27/09/2012 - 29/09/2012 - Sand in the pants

All fine and dandy, hanging out in the sandy...

Mirador of Yanahuara #2

Mirador of Yanahuara 

Got back to Arequipa after dark, only to find our previous hostel was fully booked out. A brief panic, but then ended up in a place just down the road for the same price which included a private bathroom and TV with cable. Ker-ching!

Had a bit of back and forth with the doctor before locking in the second (and final) rabies vaccine – fortunately only had to wait 20 minutes this time round before being seen. After a temporary scare resulting from some flu like symptoms (probably just a mild flu!),

I'm sure I left it in here somewhere...

The view from the buggy's cockpit

 Annaliza was now officially safe from rabies. Relief all round! Stopped off at the Mirador of Yanahuara for more classic views of the picturesque city, and then loaded up on the protein with a shared BBQ to stock up before the night journey.

We knew this part of the trip had to be money...

Protein, anyone?

Disembarked at Ica after an interrupted night, and straight on to Huacachina – a Peruvian holiday meant that prices were ramped up for the weekend, so we settled for a more basic habitacion. Huacachina is famous for appearing on the 50 sole note, and is a lagoon (and therefore town) in the middle of sand dunes galore. An incredibly popular place with the locals, where the pastimes seemed to be journeys on buggies; sandboarding; boat trips on the lagoon; drinking; and fashion parades on the streets (although not necessarily in that order). Tried out the buggy journey and some sandboarding as the sun was going down, and our driver seemed to thrive off the ladies’ screams – would never be allowed in the developed world but tens of vehicles trawl off around these dunes at high speed providing a rollercoaster style journey which just can’t be environmentally friendly… Sandboarding was fun as well, although we weren’t given the chance to try standing up – looking at our boards though that perhaps wasn’t too bad a thing!

Gone! Not sure about the style...

Going...

Going...

Enjoying a sandy sunset

Huacachina - in amongst the dunes

Desert Nights - a great place
to follow Europe's triumph!

Now that's more like it!

The next day was our laziest of the trip so far – we found a little place called Desert Nights which had excellent food and a decent Wi-fi connection, so it was a perfect place for Annaliza to do some trip planning and Tony to catch up on sport – latest football scores; the AFL grand final result; the Twenty20 world cup; and, most importantly, the Ryder Cup. It was the last day of the latter, and we couldn’t keep our eyes away from the BBC text updates as one of the most amazing comebacks in golfing history unfolded. Who knew that following sports by text updates could be such fun?!?

Not sure who came up with the
name Movidick...

Sand running - an up and
coming sport

Found time for a 20 minute row round the lake, on the faithful tub ‘Movidick’, and squeezed in a walk (scramble) up to the top of a nearby dune. Here we were soothed by the dulcet tones of passengers screaming on their buggy rides, before enjoying some ‘sand running’ back down to the town.

Good steering Annaliza - heading
straight for another boat!

Key Learnings:

1. Peruvian nurses are not yet 100% clear on how to administer a vaccination – always reassuring when the nurse is reading the instruction as the needle is injected!

Yummy!

2. If you ever go on a sand buggy, make sure all your possessions are secure. Hats are safer than suncream, as they catch in the back of the buggy… If you do one of them in Peru, be warned that instructions will not be forthcoming prior to takeoff!

3. Banoffee pie is delicious wherever you can find it.

25/09/2012 - 27/09/2012 - The Flight of the Condor

Difficult to get a sense of perspective, but take our word for it - with 4m wingspans, these birds are BIG!

Heading in to the mountains

Is that a canyon I see before me?

Our trip to Cabanaconde was a new low point in bus travel to date – we were stuck in the front seat with a painfully small amount of legroom, and Tony’s face was in far too close proximity of the rear end of the standing passengers…

Awesome sunset from the bus

Pre-Inca terracing the region is
famous for

Upon arrival, we spent the evening gossiping with a lovely English couple from Colliers Wood – small world! Couldn’t convince them to come trekking with us the next day, and after rising early we were told that the bus wasn’t going. Cue another opportunistic Peruvian to the rescue – this time 10 of us in a ute where Tony was desperately clinging on for dear life at every corner! Cruz del Condor doesn’t get its name from the sparrows in the vicinity, so we breathed a sigh of relief when we saw one of these masters of the air gliding gracefully on the thermals at the canyon edge.

Dodging the landslides

Getting down to it

Looks idyllic...

The Oasis, from above

We were shortly joined by the hoards arriving by the bus load, and made our escape to the start of the walk. Colca Canyon is rumoured by the Lonely Planet to be one of the deepest in the world, but after further research it’s probably not even in the top 10! That said, 4,160m deep is not to be sniffed at, and we pretty much got down to the canyon river in one stretch. Annaliza was suffering from a bit of flu (not rabies related, we hoped!!!), so wasn’t the happiest when it came to the uphill sections, but we made good time to the self-named Oasis at Sangalle. A strange place – 5 or 6 cold outdoor swimming pools at the bottom of a canyon with the same amount of resorts, but none with hot water or electricity! Dinner was therefore a candlelit affair, with us sharing a table with some (hate to say it!) interesting and friendly Germans.

More snow-capped mountain action

Pleased to have made it back to the top!

We were one of the last to rise the next day, but didn’t hang around before starting the hike back up. It was a grit the teeth affair, admiring the numerous cacti on display and avoiding the vast quantities of donkey droppings littering the path… Back in Cabanaconde, Annaliza really enjoyed a hot shower (so much so that she’d used all the hot water before Tony got his chance!) and a good feed prior to taking the bus back to Arequipa. Not an especially memorable journey, apart from the nail-biting 500+m one lane tunnel, with no way of knowing if something was coming the other way and no space for pulling over. Fortunately survived the scare!

Traditional dress

Key Learnings:

More pre-Inca terracing

1. Canyon walking is unusual - the fact you descend first and the finish with the uphill last provides a different challenge.

2. Swimming pools don't necessarily equate to a high standard of resort...

3. The traditional female attire in the Colca canyon region is amazingly colourful - almost trumps the bowler hats!

23/09/2012 - 25/09/2012 - A sleeper to Arequipa

6 satisfied customers following a hearty feed at Jack's Cafe...

At least the people knew when
we were back in Cusco!

We ummed and ahhed over how much time to spend in Cusco the second time round, but ended up just having a day – given it was a Sunday the main tourist attractions were all closed so we settled for a hearty lunch with the trekking crew at Jack’s Café (big breakfasts pretty much all round!) after a decent lie in, which would have been much better if it weren’t for the car alarm going off continuously between 6:30-7:30am!!!

Sillar rock - nothing silly about it!

Plaza de Armas, taxis, and El Misti
in the background - Arequipa to a T.

Had a follow up with the doctor in respect of the dog bite, although a different doc this time round had highly limited English ability (and no cool phone translating app!). Despite giving Annaliza repeated ‘OKs’, the amount he was babbling on to the nurse got us nervous again.

Quiet in the monastery

The Eiffel tower is better, but a close second perhaps?

Following an overnighter to Arequipa, some internet research (thanks Starbucks!) and a chat to Nurse Balfour we concluded that the risk wasn’t worth it and Annaliza needed to get the post-bite vaccine (it can take up to 6 months to know whether rabies was transmitted and once you have it there is no going back!). We found an English speaking doctor at a Children’s hospital, of all places and had the first of 2 required jabs – feeling much better that it was getting properly sorted.

A decent view from the monastery
rooftop - lucky nuns!

A trio of meats, and a stupid bib!

Wasn’t all fun and games though – we found Eiffel’s less celebrated iron bridge; wandered the city within a city at the Santa Catalina monastery; enjoyed the Sillar volcanic rock architecture and tambos (ancient houses rebuilt by the city government following the earthquakes); and supped on a Machu Picchu aperitif prior to bibbing up and sampling a trio of meats (alpaca, lamb and beef). Great city.

This is a Machu-Picchu aperitif.
Tony preferred the ruins!

Key Learnings:

1. Oltursa are an awesome bus company – half the price of the travellers favourite Cruz del Sur but same quality with meals, airport style check-in and service.

2. As far as we could tell, taxi driver is the #1 job in Arequipa. It’s impossible to walk a block without passing double figures! They don’t need to take the knowledge however, we had to ask 8 before someone knew how to get us to the Children’s hospital. It was 15 minutes away…

Baby Alpaca or maybe Alpaca?

3. Street vendors in Cusco and Arequipa boast about selling baby Alpaca products – got the impression that our purchases to vary the wardrobe (and keep us warm!) were more maybe Alpaca than baby Alpaca…

4. After too many emails to count, 6 failed sales and a chunk of heart ache, we’ve finally sold the Beaut! If you can avoid it, don’t try and sell a car when you’re not in the country…

22/09/2012 - Machu Picchu – Bless you! – Thank you

[OK, so Tony might be the only one who thinks that ‘Machu Picchu’ sounds like a sneeze. Leave that one there…]

Machu Picchu from Machu Picchu mountain - it;s a long way up, that;s for sure!

Watching the parting of the mist...

Planting a picture

This was the biggie – even though we weren’t arriving through the classic Inca trail (the proper Gringo Trail, which had been booked out almost 6 months in advance so unrealistic for people with plans as fluid as ours!) we were still pretty excited. Not by the early morning though – got up at 4:30am to ‘see’ the sunrise in the cloudy mountains and avoid the ridiculous amount of crowds that arrived later in the day. Made a collective group decision to take the bus up, rather than the silly amount of steps in the dark, with a view to conserving energy for the rest of the day. Hippo took us on a 2½ hour tour of the ruins, taking in the various sacrificial areas, the astronomical site, the temple of the Condor and the terraces whilst the whole place steadily came out of the clouds. Pretty much every time you got a wider view of the place, it was impossible not to take a picture. Spellbinding stuff.

Almost as good as us in real life!

Hippo tutoring time

Tony's llama call was a success!!

An emotional farewell to Hippo

Hippo said I looked like Hiram Bingham in the ole
Akubra - maybe true but didn't have Billabong in his day!

Some hot stepping

Looking out from the sun gate

Had a revitalising coffee and snack (breakfast at 5am had been a very rushed affair!) before embarking on more walking on our already sore feet. We’d booked so late we’d also missed out on tickets for the Huayna Picchu walk, but rather than whining too much we took on Machu Picchu mountain instead, a far more gruelling affair according to Hippo. It didn’t disappoint – nothing but large stone steps the whole way up, but amazing to have such an overview of the Incan ruins. It just looked so neat – unreal almost!

The classic shot from the guardhouse 

Since we weren’t sure we’d ever make it back there, took full advantage of our day there and also headed to the Sungate and the Incan Bridge, then at around 4pm took the long descent back down to Agues Calientes. During this we really appreciated not having walked up them – we were on our feet as it was! Another pizza and a couple more Cusquena’s preceded the train and then minivan back to Cusco – a truly amazing day.

Only in Inca times would a bridge
like this be built... The trail also leads
into a mountain. Crazy!

Key Learnings:

1. Treat Inca steps with respect – before you know it they can bring you to your knees (especially following 4 days hiking!)

2. Peruvians don’t seem to fully get the concept of queuing, especially for toilets – a persistent presence is required to ensure your place inline is maintained!