El Balcon Arequipa

... get home!<br><br>So after two whole days on the bus we get an hour at our destination with 2000 other tourists......money well spent.<br><br>When we booked our tour we also booked an overnight bus to take us to our next destination so we could jump on it when we returned saving us another night in Arequipa. We were initially going to go to Puno on the peruvian side of Lake Titicaca spend a night there and head to Bolivia the following day, The lady that sold us the tour ...

... we got a taxi to Sol y mayo for lunch. They say they are a tourist restaurant but I think there were more Peruvians there than tourists.Great setting in the garden with tables under umbrella round a waterfall. Franchesca discovered the kids play area and she was off, I just relaxed and listened to the local folkloric band. Meals were huge and couldnt finish them, still couldnt bring myself to ...

... aandoet is er niets aan de hand. De plaza de Armas is zoals in alle steden het centrale plein en ziet er prachtig uit. Over de gehele breedte van het plein ligt een prachtige kerk die er ook van binnen prachtig uitziet. Doorgelopen naar het Santa Catalina klooster alwaar ik een tijdje ronddool door allerlei gangetjes en doorsteekjes. Prachtig klooster waar je overigens ook mooie fotos kunt maken. Er zijn hier allerlei leuke ...

I´m now writing from Arequipa, a 16 hour bus ride away from Lima. The rest of our stay in Lima was great. We met up with a friend of a friend who lives in LIma and went out for supper (it was nice to actually know what we were oredering for once). The next day we walked along the ocean cliffs - beautiful. They have the nicest shopping amall I´ve ever seen, built into the side of a cliff. We saw street performers who perform in front of traffic stopped at red ...

... object of pitiful amusement and derision to the hostel`s residents. He "spoke" with an accent that can only be described as a a cross between Brad Pitt in Snatch and Spastic. Apparently he was German, but you`d never have known. We played giant jenga for a bit in the bar, which should have been fun, but I soon tired of this as the dentally-challenged monkey kept insisting in his inimitably vile and vulgar manner on people doing shots for various stupid ...

We arrived in Arequipa an hour late making it about half ten at night. I had taken down an address for a hostel down town and when we arrived it turned out to be a bit of a dump. We decided to stay as it was only costing s/30 per night.. that&#8217;s about &#8364;7.50, so it was pretty damn cheap. The following morning we did our normal thing after staying in a **** hostel, that is, we wandered around the city both checking out side-streets and plazas, as well as looking for a new ...

... hvor hun saa blev bedoevet med majsoel og lidt andet krudt, hvorefter en praest gav hende en mangesiddet hammer lige i hovedet, og saa blev hun jo saa lagt i en grav paa kanten af vulkankrateret. Paa grund af is og kulde er hun utroligt velbevaret i dag, men dog ikke saa smuk laengere, naermere en anelse gusten. Efter saadan en oplevelse er der vel ikke noget mere naerliggende end at gaa i kloster. Saa det gjorde vi i Santa Catalina, som er et ...

... city at an altitude of about 2300. Its very touristy, and is unofficially known as the adventure capital of Peru. Due to an absolute lack of choice of bus times, we ended up arriving at 2am, and immediately crashed for the night. <br><br>In the central part of Arequipa, every shop is either a tour agency, souviner shop, or restaurant. And the tour agencies outnumber the other stores at least 2:1. Its crazy. The other strange thing about Arequpia ...

... is a lot cheaper at $50 but all transportation is on public buses at the crack of dawn and very basic lodging (I´m talking huts). They also do a 2 day/1 night tour which is very popular with most tourists, but it is such a whirlwind I pretty much ruled it out. The nearest edge of the canyon is 4 hours away from Arequipa so you can imagine how quickly that tour zips through the canyon and past most cool sights. Next and last agency: they only do the 2 day/1 night tour (that I ...

... hidden away in there somewhere. <br><br>The other huge attraction is nearby Cañón del Colca, which is nearly the world's deepest canyon at 3191m in depth. People have been returning from a 2-4 day hike of the canyon each day and everyone has had the same experience....the canyon is full of clouds and ya can't see a damn thang. SOoo, I may skip it all together too and just move on to Cuzco. I'm kinda hiked out ...