Around Arequipa

Well, it´s 4:30 in the morning and I should probably be sleeping but I have to be up in a little over an hour to head out on my Colca Canyon trek. At this point it feels silly to even try to sleep I´d probably just snooze right through my alarm anyway. I´m still fighting off the tail end of a cold so I really should be getting my sleep, but at the same time I leave for the trek I´m also moving out of my apartment. There was just too much to do! So, please forgive me if there are parts of this that don´t make sense.

There are tons of really fun, great things to do around Arequipa, unfortunately I haven´t managed to do nearly as many as I should have done (or would have liked to have done.) But what I have fit in has been amazing.

My first weekend here I went white water rafting. I have always loved rafting but don´t think I´ve done it since Chile (which was 7 years ago now!) We went with a group of 12 people and 2 guides. There were 6 of us from our organization so we made up a boat ourselves. It was lots of fun with several class 3 rapids and even a class 4. The water was freezing and my feet, in sandals, were numb and raw from trying to hold myself in the boat. At one point where the river stilled the guide suggested that we jump in and go swimming. I´m not entirely sure he was serious--but we did! The people in the other boat stayed put. I was sure glad we had because when I fell out of the boat in a rapid (the only person that did--I´m still that clumsy!) the water wasn´t nearly the shock it would have been if I wasn´t already wet. I was wearing borrowed sandals that were too big and the foot that was supposed to holding me in the boat came out of it´s sandal. As I was getting back in they tried to give me my sandal and, until I looked down and saw my bare foot, I insisted it wasn´t mine. My foot was so cold that I couldn´t tell the sandal wasn´t there! In the end, it was lots of fun!

Then on Saturday of my second weekend here I finally managed to drag my butt to the Monasterio de Santa Catalina here in Arequipa. I walk past it all the time, but wanted to go in when I had a fair amount of time to spend there since everyone said it is huge. It is! I spent 2 hours in it just wandering around and I´m pretty sure I could have been there a lot longer if I´d had the time. It´s really beautiful the walls are super colorful and there are awesome plants everywhere. There were even some signs up so I had some idea of what I was looking at. What more could a girl ask for?

On Sunday we got up really early (Well, not as early as I would have if I had heard my alarm and been ready on time) to go to Toro Muerto. There were 4 of us from our group going. We had set it up with a driver, Rufino, for him to drive us the 3 hours out there, take us around to the sights and then bring us home. The whole day was about 11 hours total. So after I took 5 minutes to throw clothes on and water in a bag we headed off. About 30 minutes out of town we were stopped in the middle of nowhere by the national police. They insisted that Rufino did not have the paperwork to drive us out of the city. He got out with all his paperwork and went to talk to them. When he came back we were free to go, but he was pissed. He said they only wanted money, show him the law that said he couldn´t take us etc. etc. Apparently he had finally told them the didn´t have any money and they could write him up if they wanted. They let us go.

The scenery on the way out was really cool. We just went up and up the driest mountains I think I´ve ever seen. They were basically sand and rocks. Our driver rarely stayed in his lane even around turns with no guard rails, but I must have been either really tired or I´ve just spent too much time in South America because I wasn´t as bothered as others. I would have been concerned if we´d been in a bus. Then all of the sudden you could see a super green, lush valley.

When we got down to the valley Rufino announced that while he lives in Arequipa he is from this town and still has a house here. As we drove through town (which is long as it´s a valley) he honked and yelled out at pretty much everyone we passed, often stopping to shake hands and exchange pleasantries. Then we pulled up at his house and took a little strech break as he went in to drop off breakfast goodies (which we´d stopped to buy along the way.) It was a great place to take some pictures so we did that too.

My favorite stop though was when this guy (who he called little brother) told him there would be roosters there that night at 5 or 6 pm. As we drove away Rufino asked us how we felt about cock fighting. As if testing the water to see if we´d be interested in sticking around for that. Hmm...

After we paid a small fee to get into the Toro Muerto park we got a brief explanation of how the petroglyphs were made on the rocks. I can´t really tell you anything because I missed pretty much all of it while in the bathroom--and no one else seemed to follow it either. The man working there was making a new map of the path you´re supposed to take but it was really just a blank piece of poster board with some dots and numbers and a picture of a hut on it. He was really proud of it though.

Then Rufino drove us up to the starting point. It was a small covered area where the cars park and then basically you head out into a GIANT sand dune completely covered in rocks. Before starting off I asked how we would know where to go and he was like ´didn´t you look at the map?´ Um yeah, but this is like being in the desert--there aren´t any land marks. So we headed up. At first I was concerned that we wouldn´t find many petroglyph (having been to stupid to understand the map and all) but it turns out they were literally everywhere.

We just wandered around looking at what we happened across. The pictures look flat, but we went up and up until the car was just a dot. It took us a really long time to find a decent sized rock without petroglyphs that we could climb on for a picture. That´s how many there were.

At some point we decided that they were thining out and it was time to head back. Rufino had insisted that there was a green spot somewhere out there in that sand and at our turning point we could just see two dried bushes peeking out from behind another dune. I wanted to see if there really were some green bushes too. Not everyone wanted to keep going so we split up. Laura and I went to see the greenery and the other two went straight back the way we´d come. When we got far enough over to see, we found that those two dried bushes were all there were. I guess lying about that is Rufino´s way of motivating the gringos to move their butts up the mountain. We also headed back the way we´d come.

When we got back Rufino had been trying to make the others go back out because we´d come back the wrong way and missed some of the designated path. We decided to pass, the petroglyphs were really cool, but you can only see so many before the novelty wears off and they all sort of look the same.

After that we headed to a nearby place called Jurassic Park where there are some dinosaur footprints. It was such a typically South American place. They mangaged to have two good-sized pretty professional looking dinosaur replicas and yet, not even one sign explaining the whole thing. Again, I have no real information to share. It was free and would have been quite a hike up, but Rufino fibbed about one of the girls having a knee problem and so we got to drive most of the way up. The guy at the gate had the nerve to suggest that his car might not make it--boy was that a mistake! Rufino hauled ass up that hill and around the curves, scaring the crap out of all of us, all the while ranting about the man and how the car could do it with no problem--has double traction!

The footprints were cool, but it was hard to get a picture of them where they show up well. The really great part though was the view from up top. It was beautiful overlooking the valley.

After that we stopped at the river that goes through the valley. They dive for shrimp there and then it´s sold in the local restaurants. We drove back through town still shouting at everyone as we went, stopped at his house again and then went to a restaurant where the prices were outrageous, but those who wanted could try the shrimp. I just wanted rice and some type of vegetable, but that was too much to ask. Rufino had to try to go buy an avocado for them to feed me, he came back empty handed, so the restaurant guy had to go. I got avocado and tomato and was soooo happy. Rufino left us to go eat at his house, and then came back and ate a huge meal they gave him for free (for bringing us.) The report is that the shrimp was delicious and worth the price.

The trip home was uneventful--thankfully.

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