Ollantaytambo, Peru

Some time in the 16th century as the Spanish were closing in, the Inca emperor Pachacutec retreated to this fortress town in the Sacred Valley, where he and his men managed to bravely hold off the Spanish before succumbing. Now, this village of 2000 is a quaint little town that hosts invaders of a different sort, bearing cameras instead of armour and speaking languages from around the planet. Last night, after dinner, we piled into our van and headed down a narrow dirt road to our hotel. Within minutes, we encountered a large bus reversing down the road straight at us. Our driver Edgar honked his horn. A man jumped out of the bus to aid the driver. Edgar put our van into reverse and floored it. Still the bus bore down on us. More honking, then... crunch. The sound of metal on metal as the giant behemoth of a bus slammed into our front end.

Edgar jumped out of the van, yelling and screaming profanities in Spanish. The driver of the giant bus jumped out screaming his own profanities. Soon people started filtering out of the large red bus, prompting our group to follow suit. Stephen, our intrepid photojournalist, started snapping flash pictures right in people´s faces. Havoc followed suit, followed by cervesas from the back of our van. This calmed things down enough to allow the police time to come.
Eventually the situation was somewhat sorted (and sordid) and we got back to our hotel, a beautiful collection of bungalows in the mountains.

Yesterday we had a fantastic day of riding in the Sacred Valley, visiting Maras, the Inca site of Moray and the Inca salt mines. I got a flat halfway down the trail - my 6th so far, definitely a sign that it´s time for new tires - and had to walk out in the dark, which would have been a drag were it not for the billion stars and 20,000 foot mountains all around me.

Peru is so unbelievably beautiful, I may have to move here someday.

Mike