Trekking in the land of condors

We spent our last days in Peru in the south of the country, in and around the beautiful city of Arequipa. Snow-capped volcanoes dominate this region with a few of them towering over Arequipa. For the Incas, they were sacred mountains where they made sacrifices, including young children. We saw one of such sacrifices – a mummy of a young girl known as Juanita, which has been very well-preserved and her finding has contributed a lot to the contemporary knowledge of the Incas’ culture and their rituals.

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A procession through the streets of Arequipa that we stumbled upon
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We noticed the Phantom of the Opera being advertised in the streets so we decided to go and see it!
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The frame is all pure gold and silver. Must be quite heavy…

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In Arequipa, we also visited the convent of Santa Catalina, which looks like a city within a city, with its cobbled streets and colorful buildings. Here we found out a lot about the history of the convent and how the nuns´ lives looked like.

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We also spent three days in the Colca canyon, supposedly the second-deepest canyon in the world (second only to another canyon in the same area), where we saw three condors, one for each day ;-) The trip involves a descend of over 1000m into the canyon and, of course, you have to climb it back all the way up after a day or two… Fortunately, we could recover in a swimming pool located in a place called Oasis at the bottom of the canyon, where we spent one of the nights. We have to tell you, nothing tastes better than a cold beer or rum & coke by a poolside bar after a long trek on a sunny day.

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Inca terraces in the Colca Valley

Meanwhile, we´re already in Chile where we´re spending last week of our trip, so look out for the last update!

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