Arequipa, Peru by Mel

We are in Arequipa!
Arequipa is a the second most populated city in Peru. It is located toward the south of Peru and has an average elevation of 2,328 metres.
To arrive there, you guested it, we took a bus (this is the main transportation in Peru). We left Lima around 10.30pm and arrived in Arequipa around 9am. It wasn’t a bad trip. We managed to sleep ok. At the bus station, we bought our tickets for the next stop, so we don’t have to worry about it, then we took a taxi to our place. It was a very nice appartement in a lovely area and it was quiet! That is nice, because one thing to know about South America, it is loud! Maybe not as noisy as India, but still! So having a stay in a quiet place, is a very big positive!
We dropped our bags, rest a bit, and went explore around to find lunch and do our shopping. The afternoon, we caught up a bit with blogging and did some research on what to visit while we are here. There is a fair bit to do!
The next day, we found a tour operator to book a 2-day tour: again, I looked at buses and how to get to where we wanted to visit outside of the city and it sounded too complicated. If only I could speak Spanish, it would be so much easier. Might be a goal for when we come back to Australia: learn more languages. Spanish is a good place to start.
After that, we visited the massive cathedral of Arequipa. The city was founded on the 15th of August 1540 and the cathedral construction started on that very same date! Being in Peru, several earthquakes and volcanic eruptions destroyed part of the cathedral, and it was rebuilt several times since. The last time was after an earthquake in 2001, where both towers were damaged and rebuilt. To visit it, you need to have a guide. It was extremely interesting. The inside of the church is neo-classic with a lot of things imported from France, Spain and Belgium. One of the most interesting things to see is the pipe organ: it has 1218 pipes!! It is the biggest in South America. I wish we could have listen to it, but it plays on Sunday, and we would be gone before as we are only staying a few days. That was sad! When the towers fell in 2001, some pipes were damaged, but luckily they have been replaced since. Only 3 people know how to play that organ, but students are being trained. We went on the roof of the church and could admire the surroundings all around the city. Volcanoes and mountains everywhere. It very rarely rain in Arequipa, so the sky is very blue with hardly any cloud! It is beautiful. We could also look at the bells for the towers (the biggest one weight 5 tonnes). We could go under it and that was pretty impressive.
After that, just a few streets away, you can find a nunnery (I like that word for some reason!). In the 16th century, the construction of a monastery was started and in 1579, Doña María de Guzmán, a young widow with no children decided to live and shut herself in the monastery which was still in construction. She became the first abbess of it. Since then, women who wanted to live in silence and peace and exercise their love for God, could pay 100 pesos and bring 25 items (clothes, bed linen and such) to become nuns. The family also had to paid to build the lodging, which was constituted of one bedroom, one kitchen, one room for washing. Depending on the amount paid, the lodging would be more or less ‘luxurious’. The nuns lived secluded, mostly in silence and praying. The monastery only opened its doors to the outside world in 1970. Nuns still live in one part of the monastery, but the biggest part is now open to the public to visit and it is well worth it.
It is massive (a lot bigger that we thought) and beautiful. The colours of the buildings, red, ochre, blue and white are striking. There are flowers everywhere and it is quiet. The kitchen where you can see the soot of the fire used, are great to visit. I can understand why you would want to live there (but the never getting out part is a bit extreme!)
The monastery being 20 000 m2, it was a long visit! There are lots of streets to visit. It is a city inside the city, isolated from it by a solid wall of 4 meters.
After this long visit, we went to see some alpacas and llamas. There is a place called ‘Mundo Alpaca’ where you can learn about those 2 species and the other 2 camelids that live in South America. Llama and alpaca are related to camel and are domesticated now. There are 2 species that are wild and protected, which are the guanaco and vicunas. Emma loved feeding them as always and Andrew is still not very comfortable next to big animals! We learn about how they get the alpaca fibre (wool) and sort it. There is explanation of the history of those technics, which comes from pre-inca time. There is also a shop where you can buy hat, gloves, scarves and clothes made with alpaca fibre. We, obviously, bought a couple of scarves, because you know, it is alpaca fibre!
We finished the day at the ‘Nowhere’ bar with a couple of drinks and a lovely sunset.
Wednesday the 12th of November, was the first day of our 2 day-tour around Arequipa. We got picked up by a van with other tourists and went on our merry way to our first stop of many! At every stop, there were abundance of local selling souvenirs, pictures with llamas, speciality teas and more. It was fun at the first few stops, but it ended up being a bit much by the end of the 2 days.
The one thing I want to mention is the local who have their kids with them to take pictures with and ask for a bit a money. I saw a lot of tourists taking pictures of/with the kids. WE SHOULD KNOW BETTER!!!! If the kids are here, they are not at school! Stop taking pictures of kids. As long as tourists are paying for it, some people will take their kids off school to do that. I understand them: they don’t have a lot and they are getting money. But tourist should know better. This is child work, and we are depriving them of opportunities as they are not at school!!! Please think before you take a picture. Rent over.
We saw vicunas in the wild, we stop to pat some llamas and alpacas (against a small fee) and drunk Inca tea (made of coca leaves which are legal in Peru, Andean mint and another plant which I can not remember the name off!). We stopped at a very high mirador: 4910m above sea level!!! It was hard to breath! I felt dizzy and light-headed. But the view was amazing. There were thousands of rocks stacked on each other as gifts to the mountains. It was inspiring to see, as well as all the volcanos and mountains all around us. Andrew made a little rock stack, Emma stayed in the van as she was felling a bit crooked.
The next stop was the best of the day. We went to some thermal bath! Being a very volcanic region, there are several hot springs. It was so relaxing! The 4 of us really enjoyed the experience.
After that we got dropped to our room to rest a little bit. Then we had dinner at a restaurant with traditional music and dances. It was very tourist oriented, but well this is what we are! It was fun though. Me and Andrew got pull out to dance a bit. Andew loved it. I took Emma back to our room as she was a bit under the weather. Andrew and Kev stayed until the end of the show and apparently, it was fun.
The next day, we did a couple more stops. The first one was around the main square of a tiny town where locals are selling things for tourists and what annoyed me the most, was school aged girl dancing around the fountain. It was still early and they were there dancing for tourists. I would have preferred them getting ready for school. I asked the guide about it, and he said they go to school after. They dance for a couple of hours, then go to school. Great… Tourism is not always what is best.
From there, we could see one Peru’s most active volcano, which is very often smoking. It is a little bit unnerving to think that at anytime, one could erupt…
We then went to the Colca canyon, one of the deepest canyons in the world. We could see culture in terrace, which was started in this area by the Inca. The scenery, here again, is magnificent. Green and brown of different shade, valleys, hills, lagoons and cultivated areas made some truly beautiful images that will stay in our memory for a long time.
In the Colca Canyon is also the place to see Andean Condors. They wait for the air to warm up to soar on it. In the morning, a lot of people come to see that. We got lucky as we saw one gliding on the wind right over us. Andean Condors are vultures who live in the Andean range. Their wingspan can go up to 3.3m wide and weight up to 15kg. They fly using warm courant of air and hardly flap their wings. They are magnificent to watch flying. Those birds are endangered as they have less and less area to forage for food and get poisoned by farmers because they accused them of attacking livestock. This doesn’t make sense as Condors feed on carcasses. We were lucky to see one of those majestic animals.
As a lot of tourist are there to see it, a lot of locals come to sell their gear and you can also take pictures for a fee with someone dressed in a massive condor suit. That was interesting to see…
On our way back, we did one more stop at a viewpoint where we tried cactus fruit juice (sancayo) and a Colca sour (made with sancayo and pisco, the local alcohol). The fruit is very sour but with sugar, the juice was delicious as was the Colca sour.
We drove all the way back to Arequipa and rested at our place on the evening as it was a busy 2 days.
The following day, we took another bus (a day one this time) to our next stop in Peru: Puno near the Lake Titicaca.
We’ll see you there.
MelOkumaya devam et