Peru, Arequipa and trip wrap-up

Flight to Arequipa one hour. We added this after we were in Peru because we met so many people who were going there or had been. There is an old monastery there. It is now open to public but for several hundred years it was for cloistered nuns. It was an honor to have a daughter there.

This area is quite rugged with snow-covered Andes, many volcanoes. 860,000 residents, second largest city in Peru. One of the largest shanty towns in Peru is here. Alt 3,000 ft.

This is another Spanish Colonial City. It is a beautiful, diverse city.

This city does not have as much Incan presence, there have been too many earthquakes. Homes were just sleeping rooms; no large churches. Agriculture largest business: 4 crops alfalfa, 2 of garlic and onion, 1 corn, 1 potato/year. It is green the year around because of rich soil from volcanoes. Few tourists.

Most interesting thing we saw in Arequipa was ice cream stand on the street corner; cinnamon clove, very good. It was kept frozen in wooden bowl of ice. Music while we ate dinner, “Roll Out the Barrel”.

If you have several days you can take a tour into the high Andes to possibly see condors. We saw one condor on this trip. This was in Cusco at Sacsayhuaman. It was sitting at top of hill. It flew away when hikers got too near.

PERU WRAP-UP

LAN Airlines impressive. Food on every flight, even those less than an hour. Always a muffin, piece chocolate candy, some pretzel-like sticks.

Peru is so overwhelming we were glad we went at a slower pace giving us time to reflect on what we had just seen, before venturing on to another awesome sight.

This was a strenuous trip. We did a lot of walking besides the thousands of steps we climbed. We were glad we had several rest days. Getting out of bed was difficult most mornings. Advil and a desire to see everything kept us going.

Like most countries there are few handicap accommodations. This makes it more difficult, but not impossible, to see everything. We saw two elderly people in wheel chairs at Machu Picchu. They could not walk and climb the area, but were inside the gate 20-30 feet and were able to see the magnificent site.

Scenery everywhere was breathtaking; our guides and drivers were all excellent; all hotels were clean; staff polite, friendly, helpful. Peruvians were friendly and beautiful. We never felt threatened.

Goodbye from Peru. We hope you enjoyed this armchair vacation with us. Please check in later for our 2006 vacation in Turkey and backpacking from Istanbul, Turkey to Vienna, Austria.