Arequipa - Peru

The Place: In southern Peru, Arequipa is the second to Lima in terms of commerce and industry. It is however full of old Peruvian culture and history.

Some features: The old buildings and churches are made out of white rock being volcanic rock from the surrounding volcanoes.

Took a 2 day bus tour to colca canyon past the 3 main volcanoes one of which is still active. Had a great group including french, italian, peruvian, german, canadian and spanish aswell as some nuns singing their spanish praises. With English being the minority I got by with my rough spanish and after 2 days of them teaching me spanish and me teaching them english, my spanish has improved.

In the town of 'Chavay' about 3200m up in the Andes the locals still dress in their traditional clothes for the tourists and still farm inca style on terraced mountains.

Saw vicuñas in the wild.

Swam in hot baths (natural spring baths) in the town of Chavay.

Had some traditional supper listening to live Andean music (pan pipes and charangas). Drank some pisco puro, which is a drink made from la hoja (leaf) de coca. Pretty strong to taste but not that hectic.

Seeing 'Mamia Juanita', the 13 yr old mummy girl found in the volcano. She was an Incan offering to the mountains (gods) after the erruption of the nearby volcano. She´s the most well preserved natural mummy in the world and was accompanied with golden inca figurines, pottery and high quality clothes made from the wool of alpaca´s and vicuñas, preserved due to the ice in the mountains. She walked to the top of the mountain (an incredible feat) and was then killed by the incan priests after drinking a concoction to knock her out, then being hit on the head. She was a chosen one and was evidently considered highly by the Incans.

The highlight: Waking at 5 to go travel to see el vuelo del condor (flight of the condor) in the colca canyon. Was really hoping to see one but blown away to see more than 5 at a time souring under our view then over us, circling in the thermals for over an hour.

Strange observation: With the mix of tourists in the bus the comments you'd hear at a good view would be 'Bella!', 'Muy Bonita!', 'Oo la la!', and of course 'Jislaaikit!'