Colca Canyon

Thursday 15th May

It was an early start for the Colca Canyon tour. The reason for the early start, we were off to see some condors. Unlike other animals on this trip they didn't disappoint. We went to a viewing point called Cruz de Condor at 9am, and as if on some schedule they appeared. It was pretty impressive seeing them soaring about, although there were so many people there it felt more like an amusement park that wildlife viewing.

The condors may have been amazing, but the canyon itself was a bit disappointing. It was not as sepctacular as I expected. After all this is a deeper canyon than the Grand Canyon itself (and not even the biggest in the world, there is another nearby even deeper). I don't know why, something to do with the perspective effect from the mountains behind, but it didn't appear to outdo the Grand Canyon. That was my opinion and I haven't been there, but those on the trip who have been to the Grand Canyon felt the same.

The only good thing is that it finally warmed up after last nights coldness. Of course the warmness was helped by the fact that we lunched at hot springs, where most of us (even me) took a dip. They weren't too hot, but at least they weren't that smelly.

After that it was off to Arequipa. It wasn't as long a drive as some of the others, and it was on a better road. We hit the high point of the whole tour on this trip, a pass at 4,900 metres. We got out at that point and looked around. The number of piles of stones for Pachamama was amazing (the local mother earth goddess, who is honoured by piles of stones at mountain passes). I did add a stone to one and made my wish.

Then it was downhill to Arequipa. This is the largest city we have been in since Santiago. We got all the usual safety warnings, but it seemed quite nice. A group of us went out to get a kebab for dinner and so were walking along looking in kebab shops when we saw Ali and Fiona from our Lares team. Its a small world in South America. Stupidly we didn't go into the little kebab cafe they were in and instead went for a big kebab restaurant. The food in our place was really good, but the service was terrible. Nobody got a drink before their food, and some drinks even arrived after the food had been finished. We wanted those drinks free, but instead the restaurant offered Zambuka shots as compensation. As we didn't order these we left them in protest, a tough decision.

After dinner we went to a night club called Deja Vu where there was a live band playing. There was a lot of dancing. My roomie, Jono, pulled two local birds, but before I headed off he did give me most of his money and his credit cards, just in case he was getting in over his head.