After a few days in Lima, Peru, we flew into the city of Cusco, a city three kilometres above sea level. Staying up that high meant we had to acclimatize for a few days, and we had read that the best ways to acclimatize is to actually leave Cusco and go down a few hundred metres. That way the lower elevation would make it easier for your body to acclimatize. We took a one and a half hour taxi ride down a few hundred metres to the town of Urubamba.

We stayed at a place called, Amaru Ville, a B&B that had a nice room with four beds, and a games room consisting of a pool table, a fooz ball table, and a ping pong table.

We were staying here for four nights, but we had something that ruined half of our stay. Blasting headaches. The altitude had got to us by manifesting itself into horrible headaches. All we could do was lay in bed because if we moved, our heads would explode.We did manage to venture out to find food but that was about it!

And that was just the beginning. After staying in Urubamba, we took a train to the town of Machu Picchu, the town right below the Machu Picchu ruins.

That’s when things got really bad. I had pasta for dinner the first night we got there.

Then that night, I got food poisoning of top of my dumb headache. I couldn’t get to sleep, I kept throwing up, and I kept shaking uncontrollably. My tummy hurt so much as well. And then it got to the point were it got worse and I couldn’t take it anymore.

I had been super excited to see Machu Picchu but since I was feeling like yuck, we couldn’t hike up but instead had to take a bus. I get motion sickness, if you don’t already know, and in case I haven’t mentioned before, I hate road trips. And this bus ride up was twisty and turn-y galore. So there you have it. I got sick, sicker, then sickest. Headache, food poisoning, then motion sickness. Yet all worth it in the end when we saw the incredible ruins of the ancient Incan city, Machu Picchu. (At least it was worth it for me. Connor got a case of strep throat and a bad cold so I don’t know if he thought it was worth it. You’ll notice he looks rather unwell in the photos!)