Peru - LAX-LIM-CUZCO!!! (Day 2)

Day 1 - if you missed it

I had seriously been thinking I was going to never get out of LAX. Our flight FINALLY did get off the ground shortly after midnight. Initially I tried to watch part of an episode of 30 Rock, but I accidentally hit the remote and it went back to the beginning and I just shut my eyes. Next thing I know, I wake up and I have missed dinner and the first 4+ hours of the flight. AWESOME. I have never really been able to sleep on a plane! I closed my eyes again and slept about another 2 hours. When I woke up again, there was only 2:15 left of the flight. I decided to just stay up because I didn't want to miss breakfast. I ended up watching the Justin Bieber movie (don't judge me), which I liked, and did NOT miss breakfast. We ended up landing just before 10:00. It did not take long to get through immigration. What DID take a long time was getting our bags. We didn't have the in hand until 11:15. So yeah, obviously we missed that other flight. Got a soda out of a vending machine:

After going through customs, we finally meet up with one of the reps from the tour group. She had been working with the airlines on getting us on another flight. 12:45 (only a little over a three hour delay), but as I said, we had to pay for the whole thing out of pocket. No help from the airline or group :( $310 later, we have a boarding pass, get rushed through security, and have about 4 minutes to buy a little empanada from a shop before we get on the plane. Had we had more time, there was a Papa John's and a Dunkin' Donuts outside security...

We have to take a bus for this plane too. We were in the 3rd row, which must have been special seating because I had a lot of leg room. I dozed off while waiting for the plane to depart and woke up during the announcement that we were at cruising altitude. The flight was very short, less than an hour, and at least I didn't miss the snack. American airlines in general need to take note:

Cuzco airport is TINY. There are only 2 baggage claims, as you can see:

But it was decorated pretty neat:

We exit the airport and do NOT see the guy who was supposed to meet us. Neither of us can use our phones, and we don't have the cell number for the guide. Luckily, a taxi driver that spoke NO English was very concerned about us and I was able to communicate with him with my very terrible Spanish that we were waiting for a ride. He used his cell phone to call the hotel and we managed to meet up with our guide. AWESOME. We arrived at the hotel about 15 minutes before the tour started. Someone, we managed to not miss anything (other than $310 each, a nice 8 hours sleep in a hotel, and the welcome lunch).

The tour started at the square right by our hotel:

And continued to yet another square. This one is the main square. They have a two hour long parade very single Sunday. From what we gathered, only tourists actually watch it.

We went inside this cool church. No pictures were allowed. Too bad, it was very ornate and GIGANTIC. Even a "black" Jesus that they paraded around during a major earthquake.

Street performer

A Starbucks in Cusco? Of course!

The temple of the golden sun. This planter is the center and spokes out in four directions to trails leading to Inca Trail, Chile, Pacific Ocean, etc:

City is really pretty at night

After the tour we had time to shower and change clothes, then we went to dinner down the street at a really nice restaurant. I had something called the "Peruvian special" - beef, vegetables and rice. Chocolate cake for dessert.

Dinner included music and some dancing.

We left the restaurant around 8:45. I stayed up a bit, taking advantage of the free WiFi to upload pictures and such. Just in case I lose my camera or something. Even though I was pretty exhausted after all the travel ordeals, I enjoyed my day touring the city of Cusco.