We got up at 5 AM this morning! Our room was nice and warm but as soon as we left the room the rest of the hotel was freezing. We ate a small breakfast (with instant coffee) and tried to keep warm until it was time to board the bus again. Even though we were still tired, we all appreciated how pretty the morning was with the sun rising over the ...

Yay! Yesterday was Jenīs birthday, so we knew it was going to be great fun, but we had the best day of our trip so far. The night before, we ended up sharing a chorizo pizza, and let me tell you, paprika, salt, and oregano may very well be the new ranch and hot sauce. Try it on your next slice! We ate at the obscenely early hour of 5:45 pm and ...

Sat 26 April. Mini-bus up and out of town. Road towards to Juliaca, then left to Sillustani to visit the chupas - ancient burial tombs. Another hot day - oh, so predictable. We were beginning to be saturated with history by now; alpacas and vicunas were old hat, and local weaving/crafts were losing their appeal. Through Juliaca again, and on tow...

Left Arequipa (Alt. 2500m) feeling seedy, no appetite, passed thru 4500m and on arrival at Corporaque near Chivay(Alt. 3800m), at the hotel for the night, guess who was the ONLY one to need oxygen! Symptoms you donīt want to know about, but when I passed out, had everyone running! Seems our so-called "travel doctor" stuffed it up & gave us f...

COLCA CANYON After recovering from the Inca Trek in Cusco for a couple of relaxing days we made the over ten hour bus journey to Arequipa where we settled into our tents for the first time and went and ate kebabs and then visited the Plaza terrace for some happy hour drinks. The following day we awoke early for the four hour bus trip through the...

The colca canyon is the second bigest canyon in the world by 150ft the biggest is slightly north, look it up in wikipedia if you want to learn about it i will be mostly talking about the hike we did, again the pictures will be uploaded shortly i promise. We caught the public bus to a small town near the canyons main entry called Chivay, after a ...

Opting out of the organised tours that the tour agents in Arequipa are so keen to sell, we jumped on a rickety old bus bound for the Colca Canyon town of Chivay. From the dusty desert roads, we had great views of the Arequipa volcanos and some vicuņas (llama-type animals) wandering around. With immaculate timing, we arrived in the village of Chi...

Today we are being picked up at 8.30am form the Hotel Solar to do a 2 day tour of the Colca Canyon (which is about 3 hours from Arequipa). The main attraction in the canyon (apart from its stunning screnery) are the rare Condors - a huge soaring mountain bird - that grows to have a wing span of 3m - pretty massive! On our tour we have organised ...

We started the day bright and early with a 7am breakfast. The night before our guide had told us that none of the public buses were running because of protesters blocking the road, but that the different tour agencies had grouped together to get a tour bus for all of us to get back to Arequipa. We loaded the bus at 8am and headed off to Cruz del...

I just got back to Arequipa last night from a two-day trip to Chivay and the Colca Canyon. The Colca Canyon is the second biggest canyon in the world, itīs about twice as deep as the grand canyon, or so Iīm told. To go to Chivay, one has to buy a package, including a hostel, transportation, guide and breakfast. One of the other travelers, a Germ...