Adventures in Peru Pt. 3

Arequipa & the Colca Canyon

Earlier in November, Sean and I took a long weekend trip to Arequipa and the Colca Canyon. We stayed in Arequipa for a full day and two nights before we headed out to the Colca Valley.  We stayed at a really cool boutique hotel called Hotel Casona Solar, that is a renovated colonial mansion and UNESCO national monument. It had a lot of old world charm, and our bedroom had vaulted ceilings and a chandelier! 

The hotel's patio and garden was my favorite place to sit and read.

Private courtyard for the guest rooms.

Vaulted ceilings AND a chandelier! 

Plaza des Armas and the basilica lit up at night.

Day time Plaza des Armas

Cool old colonial architecture

During the full day we had in Arequipa we walked around and explored a little. Right around the corner from the hotel is the Mercado San Camilo, which is the main market for the city. One of my favorite (and free) things to do anywhere we travel is explore that city's markets, I'm always interested in seeing what kinds of produce and other goods are sold. And here in Arequipa we got to see some pretty interesting things.....

Yes, those are llama fetuses, and I still can't figure out what they are used for. Or WHY

Witch doctor stall selling various herbal remedies

After I surreptitiously snapped a bunch of photos, we moved quickly away from the creepy witch doctor stalls where old women were putting together what looked like little voodoo packets of herbs, flowers, and other bits of things. The rest of the market sold normal things... I wanted to buy and eat all of that luscious looking tropical fruit. And of course they had their millions of varieties of potatoes on display.

The other weird thing we came across in the mercado was near the bakery stalls. The bakers were selling these loaves of bread that had little babies heads painted on them....

Creepy baby head bread....

After our stroll through the mercado we headed towards the Plaza des Armas. Now, pretty much every city in South America has a Plaza des Armas, each one varying in size and prettiness. So, I'd say now I'm something of an expert on Plaza des Armas-es. And Arequipa boasts a very pretty and clean one. All the buildings surrounding the square are constructed of white volcanic stone so the whole effect is really nice to look at. 

Once you've see one Plaza des Armas, you've seen them all.

There aren't a whole lot of tourist activities to do in the city itself, Arequipa is mainly a stopping over point for people coming to or from the Colca Canyon. There's a small national museum that hosts the famous "Inca Ice Maiden"- the mummy Juanita, an Andean woman found up on Mount Ampato. And there is also the Monasterio de Santa Catalina. The monastery is massive, we spent about two hours walking around the complex, and I think we still didn't cover a few parts of it. 

View of the volcano Mismi from the monastery.

Interesting church door.

The next day we were picked up by our driver bright and early and we headed out on the long drive to the Colca Valley. It takes about 3 hours just to get to the beginning of the Valley and then another hour or so before you get to the actual canyon itself. 

A cool lagoon in the valley.

Before we even got to the Mirador del Condor, we saw a pair of juvenile condors sitting together.

The drive to Cabana Conde, the town we would stay in for the night, took most of the day. We stopped at a few places to walk around and enjoy the beautiful scenery and landscape. 

Hiking along the edge of the canyon rim.

Standing above the Colca Canyon

Looking across the canyon at a small village, in the foreground you can see the terraces the Inca people constructed for agricultural purposes.

We stayed the night at a hostel in Cabana Conde and got up early the next morning to do a bit of hiking and then head back to Arequipa for the night. We stopped at Mirador del Condor early before most of the crowds of tourists showed up, pretty much the only reason  why people stay in towns in the Colca Canyon overnight. I didn't share any more condor photos because all of mine are grainy since I only used my iPhone to take photos on this trip.

One of the many churches we saw while drive through the Colca Canyon, this one under a grant from the Spanish government, is being restored to its original designs after years of disrepair.

Views for days

It was a pretty short trip, but we managed to pack quite a bit of activity into just four days. Arequipa and the Colca Canyon are definitely two places that I would like to visit again, if we ever get the chance to come back to Peru. 


Thanks for reading! See you soon!