Cuzco Rafting

Four days ago we arrived in Cuzco from Puno. Cuzco was once the capital city of the Incan Empire. After the Spaniards came and killed off many of the Incans in thier conquests the city became the colonial one it resembles today. Many of the churches and buildings were contructed using the same stones the Incans used for thier buildings when the city was thiers. Today Cuzco is known as the capital city for ancient ruins in South America. The day after we arrived we booked a rafting trip and a jungle trek to Machu Picchu. The rafting was an amazing time. We drove about 5 hours outside of the city to the Uripumac River. This river is actually the beginning of the great Amazon River. After some safety drills we were on our way. The trip was 3 days and 2 nights of beautiful scenery and great rapids. We completed some sections that were level 3 through level 5 rapids. The campsites were amazing with sweeping views of the river and canyon. On the second nights we were treated to a Peruvian sauna miles from civilization. Our guides rigged an air tight tent on the beach by our campsite. After heating up rocks in the fire for a few hours they took them out into the "sauna". The air temp was about 50 and we packed all 17 tourists and guides into the tent. After about ten minutes we made a mad dash for the freezing cold river. We did this 3 times and it made for an experience I will never forget. After our spa treatment we dried off by the fire and warmed up. The next day we did some more rafting and surfed the river waves with our boat. Last night all of the guides and travelers met up at a bar to watch the video from our trip. The shots of our boat going down the rapids our great! I´m all smiles in the front of the boat while Sarah is hard to spot ducking for cover in the raft. Today we are going horseback riding to some different Incan ruins in the area. Tomorrow we head for Machu Pichuu via the jungle path. First we will bike down an area of the Andes to the outskirts of the Amazon jungle. Here we will spend the night and begin to make our way to the ruins over the following two days. I am really looking forward to visiting another one of the ancient wonders of the world.