The most touristy place in the world

So I did manage to leave Huacachina at 8am in the morning, although only just due to a slight issue with forgetting to go to sleep the night before - oops. Yeah Nasca lines with a hangover - not the best idea ever. Still they were very cool, looked a lots smaller from the air than I expected, but very clear and in the evening we went to a planetarium show about them, which was excellent, explained all the theories and afterwards we got to look up a telescope at the moon and jupiter. Have pictures of the moon on my camera now. Not that I?ve never done that before, but it was still cool and the picture looks wicked, you can zoom right into the craters.

So after the sick making plane ride over the line (none of us were sick, but I?ve heard we were more the exception than the rule, have heard stories of whole planes of people vomitin – nice!) we went to a cemetery in the desert where they discovered loads of Incan graves and they have all these mummies, which are really impressive, but like, just exposed to the open air, which I?m sure can not be good for them.

Then in the evening onto Arequipa which is a beautiful city, did the toursity stuff during the day and organized a 3 day trek in and out of the second deepest canyon in the world. Thinking to myself, this can not be a good idea – aargh I?m gonna die! So we set off early the next morning, me a Canadian girl called Maggie, two other English girls (sorry one English and one Scottish) , Ailsa and Bev and two Isreali women, Nomi and Zoha and our guide Roberto. And you know what I survived, and not even that apparently I was the best walker in the group – what was I saying about this whole getting fit thing?! Second night was wicked, we changed our plans to stay at a hostel Roberto recommended (which turned out to be run by his parents, hmm wonder why he recommended it!) but anyhow it was stunning. Perched up above the confluence of two rivers in the canyon bottom, with a blissful hot spring down by the river. When we arrived we were so hot we intended to go swim in the river, but foolishly tried the hot spring first, it took three attempts before we even reached the river, and even then it was the speediest dip ever and a sprint back to the blissful warm water. As the sun started to set we were taken fishing by Roberto and his father using long sticks with wire, a hook and a worm. Now Maggie, Ailsa and I (only three of us did this) we terrible, not even a single solitary fish was caught on any of our lines. Mean while Roberto?s dad was pulling out a trout every couple of minutes, which was lucky as he caught enough for all of us to eat fresh trout in the evening – don?t think fishing is my calling. After supper we were taught traditional dancing and treating to Roberto and friends playing guitars, pipes and singing, quality not fantastic, but excellent way to round off the evening before our 2am start the next day. Yes you read that right, starting to trek at 2am uphill! Uurgh, but it was done. Maggie and I arrived in our destination village at 7:15 in time for breakfast before the bus to see the condors, the others were too slow so didn?t get breakfast, ha ha, sorry me being evil. Then yeah bus to the condors, which were great, second biggest bird in the world. So in summary second deepest canyon second biggest bird. Next time I will have to do the deepest one, which is somewhere near here and see albatroses!! Went out for supper with everyone afterwards and then bus to tourist central – Cusco!!

Cusco is also beautiful, you can see the money the tourists bring in everywhere, did the sacred valley yesterday, went shopping, yey starting to get a big interest in souvenirs, bought a table cloth – very useful, and lots of 1 sol (20p) necklaces which you will all be getting for Christmas!! Off now to organize a trip to Machu Picchu, yep touristy me.

source: traveljournals.net

I love this town (Cusco not Puno)   The most touristy place in the world   Cina bonita!   The dog, the monkey and the graves   First few days in Peru  

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