Chachapoyas, Peru by the kids

On the 30th we arrived at Chachapoyas after days of buses, Chachapoyas is 2,483 meters above sea level and has around 32,100 people, the average annual temperature is 15.6 Celsius. We got to our hotel and we put our stuff down and then went out to visit the place. We booked some tours and then we went to walk around, it is a nice city. We then went to a park mum and dad talked to each other while me and Emma played, we then went to a shopping centre, got some food and went home and had a movie night. Then we went to sleep.
On the 31st we went to see the ruins of Kuelap, it’s a fortified city that when it was still standing held 3-4000 people. Here is some information about it, it was made between the 6th century and the 16th century so that means it is older than Machu Pichu. It was inhabited by the Chachapoyas also known as “Warriors of the Clouds” they stopped building it when the incas arrived and took over. The incas are the people who built Machu Pichu and they ruled most of Ecuador and Peru before the Spanish arrived. The wall around Kuelap stretches 600 meters and gets up to 20 meters high in some places, there is about 500 hundred huts in the city and each held about 8 people. Most of the huts were circular but some of them were rectangular, the guide said the reason of them being round is because of Viking influence, I’m not that sure that’s true though. There were three entrances and the main one is 70 meters long with high walls. Now this is the end of my information. We took a bus from Chachapoyas to near Kuelap and then we took another short bus to a cable car and we took the cable car to another mountain where we hiked up to the top of the mountain because that’s where Kuelap is. We went in through the main entrance and there were lots of carvings on the wall and it was amazing. Right at the end of the entrance there was a small gap that we had go through to get in and when we saw the city, it was spectacular. With all the part destroyed houses, it was indescribable. Inside the houses there were a grinding stone, a hole to store food and a little enclosure to hold guinea pigs in. We walked around a while just looking at stuff, then we saw some cool patterns on the wall the guide said they symbolised the eye of the Chachapoyas, the patterns were only on some houses and I guessed it was for important people. Apparently they normally bury the dead under the house but sometimes they bury them in other places. When the visit ended we went out, went back home and went to sleep.
On the 1st we went to visit a cave called cave Quiocta. It had some huge columns (columns are made when a stalagmite and a stalactite meet) that were like 1.5 meters thick and 8 meters tall, we saw lots just looking around, there were also some bats to. When we got to the end of the path the cave still went on so I asked the guide how far it went on and he said he didn’t know because nobody’s ever gone that far. After that we went to see some sarcophagi, they were on the side of a cliff. Back when they made them the guide recons they climbed up the cliff with the stuff on their backs carved a bit out of the cliff and then put them there. It was really cool, after that we went home and went to sleep.
On the 2nd we went to Revash sarcophaguses, there not really sarcophaguses, there mausoleums. It was a long hike down but when we got there it was absolutely fabulous, they were on the side of a cliff and they had paintings and walls, it was like a miny house. I think they were like two meters tall. After that we went to have lunch we went to a little restaurant with the guide and the other people on the tour, dad got a delicious bit of Cuy (in English: guinea pig). Me and Emma got to try some and it was exquisite, the skin tasted like pork crackle and the inside was still a bit moist which made it like taste like a mixture of pork and chicken. After that we went to a museum that had some old stuff from a mausoleum. There were lots of flowers out the front and they were very beautiful. When we got into the museum we saw some of the stuff they got buried with, the room after that had some of their history about the people and some instruments. After that we looked around saw some mummies there was over 200, it magnificent. After that we went back to the car went home and went to sleep.
On the 3rd we went to Goctar waterfall. When we got there we could see it in the distance because we were going to walk a bit to get there. The walk was two hours, so we started walking, we walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked and walked. Then we got there, it was an absolutely spectacular sight. The water fell so far that it was more like a mist than a water by the time it got close to the ground so it didn’t make that much of a splash when it hit the water. The water made a really strong wind so you had to be careful, me and Emma climbed up a bit of a slope and then we went back up the path to get back. When we got back we went to the car went back to the room and went to sleep.
On the 4th we didn’t do much we just stayed home till mid-day and then when it was mid-day we went to a bus station hopped on to the bus, got comfy, then the bus started driving. The bus was a 24-hour bus that would take us to Lima, the capital city, we would arrive on the 5th at mid-day. The 4th is our 10th month on the road anniversary, now I’m going to do a quick talk about how I feel. Traveling has inspired me, I’ve seen so many cool stuff and now I don’t want to stop, we’re coming back in two month, I’m sad. This year has changed my life, my career (well see when I’m older) right now I feel like this is how I want to spend my life. In the bus I went to sleep.
Andrew (10 years old)

On the 29th we took a bus to Chachapoyas. It was a really long trip.
On the 30th we arrived in Chachapoyas. We had some bread things for breakfast. Then the person that owned the place came to pick us up. We got to our stay and rested for a little while. Then we had lunch and booked some tours. After that we played a bit at parks. In Chachapoyas, I thought tourism was the main thing but apparently, they also count on agriculture and livestock. Chachapoyas, in the Quechua language means cloud forest and the people that lived there were called cloud warriors. It was a nice day apart from the bus.
On the 31st we went to Kuelap. First, we took a long bus, then a short bus. We arrived at a cable car that took us to Kuelap. It was an amazing view. Kuelap is sometimes known as Machu Picchu of the north. Kuelap was built by the Chachapoyas people 600 to 900 years before Machu Picchu. The houses were round, and the guide said that was because of the Viking influence. When you look out over the landscape, all you see are mountains. Then in the evening it was Halloween and we walked through the streets looking at all the costumes.
On the 1st we went into a cave that was filled with stalagmite and stalagtite (stalagmite goes up and stalagtite goes down. I remember that because of the m and the t. m for mountain which goes up and t for titanic which went down). Then we saw some sarcophagus. A sarcophagus are things that you put dead people in. The first one was easy to see. The second one was really hard to see. The third one was easy to see but the fourth pretty easy to see and my favourite one. It had a really well done face. Then we had dinner. I had a lasagna. It had way too much cheese in it. No offense mum.
On the 2nd we hiked again. We saw a mausoleum. We weren’t allowed to go in which was a letdown. It was really old. It was filled with mummies. There were drawings of stuff on the outside. Then we had lunch. Dad tried guinea pig again and it was much better than first one. After that we went to a museum. It was an interesting museum. It had mummies in it as well. There was also a shell that we could blow into. Then we went outside to the garden and picked some tomatoes. I did not like the sweet tomatoes, I only liked the sour tomatoes.
On the 3rd we hiked to Gocta waterfall. But first we had breakfast at a market. We had a long walk ahead of us. So, we started at a good pace. It took two and a half hours to get there, and then another two and a half hours to get back. There was a lot of trees. I saw no animals whatsoever. It was really quiet. Its official Spanish name is Catarata Gocta. La Chorrera is its local name. it was a beautiful waterfall.
On the 4th it was our tenth month on the road. I can’t believe how quick it is going. I’m still enjoying traveling, but I am also happy that we are going home soon, because I am missing everything there.
On that day, we took a bus for twenty-four hours.
Emma (9 years old)Read more