South America Archives

Machu Picchu is a 15th-century Inca site located 2,430 metres (7,970 ft) above sea level. It is located in the Cusco Region, Urubamba Province, Machu Picchu District in Peru. In native Quechua, machu means old person while pikchu means peak or mountain.

We departed the Aranwa Hotel shortly after breakfast and made our way to Machu Picchu Pueblo at the base of the mountain via train.

Upon arrival, we enjoyed a quick picnic lunch at the train station. There is a nice little deli on site with picnic tables beneath shade umbrellas for comfort. International Expeditions had arranged for our meals in advance so there was no need to wait in line. Porters transported our luggage to the motel so we didn’t have to worry about anything.

Something hidden. Go and find it.

Go and look behind the Ranges –

Something lost behind the Ranges.

Lost and waiting for you. Go!

~ Rudyard Kipling’s poem, The Explorer

We walked through town relatively swiftly – there would be time to shop and browse in the early evening if we desired. We boarded a bus on the edge of town and made our way along the switch backs to the entrance of Machu Picchu.

Majestic Machu Picchu

Machu Picchu stands in the middle of a tropical mountain forest, in an extraordinarily majestic setting. It was probably the most amazing urban creation of the Inca Empire at its height; its giant walls, terraces and ramps seem as if they have been cut naturally in the continuous rock escarpments. The natural setting, on the slopes of the Andes, encompasses a rich diversity of flora and fauna.

Machu Picchu is among the greatest artistic, architectural and land use achievements anywhere. The World Heritage property covers 32,592 hectares of mountain slopes, peaks and valleys surrounding its heart, the spectacular archaeological monument of “La Ciudadela” (the Citadel).

Built in the fifteenth century, it was abandoned when the Inca Empire was conquered by the Spaniards in the sixteenth century. It was not until 1911 that the archaeological complex was made known to the outside world by the American historian Hiram Bingham. Since then, Machu Picchu has become the largest tourist attraction in South America.

We entered the site with our IE guide, Harvey, in the early afternoon and were not surprised by the number of people. He led us to a few key locations within the citadel, speaking at length about the historical significance and the incredible architecture of the area. I loved listening to our guide as he shared his anecdotes, peppered with Quechua. We got a real feeling for the lifestyle of the Inca before the arrival of the Spanish.

The Incan homes were built with a slight trapezoidal construction to withstand earthquakes. Niches, built into the walls, release weight and pressure – each perfectly matched to another directly across the room from it. Where there is a door or entrance-way, two niches balance.

The design is modeled after nature. What is not visible are the more than 130 underground channels that divert and redirect water through the city. Most evidence shows that Machu Picchu was built in the 1400s. The engineering feats are outstanding – a skill that is NOT matched even with today’s technology.

Aquas Calientes

In the early evening, we returned Aquas Calientes where we meandered the stalls of the open market only briefly. The altitude coupled with the intensity at which we traversed the ruins led us home to our hotel. The Inkaterra Machu Picchu Pueblo Hotel, where we resided the next two nights, was incredible. As before, however, I will reserve my review for another time.

The small town of Aguas Calientes, otherwise known as Machu Picchu Pueblo is the village/town in the Urubamba Valley, northeast of the ruins of Machu Picchu. This is where trains come in from Cuzco and from where buses take tourists all the way up to the famous archaeological site. The Vilcanota River rapidly rushes near the town.

While it is estimated that a million tourist come to Aguas Clients each year, most don’t take the time to walk around and explore the pueblo. It has its own attractions and it might be interesting for you to check them out, if you have the time. There are many hotels and restaurants in the town, which lives primarily out of the travel industry. From cheap hotels to expensive ones in the luxury segment, you will find almost anything here.

Return to Machu Picchu

The following day, we had hoped to be amongst the 200 to hike Huayna Picchu, but it didn’t work out. This is likely for the best considering it had rained over night and the rocks were undoubtedly slick – making an already narrow trail all the more treacherous.

Instead, we spent the morning within the citadel of Machu Picchu. Harvey was with us for only a short time – providing a little more interpretive information bur thereafter we were on our own.

Geneva wasn’t feeling all too well so we didn’t stay too long. We hiked up to one of the higher viewpoints to take more photos. Patrick tried to do a short time-lapse video, but the park ranger asked him to move along.

In the afternoon, we returned to the Inkaterra where we enjoyed a leisurely orchid walk on the hotel grounds. I’ll share highlights from that walk in my review of the hotel.

Join me later this week as I share our discoveries in:

Arriving in Cusco & the Sacred Valley

Ollantaytambo Temple & Peruvian Paso (coming Wednesday)

Cusco – The Imperial City (coming Thursday)

Lima – The City of the Kings (coming Friday)

When we travel, I always purchase a DK Eyewitness Travel Guide to familiarize myself with the country and the culture. Updated annually, each book provides a detailed description of popular tourist attractions, restaurants, and lodging options.

Each guide divides the country (or city) into color coded regions enabling quick browsing while on the road. The DK Eyewitness Travel Guides are comprehensive guides that provide everything to see at a location. While comprehensive, the books give just the right amount of information to spark interest in the particular sights you want to see. They are organized intelligently for the traveler, and they always provide a map.

As a special expression of gratitude to you, I am giving away one DK Eyewitness Travel Guide of choice to a lucky reader. The contest closes on the 20th of September at 12 a.m.

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My post is one of many hopscotch link-ups. Hop over and see what others are sharing. You might also be interested in my post, 5 Misconceptions in Science & How to Dispel Them, on my homeschool blog.

This past week, I have been sharing with you our discoveries while we were in the Galápagos in a series titled, The Islands of the Galápagos. The strange beauty and attraction of these volcanic upwellings wove their mystery around us just as they have others who have visited since the archipelago was first discovered in 1525 by the Bishop of Panama, Tomas de Berlanga.

Today, I would like to expand upon the geology and geography of the Galápagos archipelago and share with you some of the resources that aided in our understanding of these enchanted islands.

The Galápagos archipelago consists of 18 main islands, 3 smaller islands, and 107 rocks and islets. The islands are located at the Galapagos Triple Junction – a confluence of three tectonic plates, the Cocos Plate, the Nazca Plate (which is moving east/southeast), and the South American Plate. It is also atop the Galapagos hotspot, a place where the Earth’s crust is being melted from below by a mantle plume, creating volcanoes.

Geology of the Galápagos

Geology (from the Greek γῆ, gē, i.e. “earth” and -λoγία, -logia, i.e. “study of, discourse”) is a field of science comprising the study of solid Earth, the rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which they change.

Plate Tectonics

Using our North Star Geography program as our guide, we learned about plate tectonics prior to our departure. There are three types of boundaries between tectonic plates:

Divergent Boundaries – where two plates are moving away from each other
Convergent Boundaries – where two plates push up against one another
Transform Boundaries – where two plates move horizontally, slipping past each other in opposite directions

After reading the chapter, we created edible models of the boundary types in STEM Club (see my earlier post, Plate Tectonics, for lesson details). This was a great activity and the kids really enjoyed manipulating the earth’s plates (i.e. graham crackers).

North-Star-Geography — As a Brand Ambassador for Bright Ideas Press we have received a complimentary copy of North Star Geography in exchange for our honest insights about how this program is working in real life with our family.

Dynamic Plate Boundaries

The lithosphere is broken up into 15 major plates, which move with respect to one and other. Mid-oceans ridges, a type of divergent boundary, are located at the edges of plates moving away from one and other on the ocean floor. One such mid-ocean ridge, the Galápagos Spreading Center, is located just north of the archipelago.

Mid-ocean ridges are often offset by fracture zones or transform faults. A major transform fault is located just north of the islands.

galapagosspreadingcenter Subduction zones occur where plates collide. A major subduction zone is located where the Nazca and Cocos Plates are subducting beneath the South American and Carribean plates. Subduction zones are marked by deep trenches and overlying chains of volcanoes (the Andes, for example).

Mantle Plume

The Galápagos Islands are one of most active oceanic volcano areas in the world. Like many oceanic islands, the Galapagos are thought to be the product of a mantle plume – columns of hot rock that rise from deep within the Earth. These plumes rise because they are hotter and therefore less dense, than the surrounding rock.

As a lithospheric plate moves over a mantle plume, a chain of volcanoes is created. The volcanoes get older in the direction of plate motion. The Galápagos Islands are located on the Nazca Plate, which is moving east-southeast. Thus, the islands get older to the south-southeast and it has produced a chain of seamounts known as the Carnegie Ridge.

A second seamount chain, the Cocos Ridge, extends northeast from the Galápagos Spreading Center. Thus a chain of volcanos was produced on both the Cocos and Nazca plates.

Geography of the Galápagos

Geography (from Greek γεωγραφία, geographia, lit. “earth description”) is a field of science dedicated to the study of the lands, the features, the inhabitants, and the phenomena of the Earth.

Volcanoes

In our North Star Geography text, we also learned that there are a number of different kinds of volcanoes. We observed two distinct types of volcanoes in the Galapagos. In the west, on the islands of Isabela and Fernandina, large volcanoes with an “inverted soup-bowl” morphology and deep calderas occur. In the east, smaller shield volcanos with gentler slopes occur.

One of the activities suggested in the North Star Geography activity guide, is to make a topographical salt dough or cookie dough map. The Galápagos islands were the perfect “model” for this activity.

In addition to the salt dough map, the kids enjoyed creating an accordion-style picture dictionary as we were traveling. You can download this free printable, Geography Picture Dictionary, for your personal use. It is a great supplement for North Star Geography. Children can sketch the geography specific to a region (as we did) or use it in a more general sense.

Craters & Sink Holes

The twin craters of Los Gemelos (one of which is pictured above) are a highlight of the Santa Cruz highlands. Though a lesser know attraction, Los Gemelos, are actually sink holes, not volcanic craters, on the highest part of Santa Cruz. These depressions were formed by collapsing underground lava tunnels.

Upland Forests

This region also boasts of a beautiful Scalasia forest with trees covered by many epiphytes. In recent years, however, some plants have been introduced that are invading the Scalesia pedunculata forest rapidly. What was interesting here was that in addition to the Scalasia, cacti were also present (though more abundant in the lowlands).

In contrast to the dry coastal lowlands, the highlands are covered by mist in the garua (foggy) season and receive thus much more moisture and support a more luxuriant vegetation.

If you would like to further explore the Galápagos from the comfort of your home or if you are planning to visit yourself, my multidisciplinary unit study, Galápagos Across the Curriculum, provides ample opportunity for kids to explore the diversity and remarkable history of the islands through a variety of hands-on science activities and projects.

This is the fifth post of a five day hopscotch series. Join me each day this week as I share with you our discoveries in the Galápagos Islands.

Isla Española

The kids and I would agree that Isla Española is our favorite. We spent the entire morning here on our seventh day – walking very slowly as there was so much wildlife to see here, particularly the baby sea lions, Waved Albatross, Nazca boobies, and Blue boobies.

Located in the extreme southeast of the Galápagos archipelago, Isla Española is considered, along with Santa Fe, one of the oldest – and thus the first to which animals arrived. The climate is very dry, like most of the archipelago, but due to the flatness of the island, it is the driest of these islands, with only a few inches of rain per year.

nazcabooby

As one of the oldest islands, Española is slowly becoming a rocky, barren land with little or no vegetation giving way to large bays with sand and soft shingle which attracts a number of Galápagos Sea Lions.

Punta Suárez is of particular interest to birders because of its varied bird life. As it is one of the oldest islands, this island has its own endemic species, amongst them the Española Mockingbird which has a longer and more curved beak than the one on the central islands; the Española lava lizard; the Marine Iguana of the subspecies venustissimus, which has red markings on its back; among others.

As we walked along the trail on the cliff, we observed a surprise at every bend. We were able to watch a male Nazca booby court a female calling her attention and placing “gifts” of stones and sticks on a nest. We also watched a female Blue booby feeding her chick who was as white as snow and fluffy white.

As we returned to the Evolution later that afternoon, and what I later realized was the last time (for the next day we anchored off at Isla San Cristobal for our departure flight back to Guayaquil), we were captivated by a number of small golden rays that circled the panga and stayed with the ship for sometime after.

Read my other posts in The Islands of the Galápagos series:

Interested in following along on another hopscotch? Check out the topics by the iHomeschool Network bloggers.

This is the fourth post of a five day hopscotch series. Join me each day this week as I share with you our discoveries in the Galápagos Islands.

Isla Bartolomé

Isla Bartolomé is a volcanic islet just off the east coast of Isla Santiago. It is one of the “younger” islands in the Galápagos archipelago. This island, and Sulivan Bay on Santiago island, are named after a naturalist and lifelong friend of Charles Darwin, Sir Bartholomew James Sulivan, who was a lieutenant aboard HMS Beagle.

Bartolomé has a volcanic cone that is easy to climb and provides great views of the other islands. We began our tour here by hiking up this cone in the morning – a relatively easy hike via a raised wooden walkway and stairs.

From the viewpoint we could easily see Pinnacle Rock, the distinctive characteristic for which Bartolomé is famous and the most representative landmark of the Galápagos.

pinnacle The majority of our group chose to spend the afternoon on the beach (pictured just behind us above) where marine iguanas, sea lions, fur seals, land and sea turtles, flamingos, crabs, dolphins, and sharks can be found. While the flamingos continued to evade us, we did observe a shark playing in the surf, just a few feet from where we stood.

The afternoon was a little windy and cold and thus Patrick and Buddy were the only passengers to join Cristina on a snorkeling outing. They were rewarded handsomely, however. Not only did they see sharks resting on the ocean floor, but they were also able to swim with a pod of dolphins. I was so jealous – I’ve always wanted to swim with wild dolphins!! I am kicking myself for being a wimp and not want to get cold.

Isla Santiago

Isla Santiago consists of two overlapping volcanoes, atop the northwestern shield volcano. The volcano in the island’s southwest erupted along a linear fissure, and is much lower. There are many volcanic fissures and a variety of red, orange, green, and glistening black volcanic formations.

We spent the evening meandering about Sullivan Bay, which is especially fascinating for those who are interested in geology and volcanology. Here you can walk over the un-eroded, black lava flow covered with lava bubbles and tree-trunk molds in the surface.

Read my other posts in The Islands of the Galápagos series:

Interested in following along on another hopscotch? Check out the topics by the iHomeschool Network bloggers.

This is the third post of a five day hopscotch series. Join me each day this week as I share with you our discoveries in the Galápagos Islands.

Fernandina

Isla Fernandina is the third largest, and youngest, island of the Galápagos Islands. It is considered the most pristine of the Galápagos Islands and has had no species of mammals introduced, which sets it apart from most of the other islands in the archipelago.

The westernmost of the islands in the archipelago, it was named in honor of King Ferdinand of Spain, who sponsored the voyage of Christopher Columbus. Like the other islands in the archipelago, it was formed by the hotspot and is an active shield volcano that has been erupting since April 11, 2009.

In 1968, the caldera underwent a collapse when parts of the caldera floor dropped 350 meters. Since then, a small lake has intermittently occupied the northern caldera floor, most recently in 1988. Due to the active volcano, there is not much plant life on this island and has a mostly rocky surface.

We landed at Punta Espinoza, a narrow stretch of land where hundreds of marine iguanas gather in large groups on black lava rocks. We had to be careful where we stepped because they literally carpeted the ground and camouflaged so well with the ʻaʻā and pāhoehoe.

Most of the lavas on Fernandina are ʻaʻā. Pahoehoe lavas on Fernandina are largely resticted to vents on the coast plain. ʻAʻā is extremely difficult to walk on, making the climb to the summit a difficult one, however, tourists are kept to the outskirts of the caldera.

A nesting colony of Flightless Cormorant inhabits this island and we were able to get remarkably close. Other endemic wildlife include Galápagos penguins, pelicans, Galápagos land iguanas, and sea lions. Mangrove forests abound on the fringes of the island.

Read my other posts in The Islands of the Galápagos series:

Interested in following along on another hopscotch? Check out the topics by the iHomeschool Network bloggers.

This is the second post of a five day hopscotch series. Join me each day this week as I share with you our discoveries in the Galápagos Islands.

Isabela

The seahorse-shaped Isabela Island is the largest of all the islands, measuring 120 km long and greater in size than all of the other islands combined. One of the younger islands and more volcanically active, it was formed by the joining of six shield volcanoes — from north to south — Ecuador, Wolf, Darwin, Alcedo, Sierra Negra, and Cerro Azul. With the exception of Volcano Ecuador (whose western flanks have collapsed), all are still active.

Wolf Volcano, with an elevation of 1707 m, is the highest point in the Galapagos Archipelago. Isabela provides visitors with excellent examples of the geologic forces that created the Galapagos Islands, including uplifts at Urbina Bay, tuff cones at Tagus Cove, and pumice on Alcedo Volcano.

In 1893, Antonio Gil, a well-known Guayaquileño, arrived in Galapagos and after visiting the other islands, colonized southern Isabela, founding the town of Puerto Villamil on the southern coast and later Santa Tomás in the highlands.

Villamil – named after a freedom fighter from the Guayaquil, José de Villamil – began as a center for a lime production operation where they burned coral collected in the coastal waters. Santa Tomás was the center for a sulfur mine in the caldera and a nearby coffee plantation.

Urbina Bay

Located at the base of Alcedo Volcano on the west coast of the island, this area experienced a major uplift in 1954, causing the land (formerly red mangroves) to rise over 16 feet. The coast expanded half a mile leaving marine life stranded on the new shore.

On the morning of our third day, after a wet-landed from the panga, we walked in land about 1/2 mile and observed sea turtle nests, Giant tortoises, beautiful orange land iguanas, many small marine fossils, and several Galapagos hawks.

After our hike, we spent some time on the beach swimming and snorkeling with the sea turtles, sea lions, rays, and the diverse fish that were near the shore.

Tagus Cove

Tagus Cove on the northwestern side of the island was named for a British naval vessel that moored here in 1814 and provided a sheltered anchorage for pirates, buccaneers, whalers, and others. One can still see the names of their ships carved into the rock, a practice that is now prohibited.

In the afternoon we first chose to snorkel from the panga. We saw many colorful fish but the most exciting were the penguins and sea horses, the latter of which were difficult to see they were so well camouflaged in the Sargassum.

seaturtle After returning to the Evolution to get warmed up and a little something to eat, the group split up – several (including Patrick, Jeffrey, and myself) ventured out again for a panga ride along the shore. Geneva chose to join the others for a “power hike” to Darwin Lake (he visited Tagus Cove in 1835).

The panga riders enjoyed many opportunities to observe boobies, penguins, iguanas, cormorants, and noddy birds along the cliffs and shoreline. I most enjoyed seeing the yellow and orange cup coral (just at the water line) in a small cove. They were so brightly colored!

darwinlake