Lima – I was very anxious when I landed knowing that I was in a new place and cetainly didn’t speak much of the language. Went on a rollercoaster taxi ride from the airport to my hostel in the Mira Flores district where I met up with Scott. We enjoyed an authentic local dish for dinner, walked around the city, enjoyed a couple Cusqueños at the hostel and called it a night.

Huacachina – The next day we departed early on a bus for Ica. We arrived after a short 4 hour bus ride and immediately took a quick cab ride to the desert oasis called Huacachina. This is a strange little Oasis city is surrounded by miles of massive sand dunes. The city itself consists of nothing more than a small oasis or pond surrounded by hostels, restaurants and craft vendors. This was a fun stop! Scott and I took a trip out to the dunes on a buggy and did a little sandboarding. It was so much fun, but also very dangerous. Let’s just say these buggys were a little ghetto. They had seatbelts were fastened with a simple overhand knot. Felt really secure as we tore through the desert. Sandboarding was great also. Sure it was fun to stand on a handmade snowboard shaped piece of wood and go down the sand, but if you wanted to go really fast you layed on your stomach. So that’s what we all did and whew dis we fly down the dunes. If you ever get to Huacachina you must give it a go!

Paracas – The next day was split between Paracas and Ica. We woke up early and took a bus from Huacachina out to the ocean-side village of Paracas for a boat tour of the Islas Ballestas. These island host a wide variety of animals that I have never seen before. There were sea lions, dolphins, pelicans, and lots of boobies. Of course I’m talking about the birds, you know masked boobies and blue-footed boobies. Oh and most importantly I got to see penguins! So great.

Ica- After our tour of the islands that morning Scott and I headed back to Ica. We spent our time negotiating bus travel to Cusco which is a little difficult when there are some serious riots going on in cities along the bus routes. We found a bus that didn’t go near these areas. After this Scott and I enjoyed lunch and pisco sours in one of Ica’s most historic restaurants. Pisco is a local liquor made from fermented and distilled grape skins left over from the production of wine. These are quite tasty but I think they give me weird dreams.

From Ica we took a long 25 hour bus ride to Cusco. Uggghhhh such a long journey. But it was worth it because Cusco is amazing! I will tell you more about this city very soon.

Haven’t posted in a really long time.  Life has been busy as always and my adventures have been scaled back a bit due to an unfortunate bike adventure resulting in a broken clavicle.  Nonetheless here are a few pictures from a couple of my weekend projects.  On the left is a wheat/hefeweizen that I have been working on.  Basic rundown is 1/2 lb. 15 ºL Carmel Malts, 6 lbs. Wheat LME,  1.5 oz of 4.8 ? Mt. Hood Hops, and White Labs WLP320-American Hefeweizen yeast.  Should be pretty good, had a very active primary fermentation.  On the right is a raspberry braggot type recipe that I am fooling around with for Ruthi.  Consists of 3-1/2 lbs. Light LME, 1 lb. corn sugar/dextrose, and WLP720 Sweet Mead/WineYeast for primary fermentation.  Then today I added 3 lbs raspberry puree to the secondary fermentation.  It smells amazing right now so we’ll see what happens.  The process photos and the bottle picture are of  a West Coast American Pale Ale.  This recipe needs about another week to condition in the bottles and then should be ready to drink.  Here is what I did for this:

Fermentables:

US Caramel 40L Malt 8.00 oz 7.1 % 3.8 In Mash/Steeped
Extract – Light Liquid Malt Extract 6lb 8oz 92.9 % 4.2 Start Of Boil

Hops:
US Columbus(Tomahawk) 14.8 % 0.50 oz 25.9 Loose Whole Hops 60 Min From End
US Centennial 8.0 % 0.50 oz 7.6 Loose Pellet Hops 15 Min From End
US Cascade 7.5 % 0.50 oz 2.9 Loose Pellet Hops 5 Min From End
US Cascade 7.5 % 0.50 oz 0.0 Bagged Pellet Hops At turn off
US Centennial 8.0 % 1.50 oz 0.0 Loose Whole Hops Dry-Hopped

Yeast:
White Labs WLP001-California Ale

So I realized that I never finished talking about the cider that I made for Christmas.  It turned out pretty good.  Rather flat after a couple of weeks of conditioning then all of a sudden WHAM-O…super carbonated.  ABV turned out to be way higher than expected, probably around 12%.  Tasted more like a dry apple wine than a cider.  I learned a lot from this experiment and expect this year’s batch to be even better.

Today I am trying something new. It is Friday and I am riding the bus to work. I got up about an hour earlier than usual and rode my bike to the bus stop which was not only a great ride but also provided for a little exercise. First bus had no room for my bike so I had to wait a bit for the next. Might be a bit late but it is Friday and I’m sure I’ll end up staying a little late anyway.

So yeah. Here I am sitting on the bus. I’m saving some gas which was one of my goals for the new year and I’m getting Zen! My book is patiently waiting on my lap as it has been waiting on my shelf for two years. The Little White Bird by J.M. Barrie is a book that I have started to read four times now. I shouldn’t keep it waiting any longer. Here are a couple pictures:

UPDATE:  After writting this post on the bus it began raining like crazy.  Biked about a mile in the rain to the office and showed up to work a little late and totally soaked.  I loved every second of it!

I just wanted to take a moment on this October 31st to share with everyone the pumpkin or pum-pum that Ruthi and I carved this year.  The robot’s name is Robbie and he was carved using a  linoleum block carving tool.  I like him!

this is my crew

And this is where the hard cider project begins.  It is pretty simple really.  Juice the apples, add the sugar, and then heat for 45 minutes, but don’t boil or you will cause the cider to become forever cloudy.

While that is cooking use the B.E.S.T. sanitize everything that the  cider will come into contact with.  This prevents stray bacteria and other yuck from crashing the party.

Once the mixture is done cooking let it cool down to room temperature.  This takes a long time and is really annoying, but if you skip this step you will kill the yeast and just have a lot of juice in a jug with dead yeast.

When cool enough, it is time to add the yeast.  Follow the instructions on the package.  Mine said to mix yeast with 2 oz. warm water, let sit 15 minutes and then stir.  When that is done add the yeast nutrient to the yeast and gently mix it up.

Now put the sugary apple juice mixture into the sanitized carboy and add in the yeast mixture.  Give the jug a little swirl to make things are mixing together nicely.  Put your stopper and airlock in the carboy and fill the airlock with water.

Now it is time to let our little friends the yeast do what they do best.  Put this whole setup in a dark place where the temperature will not exceed 70 degrees.  Gas should start venting from the airlock within a day or two which will let you know that the yeast are happy.  Just let it sit.  Don’t move, don’t taste it, don’t add anything to it.  In about two weeks the primary fermentation will be done and it will be time to move onto the next step.