The EU in Peru??

The Loki Hostel, while extremely entertaining, providing of hot showers and comfy beds, is one of the strangest hostels I have ever been to. It has the feel of a European ski lodge chucked in the middle of Peru. The only Spanish that can be heard is from the maids, groundskeepers, and the office staff. The office staff also knows brilliant English as well. (My UK English is coming back from being around all of the brits and Aussis all week...) It seems like a lot of the guests here only move from the bar to their beds. Some of my roommates are still in bed at 4 in the afternoon.. To be fair they had just gotten back from their Inca trek yesterday, but it's also from the party at the bar last night.
After getting in to Cusco, all of us exhausted travelers showed up at the loki hostel. I got dropped off with 6 Australian lads, a French/English lad, and a 40 something from Brazil and we shortly found out that we couldn't check into our rooms yet. Lunch seemed like a fantastic idea although it started the trend of eating pizza for the rest of the week. Apparently all of these tourist towns have capitalized on the fact that they know gringos like pizza. There are pizzerias everywhere!! I'm kind of sick of pizza. My friend and I did find an amazing Italian wood burning pizzeria though. It almost had the taste of Imos without the provolone, thin crunch crust and all. Sad to say it but it might have been better than Imos.. sacrilegious I know.

Four of the Aussi lads and I definitely hit it off and were attached at the hip for the rest of the week. I also ended up meeting a Canadian girl who knew someone that I knew from Truman. The world is so small. A big group of us set off on Tuesday to try and explore Cusco and hike up to Saqsaywaman or "Sexy Woman" as the gringos call it. Saqsaywaman, an Incan fort (captured by the Spaniards of course) consisted of HUGE black blocks that were carefully carved and formed into a wall. The funniest part of this trip was the 4 or 5 men standing along the path up to the ruins trying to sell us horse rides around some of the countryside around Cusco. They tried really hard, but none of us were giving in. We got back to the hostel after a local menu (starter, soup, main dish and a drink for 8 soles) and started planning our adventure to Machu Picchu. Somehow I became to tour guide. I had the Lonely Planet Peru Guide and spoke a little bit of Spanish. Apparently I fit the bill. It was definitely an adventure.