Flights are booked!

Although we booked the trip itself on June 7th, Morgan and I kind of dropped the ball with regards to booking our actual flights to and from Lima. After doing some serious research this morning (that involved having way too many browser windows open at once),we finally came to a consensus on flights that made sense to both of us financially, and still allowed us to travel to and from Peru together. This consensus involves some very long layovers (for me at least) in Miami, and red-eye flights both going there and coming back, but I'll be leaving Indy at 1:20pm on Saturday, August 28th, returning to Indy 12:50pm on Monday, September 6th (Labor Day). Any volunteers out there to either drive me to the airport or pick me up when I get back? :)

When on the phone with GAP today giving them my flight information and arranging a ride from the airport to our hotel in Lima, I asked if there was anyone else in our group that was unable to obtain permits for the Inca Trail and would be hiking the Lares with us. The lady on the other end informed me there were two other people that were hiking the Lares with us. While it stinks that other people got shut out of the Inca Trail like we did, I'm happy that there will still be a small group of us sticking together the entire trip and doing this alternate trek. I was also informed that even though we're not necessarily hiking with them, there are other GAP groups hiking the Lares that start the same day as us, but possibly leave at different times. So, it's very possible we'll bump into them along the way, and possibly even camp in the same locations, which is cool.

Booking the flight this morning made everything feel just a little bit more real than it already was. Only 9.5 more weeks to go before the adventure truly begins!

Until next time,

Ryan