I cuddled a baby alpaca!! Tuesday 10th

Buenos dias!! Today has been by far my best day yet in Cusco, definitely a day I'll always remember! I woke up nice and early for orientation day luckily feeling a lot better than last night, and got my stuff together that I'll be leaving in Cusco at the crees office, then all the volunteers met downstairs to get the bus to the office. There's 7 of us volunteers all together, and we're already getting on and making fun of each other, so I can tell it's going to be a good few months! At the office we had coffee and biscuits and met all of the crees office staff and Louise and Tabby who work at the MLC, so they'll be with us on our journey in tomorrow, and they're just the coolest. Anyway we sorted out all of our documents and stuff like that and then had a little presentation about crees and what they're doing and what we can expect to see while we're there- I can't wait to handle some cool frogs and snakes! After that we all took a walk up some VERY steep hills in the boiling sun and saw some amazing views of all of cusco and the mountains behind, and carried on up, walking through little side streets with lots of cool shops and stalls. And then....I saw it....across the street, a lady holding her baby alpaca in her arms! So like the embarrasembarrassing tourist I am, I ran over to ask to take a picture of him, and she just handed him over to me!! Oh my god he was so soft and fluffy and cute, it was hard to hand him back (picture on FB)! After our walk Louise and Tabby took us to a little restaurant near our hostel and I had some amazing Dragon fruit juice and the best minestrone soup I've ever had (apparently the Peruvians are known for good soup, but I didn't know this). After lunch we took a walk to this massive indoor market that has EVERYTHING- I saw some crazy things that I've never seen before, lots of gross animal carcasses and stuff like that, but lots of amazing fruit and jewellery and clothes as well. We stopped at a massive fruit stall and tried all kinds of amazing fruit that I've never heard of before, I wish I could remember the names but it was all so good! I tried a teeny tiny banana that tasted like perfume, but it was so cute I didn't even care. Anyway I've just been out to get the last few things I need for the jungle and we're having a rest now before dinner tonight- I'm determined to try guinea pig and a proper pisco sour, so I may have to try and sway our restaurant choice! Tomorrow morning we're meeting at 6:30 to start our journey into the jungle- it sounds like it's going to be incredible! We're driving through the Andes stopping at some little towns and Inca ruins, and spending the night at a place called Paradise something in the cloud forest, where they have a bunch of hummingbird feeders that are swarming with hummingbirds, so I just can't wait to see all of that! I won't have internet during the journey and apparently the internet at the MLC really is infrequent and temperamental, so I'll do my best to update whenever I can, but it'll probably be pretty sporadic from now on :( Hope everyone is well back home, i miss you all, feel free to email me and let me know what's happening with you, I'd love to hear from people! Xxx