Arequipa - The White City

After having enough of the dusty desert, we are looking forward to a city with a good reputation: Arequipa - the white city. We want to see the beautiful colonial architecture and experience the pleasant atmosphere ourselves, so we take the next bus. However, it doesn't take long because the air conditioning is broken. After enduring 2 hours of tropical heat, we change vehicles and now we're traveling in a more air-conditioned environment.

So we only reach Arequipa at night and fall straight into our beds. The thumping beat from the club next door doesn't make falling asleep any easier, but that won't change in the coming days.

After a typical South American breakfast (stale rolls, jam, egg, egg, and more egg, coca tea or instant coffee), we explore the white city. Yes, indeed, it's really beautiful here! Lovely streets and alleys invite us to stroll around, numerous restaurants and cafes invite us to linger. A culinary highlight during our stay here is a small vegetarian restaurant that serves typical Peruvian dishes very deliciously and with lots of love. You can easily treat yourself to a daily lunch menu for 3 Euros. Even the chocolate cake here tastes very good, which is a rarity in South America.

The Café Cochoa also makes extremely good chocolate, especially the hot chocolate is a dream. This is where the free walking tour starts, which we will do the next day. We visit various churches and squares, learn about the indigenous influences on the regional architecture, and culinary delights such as Queso Helado - cheese ice cream. However, this ice cream owes its name only to its appearance, not its taste.

The municipal convent is also very worth seeing, and it's huge, almost like a small city within the city. We spend a lot of time here in the bright sunshine, wander through the former cells of the nuns, and escape from the countless tourist groups.

Not far from Arequipa is the impressive Colca Canyon, the 4th largest canyon in the world. We book a 2-day tour there to admire the enormous condors and hike into and out of the canyon.

Sebastian loves getting up early and is excited when we are picked up at 3:30 am the next morning. Totally exhausted and feeling slightly queasy in the stomach, we are chauffeured in a minibus to the small mountain village of Chivay, where we have breakfast. Somewhat refreshed, we continue to the condor viewpoint. Of course, we are not the only tourists, numerous buses are gathered here, unloading their tourist merchandise, hoping to catch a glimpse of a condor. Lisa is naturally very excited, as big birds are one of her passions. Sebastian, on the other hand, is somewhat uninvolved, sitting on a rock. Apparently, the dinner from the night before didn't agree with him (to be continued...)

So there we are, standing at the edge of the canyon and staring downwards. I wonder if a bird will appear? Yes! Exactly one! But it's actually worth watching...with its gigantic wings and a wingspan of three meters, the giant bird glides almost weightlessly past us. There is no photo as proof because sometimes you just have to enjoy the moment!

We continue to the starting point of our descent. Sunscreen is applied generously and water is refilled because the sun is relentlessly hot. Going downhill a little bit should not be too strenuous...we think. However, as the day goes on, we realize that a three-hour descent on a narrow gravel road in the blazing midday heat requires quite a bit of energy. At the bottom of the canyon, we cross a large bridge with our group and walk a little further to our lunch stop. Here, we have quinoa soup and alpaca. Hopefully, it's not too much further to our overnight stay in the oasis. However, we still need to be patient and walk a bit more before we can rest. With the last bit of strength, we reach our hostel and jump into the pool. Crossing the canyon is more exhausting than expected. However, the promised oasis can be considered a euphemism.

We sit together for dinner with Julia and Martijn, an Austrian-Dutch couple, and together we wish for a slightly more comfortable accommodation. Our night hut is only made up of a few bamboo sticks and is certainly an inviting place for the crawlies of the oasis. However, we can still sleep well because we are extremely tired.

The alarm clock rings again at 4 o'clock and now Lisa already has aching muscles. There's nothing we can do about it, the steep ascent begins at 5. A few sips of water, a granola bar, and off we go. The first steps are still easy, but after the first hour, we feel our legs and the breathing becomes a little more difficult again. It's not surprising with a total ascent of 1700 meters. And so we scramble up the mountain, stopping every now and then, looking at the rocky landscape and our increasingly smaller accommodation at the bottom of the canyon. Quite a few participants prefer to forgo the additional effort and let themselves be carried back by donkeys - the latter sweat and pant just like us.

After 2 hours and 45 minutes, we have made it. At the top, a cheering crowd awaits us. Once everyone has reached the goal, we hike cross-country to the next village. There, we have breakfast and then get on the bus back to Arequipa. We quickly pick up our stored backpacks, book the next hostel, and rush to the bus station to get to our next destination overnight - the city of Cusco. By the way, Sebastian still doesn't feel much better...