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Having spent a very relaxing few days on Isla del Sol, we felt we had seen the best of Bolivian Lake Titacaca and headed for Peru. We decided to go straight to Cusco, capital of the Inca empire and nowadays tourist Mecca. The journey involved a very long and very slow, bus ride (during which we were subjected to both Home Alone films dubbed into spanish and played ear piercingly loud). Despite this, we enjoyed watching the spectacular, high altitude scenery pass us by on route.
On arriving in Cusco and after a good night's sleep, we set out to explore the historic centre of town and, in Liz's case, to reminisce (probably quite annoyingly) over the various cafés and pubs she frequented whilst here in 2007 (mainly the highest authentic Irish pub in the world and a cafe that serves big fluffy pancakes). We spent the day wandering through the narrow, cobbled streets, admiring the local handicrafts and dodging traffic and very persistent street sellers.
After a tough day of pounding the streets and having only had bread and bananas for lunch, we passed a cafe with a sign offering "waffles gigantes" and decided to treat ourselves. We
decided to treat ourselves again that evening to celebrate six successful months of travelling with a curry (something that is very hard to find in South America).
Unfortunately, the weather took a turn for the worse after our first day in Cusco and we experienced some heavy high altitude rain. Without the sun, the city and our hostel felt pretty cold, particularly with the Peruvian lack of hot water and heating. We therefore spent the next couple of days planning our trip to Machu Picchu (which involved a visit to a tiny, hard to find ticket office outside the centre of town) and on our last afternoon, a trip around Cusco on an open air bus to see any of the main sights we may have missed (including a special stop at the tour guide's brother's restaurant).
Early the next day, we caught the train to Aguas Calientes, the town beneath Machu Picchu, ready to catch the 5am bus up to Machu Picchu the next morning. Despite our very early start, we were nowhere near the first people into Machu Picchu, but luckily, as it is such a big place, we were able to see the famous view
of the main site without too many people, which was great and worth getting up early for. We spent a good six hours exploring Machu Picchu and then decided to walk back down to town.
Our next stop was the small town of Ollantaytambo in the Sacred Valley, a town that was apparently laid out by the Incas in the shape of a corn on the cob (this takes quite a lot of imagination to see). We had a lovely stay in Ollantaytambo, exploring the ruins above the town and spending a day walking up to some less well kept ruins of an Inca fortress.
After a great stay in Ollantaytambo, we headed back to Cusco briefly to catch a night bus to Arequipa. Our main reason for going to Arequipa was to visit the Colca Canyon, but we enjoyed exploring the city as well. The city has a historic centre with impressive colonial buildings such as the Santa Catalina Monastery, which is like a small spanish town within the city. We spent a couple of days in Arequipa, before heading off on an old rickety bus to the town of Cabanaconde at the top of the Colca
Canyon.
The Colca Canyon is just a smidgen smaller than the deepest canyon in the world. For some stupid reason we decided it would be a good idea to walk down and back up this canyon in one day to see the green oasis at the bottom. Although only a small area, the oasis was once an important agricultural plot due to its fertile ground and significantly lower altitude compared to all the villages at the top of the canyon. However, such intensive production on such a small area of land seems to have lead to problems with plant disease and the oasis now solely caters for tourists who are intrepid enough to climb down the canyon and wish to stay a night or two in one of the rustic oasis hotels, before tackling the long climb back up. We'd read on a blog that the walk down and back up the canyon was doable in one day, but tough and was for "serious walkers" only.
So early the next morning, fuelled on cactus juice, we decided that yes we were "serious walkers" and set off. The walk down in the fresh morning air and the swim in
a hotel's open air pool in the oasis was lovely. The walk up in the midday heat and at significant altitude was not. After four hours of solid uphill with very little shade, we finally made it back up to the top of the Canyon, where we had to question whether we really were "serious walkers" (we felt better however, when we met a fit looking German couple, who we're finding the ascent just as difficult as us and also when we heard an American lady proclaiming it would be "impossible to go up and down the Canyon in one day"). A few hours later, after a tasty alpaca stew for dinner and a couple of big beers, we congratulated ourselves on conquering the Canyon and decided we were in fact "serious walkers" after all.
We returned to Arequipa for one day and then caught a night bus up to Paracas on the Peruvian Coast, where we spent a few days staying with the family Liz volunteered with in 2007 in the small fishing town of San Andres. In this time we visited the Islas Ballestas, Paracas National Reserve, the sand dunes at Huacahina and sampled Pisco (Peruvian brandy)
at an artisan Pisco bodega (even though it was only eleven o'clock in the morning).
After Pisco we headed up to the Peruvian capital, Lima, where we spent a couple of days enjoying the clean and cosmopolitan streets of Miraflores and replacing some of our threadbare clothing, having noticed how scruffy we now looked.
Our next destination was the town of Huaraz, back up at 3091 metres above sea level and next to the spectacular Cordillera Blanca. We didn't take to Huaraz itself, so decided to base ourselves at the smaller town of Caraz. From Caraz we made our way up into the mountains to walk to a high altitude glacial lake called Laguna 69. The walk took us through spectacular and weird scenery and finally to a brilliant blue lake beneath a glacier at 4600 metres above sea level. We'd been warned that this walk was not to be embarked on lightly as it was pretty tough, but after the Colca Canyon it seemed relatively easy (for us "serious walkers" anyway).
From Huaraz we had planned to carry on through the north of Peru, crossing into Ecuador over land. However, we decided that we really needed
to get a move on, so we flew to Quito, ready for our next adventure on the Galápagos Islands.
Things we've learnt in Peru:
- It is impossible to get Liz passed a sign that says giant waffles.
- Peru has an amazing selection of bizarre looking and great tasting fruits, many of which we'd never seen or tasted before. We OD'd on chirimoya.
- Walking up and down the Colca Canyon in one day is for "serious walkers" only.
- We have achieved "serious walker" status despite the Canyon almost killing Liz.
- You can visit anywhere you want to in Peru as long as you take a tour. Independent travel is more of a challenge. For this reason we now need a ten day holiday in the Galapagos.
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