Peru - part 2: 17th May - 27th May 2011

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After the surprisingly smooth border crossing from Ecuador, we were dropped in the town of Tumbes at 9pm. A short tuk tuk ride took us to a public bus which was departing for Mancora, 2 hours south. It was again a very slow journey offering almost door to door service for the many locals on board. We eventually pulled into Mancora and managed to find a cheap hostel still open with a spare room. It felt great to finally arrive after 16 hours of frustratingly slow buses. We slept well that night and woke up the next day ready to explore the small town.

Mancora is a rustic beach destination where you can surf. Again it was not a patch on the Caribbean but the weather was warm and the sea refreshingly cool. We spent the day on the beach, eating lunch at a beach front restaurant. Dan rented a surf board but was instantly disappointed, the surf here was nothing compared to Montanita, in fact there was only one break that was surfable. It was so crowed by locals and beginners that it was near impossible to catch a wave without someone else cutting in or being shouted down by an angry instructor. The tide was coming in and Laura got caught out when an unexpected huge wave came up the beach and soaked everything causing her to jump and up break her sunglasses! (They’d done well to make it this far to be fair, all the way from Thailand!) That evening we had a really good meal – a Thai restaurant had been recommended by the man in the surf shop and the food was delicious – we thought we might go back there in 2 days time for Dan’s birthday meal. A second day was spent in much the same fashion, relaxing in the sun and enjoying the beach life.

Then came the morning of 20th May – Dan’s 25th birthday! We had agreed that this year we wouldn’t buy each other birthday presents (pointless really when we are never apart to buy a surprise) but Laura couldn’t let him have nothing to open, so Dan very excitedly unwrapped a different selection of sweets and chocolates. We skyped home so the Hunn’s could wish the old man a happy birthday and then went for brunch at the beach. Dan enjoyed a very fresh and tasty prawn cocktail before we spent the afternoon chilling out on the beach. We were rather surprised to find some dead dinosaur looking creatures on the beach, they must have been some sort of eel with massive teeth, we’re not sure what killed them all. We enjoyed a pisco sour cocktail just before sunset and then a large beer on the beach once more before going home to shower. We donned our smartest gear and headed to a restaurant we would normally deem as too expensive, but this was a special occasion! We even treated ourselves to some wine – a first for a long time! Dan ate tuna steak, and even managed to persuade Laura to sample some (she hasn’t eaten fish since a child) and the conclusion was that it tasted like meat so what’s the point, just eat meat!! We rounded off the meal with a nice crumble, although not a patch on watch our grandmothers make! We headed to a bar for a few more drinks to end a very relaxing and pleasant day.

Day two of being a 25 year old for Dan wasn’t so pleasant... he spent the day feeling ill in bed with a bout of food poisoning. After playing nurse, Laura took herself off to the beach and the lady at the hostel kindly let us have a late check out so Dan could stay near the bathroom. Unfortunately we had booked a bus for 6pm that evening so Dan bravely packed up and we set off on one of our longest journeys yet. Just what you need when you are throwing up!! 18 hours later we arrived into Lima; somewhere we had already spent one night a month ago and weren’t bothered about spending any longer. Time being very precious as we near the end of the trip, we booked straight onto another 16 hour bus leaving in 3 hours time. Just long enough for a disappointing meal at the bus station (Dan was finally feeling a bit better luckily) and a quick look around a dodgy market. Here we managed to get 2 cheap Boca Junior football shirts ready for when we hopefully go to a match in June – Laura’s first ever football shirt!

The 16 hour bus to Arequipa was made slightly longer when the bus temporarily broke down. We were very glad to finally move into a hostel nearly 40 hours after leaving our last one! The shower felt very good! Arequipa is Peru’s second largest city and nicknamed the ‘White City’ due to its light coloured volcanic rock architecture. We set off to explore, starting at a really nice little restaurant called Crepisimo where we ate in a pretty traditional courtyard. Next stop was Museo Sanctuarios Andinos, well we hadn’t done a museum in a while! We were shown a 20 minutes National Geographic video which introduced and explained what we were about to be shown. In 1995 an anthropologist called Dr Johan Reinhard discovered ‘Juanita’, a young Inca princess who had been sacrificed as a gift to the mountains to ensure no more volcanic eruptions. Her body had been frozen for over 500 years and kept in immaculate conditions by the freezing temperatures (she was discovered after an eruption which had melted the surrounding ice). We learned how she had to trek all the way from Cuzco and then 6288 metres up Volcan Ampato before they drugged her and made the final sacrifice with a blow to her head! Lucky girl! Still it was very interesting and very important to the Inca culture. After the video we were given a guided tour around the artefacts that were found along with her body (and 5 other child scarifies found in the area) before we got to see the ice princess herself, in a box within a box within a box and still frozen to help the preservation. It was an interesting tour and as Dan put it ‘you can’t get too bored in an hour!’

We sat in Plaza de Armas soaking up the sun and avoiding the pigeons, wandered around the artesian markets and shops and then begun researching tour companies. We wanted to visit the Canon del Colca – the world’s second deepest canyon at 3191m (second only to its neighbour Canon del Cotahuasi which is 163m deeper!). This can be done independently, but Naomi and Steve had said nothing but good things about the tour they did here, and more importantly it was really cheap so decided we’d save ourselves the hassle of more public transport! Our research paid off and we booked a 3 day 2 night tour for $130 peso (about £29) and this included transport, accommodation, all food and our guide! Not bad at all especially when you compare it to the Inca Trail which cost over 500 US dollars, ouch!! The down side of this tour was the 3am collection time – just what we wanted after 2 nights sleeping on buses! We spent the evening packing our small backpacks and going for a quick but tasty pizza before trying to get an early night.

3am came around all too quickly and we soon found ourselves once more trying to nap on a bus for the 3rd night in a row – this one being a cramped mini bus going over very bumpy roads! We stopped in a town called Chivay at 6.30am for a quick (and rather disappointed) breakfast. It was then back on the bus and we drove to the Cruz del Condor look out at 3700m. The scenery here was very impressive looking down into the Canyon and we were pleased to find 3 condors circling around over head. They just seem to glide through the air – huge birds and their wingspans can reach 2.8m and they live for 60 years! There were plenty of locals around selling all sorts of local arts and crafts but we refrained from purchasing anything as we didn’t want to carry it! We continued our drive onto the town of Cabanaconde where we prepared ourselves to start the trek. We got to watch a parade by the local children, very cute but definitely the worse marching band we have ever heard! Finally at 10am we begun walking, 8 of us in the group - 3 French, 1 German, 1 Canadian, 1 Chilean and us, led by our local guide Pepe. We also adopted a local dog who apparently does the 3 day tour whenever a group comes by! The first hours walking was flat and then begun the steep 1200m descent into the canyon. Health and safety isn’t at the fore front of Peruvian minds, there is no way this trail would be allowed in England without huge hand rails and barriers everywhere! We were walking on very narrow, sandy paths with near vertical drops. Poor Dan was doing this in old trainers with no grip – something he quickly regretted! It took about 3 hours to reach the bottom and we were exhausted when we finally made it! Turns out downhill walking can be difficult and we were both suffering with a bit of exhaustion after our recent sleeping patterns – 3 night buses in a row isn’t good preparation for a 3 day trek! (We naively thought we’d still be fit from our Inca trail). A short walk along the river led us to our accommodation where we had a late lunch of alpaca which tastes a bit like mutton. We were the last group into camp and this meant the showers were cold but we were pleased to find we had a room to ourselves (we expected dorms given the price we had paid). We really did feel truly shattered so once we were clean we headed to bed and slept until dinner! Dinner was sociable but the conversation wasn’t flowing overly smoothly with French, Spanish and English all being spoken but not understood by all. Still tired we returned to bed early doors did a scorpion and spider check as advised by Pepe and called it a night. We both slept soooo well despite the freezing cold conditions.

We awoke the next morning to a fantastic view of the canyon, and enjoyed pancakes for breakfast before embarking on the guided section of our tour. Pepe taught us all about the local fruits, flora and fauna found in the Canyon and their uses. We each had our faces painted with dye for cactuses and our favourite bit was went we got to sample the local fruits. This included avocados, pakay, a really sour fruit a bit like a kiwi called samcayo, an orange fruit full of pips called tuna and chirimoya – our favourite which tasted a bit like melon but with the consistency of avocado. The walk was ‘Inca flat’ i.e. up and down but nothing too strenuous and we passed through a couple of small villages where we saw real tradition Peruvian living in action. We reached our next accommodation early in the afternoon. This was called ‘The Oasis’ and comprised a lovely blue swimming pool and mud hut accommodation. Perfect! We really enjoyed lunch – stuffed avocado – we can’t get enough of it! The pool was very refreshing and we dried off in the sun before playing some cards and writing some diary. After a 3 course meal we once again called it an early night, the alarm was set for 5am to ensure we could do most of our uphill walking in the cool before the sun came up.

At 5.30am, we were ready at the meeting point set for our morning hike. Petra, the German lady soon joined us, but there was no sign of the others or Pepe the guide. It turned out they had stayed up until 3am drinking! Eventually someone woke Pepe up and he gave us the all clear to head off without the others. We had to climb 1200 meters on steep zigzagging paths – something Laura was pretty scared of given how difficult she found the Inca Trail! The lack of sun made the going much easier and the 3 of us soon got into a good rhythm meaning we made good progress. We felt pretty smug when one of the French girls passed us on a mule she had hired to ride up instead of walking, lazy! Unfortunately our delayed start meant the sun soon appeared and we begun to run out of water – the going got tougher. Eventually, after 3 hours we made it to the top and it felt great! We hung around and waited for our guide and the rest of the group to show up and then headed back into Cabanaconde where we had a well deserved breakfast. It was then back onto the bus and off to a couple of other look out points for some good photographs before we arrived at some hot springs. It was very soothing on our tired legs, but probably a bit too warm given the heat of the midday sun. The final lunch wasn’t included in the price of our tour, and given we’d just had breakfast; we opted out and enjoyed a chirimoya instead. The journey back was a long one, but we got to stop at 4900m where we were able to photograph the 3 surrounding volcanoes (Volcan Chucura 5,360m, Volcan Mismi 5,672m and Volcan Ubinas 5,672m) but we didn’t hang around long enough for anyone to feel the effects of altitude sickness. We arrived back into Arequipa just after 6pm; we said our goodbyes to Pepe and the rest of the group and walked back to our hostel for a well deserved shower. All in all a, very enjoyable and successful tour that we would highly recommend. We ended the day with dinner at a Mexican called Tacos y Tequilla – great value and excellent food!

Given our short time schedule we really needed to be moving on. Our plan was to travel to Puno, a small town on the edge of Lake Titicaca (the world’s highest lake), visit the floating islands, then cross the border and continue on into Bolivia. However, we had learned of problems between the 2 countries which had resulted in a completely shutting the border both on land and on the lake. We heard stories through friends we had met, of boats being refused entry into Peru and therefore having to travel another 10 hours back to Bolivia. A bit of internet research showed us that road blocks were now in place and the situation was becoming dangerous as food shortages became a real problem so buses were being hijacked and tourists stuck. A tiny part of us thought this would make an interesting travelling tale, but we really didn’t have time to be delayed. So unfortunately Lake Titicaca got cut (from this trip anyway) and we rerouted back through Chile (for the third time – our passport pages are now pretty full of stamps).

In total we spent 24 days in Peru (the 4th longest duration behind Auz, NZ, and Thailand) and we loved it. It is an incredibly diverse country (and pretty big – 5 times larger than the UK) and we are glad that we got to experience the jungle, beaches, canyons, mountains, desert lands and importantly, the Inca sites. We left feeling like we have seen the highlights Peru has to offer (bar Lake Titicaca) and would love to come back again one day to explore the rest.

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Comments

[John Rayner]

Peru part 2
What a shame you missed Lake Titicaca. It is unlike anything you will have seen thus far. I have a picture of Annette and the rest of the ladies on our tour dressed in traditional clothes. It looks like an audition for Widow Twankey!!!!!! Stay safe and enjoy the rest of the trip. John