Amy Blog 1
Hi everyone, here is another travelogue from Amy and Craig, here in sunny Arequipa. We don{t mind if you dont want to get these so, let me know if you want off the dist list, and if you like you can check Craig[s blog http||craiginperu.blogspot.com too, he is writing his own and , we[ll do a combined log there later. Hard to type on latin american keyboard!
Arequipa is the "second city" of Peru, its own republic the locals claim, and it{s where I lived when I was 8. So this has been a great journey "home", much nicer than 1999 because I have seen more of my favorite places here. We are having a fabulous rest day here after being up in the high canyon of Collca the last 2 days.
We flew here early Sunday morning, after sleeping overnight on the floor of the airport in Lima, which is a clean but noisy experience, with good food and relative safety but not a lot of creature comforts. Next time we will bring inflatable plastic rafts and sleep in a different part, because for some reason parents like to show their kids takeoff and landing planes at 3 am.
The first thing I noticed, at 3 am and since, is the lovely musical quality of Spanish here in Peru. When I was a child here, I learned "Castilian" not spanish. Arequipa prided itself on its hispanic racial and cultural purity. In the meantime, the population of Arequipa has become 70% the children of immigrants from the puno area, and now the Quechua lilt predominates. It is beautiful, like everyone is singing to you. Maybe it was always like this, but it is so different than Mexican spanish which is a little ploddy by comparison or Argentinian spanish which is very italian. The next thing is again the incredible gentility and kindness of the way peruvians interact even with strangers. lots of courtesy and warmth. Also laughing, at gringos sleeping on the floor.
Arequipa is splendid. It sits in a valley surrounded on 3 sides with tall volcanic peaks, still covered with snow at the tops despite droughtlike weather this year. The valley is only green where it is irrigated, but what a green, lovely pre Inca terraces here and there, and they contrast beautifully against the low, volcanic ash and púmice covered hills. Our first Sunday afternoon here we took an outskirts tour, the Tur Campina, for 60 soles abt $25 which Angel, the taxi driver most recommended by our hotel, the Casa de Melgar, which is $35 a double. We saw many beautiful upper class neighborhoods, which are built with sillar, the local white stone, lots of postModern style and some intricately carved portals which is what Arequipa is famous for. We saw a lot of sights from my childhood -- Tingo, a little amusement park on a lake where you get bunuelos, which are light yeasty fried dough with syrup, fantastic, much different than others in latin america, and anticuchos, which are skewers of beef heart covered with local spices then barbecued, was our first big stop. Lots of local families take their kids out to the "country" on Sundays for family meals at outdoor restaurants. Most of the communities in the outskirts are up on the dry volcanic hills, very dry, while the flat lands remain irrigated farmland with alfalfa, barley, onions, garlic and cows bulls or sheep. On one of the hills we climbed 8 stories up stairs to a viewpoint, a good exercise at 8,500 feet, to look at the city at the feet of its 3 volcanos, Misti, Chachani and PichuPichu. We also went way out to an old mansion, the house of the founder, 8 miles out along a little river, which is where one of the conquistadors kept his mentally ill son, in tranquil luxury in a hacienda with stone walls 3 feet thick and gorgeous window seats framing the white stone hills above green fields and pepper trees. Then we went on to the old mill at Sabandia, still working, which we went to for picnics as children. I recognized the house of some very rich friends we had, the Rickets, about half a mile from the mill. The city has grown, but remains very charming. Cars are tiny, and most are taxis, as people do not make much money at all. However everything including the squatters barrios looks much nicer than 6 years ago. I think Peru has benefitted from some tranquil years.
Downtown Arequipa is also very nice. While there is a small, colonial center with tourist focus, just next to it are several blocks of cosmopolitan stores and cafes with Italian, middle eastern and other restaurants, and many bakeries making fine European pastries with layers of flaky dough, lots of whipped cream, and classy decorations, many in marzipan and chocolate. They are starting to sell "guaguas", little round-bellied icing covered cakes with quechua indian heads, something they do in November that I mysteriously remembered from childhood. While a lot has changed, many things are the same, my old catholic school, the way all the school kids participate in parades in military formation with bands in the Plaza de Armas on sundays, the way people cover their hearts to sing the national anthem and the anthem of Arequipa, and even the ancient galapagos turtle I used to visit at a hotel near our house. He or she is still alive, after 40 years, eating carrots. My old neighborhood, Selva Alegre, is quite classy, craig was impressed. Everything is shining in the endless sunshine, water is still mostly heated with solar systems and the mountains tower over it all.
We spent Monday and Tuesday in the highlands near Arequipa, in the Valle de Colca which is a very deep canyon, apparently just recently reconfirmed by GPS as the deepest in the world, which is a famous place to see condors (we saw 3). But what I like best is that it is a valley that because of its long time isolation retains its cultural integrity, with two different Quechua speaking groups who still wear traditional dress and farm pre-Inca terraces that go from rivers edge up to near the tops of the surrounding canyon walls going up as much as 2,000 feet. The terraces are in beautiful ribbons and ampitheater-like formations and just now, with a few being green with crops but many more plowed waiting for the rainy season, have fascinating textures, like looking at quilts. It is so large, 40 km long, and the high terraces have been abandoned since the spanish arrived to bring smallpox and take everyone off to work the silver mines, but at one time 60,000 people lived here.
To get there, we took a tour with a great tour leader, Luisa Gladys, and bus driver, Estanislau, which took us five hours to get up from Arequipa, which is 8,500 feet over a pass of more than 14,000 feet into Colca which is about 11,500. On the way you go behind one of the volcanos, its dry and dusty and lightly vegetated with cactus, ichu grass and yareta, a very longlived low plant that we burned for fuel as kids, through a vicuna reserve which has several herds of these light-colored, light-footed camelids, with the most expensive natural wool fiber in the world. They were going extinct but have been rescued. They are lovely and graceful, especially when they run. The bus tour which was very nice, about 12 of us, stops at a small village for coca leaf tea and you get encouraged to buy lots of coca candy in order to prevent altitude sickness. At the coca tea restaurant, tame baby alpacas beg for your used tea leaves and eat them out of your hand. quite sweet. You also get to see large herds of grazing alpacas and llamas with their shepherds. Things are bleak on the altiplano, but quite beautiful, lots of birdlife in the watering spots. The pass goes over the lip and inside a high volcanic caldera, it looks a lot in there like Haleakala in Maui or Death Valley, but there are small glaciers at the rim. Then you drop down, down, down into Colca valley, alongside the ancient irrigation canals which bring the water into this place. By this time its 1 oclock so they take you for lunch and then out hiking for an hour or two from one of the local villages out old trails to ruins that overlook all the terraces. As the sun drops, you go to the local hot springs which is clean, hot and beautiful and then after that, to a meal with live musicians who were fabulous musicians, also quite handsome and thank God they never, ever sang "El Condor Pasa". Instead, they played local and regional dances. They played the charangos and guitars, flutes and panpipes some sets five feet tall and 2-ft wide drums whose surface is still furry except where they strike it. There were some dancers, they showed a local dance where there is a lot of sexy horseplay involving striking each other gently with whips while one partner is forced to lie down. The next morning you get up very early to drive down the 40 km to the deeper part of the canyon where the condors breed. They are still there and although it was mating season, so they were more wary and apparently left for their daily hunting rounds a bit earlier, we still got to see 3 of them, hanging out on the rocks and occasionally taking test flights. There were a lot of tour groups there, much more than in 1999, but so what.
The tour is quite a deal, still only $20 which included all these stops and our overnight stay at a pretty decent clean little hotel, with bath (but not the meals, about $10 US per couple each, or the valley ´touristic fee´of $7 US). If someone is coming here, note that you really can shop around. Tour quotes can range from $20 to $60, sometimes because they are putting you up at fancier places in Chivay, but exactly the same tour. I liked being in the cheaper hotels because it put you in "downtown Chivay", a 3 block square area with busy local markets, lots of women still wearing their local costumes, swinging their 3 layers of skirts around kind of like Mammy in Gone with the Wind as they made their way down the dirt streets. We had thought of staying in Colca for a few nights which some folks do to hike in the area, it would be fabulous I think. We had thought of going on our own, but the tour was really well arranged and our fellow travelers were great. So I would do this again. Trying to take local buses in the high, dusty altiplano would be a lot of work to organize and I don{t think you would gain much.... take the tour and then stay on and take a local bus back, would work as well and you would get all the transportation to the different sites and hiking spot and hot springs.
Well that is installment 1, today we will see the beautiful hidden convent of Santa Catalina which is like a small town, and Juanita, the 13 year old girl mummy who the Incas sacrificed on the top of the volcano Ampato. More later... xox Amy and Craig
Arequipa is the "second city" of Peru, its own republic the locals claim, and it{s where I lived when I was 8. So this has been a great journey "home", much nicer than 1999 because I have seen more of my favorite places here. We are having a fabulous rest day here after being up in the high canyon of Collca the last 2 days.
We flew here early Sunday morning, after sleeping overnight on the floor of the airport in Lima, which is a clean but noisy experience, with good food and relative safety but not a lot of creature comforts. Next time we will bring inflatable plastic rafts and sleep in a different part, because for some reason parents like to show their kids takeoff and landing planes at 3 am.
The first thing I noticed, at 3 am and since, is the lovely musical quality of Spanish here in Peru. When I was a child here, I learned "Castilian" not spanish. Arequipa prided itself on its hispanic racial and cultural purity. In the meantime, the population of Arequipa has become 70% the children of immigrants from the puno area, and now the Quechua lilt predominates. It is beautiful, like everyone is singing to you. Maybe it was always like this, but it is so different than Mexican spanish which is a little ploddy by comparison or Argentinian spanish which is very italian. The next thing is again the incredible gentility and kindness of the way peruvians interact even with strangers. lots of courtesy and warmth. Also laughing, at gringos sleeping on the floor.
Arequipa is splendid. It sits in a valley surrounded on 3 sides with tall volcanic peaks, still covered with snow at the tops despite droughtlike weather this year. The valley is only green where it is irrigated, but what a green, lovely pre Inca terraces here and there, and they contrast beautifully against the low, volcanic ash and púmice covered hills. Our first Sunday afternoon here we took an outskirts tour, the Tur Campina, for 60 soles abt $25 which Angel, the taxi driver most recommended by our hotel, the Casa de Melgar, which is $35 a double. We saw many beautiful upper class neighborhoods, which are built with sillar, the local white stone, lots of postModern style and some intricately carved portals which is what Arequipa is famous for. We saw a lot of sights from my childhood -- Tingo, a little amusement park on a lake where you get bunuelos, which are light yeasty fried dough with syrup, fantastic, much different than others in latin america, and anticuchos, which are skewers of beef heart covered with local spices then barbecued, was our first big stop. Lots of local families take their kids out to the "country" on Sundays for family meals at outdoor restaurants. Most of the communities in the outskirts are up on the dry volcanic hills, very dry, while the flat lands remain irrigated farmland with alfalfa, barley, onions, garlic and cows bulls or sheep. On one of the hills we climbed 8 stories up stairs to a viewpoint, a good exercise at 8,500 feet, to look at the city at the feet of its 3 volcanos, Misti, Chachani and PichuPichu. We also went way out to an old mansion, the house of the founder, 8 miles out along a little river, which is where one of the conquistadors kept his mentally ill son, in tranquil luxury in a hacienda with stone walls 3 feet thick and gorgeous window seats framing the white stone hills above green fields and pepper trees. Then we went on to the old mill at Sabandia, still working, which we went to for picnics as children. I recognized the house of some very rich friends we had, the Rickets, about half a mile from the mill. The city has grown, but remains very charming. Cars are tiny, and most are taxis, as people do not make much money at all. However everything including the squatters barrios looks much nicer than 6 years ago. I think Peru has benefitted from some tranquil years.
Downtown Arequipa is also very nice. While there is a small, colonial center with tourist focus, just next to it are several blocks of cosmopolitan stores and cafes with Italian, middle eastern and other restaurants, and many bakeries making fine European pastries with layers of flaky dough, lots of whipped cream, and classy decorations, many in marzipan and chocolate. They are starting to sell "guaguas", little round-bellied icing covered cakes with quechua indian heads, something they do in November that I mysteriously remembered from childhood. While a lot has changed, many things are the same, my old catholic school, the way all the school kids participate in parades in military formation with bands in the Plaza de Armas on sundays, the way people cover their hearts to sing the national anthem and the anthem of Arequipa, and even the ancient galapagos turtle I used to visit at a hotel near our house. He or she is still alive, after 40 years, eating carrots. My old neighborhood, Selva Alegre, is quite classy, craig was impressed. Everything is shining in the endless sunshine, water is still mostly heated with solar systems and the mountains tower over it all.
We spent Monday and Tuesday in the highlands near Arequipa, in the Valle de Colca which is a very deep canyon, apparently just recently reconfirmed by GPS as the deepest in the world, which is a famous place to see condors (we saw 3). But what I like best is that it is a valley that because of its long time isolation retains its cultural integrity, with two different Quechua speaking groups who still wear traditional dress and farm pre-Inca terraces that go from rivers edge up to near the tops of the surrounding canyon walls going up as much as 2,000 feet. The terraces are in beautiful ribbons and ampitheater-like formations and just now, with a few being green with crops but many more plowed waiting for the rainy season, have fascinating textures, like looking at quilts. It is so large, 40 km long, and the high terraces have been abandoned since the spanish arrived to bring smallpox and take everyone off to work the silver mines, but at one time 60,000 people lived here.
To get there, we took a tour with a great tour leader, Luisa Gladys, and bus driver, Estanislau, which took us five hours to get up from Arequipa, which is 8,500 feet over a pass of more than 14,000 feet into Colca which is about 11,500. On the way you go behind one of the volcanos, its dry and dusty and lightly vegetated with cactus, ichu grass and yareta, a very longlived low plant that we burned for fuel as kids, through a vicuna reserve which has several herds of these light-colored, light-footed camelids, with the most expensive natural wool fiber in the world. They were going extinct but have been rescued. They are lovely and graceful, especially when they run. The bus tour which was very nice, about 12 of us, stops at a small village for coca leaf tea and you get encouraged to buy lots of coca candy in order to prevent altitude sickness. At the coca tea restaurant, tame baby alpacas beg for your used tea leaves and eat them out of your hand. quite sweet. You also get to see large herds of grazing alpacas and llamas with their shepherds. Things are bleak on the altiplano, but quite beautiful, lots of birdlife in the watering spots. The pass goes over the lip and inside a high volcanic caldera, it looks a lot in there like Haleakala in Maui or Death Valley, but there are small glaciers at the rim. Then you drop down, down, down into Colca valley, alongside the ancient irrigation canals which bring the water into this place. By this time its 1 oclock so they take you for lunch and then out hiking for an hour or two from one of the local villages out old trails to ruins that overlook all the terraces. As the sun drops, you go to the local hot springs which is clean, hot and beautiful and then after that, to a meal with live musicians who were fabulous musicians, also quite handsome and thank God they never, ever sang "El Condor Pasa". Instead, they played local and regional dances. They played the charangos and guitars, flutes and panpipes some sets five feet tall and 2-ft wide drums whose surface is still furry except where they strike it. There were some dancers, they showed a local dance where there is a lot of sexy horseplay involving striking each other gently with whips while one partner is forced to lie down. The next morning you get up very early to drive down the 40 km to the deeper part of the canyon where the condors breed. They are still there and although it was mating season, so they were more wary and apparently left for their daily hunting rounds a bit earlier, we still got to see 3 of them, hanging out on the rocks and occasionally taking test flights. There were a lot of tour groups there, much more than in 1999, but so what.
The tour is quite a deal, still only $20 which included all these stops and our overnight stay at a pretty decent clean little hotel, with bath (but not the meals, about $10 US per couple each, or the valley ´touristic fee´of $7 US). If someone is coming here, note that you really can shop around. Tour quotes can range from $20 to $60, sometimes because they are putting you up at fancier places in Chivay, but exactly the same tour. I liked being in the cheaper hotels because it put you in "downtown Chivay", a 3 block square area with busy local markets, lots of women still wearing their local costumes, swinging their 3 layers of skirts around kind of like Mammy in Gone with the Wind as they made their way down the dirt streets. We had thought of staying in Colca for a few nights which some folks do to hike in the area, it would be fabulous I think. We had thought of going on our own, but the tour was really well arranged and our fellow travelers were great. So I would do this again. Trying to take local buses in the high, dusty altiplano would be a lot of work to organize and I don{t think you would gain much.... take the tour and then stay on and take a local bus back, would work as well and you would get all the transportation to the different sites and hiking spot and hot springs.
Well that is installment 1, today we will see the beautiful hidden convent of Santa Catalina which is like a small town, and Juanita, the 13 year old girl mummy who the Incas sacrificed on the top of the volcano Ampato. More later... xox Amy and Craig
posted by Craig and Amy at 10:54 AM
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