Arequipa

I arrived in Arequipa, Peru´s second largets city, last Tuesday and boy was it a welcome relief from La Paz! The city is way more laid back with space to breathe, there are tourists but much less tha Cuzco which is pretty good too.

The city at first glance appears very European and you´d be forgiven for thinking you were in spain if you suddenly woke up in the centre one day. There are lots more spanish decendants here as I slowly and reluctantly move further away from the Andes. The centre is dominated by a huge main plaza with the biggest cathedral I´ve seen so far, the university is situated near the main plaza as well as lots of private buissnesses. Then after you sepnd a few days wandering the streets around and further away from the centre the class divide reveals itself. From my brief stay here it seems to have the same problems as Lima - the whites have the good jobs, large houses more disposable cash and the indeginous Andean people are the ones living on the street or attempting to sell anything and everything. The divide is maybe not as clear cut as Lima but it´s definately there.

The hostel I´m staying at organises volunteer opotunities in a local school and so Wednesday and Thursday I´m going to visit and help out with whatever needs done, I though it might be cooking and cleaning but Iñve since heard that several teachers have left becuase of the lack of pay and so I have a feeling I might be in the classroom!

I have just gotten back from a trek in the Colca Canyon, the worlds deepest canyon (4000m). It was pretty spectacular. I have never seen scenery like it before, we walked down 1000m to the botom of the canyon, with the mountains towering above us and some fantastic rock formations - I know that sound really geeky but you should have seen how beautiful it was! We then walked through one of the villages and onto the next small village where we stayed with a local family for the night. The views in the morning were amazing, there´s nothing quite like getting washed outside with huge mountains towering over you on one side and sheer cliffs on the other.

The canyon has 12 villages with a population of 800, mostly young children and older people. Our guide was telling us that because most of the teenagers have to go to secondary school in the nearest town they don´t want to return to the difficult life in the canyon after they have finished either school or university and so the population and the traditions associated with the villages here are disapearing quickly. The tour company, Land Adventures, try to arrange for volunteers to stay in the canyon for 1 month to help in the school and to help adults to learn to read or write or learn english so that they can subsidise their farming income with money from tourism. I feel the need for another trip coming on..... Our accommodation for

the first night

Anyway back to the trek, We headed through another couple of villages and then down to an oasis on the floor of the canyon to chill out by a pool and have some lunch. We had to wait for the sun to disapear before we began the 3 hour climb out of the canyon. The last day of the trip we went to a place called Cruz del Condor where we saw the condors flying across the canyon and right above our heads - it was mesmerising and a lot of fun to try and photograph. The last part of our trip was chilling out in the natural hot springs in a town called chivay. Lots of hot water with the volcanos surrounding Arequipa.

So now I have two more days in Arequipa before I head to coast to work on my homecoming tan! and probably not many more blogs before I have to think about returning to reality!