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In somewhat close to 12 hours away, my plane home will be lifting off, hopefully with myself on board!
I can't begin to say just how surreal this feels- it finally hit that today is my last day in Peru, and it seems really quite odd.

From watching Condors rise up thermals in Colca Canyon to relaxing on Mancora beach, these final two weeks have been lovely and relaxing- a great end to an amazing trip. I only hope that my flights go relatively smoothly.

I've had an incredible time out here in South America- intensely varied, and rarely dull! Even the two volunteer projects were incredibly different to each other, never mind the actual travelling itself: a multitude of unique countries, a ridiculous number of places and numerous unforgettable memories

It´s my final day at Mancora- Tonight we´re off to Trujillo, then it´s another nightbus the day after to Lima. 
Just relaxing here has been brilliant- no buses, no need to get up early, no need to spend half the day searching for a hostel- we´ve spent most of the last few days asleep on the beach!

Anyways, got to dash, but I´ll be home by Saturday- most odd!

Found an english speaking bouldering cafe! Sorted!

Currently paying 7.5 bolivianas a night at a fairly decent hostel (24 hour hot showers!). The stinge in me got their price down from 10, still working vaguely in Peruvian soles. Perhaps twenty minutes later we converted it back into pounds and broke into fits of laughter- that´s about 40/50p. Bolivia is CHEAP! and this is the touristy section too.
Finally caved in and bought an alpaca jumper- i´d been resisting on principle in Peru because they´re a good ten pounds, ridiculous! Managed to get one here for the princely sum of the equivalent of three pounds. Nice!
Though I can certainly feel "Gap year tragedy" setting in- a slow but certain conversion into a hippy that seems pretty damn inevitable to all us gap year lot. Grr. <sup>(ie, longer hair, trousers repaired with safety pins, peruvian "chompas" and the ever wonderful peruvian hat).

It´s a worrying sign.</sup>

Anyways, we´re (there´s a good group of us at the moment, staying together until La Paz, the capital of Bolivia, in a couple of days) off to the famous Island of the Sun on Lake Titicaca tomorrow- it´s rumoured to be stupendous.

As of Friday, I am no longer a volunteer! Now a gringo traveller. Hrm.
Plan Summary:
I´m travelling with Fiona (another ex-volunteer fromt´ jungle) round South America until my flight home on the 28th of July.
We´re starting tonight, with a night bus to Puno in Southern Peru. From there, we´ll see Lake Titicaca, before heading across into Bolivia a couple of days later. 
We should spend a good couple of weeks in Bolivia, as it´s nice and cheap! Starting in Cocacabana, we´ll work our way south to the capital, La Paz. From there, we´re going to the salt plains- four days worth should bring us to Argentina.
Not overly sure what we´re doing there yet! If we have the time and money, it´s off to Buenos Aires. Perhaps not.
Then back West on a bus to Santiago, and time to see Northern Chile.
From there, we continue up the coast back into Peru- meeting other volunteers in Arequipa, and spending as much time as we have left seeing the sights of the coast (including numerous beaches) before returning to Lima for flights home.
Arg!

A fairly damn good start to the travelling last night- sitting in a balcony off the Plaza, watching fireworks launched from Sacsaywaman (a national Park hundreds of metres up above Cusco)- combined with a fairly decent concert (they put up a temporary stage in front of the Cathedral) and toffee apples, and it wasn´t half bad!

So yes, what with the entirety of Cuzco celebrating various festivals (basically the whole of June is a holiday) we had a couple of days in which the INC weren´t exactly around- so us Inca Projecters decided to make the trip to Macchu Picchu with our spare time. 

Important stuff of late:
Went to Nazca, saw the lines from a tiny plane (in the words of the pilot, "¿your first time in a Cessna? Me too!") which was pretty damn cool.
Went to Huaccachina, had the most amazing time sandboarding- even the transport was just a rollcage with a massive engine and wheels strapped onto it. Brilliant! Incredible scenery too- literally mountains of sand. At one point, everyone shouted "noo! There´s no way this buggy´s going down that massive steep dune!" to which our driver calmly replied, "don´t be daft. You´re sandboarding that!"
Returned to Cuzco/ Pisac, found Inca Projects is actually pretty cool (I excavated a llama! It had been buried for at least ten years, if not fifteen), but didn´t stay overly long- there´s Macchu Picchu to be seen!
Anyways, we avoided the frankly ridiculous Inca Trail (overcrowded and costing upwards of $300- mad!) and even the less well known Salcontay (?)- which takes about 5 days and still costs a bomb- by convincing a Taxi driver to take the bunch of us to Santa Theresa, (at a rate of about 1.20 an hour, cheaper than Peruvian buses!) where we then got a collectivo to Santa Maria- another tiny unknown town. Getting there about 7am this morning meant, via an insane Peruvian "bridge" (merely a glorified trolley you pull along a wire!), a flat bed truck and several hours hard hiking (the time we spent swimming and reading on the rocks was especially strenuous), we could see the odd bit of ruins from Macchu Picchu by 2pm.
We´ll head up tomorrow- though it´s only two kilometres, the gradient of the steps are woeful- perhaps in time for sunrise.
However, now I´m off to watch the football with the bunch (oh so very Peruvian).