Truck breakfast and a walk into town

I slept pretty well but was awake from 4.30am. We both got up by 6.  It was a lovely sunny morning, so we enjoyed the warmth until the rest of the camp started to stir.  Those who had gone out last night were rather worse for wear this morning.  Nikki was doing the truck breakfast for 8am.  She was making pancakes, so I acted as her commis chef and cut up the fruit and got everything else out.  It went down very well with most of the group.

After breakfast, we sat around chatting for a while before heading into town to explore.  Mark was in a lot of pain today, so it was slow going.  When we reached the historic centre, we went for a coffee and shared a piece of coffee cake.  It was very good!

Arequipa is Peru's second largest city, but it is only one tenth the size of Lima.  However, despite this, it matches the capital in terms of cuisine and historical significance.  The Unesco World Heritage-listed city centre is full of baroque buildings carved from sillar (white volcanic rock), giving Arequipa the nickname 'Ciudad Blanca' (white city).

Our first stop was to have a look at Iglesia de la Merced.  It had a very elaborate nativity scene!Read more