Peru Summer 2018

June 18-22, 2018 Last week (sigh). I spent as much time as possible with my friends and host family during my last week in Peru. Thinking back now, I don't even remember all the of homework assignments and studying I did this week. All I remember is exploring Cusco for the last time with everyone. On Monday night we organized a soccer match for all of the people with CIS. I'm happy to say that playing soccer the last week was much easier than the first week. The whole time I was in Cusco, Joaquin (my host brother) and I tried to plan a day where we could play soccer together, but each time our plans fell through. Finally, on this night, we got to play together. It was all of us students, our host families, and some other people and it was a whole lot of fun. On Wednesday, I had my last field trip with my history class. We visited el Monasterio de Santa Catalina. In it, there was a museum about the lives of the sisters of Saint Catherine. The place was beautiful, but it was...

June 17, 2018 Got up around 3:30 AM this day to hop on a bus to Rainbow Mountain. Rumors going around said that the mountain was covered in snow. I had even heard of people's tours getting cancelled, but my friends and I stuck it out. We rode the bus 2 hours to a small town where we ate breakfast, then another hour to the mountain. This hike was by far the hardest one I did. It was way more difficult for me than Lake Humantay even though the weather was perfect. The problem was with the altitude. Rainbow Mountain is at 17,000 ft, which makes it super hard to catch your breath. I had to stop every 5 minutes or so just to breathe. At the bottom and all along the trail, locals were walking around offering horse rides. I must have been offered a ride at least 50 times, but I stuck out the nausea and head-spinning and eventually made it to the top. I don't think I've ever felt more accomplished about anything. The difficult hike was definitely worth it. The view from u...