A New Year

Happy New Year and Merry (late) Christmas!!!

Wow – I can’t believe it’s already 2023. Time has been FLYING but also being SO slow since 2020 and COVID lol.

I hope everyone has been enjoying their holidays wherever that might be. I’ll start off by saying mine was very weird haha. I was coming back from vacation on Christmas Eve and wasn’t feeling too well, so Ana (one of my co-workers and good friends) tested and we both were positive for COVID. This meant isolation and sleep haha. So all the rest of that day and Christmas day consisted of sleeping, eating, sleeping, and all over again and again. Then fast forward Ana and I started back work on the 30th after feeling much better, though for me I still was very tired. NYE came around and I was in bed by 8:30pm to be up the next morning at 4:15am. So I went to bed in 2022 and woke up in 2023! Quite a fun time (HA-HA) if you ask me.

Now time to back track a little to update you since my last post. BBC came in November for 2ish weeks and man was it hard work. Never would you have told me that I would be tracking monkeys WHILE setting up experienced camera men to get good filming shots. It was very new for me and took a lot out of you. A normal day consisted of carrying two very large cameras, two very large tri-pods, breakfast, rain gear, extra batteries, water, bug spray and some other miscellaneous things out. All their gear was very heavy and clunky to carry through the rainforest, so you had to do this with intense care and caution. Next, you had to find the monkeys with a team following behind you. After this you have to keep the group in sight, and not only that but to infer their next moves and to which marked trees they might/might not go to in order to set up the tri-pods and cameras for a good angle. A lot of stress as you can imagine. We had lows, but we also had highs. And at the end of the 2 weeks we had made some awesome memories and new experiences.

Onto December, things were going pretty normal until around the 8th when Peru Government news came out that their President tried to dissolve congress to escape his impeachment (which failed for him). This wasn’t good news because we had vacation starting on the 15th. Well, that had to be delayed two days due to a lot of protests going on and road closures – including people overtaking Cusco’s airport. When we finally flew into Cusco we arrived around 10pm and made it to our hostel with no problem (because their was a curfew). The next morning at 5am we got picked up by our tour company to head on a 4 day trek to Machu Picchu! We drove ~3 hours of backroads before arriving to our drop-off destination. From there we hiked up a steep mountain until we arrived at the top with a stunning blue lake and a huge glacier behind it. The beautiful sight didn’t last for too long because the rain came and blew clouds over. I quickly threw on my rain jacket, rain pants, and my backpack cover before grabbing some hot coca tea from a tiny shelter/shop that was at the top to warm my hands up. We hiked down to our camp where we stayed in these very cute tiny wooden and glass ‘pods’ with stunning views of the 4th tallest mountain point in South America. We had dinner cooked for us, talked about our day, listened the plan for tomorrow and headed to bed.

Now onto day two which was the longest day… around ~13 or so miles of hiking. Woke up with a killer headache (to find out this was just residual altitude sickness). The first 45 minutes from waking up felt like my head was going to pop from pressure. I definitely had the least worries when it came to altitude sickness – there were many others that were throwing up, nauseous, and completely out of it due to how high we were (15,091 feet to be exact!!!). A lot of it was uphill and very steep. The views were crazy amazing though!!! As we got closer to the Salkantay peak we started to get into some snow, which apparently had happened the previous night. We stopped for lunch in a small village which had lots of animals running around which made us all happy from the long and tiring journey so far. After lunch we hiked another 3/4 hours to the small town where we would stay for the night. This time our ‘pod’ had a view of a river flowing down past us. The sound of rushing water as I unpacked was so comforting and felt just so… safe.

The next day was our last hiking day. Our first stop was some natural hot springs! This was so relaxing to the body and mind after a long previous two days. There were 4 different pools all ranging in temperature. They had rocks in the bottom of the pools and a stunning view off in the distance as we chatted, took pictures, and basked in the sun. After 3 hours of pure relaxation, we hiked through the beginning of the rainforest as we made our way to Machu Picchu! The last little bit was along the train tracks that most people normally take there if they don’t choose the trekking option. We arrived in Agua Caliente (the town formerly known as Machu Picchu town) in the afternoon and dropped off our stuff at the hostel before we explored the small city and all grabbed some drinks before dinner time. We all ate dinner and headed to bed ready to see one of the 7 wonders of the world tomorrow. Some of us took a 30 minute bus ride to the top, while other hiked ~1 hour to the top. After we all met up there our tour guide Alex showed us all around the ruins with pictures of what it used to look like. He explained the history behind the discovery, what Machu Picchu actually was used for and anything else we had questions about. When we first entered there were lots of fog and clouds over the mountain peaks and ruins. Though later it started to burn off as the sun peaked through to showcase a beautiful sight. After a few hours of touring around we headed back down and went to our last lunch together as a group. Even cooler – we got to take the train back and it made me feel as if I was heading to Hogwarts haha. The last leg was driving from Ollantaytambo to Cusco where we would stay two nights to explore the city and buy some souvenirs for our family and friends.

Now back to the original paragraph where I got sick and missed Christmas: after returning from vacation on Christmas Eve I started to feel sick, and turns out I had COVID for the second time. With 2023 now in motion we have ~5 days until BBC arrives again which will be awesome! It’s such a cool opportunity to be able to work with people who are just as passionate in their line of work to travel all across the world and leave their family and friends just to get ‘the shot’.

Now to talk a little about the new year and some ideas that I want to start/begin. We all say ‘a new year, new me’, but do we really do anything about it? It all starts with your own mindset. Next the people around you. If you don’t do either of these things then nothing is really going to change. It’s crazy to look back on your past self and think wow I used to be there, with those people, thinking those things. Self positivity, and genuine people is key to help propel yourself forward and into a better mindset.

the energy for 2023 is: no more lowering basic standards and no tolerating mistreatment. give your time to people who are revitalizing and emotionally prepared for deep connection.

yung pueblo

the energy for 2023 is: let your growth and healing attract mature people and good situations. when you change from within, your outer world gets brighter.

yung pueblo

So as you reflect over your past year and think about what you want in the upcoming one it’s important to be kind to yourself. We all have made mistakes, said things we didn’t mean, and wish we were able to go back and change it. Truth is that all of that makes you into the person you are right now reading this post. That is so crazy to me! You have basically been a potter molding this bowl (aka: you) every year. It takes a different shape each time you have a new idea of where you want to go. Then sometimes you get frustrated with how it’s turning out so you just smash it down to a ball of clay and start from scratch again. This is a constant cycle until you have a piece of work that you are happy with. This could take years to get there. So – in the meantime be nice to yourself and just know that we all are going through our own growing in different ways. It is not always about the end product, rather than, the path to get there and the tools you used to help you achieve your goals. 🙂

Happy 2023 everyone! I hope this year is going to be a great one!

Talk to you all soon,

Luke

And here are a few more before our vacation with BBC and around the field station: