Cuzco

South America Day 9

Did I mention an early start? 4.20am! We had to be at the airport early for our flight to Cuzco. I think there are only 2 flights a day and our left at 6.50am meaning that we had to get organised early because of the group factor. The usual stragglers were slow getting off the mark again, obviously needing their beauty sleep (didn't work either ). We still managed to make the flight but breakfast was a tad rushed.

The flight wasn't direct. We touched down & swapped seats in Juliacca near Puno.

The flight from Juliacca to Cuzco gave us a look over the Altiplano with the volcanoes around Arequipa quite prominent. I've labelled a few of them. You can see how flat the Altiplano is which is hard to believe considering it's all well above 3000m above sea level. Most places around the world at that altitude tend to be a cluster of rugged snow capped mountain peaks. In contrast the Altiplano is a flat (relatively flat) dry desert.

This crazy twisted road was about the only other point of interest from the air. I have no idea how this is the easiest route to anywhere but the terrain around Cuzco is pretty rugged.
Eventually we made it to Cuzco in time for a late lunch.

Cuzco

Cuzco's a bit like Arequipa in that the buildings surrounding the main square (Plaza de Armas - for a change) had two levels with shops around the lower level & restaurants at the top. The buildings aren't anywhere as grand as Arequipa. Instead of the vast balconies, Cuzco has little balcony boxes. We took a punt with a pub of sorts that the three in shot (Mike, Nic & Polly) had come to. It turned out to be a fairly good call.

Cuzco's main square isn't as grand as the one in Arequipa, but it has it's charms. There's a Cathedral & a church. Pictured is the Cathedral. I like the bright coloured flower beds. Both the Cathedral & the Church have a real Spanish Gothic look to them.

Here's the Church in the Main square, La Compania. Not much to say about it. Just another church.

As mentioned before, Cuzco has these little timber balcony boxes instead of the vast verandas Arequipa has. It's very quaint.

The plan for the afternoon was to take a short uphill hike to the ruins of Sacsayhuaman (pronounced sexy woman, or close enough). We were to start the Lares trek the next day so a couple of hours wander would set us up for the 3 day trial ahead.
Cuzco was once the centre of the Incan empire before the Spaniards came along & trashed the place. The centre of Cuzco was Sacsayhuaman pictured here on the left hand hill above Plaza de Armas. It's a fairly steep climb to the ruins, but short enough not to be a drag. The right hand summit has a status of JC. Another legacy of the Catholic marauders.

On the way up the hill you have to clear the houses of the city via a seemingly endless set of stone steps.

Right at the upper boundary, there's a church, Santa Teresa, with a grand view of Cuzco. This photo is one of 3 I took to get a full panorama. The view from the ruins was even better.
Photographing the church we were standing in front of was pointless because it was shrouded by scaffold & plastic for renovations.

After a short but surprisingly tough climb, we reached the entrance to Sacsayhuaman. As for most tourist spots around the world, there was a ticket booth. We knew the scoop & bought the Tourist Pass that covered us for this & a number of other ruins around Cuzco & Sacred Valley, where we were headed the next day.Notice behind my sexy woman is one of many rock walls in the complex. The individual blocks are huge, but individually crafted to fit to the adjacent ones. Considering how massive the blocks are, the joints are almost air tight! They don't use mortar or fill the gaps with anything. It's shows the talents of the Incan people. The added interest is the fact that the Cuzco area gets regular earthquake visits & these walls are still as tight as they were centuries ago when they were constructed. Mean while, many of the European structures in the city below (including the Church & Cathedral mentioned before) have been destroyed & re-built more than once before.

The Incas were really quite civilized all things considering & their engineering feats are quite impressive. Think about how they managed to put that huge capping stone over the doorway. The Egyptians are renowned for moving big rocks around, but these people had a pretty good handle on it as well.The ruins look like the sands of time haven't been kind to them but the reality is that the Europeans dismantled it block by block & used the parts to build their churches & buildings down in the city below. It's kind of sad, but that's human nature for you.

90% of the South American population are Catholic & it shows. Standing at the high point of Sacsayhuaman, the ever present Christ the Redeemer was again a dominant feature of the landscape. It's lit at night so all the locals down in the city can see their saviour. It's kind of tacky really, but nothing you wouldn't see in Europe.

This view is more like what you'd expect to see at an Inca ruin. The terraces would have been for farming and even housing.

The terraces above are from where the previous shot was taken. It's a bit hard to get perspective, but believe me it's a pretty impressive structure considering the builders didn't have cranes or modern machinery.

Maybe this photo will cast some light on the situation. Check the huge rock to our left.
As you may have guessed, the Sacsayhuaman ruins impressed me. It's one of four within about 5 kms of this one.

The final comment from up on the hill at Sacsayhuaman is the view down to the city below. In the photo above you can see Plaza de Armas below with it's gardens & 2 churches.
We met up with Gemma & Emma from our tour group by chance & eventually headed back down to the hotel. I had started to feel the effects of the dodgy food at lunch the day before. It was the start of a couple of a horror 24 hrs for me & I wasn't alone. When I got back there were a couple of other casualties already hiding in their rooms.To make things worse, my faithful Merrel hiking shoes finally let me down. The toe on one of the boots came away from the sole 36 hrs before we were to hike for 3 days. Our tour guide Roberto took me down to the part of town that he'd told us earlier in the day, not to go to for emergency repairs. I was to go back & pick them up later that evening.

Cruzal Condor

South America Day 8

Colca Valley

The beds in the hotel at Coporaque were aweful! I don't think they even had a mattress. Enough said on that but the new day bought nice clear weather & a cool crisp morning. I was all excited because we were going to see condors

The hotel was too cheap to pay someone to mow the front lawn, so they have an alternate method. Llamowers are very popular in Peru.

To get to Cruzal Condor we headed out along the road that runs to the other side of Colca Canyon to where we stayed the night before. It's a mainly dirt road that has steep cliffs above on one side & steep cliffs below on the other. You can see the road to the right of picture following the canyon. Chivay that we'd just come from is far in the distance to the right.
There are also 3 little lakes to the left of shot that the guide made a big deal about. Can't really see what the big fuss was about myself. What is interesting, & not so apparent, is the aqueducts that criss cross through the valley. They were built by the local inhabitants centuries ago before Europeans came to South America. The Romans are always revered for their water transport systems, but it would seem that they weren't unique.

High in the cliffs above the road were more tombs. These ones were much harder to get to. I'm not completely sure how they did get to them....

Cruzal Condor

Cruzal Condor is the second deepest section of Colca Canyon. It's twice as deep as the Grand Canyon & is supposedly the second deepest canyon in the world behind near by, Cotahuasi Canyon. The walls aren't as steep as the Grand canyon, by the opposite side is much closer. The Grand Canyon is much more scenic, but it doesn't have condors!

Cruzal Condor was the next designated group shot. Everyone was in there this time.
Back Row L->R Melissa, Richard, Hina, Mike (messing up the photo again!) Kerri, me, Vincent, Vixy.
Front Row L->R Smita, Gemma, Emma, Special K, Polly, Nora, Nic.

These houses where across the canyon & far below where we were standing waiting for Condors. Considering the locals typically have fairly basic transport, living perched on a cliff is a pretty tough way to exist.
We spent a lot of time just sitting & waiting for a glimpse of a condor, so we checked out everything else of interest in the canyon.

There were plenty of birds to keep me interested & make sure the camera was good to go when a condor did arrive.
The Giant Humming Bird in the photo above was one of a number that were hanging around us. They are the largest humming birds on the planet & possibly the most brazen. They came up very close to us but just out of reach.

Right when we were about to give up on seeing a condor, Melissa & Richard spotted it first soaring high above us. The white collar gave it away as a condor, not a vulture (although they are closely related). It was so nice to see one free to soar rather then cooped up in a zoo like the only other condors I've seen.

Maca

Eventually we had to leave Cruzal Condor. It was a little disappointing that we only got to see the one condor & from so far away, but that's wildlife spotting for you. Wild animals never really perform on request.
On the way back to Chivay we made a stop at a village called Maca. It has this fancy white church (pictured). Apparently it's nothing that special inside. I was too scared to go in for fear of being hit by a lightning bolt. Not true. The huge number of tourists invading the locals' still active church put me off. I equivalate it to a hoard or people coming into your back yard to take pictures while you're having a 21st birthday party. It's just kind of rude.

This put me off Maca as well. This magnificent Andean Eagle was chained to a tee perch & used to extract money from tourists. I really cringe when I see raptors in captivity. Unfortunately one or two from our tour (you know who you are ) fed into it & had their photo taken with the bird. It's unfortunate the things people are allowed to do in less developed nations.

Altiplano

We stopped for lunch in Chivay on the way back to Arequipa, but at a different place this time. The food wasn't right & my bad food radar was spot on. Later that day I started to feel ill & was the start of 2 weeks of trouble & I wasn't alone. It's just one of those risks in South America. particularly in Peru & Bolivia.
We travelled back along the same route that we'd taken the day before. I made the driver stop a couple of times for Vicunas. This one was good because I managed to get my Animal + Scenery all in one, shot by catching the Vicuna in front of El Misti.

One more Vicuña for good luck.
The gang on the bus were getting shitty at me by this point with my asking the driver to pull over so I could take photos. But you know what? Too bad. It's probably the last time I'll ever go there & we weren't in any hurry. They'll get over it. I got my shot so I'm happy. They've probably forgotten about it by now. (Lucky I just reminded them.) As it was, some of my photos became quite popular later on in the trip, particularly the ones I took with the long lens.

Just before we started to descend the valley back into Arequipa, Ampato appeared out of the Altiplano. It was obscured by cloud on the out lap but the blue skies on the return trip gave us a great look at this white giant. Remember Ampato is the inactive volcano Juanita & the other child mummies were found. You can see why the ancient people of the area used to think this mountain holds special powers.
That's the last I have from the Arequipa area. For more photos from Arequipa & Colca Canyon, click on the following links. Arequipa, Colca Canyon. I've also added to the Andes Animals & Andes Birds albums.

We arrived back in Arequipa just before dark, dumped our gear in our rooms & set about finding a meal. We went to bed early because we had a very early start the next morning.
You can see the trip to this point on the map as a blue line. Notice the spur out to Colca Canyon. The next leg would be by air instead of lengthy stints on the bus. The only snag was the early start. A small price to pay.

Travel from Arequipa to Colca Valley

South America Day 7

Travel to Colca Valley

After breakfast we were on another bus and off to Colca Canyon. I was pretty excited about the possibility of seeing some wildlife including Vicuñas (wild variety of Llamas) and condors.
On the way out of Arequipa we stopped at a store to buy some supplies including cocoa leaves (yes the ones that cocaine is made from). I was more interested in snacks.
Just on the outskirts of Arequipa we stopped for some uninterrupted views of the surrounding volcanoes. The one in the shot above is Chachani, the one that looks more like a mountain range than a volcano. The one below is El Misti.

That's about it for Arequipa. We returned the following evening only to leave early the next morning so there's nothing to tell. For more photos from Arequipa, click on this link.

Leaving Arequipa, the bus soon climbed into the surrounding ranges. Pictured above is typical of the Altiplano (High Plain). It's not quite what I pictured the Andes Mountains to look like.
We were pushing 3000m by this point but it didn't look much like the revered Andes mountain range. It was incredibly dry as well with cactus scattered across the landscape surrounded by dry desert grasses. The only patches of green are the valleys where a small amount of water (mainly from condensation at high altitude than anything else) gathers, and allows for small farms (above).

Eventually the twisty climb gave way to open desert plains and straighter roads. Around the same time we pushed through the 3500m mark, the driver spotted some vicuñas.

There were once many different types of Camelids (camel like animals) in South America. Man domesticated most of them or wiped them out all together. Now there are two domesticated (Llamas & Alpacas) and 3 wild varieties, vicuñas being the most famous one.
Vicuñas are protected in Peru now, but the locals still round them up occasionally & shear their coats for them. Vicuña wool is apparently the softest animal fibre in the world (so they say) and clothing made from it fetches a tidy sum. Baby alpaca clothing is highly sort after in Peru but vicuña gear is right at the top of the heap and multiple times (10ish) more expensive.
They're skittish little creatures, about the same size as a small deer. Their round skulls & flattened back ears distinguish them from their relatives

This strange collection of sandstone pinnacles is known as the rock forest. It kind of looks like little black Xmas trees, don't you think. It's one of a number of attractions from the same spot.

This is the other natural sight from the same spot. We were pretty much on the opposite side of El Misti from Arequipa by that point.

The downside of the natural wonders is that it's a perfect spot for the locals to set up a tourist trap. It probably started up as a couple of local ladies with some rugs & necklaces to sell, but is now a number of stalls & a restaurant/coffee shop/trinket shop. The tourist buses were lined up 10 deep. I guess it was the only civilisation for a hundred kms each way. Where else was there to stop for weak bladders.
Our group did the obligatory wander around, some were more interested than others. Polly (left with light blue singlet) doesn't seem overly impressed. Mike (centre with white sunglasses) was busily taking photos like a good tourist.
The side story to this was the coca leaves. Most of us had tried them & hated the taste. It didn't seem to alleviate the effects of the altitude either. The tourist stop had all manner of coca cookies & different sweets loaded with the stimulant. I bought a pack of each for the trip. I found the sweets worked better than the leaves.....

This is what I like to call a Peruvian Come in Spinner. Looks all very innocent, but this is a classic shot for a tourist to take & the pie eater pictured had her hand out for a "donation" every time the camera clicked. Kerri took this one & escaped the toll by using the long lens.

No. Not sheep. These are alpacas. They are the high altitude version of sheep though. Most people have heard of alpacas. They're the smaller of the two domestic camelids. Their close cousins, the Llamas, have a head much more like a camel. Alpacas are used for wool, meat & I'm guessing milk, but can't confirm that. I can confirm that alpaca stew is delicious.
After the stop at the tourist trap, the scenery changed from dry plains & vicunas to wetlands & alpacas.

The best fleece from alpacas come from the young ones. They have softer fur until they're a couple of years old.

Llamas are the bigger cousins of the alpacas. They don't uses them so much for wool, but more as pack animals. They're quite tough & strong animals & are more sure footed than horses, particularly on the steep high mountain trails

The Peruvians are resourceful people. This guy has some how ocky strapped his alpaca to the back of his motorbike.

Toward the end of the long journey from Arequipa, we started to descend the final valley toward Chivay, the main settlement in Colca Canyon. The bus stopped at yet another local roadside stall. The view of Chivay (pictured) can't be knocked. The brown baby alpaca was a useful money spinner for the locals who wanted money every time you took a picture of it.

The Peruvians are known for their colourful clothing. This little girl certainly had the colours going on.

Plaza de Armas, Chivay. Yes, even the small townships have a Plaza de Armas. The escarpments that surround Chivay are really quite daunting. Chivay sits nearly at the bottom of Colca Canyon (3800m) & considering we'd just descended from 4910m, you're looking at the best part of a kilometre to the plateau above.

We had a nice buffet lunch in Chivay where we tried alpaca stew (very nice) and Mike cleared out the guinea pig stew so I didn't get a chance to try it. I imagine it's quite like rabbit (haven't had that either ).
After lunch, we piled back into the bus & travelled the 20 odd minutes along a bumpy dirt track to the small village of Coporaque. It's a funny little place with the only sign of tourism being the hotel we stayed in (the yellow buildings amongst the blue roofs). Unfortunately the water was off due to town water issues. This made the urgent ablutions after the long day a bit tricky. We were off for a short hike almost straight away anyhow & they had promised the water would be back on by the time we returned.

The tour always does this short hike or similar to get the travellers accustomed to hiking at altitude before the 3 day hike coming up a few days later. It also gives the tour guides a chance to see if there are any amongst the group that are clearly going to be a problem. A couple of the stragglers started to become apparent even early in this first hike.
Having spent a lot of time hiking in the Rockies during the northern summer, I was feeling pretty good. The couple of days in Arequipa had let my body adjust to the altitude & was ready for the next level. Kerri had her trusty hiking poles & was powering along as well.

This was the hike destination. More dead people. The local Incan people had been burying their dead relatives up in the cliffs for many centuries until the practise was outlawed by the Catholic Spaniards a few centuries ago.The Incans liked to bury their people high in the cliffs out of harms way overlooking the countryside. Not such a bad concept & hardly unique.

We descended back down to the hotel in fading light. We showered & jumped back on the bus. Dinner was in Chivay followed by a trip to the hot springs. I'm not normally a fan, but I was feeling a bit beaten up after the multiple changes in altitude & hiking so it was really quite relaxing.

I should mention that both Karishma (Special K as we came to know her) and Emma were both quite ill with altitude sickness during the day when we were above 4500m on the plateau. Needless to say, those two struggled during the afternoon hike as well. It's funny how some people can handle altitude better than others.