Yes so we arrived safely to Arequipa which is Peru´s 2nd city. Its got perfect weather ... seriously like ... sunny 300 days a year, cool at night so nice to sleep, no mossies, cheap beer, nobody harassing us to buy finger puppets, paintings, etc, good food and its just a normal real town which is a relief after 12 days around Cusco and mass tourism!! Staying in an ok hostel (PS in case your wondering why I keep mentioning hostels its for anyone else who´ll be along soon after us!) Hostal Nunez. The ensuite rooms were great but we´re going cheapo now so in smaller non-ensuite room. Saying that hardly any backpackers about so have the top floor to ourselves. Really nice rooftop for brekkie.
Doing a spainish course with CEICA and I have to say its brilliant. We´re doing 5 hours a day and its all beginning to make sense in shops, restaurants, etc. Would highly recommend this place to learn spanish. Its in a little house, with lovely garden and room, about $10 us per hour for us both and really good, professional and keen teachers. Did a cooking course last night with them and made cerviche (Peru´s national dish of fish cooked in lime - really nice!), cuasa papa (which is like a potato castle made from egg, spuds, avocado and mayonaise mixed in layers - its ok), and some yummy dessert made from purple-black corn syrup with fruit. Tell ya what tho - the Peruvians are seriously sweet toothed. All of them out 3- 8 spoons ofsugar in tea ... really they do!! there´s cake shops everywhere and ya its a bit of a tubby place (altho not obese just well rounded). Oh and the meals here are MASSIVE ... did I say this before? Like I can eat for Ireland and I find I leave half my food frequently as they just serve way too much.´Oh and its about 2-3 euro for a litre of beer .... yummy!!
What else is in Arequipa ... nice main square and buildings. Think its called the white city cos of the stone they use. Found awesome coffee (well for Peru) too in Manola just off the square.
Annoying things are the little taxis, buses and colectivos (hiaces with lunny drivers which are local buses really) that continously beep the horns ... and I mean all the time ... not just at each street corner but every 10 metres ... really. And if someone stops, everyone behind the car just beeps the horn even if its for a red light (all about 6 of them!!). Also the beds here are the lumpiest things ever ... I think they went out of their way to make our pillows and bed lumpy. But aside from that ... we´re happy being spanish students (altho learnt the irregular verbs today and that sucks!) until tomorrow.
Think we´re going to head to salt plains in Uyuni (Salar del Uyuni), Bolivia on saturday via either aArica in Chile or else La Paz. Will decide on beer tonight!!
Colca Canyon ... did the trip last weekend. The plan was to do the 2 day tour and see what it was like and go back for more this weekend after spanish course. Decided tho not to go back as its savage dry - suppose it is the Atacama desert for a reason - hence the plan to head south.
The tour was ... well VERY touristy. It was cheap out us$20 but jaysus they did their utmost to squeeze every last sole out of us. The drive is amazing (could also have done in public transport), over the desert, passing by ChaChani, El Misti and other volcanoes I cant remember the name of. The highest pass was 4900m and the view was incredible. The road was a bit wild tho, drove thru an (extinct) volcano at one stage, the driver was a headcase - I wouldn´t put him drivign nails, and in some parts drops of 1000 (ya 1km) straight down. Stayed in Chivay (with obligatory Irish pubs - was alright, the most irish thing was the name McElroy!), had to do tourist lunch, dinner and again lunch the next day but in fairness the food was good. Didthe hot springs as well which were really good and clean ... recommended!
On the sunday we got dragged out of bed at 5am to go and see the condors ... supposed to go early as best time of day. So off we went, and then we stopped at not 1 but 3 little villages on the way so it was 9am by the time we got to the condor lookout. I seriously thought that was pulling the p1ss like. In one place there was little boys danvcing around a fountain at 6am for the tourists ... jayus whats that about. And the usual hawkers selling stuff everywhere but I suppose at least they didn´t follow us. Its a cool drive (altho a bit scary) out to the highest part of the canyon which is 3700m or something AND we did see condors AND they did make the trip worthwile as did the scenery but we could have done with less ´sheep tourism!´ Oh also seeing llamas, alpacas and vicunas in the wild is very cool!
One last rant for the week. There´s a delicacy here called ´cuy´which is guinea pig. Now I´m no biologist (I cant even spell the word!) but dotn guinea pigs look a little like colourful rats??? We´ve all seen road kill ok (especially in Oz) and you know the flattened look it gets after a day or so ... well thats what cuy looks like on a plate except the head is fully intact and not squashed, the little paws have all the nails etc but apart from that everything is flattened as they cook it under a big stone. Our spanish teacher said check the tail before eating as if its long then its RAT!! yummo ... on that note I´ll sign off and have a good w-e all!!
We´re off to Chile or Bolivia or both .... wahoooooo!!
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