After enjoying 10 days in Mendoza we organised our bus to Lima. The reason for this mad rush of a trip was to get to Cusco, as planned, for my 40th birthday.
This trip was a mixture of bliss, and pain. In regards to bliss we enjoyed another pass over the Andes after some heavy snow. In fact the road had not long reopened. Geraldine, the kids and I had our faces planted to the glass of the bus enjoying the magical scenery. However this magic was short lived. We made the mistake of jumping on a bus with no cash whatsoever.
What made it worse is that we booked a cheaper bus that did not serve food and only stopped at remote roadhouses that did not take credit card and there was no sign of life within cooee let alone an ATM. Luckily Geraldine packed some 'bird food' that got us over the line. We also managed to stooge a free meal as we ordered a meal thinking we had enough loose change but alas....we did not. The man was quite kind and let us on our way.
We finally reached Lima about 60 hours later a little malnourished and somewhat 'backed-up'. The positive was we vowed to never make the same mistake again.