"The Lonely Planet guidebook empire is reeling from claims by one of its authors that he plagiarised and made up large sections of his books and dealt drugs to make up for poor pay. [...]

"They didn't pay me enough to go Colombia,'' he said.

"I wrote the book in San Francisco. I got the information from a chick I was dating - an intern in the Colombian Consulate."

(The Daily Telegraph, via: orf.at )

Surprising? Not really. All's fair in love and war and publishing...

Update: Thomas Kohnstamm and our guidebooks - Lonely Planet's position.
Discussion on Lonely Planet's Thorn Tree Forum.

Lonely Planet makes the best of the situation: They are reviewing all the information Kohnstamm has ever contributed to their South America guidebooks and keeping their readers up to date. They do not deny anything Kohnstamm said in his interview or attack him in response.
The majority of the LP readers understand, and don't focus their anger and frustration on LP, but on Kohnstamm. Even though LP does not say it directly (which could be interpreted against them), it becomes clear to everyone that things like that do happen. Accurancy of information is not even the topic here - it is marketing strategies. Things won't change if we stop relying on LP guidebooks, but the strategy will fail if we don't buy Kohnstamm's book.

These are the last days of our trip, which went by way too fast (as days like these always do)...

Santiago, drowning in smoke... and no snow covered mountain peaks.



Valparaiso, a funky dirty little town full of graffiti and houses in weird color combinations... the coolest place we saw in Chile.









Mendoza, our first stop in Argentina. We rented bikes and explored the city, and had lunch at a great vegetarian restaurant. Tried Argentinean wine, and spent an afternoon lying in the park, half asleep, listening to music...



Buenos Aires. I could live here (and so could I in Mendoza... if it were not for the Spanish which is almost impossible to understand). European flair, Viennese coffee house culture, and amazing steaks. Korean food, by the way: Wow. Give it a try if you the chance.







On the 18th, I left Dave and Dan in Buenos Aires and spent the day getting from there over Lima to San Jose and then by bus to Quepos, Costa Rica. This bus ride was the most, let's say, authentic one I have had so far. But I made it to Manuel Antonio save and sound, and here I am now, sharing a house with four other girls from the TEFL course. We are almost in the jungle, there are monkeys in the back yard... paradise!

Still, I feel like jumping on the next plain and going back to South America, to traveling, getting away from schedules cutting days in little pieces...

The last days were filled with long bus rides and interesting sights: We left Cusco on the 4th of May and took a 13 hour overnight bus to Nazca, where we met John again. We did a flight in a 6-person-plane (just the four of us, Dan, Dave, John, I and the two pilots) over the Nazca lines ... here the hummingbird.



Later the same day, we went on to Ica and and spent the evening sand boarding, dune buggying and having barbecue at the oasis town of Huacachina. The next day, we took a boat tour round the Pallestas Islands, seeing thousands of birds, sea lions, and a few penguins.



On the 6th, we went to Lima, watching Spiderman and eating tons of greasy American food: Burger King, Pizza Hut, KFC and Starbucks.



Then we took the next overnight bus to Huaraz (which is where I am right now). Yesterday, we visited the glacier, and today the turquoise green laguna of Llanganuco. Tomorrow, we will spend a day at the hot springs, and then go back to Lima for two days.






It feels good to be traveling again. And buses here are (apart from being cheaper) way more comfortable than the Eurolines... well, at least apart from the annoying music they play all the time.

I spent Monday and Sunday with Kalen, an American girl who lives at my place, at Aguas Calientes and Machu Picchu.



An impressive place, hidden between mountains and jungle. We left at six in the morning to see the ancient empire surface from the veil of morning mist, an abandoned kingdom in the middle of nowhere...



Relaxing in the sun...



Our guide at Machu Picchu, repeating the omnipresent phrase: La hoja de coca no es droga! He also gave us coca leaves to try. They actually taste quite good, just as the tea I have exchanged my coffee addiction for.

My best moment of the weekend, however, had nothing to do with Machu Picchu itself. Kalen and I went to a bar in Aguas Calientes Saturday night, where we run into a Bolivian-American and a Peruvian guy. As the four of us were pretty much the only guests, we eventually started talking and playing darts. While the Bolivian-American tried to impress Kalen with his near-native English, I had my first real non-smalltalk Peruvian conversation with Ramon, who luckily did not speak any English. [I am able to have a conversation going beyond weather or buying groceries in Spanish (well, in presumably bad Spanish, but!!)] Ramon studies history and photography in Cusco, and he told me about how he loves to walk through the city with an old manual camera, trying to catch little moments which matter to someone. He told me about the one rainy day he saw a corpse on the sidewalk, and a woman kneeing before it, crying. About how he came closer, careful not to attract attention, took his black and white picture, and left unseen.

On Saturday, Jorge, our Spanish teacher, took us to his parents´ house in Ollantaytambo for eating cuy, guinea pig:



Just a few minutes before, they were running around and playing...



Just out of the oven.



Lunch is served. (No - I would not eat it a second time. It comes with all its inner organs and a few hairs left on the skin... But: I did it. I had a plate of cuy. You can not come to Peru and not try this delicacy, can you?)

Exploring the surrounding Inka ruins with Gord from Canada.



Lamas, alpacas and donkeys on the side of the streets.



Walking through a nearby village.

Nothing compares to visiting the markets. There are plenty of them, and one could spend whole days just looking around, breathing the flavor of exotic herbs and spices, wandering through colorful tunnels of alpaca blankets, or getting chased by flies through the meat areas of the mercados.



Most things are sold as a whole.



Every kind of vegetable and tropical fruit you can imagine...



Alpaca carpets, blankets and clothes.

There is always something going on in the streets or the uncountable bars, pubs and restaurants surrounding the Plaza. Strolling by, I have the feeling that everyone participates, be it actively or as part of the supporting crowd. Dancing on the plaza, parades through the city...



The annual Malino market fiesta, where all the people working at the market dance on the streets.

There are great little places to spend your time at, many of which have fantastic life music without charging any entrance fee. Jazz, Reggae, Salsa – something for every taste. (There is also discos, of course, where the music is just as bad as in good old P2. But, other than in Allhau, at least entrance is free, and usually comes with a free Cuba Libre.) In the little live music bars, which I like better, people just sit in their corner drinking their beer and listening, moving to the music no matter whether sitting or standing. Even the nightlife feels more easy-going here. Everyday-problems shrink, in a world which may not be relaxed by choice but has not yet reached the level of non-relaxedness we are usually caught in.



Eating Alpaca (which is just as tasty as they say) and listening to Peruvian music.

Another important part of Cusco’s nightlife are the movie clubs. As there is no cinema, there are several bars showing movies on a large screen. Entrance is free, and you can either sit in the movie part of the bar watching a movie while drinking your cocktail or stay at the bar-part, just chatting and being out. There is a list of movies the bar owns, and the majority of the guests decide what will be shown. We saw The Last King of Scotland the other night. An impressive movie, and I haven´t seen it before... seems that I had to go to Peru to watch it.

Even when just planning to buy cookies in the shop around the corner, I keep being drawn deeper and deeper into the labyrinth of little stony streets, seeing something worth following or taking pictures of ahead of me whenever thinking of turning back.



Walls built in Inca times serve as foundation for later buildings.



Alpaca wool is used for making cloths and blankets; the meat is said to be super tasty.



There are countless little things, abandoned places, traces of a life we will never get to know, making me wonder what the person who has painted the hamburguesa poster, now leaning uselessly in the backyard, was like. What was his story, what were the stories of his friends, his family? What were their dreams, their secret wishes? What did they go out to look for, and what did they find?



Kids playing soccer in the street.



Incredibly blue skies.



Small side streets...



Soccer fans dressed in red, Cusco’s color, marching through the streets with colorful umbrellas, chanting and shouting before the big game of the South American Championship: Cienciana Cusco wins 3:0 against Argentina.

Flight over the Andes.



Cusco, once the capital of Inka empire, is one of the most charming places I have ever seen. Falling in love with the city started almost the moment it came in sight from the airplane: Thousands and thousands of little houses are scattered over the valley and up the hills, their colors and location making them look like a toy town some child playing in the garden has spent hours on arranging in the fresh-cut grass between molehills. Away from the busy main roads, there are labyrinths of steep little cobblestone side streets too small for a car to pass, with tiny balconies rising into them from the surrounding houses. Uncountable little corner shops offering everything you can imagine, green parks and clouds of people flocking through the main streets, locals trying to sell vegetables, paintings and homemade dolls whenever you pause for a moment.

Peruvian woman cooking something tasty in her street food place.



The Plaza de Armas has been the heart of the city since Inka times. One could spend hours here, just sitting on a park bench or lying in the grass watching people...



Peruvian woman at the Plaza de Armas; little schoolboys in their uniforms taking a rest.



I’ll upload more and higher resolution pictures when I come over a faster computer. However. Tomorrow I will get to know the Cusco off the touristy track, when I start my teaching job at a daycare centre in a poor part of the city. I’m excited, wish me luck!