UAS Peru Trip
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (29.3MB)
You might think that traveling to Peru and bearing witness to the wonders of Machu Picchu is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I would have thought so, too, except that I just got back from my third trip there.
I’m always the one advocating some new and exotic locale whenever Oksana and I plan our travels (with the whole world to see, why keep going back to the same places?), but somehow Peru just keeps falling into my lap.
The first time I went was in 1998, when my roommate and I stayed in South America for a couple months after a university trip to Ecuador. The second time, in 2002, was when I was invited by the university to help lead a class through the country. Last month, six years later, opportunity came a’knockin’ once again. Peru had treated me well twice before; how could I say “no?”
Even with my desire to see something new, these recurring trips never disappoint. The first time there, we flew to Machu Picchu on a helicopter because the train tracks leading to the ruins had washed out in a storm. The second time, we hiked the Inca Trail and visited many more of the ruins around Cusco. This time, I was a part of a group that headed down into the Amazon basin for a few days in the jungle.
This was also the first university trip upon which I lugged my video camera around. The students gave me permission to point my lens in their direction after I promised to make them a great DVD of their adventures. I shot 14 miniDV tapes worth of footage while we were down there and I plan to add a few more hours of interview footage in the coming weeks. Before I started editing a project of this magnitude, however, I needed to familiarize myself with what I already had. It seemed like putting together a short music video would accomplish that goal nicely.
While many of these snippets of video will only mean something to those of us that were in Peru, I trust that the imagery will convey not only the amazing sites we saw, but also how fun, adventurous, diverse, and just downright awesome the people in our group turned out to be.
Related posts:
Great video. More JUMP material?
I’m hoping you’ll post the full version online once it’s complete…
Awesome Arlo! I love it, we all had such a good time. Thanks for doing this.
Hey, glad you liked it! With so much footage to choose from, I had to cut out a lot of great stuff to deliver a more “well-rounded” experience. Good to know it’s still worth watching.
I don’t think I’ll be submitting this video to JUMP; people usually complain about watching someone else’s “vacation footage.” I can understand that. It’s not like this video has much in the way of a story to grab your attention; it’s mostly just a rapid series of someone else’s memories triggers.
I doubt I’ll be putting up the final DVD-length video on my website. Setting aside the whole filespace issue (I estimate it’d be about 840MB in the iPod format I’m posting in nowadays), it’s likely to involve the personal stories of upwards of 20 people. I wouldn’t expect every single one of them would be comfortable with it posted in public… I do, however, plan to put together some clips for the UAS website.
Thanks for sharing this Arlo. Like I said, I think it would be great to show this to others who weren’t able to join in the fun.
[...] you may know, I took a little trip down to Peru last winter with a group of college students. I carried along my [...]