ollantaytambo-Chinchero and i think there was another town which i can´t remember.. so i will do that one day as well and then catch up on my lessons another day or something. oh FUN :)

i´m really enjoying it here so far :) hopefully the inca trail won´t kill me :D .. ok.. so i won´t be posting here for the next 4 days... i´ll upload some pictures of Cusco as well.. and next posting is scheduled for the 2nd of July :) take care!