Hatteras Beach Week

Every year, for the past 10 years, we've gone with the family to Hatteras, NC for a week at the beach. We arrived yesterday, staying at our rental house -- this year the house is named Surf N'Dippity. Neat house -- sleeps 16 and we are only 12 this year. Katy and me; Mike, Debbie and the 4 grandsons; Pete, Linda and their grandson CJ, and brother in law John (who arrives tomorrow). This is CJ's first trip to the ocean ever, so he's having a 7-year old's blast of a time. Weather is perfect -- high today was 85 and not a cloud in the sky. Lows in the mid 60s. Great sleeping weather. The only down side at all -- Hurricane Danielle is about 800 miles off shore and the waves are something fierce. Never seen them quite this big.

Here's a photo of the house.

Our Anniversary -- Blue Duck Tavern

For our anniversary last night we went to the Blue Duck Tavern in the Park Hyatt hotel. This is another of our top-10 restaurants in DC. Katy started with Sardines on "toast," a tasty preparation of a typically bland fish. Paul tried bone marrow for the first time, spreading it and roasted garlic on some toasted bread. For the main course, Paul had two magnificent crab cakes and Katy ordered the whole fish fillet. The meal was accompanied by a delightful wine -- the 2006 Mendel Unus from Mendoza, Argentina. It's a 70/30 Malbec/Cabernet meritage blend with a very fruity nose and a strong alcohol finish. It improved very much as the evening went on.

What we particularly liked about this visit to Blue Duck (besides the food which was, as always, spectacular) was our chance to watch the kitchen. We'd told them in advance that it was our anniversary and, to our surprise, they saved us seats right by the kitchen, so we got to watch the preparations. One of the interesting pieces was the finishing chef (who knows what his official title is?) whose job was to put on all the garnishes and to grind on the last little bits of topping for the dishes. He was a master of the "small touch" and we really enjoyed the show.

Overall, Blue Duck rates tops for ambiance and food. Well worth a visit.

The Music of Epcot

Epcot Center in Orlando has a series of pavilions reflecting cultures from around the world. We had lunch in Italy and dinner in Morocco. And along the way we heard the music of Mexico and Japan. Here are two small tastes:

We Went to Disneyworld!

We take a short pause from the blogging about the trip to Peru to note this weekend's trip with the grandkids to Disneyworld. Details to follow. For now, just to prove we were actually there here is a photo.

Our Trip to Peru -- Over the Top

The third day of the hike was, without doubt, one of the most challenging days either of us has ever faced. It began poorly, the night before, when Katy seemed to fall ill. She was suffering from pretty severe sinus pain that we feared was brought on by the altitude and we worried that she would not be able to climb at all. After a phone-call diagnosis by a Peruvian doctor some pain medications and antibiotics were prescribed and we decided to forge ahead.

The first quarter of the day was a steady uphill that seemed to portend well. But then we hit the "Seven Serpents" -- a series of 14 switchbacks that went almost vertically up a steep wall from roughly 14,000 to 15,000 feet. Part of the way up, Katy climbed onto a burro to get to the top. Paul, meanwhile, was suffering shortness of breath and, candidly, a healthy helping of panic at what he was experiencing. The next 45 minutes seemed like an eternity.

Eventually, we made it up the Serpents and then had a well deserved rest. As you can see from this photo, Paul was not particularly happy at this point. But at least we had made it.

From there it was a relatively short hike (maybe a mile and only 300 more feet up) to the top of the Salkantay pass. There we paused for a well-deserved second rest and some good photos. As you can see, the pass itself is right in the shadow of Mt. Salkantay. The peak behind us is up around 20,000 feet and has been climbed only twice in history (at least as far as anyone knows). To have gotten so close to it was exceedingly difficult and rewarding -- but also amazingly unnerving and challenging.

And so we began a long downhill slog. We still had more than 4 hours to go to the next lodge (overall hike time on this day was 9 hours) and after about 2 hours we stopped for lunch. The most amazing thing happened -- lunch was a hot lunch served in a tent that had been erected for that purpose. Our cook had left the morning lodge after serving us breakfast and literally run ahead of us to set up for lunch. Never had a simple meal tasted so fine! And when we finished the downhill run to the lodge both of us indulged in Pisco Sours to celebrate -- we'd refrained from alcohol until then as a precaution but boy were we ready.

Oddly enough, the second lodge was at almost exactly the same height (12,000 feet) as the one we had slept in the night before -- so our total up and down of 6,600 feet (more than a mile) had gotten us "right back where we started." Except now we were over the pass and past the most challenging part of the hike.

Our Trip to Peru -- The Hike Begins

On Thursday evening we met the others in our hiking group (all Americans, save for two English couples) and our guide, whose given name was (I kid you not) -- Washington. His father had been and admirer of George Washington and named his Peruvian son after the first American President.

Early the next morning we began our trip. Our convoy headed out and the cars let us off about three miles from our first night's lodge. And so we began our walk. Over the next 6 days we would go approximately 39 miles and climb more than 2 miles up and down in elevation change.

The lodges were a chain operated by the Mountain Lodges of Peru. Each one is constructed at distances that are a day's walk from each other. Only the first one is accessible by road. All of the remaining lodges were constructed using materials that were carted in by hand or by burro.

Despite their isolation, the lodges are models of hospitality. They were, in a word, spectacular. When we arrived at the first lodge (pictured above) after a short 3 hour acclimatization hike we were met by staff who gave us a cup of hot tea and a cold towel to wipe off the dust and grime. They took our poles and carefully put them away, and then took our boots away, to be returned to us after they had been cleaned. The next morning they were all carefully laid out by the door.

The other service at the lodge was gracious. Each had a small bar (the local specialty is a drink called the pisco sour which is an absolute killer) and a hot tub. The view on the left is the view from the hot tub at the first lodge of Mt. Salkantay. Our goal, in the hike was to cross the pass below Salkantay's peak -- basically walking through the notch on the left side of the photograph.

After a fine meal (our chef followed us from lodge to lodge and his cooking could easily match up against some of the good restaurants in Washington DC) we retired to bed, there to find that our towels had been twisted into an origami of swans and that two hot water bottles had been put in the bed to keep our feet warm. Talk about being well treated. If you ever want to go on a hike but have a nice place to stay each evening, this is the way to do it.

And so, our trip began. The next day we took a second hike to get the feel for the thin air. The lodge was actually at about 12,200 feet. On the second day we took a short 4 hour hike to a glacial lake up at about 14,000 feet. As we walked we could see the tops of Salkantay and her companion peaks -- all at about 20,000 feet. Remarkably, we could see an Andean Condor circling the top -- at a guess the condor was up around 22,000 feet. Even at that distance and through binoculars you could see how magnificent he was.

The glacial lake was well worth the trip. You could see the moraine left by the glacier and the ice-blue water of the lake was stunning. We found the trip up and back a challenge -- it was not so hard on the legs, for we were well prepared physically, but the thin air was quite a noticeable factor. Still, after two days of preparation work, we thought we were ready to climb across the Salkantay pass.

Black Salt -- DC

We went to the Black Salt Restaurant last night for dinner -- the first time we'd been there in more than a year. We had such a good time, we wonder why we don't go more often -- though it is geographically undesirable, located over in the MacArthur Park area of town [all the way across the town from our Capitol Hill house].

Black Salt has a fish market in the front of the restaurant that gives the place a nice local feel. People from the neighborhood by the fresh fish there. Even better, the whole place has a nice ambiance -- not overly pretentious and a friendly staff. [Paul even met one of his rugby buddies there who was tending bar].

We had a great meal. We had fish of course, since it is a fish market! In fact, the restaurant provides a list of daily fresh fish that are available for grilling or baked. Last night they had everything from tuna to tilefish.

Katy started with a sashimi appetizer platter (one of the daily specials) that had hamachi, scallps and some strange Japanese fish whose name we forget. It was served with a sea urchin vinagrette that served as the dipping sauce. Quite lovely. Paul had the gazpacho -- a cold soup served, in this case, with lump crabmeat and a whole tomato in the center.

For our main courses, Katy ordered off of the daily specials and got a roasted rockfish with a suprisingly spicy panag curry sauce and great fresh vegatables. Paul was even more adventerous -- he said "let the chef choose whatever he wants to do." He wound up getting a grilled mangrove snapper [we were told that is the rarest snapper around] covered in a dijon cream sauce layered on top of fresh sweet corn, more crabmeat, cooked tomatoes and peas. The sweetness of the corn was perfectly matched with the crab meat and the dijon sauce and the fish was cooked to perfection.

We accompanied the meal with a 1/2 bottle of 2005 Muga Riserva Roja wine from Spain. The wine was a good full bodied red, that was perfect with the appetizers, but it clashed with the main courses -- especially Katy's spicy rockfish. In retrospect we should have gone for a Pinot Noir or a white wine of some sort.

Of course, the best course of the night was dessert! Katy had a wonderful Dark chocolate flourless cake with raspberries and coconut sorbet (with real coconut grated in it). Paul had something called Butterscotch creme which was a utterly sinful concoction of scotch, vanilla, cream, almond crackle and two shortbread cookies. It was so sweet that he didn't finish it, if you can believe that!

We don't know why we don't go here more often ... but we are going to fix that in the future.