Life in Peru (Dan at Aldea)

Hello everyone!

Life is great here in the great land of Peru. I got a little sick this week, but maybe it's just a painful way to lose weight. At the Aldea they serve a lot of food every meal, and it's tough to turn it down. That means that just maintaining my weight will be difficult here and my dream to lose a few pounds for real will be especially difficult. I have been running however, and we found this great trail above the houses that is on the side of the mountains. Except for the ever vicious dogs, its a great run that gives a really good view of the valley. I'm really glad I have Natalie and occasionally Preston and Tanner to run with. Even in this beautiful country, it's still easier to have someone running at your side.

I'm not sure if I told that I carved a baseball bat, but I made a rudimentary bat that is still slightly curved so we can play baseball with the kids of the Aldea. It is awesome! (If I do say so my self) We have also been playing some volleyball, which is a favorite of many of the girls here. Another great game is tree tag. There are some great mango trees in the center of the aldea that have great branches for climbing and 'monkeying around.' We play tag while staying in the trees, it's tough to get the little ones because even the small high branches will hold them just fine.

We are working right now on our travel stuff to Machu Picchu and then Iquitos. We now have tickets from Lima to Cuzco for the first week of July. It's about 100 dollars round trip for the plane, and about 25 bucks for the bus down to Lima. I am really excited to go the Sacred Valley and see all that stuff. After that, we are planning to go to iquitos which is a town in the Peruvian amazon. I'm pumped, getting the tickets has been a challenge. I'll have to get some malaria pills those few days, but it'll be well worth it. I've just heard so many great things about Machu Picchu and Cuzco that I'm just pumped to see everything.

I also picked up a panflute this past week, it's not great, but I got it for only 18 soles, so that's okay. I really do want to get and play a churrango. It's a 10 string oversized ukulele that is just awesome. You play 2 strings at a time so every note has harmony. Right now we (the band we created 'Lost in Aldea') is practicing the Hawaiian guy's version of "Somewhere over the Rainbow." Tanner has a uke, and I have a panflute solo at the end of the amazing song. I'm pumped to play it.

We had a great Saturday night talk where we wrote down 100 goals that we want to do in our lives. It was tough to get things down, and I only have 75 written right now, but it really made me think about the important and the not so important things I want to do.

Anyway, I think we're going to Chan Chan in the morning, which is a world heritage site near Trujillo of pre-inca ruins. I'll let you know how it goes.
Thanks for all the support stateside, and hope all is well with you!
-Dan