Bienvenidos a Chile - Atacama, Santiago and Vino

Day 46 - Day 49 - 20th January -23rd January
Having cleared Chilean immigration we set about finding a hostel in the desert town of San Pedro de Atacama.  As the name suggests, San Pedro is an oasis town in the Atacama desert.  It is a gringo hangout, with more western backpackers than we saw in the whole of Peru and Bolivia put together.  Most of the buildings are made of mud, as it seldom rains in the driest place on Earth!  The streets bustle with backpackers and are full of shops, restaurants and outside bars filled with fire pits at night.  The adobe church in the centre of town was built in the 17th century, its walls are made of mud and the roof is made of wood, both survive to this day.  The change in altitude and temperature was quite something - suddenly we were basking in glorious sunshine, although the nights did get a little chilly, this being the desert.  Our hostel was a very chilled out affair, with rooms arranged around communal gardens strewn with chairs and hammocks, and a kitchen for cooking.  We decided to spend a few days relaxing here, rather than trying to hot-foot it to the beach, as the combination of buses required to do that and end up in Santiago became quite complicated and pricey.  Having spent the last few days travelling through the desert we also decided not to bother hauling ourselves out on any tours of the nearby dunes.  Instead we spent three lovely days sleeping late, wandering the streets, perusing the markets and shops and generally relaxing.  As the cost of everything in Chile is quite a lot higher than Bolivia and Peru it was great to be able to cook for ourselves.  We enjoyed making our own breakfasts and even cooked ourselves a slap-up pasta meal - the luxuries of travelling!

Adobe church, San Pedro

San Pedro streets

Day 49 - 23rd January
Our longest bus journey so far - we caught the 8:11am bus to nearby Calama, where we had a picnic breakfast at the bus station to wait for the 12:00 to Santiago.  The bus to Santiago was 24 hours long, but it was actually not that bad.  We had paid extra for cama seats, that are wider and fold back further, and the bus played a succession of passable films from midday til midnight to keep the weary traveller entertained.  A small dose of Diazepam, procured in Bolivia, helped the night pass soundly, and we woke up in Santiago in the late morning of the 24th.




Day 50 - 24th January
After arriving in Santiago at around 11:00, we walked to our hostel and relaxed in the sunny garden until our room was ready.  After a reviving snooze we set out to explore the centre of the city.  Santiago is a beautiful city, with wide boulevards, plenty of green spaces, grand colonial buildings and modern architecture.  It feels a little like a European capital but on a grand scale, or like a US city with character.  We wandered past some of the government buildings and went into the cathedral (large and very tasteful for a Catholic cathedral!)  After that we rested for a while in Parque Santa Luis, the city's most central park.  There we climbed to the top of Cerro Santa Luis for beautiful views of the city.  Enjoying the green spaces and cafe culture of central Santiago, we decided to head down to the river, expecting to find more of the same.  The only problem is, the Rio Mapocho has dried to all but a muddy stream and the only roads that run along it are major thoroughfares!  Oh well, back to our laid back hostel for a gourmet dinner o f soup and bread, topped off with some local beer.  

Old Congress Building

Santiago

Santiago Cathedral

View from Cerro Santa Lucia

Day 51 - 25th January
Happy day!  Today we went wine tasting in the Maipo Valley.  We decided to forgo the mass production of Concha y Toro, the most popular winery, in favour of some smaller local producers.  One of the best things about Santiago is how easy it is to get to the vineyards.  Less than an hour from the centre of town on the metro we found ourselves at Vina Cousino Macul, a vineyard founded in 1856 by a French family, who still own the vineyard today, as well as another one in nearby Buin.  The tour at Cousino Macul was good value and very informative.  We learnt all about the wine production process, from the methods used in the early days of the vineyard to the latest in modern technology.  The tour also included 2 tastings - a blush white wine, which was refreshing and dry, and a Cabernet Sauvignon Reserva, which we'll look out for at home.
Next stop, about half an hour walk away, was the tiny vineyard of Aquitania.  Set up in the 1990s by 3 French vintners, one from Chateau Margaux and one from Bollinger, with a Chilean partner, they aspired to create Chilean wines of distinction.  Production at the vineyard is very small, producing only 7 varieties, with some of their grapes grown at their other vineyard in the lake district.  We opted for the premium tour here, which included a personal guide around the estate and buildings.  They were bottling some of the wine when we visited, a process that only happens 5 or 6 times a year.  The cellar was very small in comparison to Cousino Macul, and all the bottling, labelling and storing is done by hand on site.  The tasting included a delicious Pinot Noir, their signature Cabernet Sauvignon and a fantastic Chardonnay, voted Chile's best Chardonnay several years running.

Wine tasting at Aquitania

After such a lovely afternoon it was a shame to head back into the city, and the rubbish directions provided by the Lonely Planet made it even more arduous.  We ended up getting a bus in the wrong direction and having to walk over an hour to the nearest metro station!  

Day 52 - 26th January
Today we relaxed in Santiago again, we went to some of the local markets and walked up to the city's tallest hill, Cerro San Cristobal, hoping to go to the swimming pools at the top, but the cable car had now closed and by the time we got there it was too late to walk the 4km up the hill to the pools so we gave up and went back to the hostel.  We had a slight (major!) panic when we discovered Jon had misplaced our bus ticket for this evening.  After searching fruitlessly through our bags we managed to locate the dumpster (excuse the Americanism but we don't have an equivalent word) on the corner for the street where the hostel put their rubbish.  Luckily I always carry some latex gloves and Jon spent an uncomfortable 10 minutes searching through the rubbish before locating our precious tickets!  Cue another laid back evening drinking beer and eating pasta in the garden before boarding the night bus to Pucon in the Lake District.

Mines, Salt Flats and Moonscapes

Day 42 - 16th January
Today we got a bus to Potosi, which, at 4090m is the world's highest city (another UNESCO site).  Potosi sits beneath the Cerro Rico mountian, a rich source of silver and was founded by the Spanish as a mining town.  In colonial times it was one of the richest cities in South America and was the site of Spain's colonial mint.  The silver mine is still working, under a cooperative system, whereby each member is entitled to work his own section of the mine and the minerals are sold through the cooperative.  Although there is not much silver left, the mine is rich in other minerals and is very busy.  Working conditions are tough, although now much better than in colonial times when miners would spend up to 6 months living underground, working long days powered by coca leaves.  Millions of miners died in the colonial era.  Today the mine has electric light but most of the work is still done by hand, including setting dynamite, carving the rock and hauling tons of material to the surface by hand.  We took a very interesting tour of the mine in the afternoon, complete with full miners gear.  The mine was quiet as there had been a wedding the day before and most men were sleeping off hangovers, still our guide took us deep inside the mine to see some men at work.  It was hot, dusty, wet and smelly, and the work seems unimaginably hard.  We met one miner, Jorge, who was 15 years old and had already been working for 2 years.  The trip was fascinating, and not nearly as scary as the Lonely Planet makes out! 

Tio Jorge, the Devil-God

Happy miners

Jorge makes dynamite

On the trip we met an American called Ben, who was planning on heading to Uyuni the next day, the same as us, so we decided to team up and travel together for a few days.  After getting out of the mine we relaxed over beers and some local food.

Day 43 - 17th January
Today we took the bus to Uyuni, gateway to the salt flats.  The bus took 6 hours and we arrived mid-afternoon.  There isn't much to recommend Uyuni town as a place to visit - it is thoroughly in the middle of nowhere, strewn with rubbish and has a deserted wild-west town feel to it.  We did, however, find our cheapest accommodation of the trip so far - £3.50 each for a 3-bed dorm.  After trawling the tourist agencies in town we finally booked a 3-day trip of the nearby salt flats (the reason for going to Uyuni) for the bargain price of £68 each.  As far as we could tell, all the tours do the same thing and go to the same places, staying in the same hostels, so there seemed to be no sense in paying twice as much.




Day 44 - 18th January
After the world's most disorganised breakfast we started our 3-day salt flat tour.  There were 6 of us in our jeep, Jon, Ben and me, a Kiwi called Steve, a German called Nils and an Argentinian called Rudolfo, not to mention our driver-cum-guide Javier.  As Ben spoke reasonable Spanish we had decided not to pay the extra 600 Pesos for an English guide, especially as there isn't really too much guiding involved in looking at spectacular landscapes.  That turned out to be an excellent decision as Javier did, indeed, do much more driving than guiding and the sites mostly spoke for themselves.  We met a group who had paid 1200 Pesos for a 'premium' trip with an English guide and they ended up doing exactly the same as us, including the same basic lodgings and food.


Our first stop was the small town of Colchani, where the salt collected from the Salar is processed. We didn't actually see any of the processing, it was really a tourist tat market, although there was a salt museum that was built of salt bricks and housed large salt sculptures, including an armadillo and a giant llama.

Salt llama

After that we visited the salt flats (Salar de Uyuni), which cover an area of over 12000 sq km, nearly twice the size of Lake Titicaca.  This has to be one of the most unusual and spectacular landscapes on the planet.  The white salt stretches as far as the eye can see, obscuring the horizon until you feel like the land goes on forever.  In the wet season the salt is covered with a shallow layer of water, perfectly reflecting the blue, cloud-studded sky in places.  Further in towards the centre, the water dries up leaving just the salt, which is blindingly white.  We took the obligatory silly photos, taking advantage of the lack of perspective in the landscape and spent a good amount of time wandering around and marvelling at the strange wonder of the place.  It is impossible to describe what it looks and feels like, and photos could never do it justice - everyone will just have to visit the Salar to see for themselves!

Jumping for joy in the Salar

Obligatory silly photo

The endless Salar reflecting she sky

After a picnic lunch sitting outside a hotel constructed entirely of salt, we drove on to every boy's dream - a 'cemetery' of rusting trains!  We had plenty of time to play around on the trains, climbing into boiler rooms and funnels, re-enacting film chases running along the tops of carriages. Some had been turned into playground equipment, with swings and see-saws made out of train parts - it was a lot of fun!

Jon plays engine driver

Train cemetery

We then began a long journey in the jeep to our first night's accommodation.  The roads were made of dirt and sand, with steep ditches on either side and the dust from other vehicles and glare from the sun made it nearly impossible for Javier to see the road.  At one point we had a very near miss when the jeep left the road, plunged into the road-side ditch and felt like it nearly rolled over.  We were all thrown from our comfortable seats but Javier did a fantastic job of keeping the jeep upright and we eventually came to a gentle stop at the side of the road with only a few bruises between us!  After that it was easy driving to our first hospedaje (basic hostel) in the small town of Alota.  We had a dorm room for all 6 of us with the creakiest beds in the world, but dinner was tasty and there was a shop selling beer so a good time was had by all.




Day 45 - 19th January
We got up at quite a civilised hour for breakfast and then set off again in the jeep.  Our first stop was a huge boulder field in the shadow of snow-capped volcanoes.  It was quite a sight - boulders big and small as far as the eye could see, and we wasted a happy hour or so scrambling and climbing amongst them.

Boulder field

Grupo Javier with our trusty jeep

We spent the rest of the morning driving through spectacular desert lakes.  I hadn't expected the Bolivian scenery to be so spectacular but with each turn of the road we were transported to amazing landscape after amazing landscape.  Sometimes we were in sandy desert, other times boulder fields or mountain lakes filled with pink flamingos, and at times we appeared to have left the Earth far behind as the landscape resembled the moon or Mars.  Our last stop was at the Laguna Colorado, a lake turned bright red by microorganisms - amazing!

Where we stopped for lunch

Laguna Colorado

Tonight we stayed at our highest hospedaje yet - 4900m.  Again we had a large shared room but the beds were comfy and, again, the food was good.  We also celebrated the last night of the trip with a few bottles of Bolivian wine - not the greatest, but needs must!




Day 46 - 20th January
Today we were up brutally early, at 4am, to head out into the desert to see the sunrise over the geysers.  Having never seen a geyser before I was very excited, and this was a whole field of bubbling pools and shooting plumes of steam.  This being Bolivia there were no safety precautions and we were able to walk among the geysers, standing right on the edge (apparently they lost a Japanese tourist a few years ago!)  The desert was freezing at that time of the morning but being amongst the steam helped take the edge off.

Geysers

After the geysers it was time to warm up, so we headed to some thermal pools for a pre-breakfast dip in the early dawn - magical.  After a hearty breakfast we travelled to the last stop on our trip - Laguna Verde, close to the Chilean border.  Apparently the lake is only green when the wind blows, which fortunately it wasn't when we were there.  After spending some time marvelling at the spectacular scenery of southwest Bolivia we bid goodbye to our fellow travellers (who were heading back to Uyuni) and crossed the border into Chile.  Exiting Bolivia was as easy as entering - a few minutes and a stamp in your passport - but when we got to San Pedro de Atacama to enter Chile it was a different story.  We spent nearly two hours waiting in a queue in the baking sun before getting to the immigration desk.  Once there it was a very quick stamp, so I'm not quite sure how it took them so long!  Now safely in Chile we found a lovely hostel and set about planning the next stage of our journey.

Thermal pools

Laguna Verde

Bolivian desert

La Paz to Sucre

Day 36 - 10th January
Time to say goodbye to the beautiful Lake Titicaca, as we boarded a bus to the Bolivian capital, La Paz.  In typical Bolivian style, our "tourist" bus was not exactly 5* and they had overbooked, which meant Jon had to squeeze in to a tiny seat on the back row and I sat up front with the driver!  The strangest part came when we were all ordered off the bus to board a small boat to cross a section of the lake (our bus went on a boat of its own!)

Bus to La Paz

Countryside on the way to La Paz

We arrived in the late afternoon and checked into our hostel, the Adventure Brew, which is linked to a local microbrewery and gives you a free beer every night - happy days!  We spent the evening chilling in the bar and chatting to an American called Jeffrey, who was 20 months into his 2 year round-the-world trip and had plenty of tips and stories to tell.




Day 37 - 11th January
We spent today exploring La Paz.  It's safe to say it won't make my top 10, mostly due to the huge amount of litter in the streets and the overwhelming smell of urine.  That said, it did have some charm, with small, steep cobbled streets and warren-like markets.  The Witches Hat Market sells the usual tourist stuff alongside teas, herbs and dries llama foetuses, which the Bolivians bury under their houses for good luck.  In the usual small world of travelling we bumped into a couple that Jon did the Inca trail with, who happened to be staying at our hostel, and spent a nice evening in the bar with them.

Dried llama foetuses

Government buildings, La Paz

Day 38 - 12th January
Happy birthday Jon!  Today we celebrated Jon's 30th birthday by mountain-biking down the "World's Most Dangerous Road" - a 40 mile stretch of winding gravel and dirt road that hugs the side of a steep valley with drops of over 600m at the edge.  The route starts at 4700m and descends 3600m to the valley below.  Most of the road is single-track and very narrow in places, meaning that accidents were very common until a new, wider road opened in 2006.  Now the vast majority of traffic down the road is groups of cyclists out for a thrill.  We resisted the huge pressure to go with Gravity, the company owned by our hostel, who charge nearly twice as much as everyone else and, after some research, chose a company called Velocity.  There were 5 people in our group - a Russian man, a Danish couple and us - assisted by Simon, our guide and Manuel, our driver.  We were kitted out in full protective gear at the start of the ride, something I was very grateful of later!

The start of the ride

 The start of the ride followed a tarmac road through a wide valley, with beautiful views of the road and river below.  We then hopped back in our van to drive a short way uphill to the start of the Death Road section.  The top of the road was cloud forest and visibility wasn't great for the first few minutes, until we descended below the clouds and the valley began to open out below us.  The terrain was very steep and rough, with lots of loose stones and gravel - I have to say I hated every minute of this section but at least Jon was enjoying himself.  

Our group on the Death Road

Precarious drops

In the middle section the road levelled out a bit and became smoother, the views were spectacular, I was beginning to trust myself and my bike and was beginning to enjoy the ride.  Obviously that's when I fell off!  True to form it was a comical accident - I got stung by a bee during one of the steeper descents, lost concentration for a fraction of a second and went flying head over handlebars, skidding along the road as I landed.  After laying dazed for a few seconds I brushed myself off and surveyed the damage - the bike was fine, my shorts were ripped, I had cuts and bruises on my legs and hands, a bruised jaw and my elbow was very sore.  As I said earlier, if it wasn't for the elbow and knee pads and the full face helmet, my injuries would have been a lot worse.  Manuel the driver caught up with me, checked I was ok to carry on and radioed the others to let them know what had happened.  Having just started to enjoy myself I was buggered if I was going to give up because of a little fall, so I got back on the bike and worked my way, slowly, to the end of the route with Manuel following behind.  The pain in my elbow as I passed over each bump in the (very bumpy) road was excruciating, but nothing compared to the exhilaration of finishing the ride with my fellow bikers.  We celebrated with beer, followed by lunch and a swim at a nearby hotel.  I don't think me and mountain-biking are destined to be friends but I feel very proud at having completed the challenge, and Jon had an awesome birthday experience so it all turned out good in the end.

Tonight the bar had 2 for 1 cocktails so we toasted Jon's 30th with another friendly group of travellers.




Day 39 - 13th January
After a reasonably late and boozy night we had a well-deserved lie in.  We spent another day wandering round La Paz, skyped our parents so they could say a belated happy birthday to Jon, and boarded a night bus to Sucre.  After the luxury of the Peruvian buses our expectations were high, and the journey started well when we discovered that the bus had seats that lie completely flat.  Our joy was short-lived as, an hour or so into the journey, we found that the bus didn't have a toilet, and the journey to Sucre was 12 hours long!  Fortunately nature called for the driver and we stopped by the side of the road, where we were able to take advantage of the back of a shipping container as a makeshift bathroom.  At least the seats were comfortable as we settled into the rest of the journey.




Day 40 - 14th January
We arrived in Sucre in the early morning and walked for about an hour before we found a hostel.  Having not slept at all on the bus, I went to bed for a few hours while Jon explored the city and arranged to meet up with some friends that evening for happy hour.  Sucre is regarded as Bolivia's constitutional capital and is quite pretty, with a colonial centre filled with white buildings and green plazas.  At 2700m it was nice to be a bit lower again and the weather was noticeably warmer and sunnier.  At 5:00 we met Grace and Dan and their 2 American friends for happy hour - the problem was it turned out to be happy hour on desserts, not drinks - not quite what we had in mind!  Still we made the most of it by sharing nachos and each having a dessert, before heading to another bar with a real happy hour, where we drank 2 for 1 cocktails (the local grape spirit, sangani, tastes a little like gin)

Plaza de Armas, Sucre

Sucre

Day 41 - 15th January
Being a Sunday, everything in Sucre was shut, so we had a lie-in followed by a leisurely day wandering round the city and reading our books.  We booked a morning bus to our next destination, Potosi.

Lake Titicaca - goodbye Peru, hello Bolivia!

Day 32 - 6th January
We spent today exploring Puno and arranging a day trip for tomorrow to visit the floating islands on the lake.  There isn't much to see in Puno but we wandered down to the port, which looked a bit like Southsea, complete with pedalos and small kiosks selling snacks and tourist tat!  After a wander round we took a taxi to see the Yavari, an iron-hulled gunboat that used to patrol the waters of the lake for the Peruvian navy.  She was built in England in 1861 and shipped, along with her sister ship the Yapura, in 2766 pieces to Arica in Chile.  The pieces were then transported over the Andes by hand an mule, taking an incredible 6 years, before being reassembled on Lake Titicaca.  Left neglected after she was decommissioned, she has now been restored by a charity and may soon be running cruises on the lake.

Yavari

Day 33 - 7th January
Today we did a tour to the floating Uros Islands, around an hour from the Puno shore.  The islands are made from totora reeds, which are cut from the lake bottom.  The root sections form the base of the islands and are lashed together with rope to form a large floating platform,  This is then covered with layers of the reeds, crossed over to form a kind of springy carpet.  Usually one extended family lives on each island, with several small bedroom huts, a tee pee-like kitchen and a small garden.  The island we visited also had a steel hut that served as a local kindergarten.  The reeds at the base of the islands rot away rapidly, so are are replaced with a new layer on top every few weeks to ensure that the island stays dry and solid.  The islands are anchored using large sticks pushed into the bottom of the lake to ensure they don't float away.    The island visit was really interesting, especially learning about their construction, and it felt very strange walking across a large, springy layer of floating reeds!

Uros floating islands

Uros islands

Uru women waving us off

After the Uros, we sailed on another few hours to Isla Taquile, a large natural island in the lake, famed for its weaving.  Although the morning had been very wet, by the time we reached Taquile the sun had come out and the place resembled a Greek island, with steep slopes, green fields and bright blue water.  We went for a lovely leisurely walk to the main town, where we had a tasty lunch and learnt about the local weaving traditions.  Men on the island knit hats from the age of 7 to denote their social and marital status, with distinct ways of wearing your tassel if you're looking for a girlfriend.  Young girls save their hair as it falls out with brushing or is cut, and give it to their fiancé when they get engaged.  The men then use the hair to form the basis of a wide belt that they weave for the wedding day, and the women weave an elaborately decorated panel detailing their life together, that will be sewn to the man's half on the wedding day.  

Harbour, Taquile

Isla Taquile

Day 34 - 8th January

Farewell Peru!  Today we crossed the border into Bolivia, a very smooth and quick crossing, despite what the Lonely Planet and countless travel forums would have you believe!  We just booked a bus ticket to Copacabana in Bolivia, got off the bus at the border, had our passport stamped, and got back on the bus again.  

We checked into a hostel in Copacabana, a small town on the Bolivian side of lake Titicaca, and had lunch in the sun on our terrace overlooking the harbour - very relaxing.  In the afternoon we took a walk round town and climbed a nearby hill, Cerro Calvario, to some beautiful views of the lake.  It was a short but steep climb in blazing sun, and we were very glad of the ice-cream seller at the top!

At the top of Cerro Calvario

Cerro Calvario

Day 35 - 9th Januray

Today we had a time-zone fail and missed our day trip!  Bolivia is one hour ahead of Peru, and while Jon had changed his watch, he forgot to change his mobile, which also serves as our alarm clock.  Consequently, when we woke up at what we 7:30, our 8:30 boat to Isla del Sol was pulling out from the dock!  So we spent another day chilling in Copacabana - it's a hard life!

Canyon Country

Day 26 - 31^st December

We arrived in Arequipa early and tried to find a hostel. This proved more difficult than we had first thought as most places were closed and our city map wasn't great. Once we had settled ourselves into a nice hostel I proceeded to spend most of the afternoon asleep, having picked up a cold in the jungle (don't ask me how!) In the evening, feeling much better, we went out for dinner and then headed down to the Plaza de Armas to see what the Arequipenans do to celebrate new year. It didn't look like a lot was happening so we settled ourselves into a bar overlooking the square to see in the new year with some local beer. At midnight all hell broke loose in the square – hundreds of people had gathered and set off fireworks and fire crackers they had purchased from street sellers. The noise and chaos was incredible, everyone letting off their fireworks at once. It's a shame you'd never get away with it in the UK, everyone behaved sensibly, no-one got hurt and the atmosphere was fantastic. Feliz Ano Nuevo everyone!

Arequipa

New Year's Eve, Arequipa

Day 27 - 1^st January 2012

We had hoped to do a bit of sightseeing today but it turns out that everything in Arequipa shuts down on New Years Day, including the tourist sites. Instead we took a walk up to a mirador with views over the city and spent the rest of the day in our hostel, reading and playing games.

Day 28 - 2^nd January

This morning we visited the Monestario de Santa Catalina, a huge, sprawling convent in the heart of Arequipa. The convent takes up an area of over 20,000 square metres and even has streets and squares inside it. The Nuns' cells were quite opulent, many of them consisting of many rooms, gardens and lavish furnishings. The Nuns' families would sell the cell to another Nun when she passed away. There are still 30 Nuns living in the convent and the chapel was closed, although the art gallery and museum were opening, housing an impressively large collection of religious art from the Cusco school.

Monasterio de Santa Catalina

After the Convent we tried to get a bus to Cabanaconde, a town at the Colca Canyon, where we planned to do a few days walking, Unfortunately all the buses were full and we were only able to get as far as Chivay, a town at the head of the Canyon. Jon finally got his wish to travel on a local bus. We started the day in Arequipa in shorts and t-shirts, and ended it passing over bleak Andean high plateau, and snow covered peaks at 4800m. When the bus was full, people started filling the aisles and I ended up with an elderly Quechua woman sitting at my feet. Eventually she decided this wasn't comfortable and squeezed onto mine and Jon's seat with us, practically sitting on my lap. It was hard to be annoyed with her when she stroked my leg, held my hand and gave me a big toothless smile! With no plans or information about Chivay we gratefully accepted the offer of a hostel from a woman who met us at the bus station and were piled into a tuk-tuk with our bags stuffed in around us. As it was throwing it down we didn't argue when the tuk-tuk driver opened the door to what looked like a deserted house, ushered us into an empty room and waved us goodbye. Eventually the owner appeared to take our money and we wandered into Chivay in search of dinner. Being low season the town was totally deserted but we managed to find somewhere to serve us pizza and beer. That night it was bitterly cold and I was grateful for my thermals in bed.

Day 29 - 3rd January

Another day, another bus.  This time we took another 3-hour local bus to the small town of Cabanaconde, situated near the top of Colca Canyon, the world's 2nd deepest canyon.  We reached Cabanaconde at around 4pm and were greeted off the bus by one of the staff from the hostel, even though we were a day late! The weather pattern at this time of year in the canyon is hot and sunny in the morning and rain late afternoon and evening.  As we were walking to the hostel the heavens opened and the torrent didn't stop until the next morning, so we spent a very relaxing evening sitting in the bar of the hostel, drinking beer by the warmth of the pizza oven.

Day 30 - 4th January

This was the day that Jon nearly killed me by overestimating my physical fitness!  The Colca Canyon has some beautiful hikes, most of which are done over a few days.  We had intended to do a 2-day hike into the canyon, stay at the bottom and hike out the next day, but with the weather being so predictably awful in the afternoons and evenings we decided that our warm, cosy, friendly hostel was preferable to spending a damp night at the bottom, and decided to do a day hike instead.  The problem was that the day hike we decided on was a 1200m steep descent to the oasis at the bottom of the canyon and back up again.  Had we stopped to think we may have realised that this is akin to climbing Ben Nevis in reverse and we may have adjusted our expectations somewhat!  The walk started well, across fields, past a spectacular view point, from which we could appreciate the beauty (and scale) of Colca Canyon, and then a very steep 2-3 hour hike down the side of the canyon to the Sangalle Oasis 1200m below.  By the time we reached the bottom, both mine and Jon's legs were feeling the strain and we were very grateful to slip into one of the beautiful cool swimming pools that cluster around the river at the base of the canyon.  

At the top of Colca Canyon

The view down to the oasis from about half way

Sangalle Oasis

Feeling revived we set off an hour or two later to begin the long climb back to the top.  My relief was short-lived - the climb was incredibly steep, on very uneven terrain with loose stones and dust and knee-breaking steps.  I maintain that I would have made it up if we hadn't already done the hike down less than a few hours before.  As it was it was incredibly slow going (even Jon says that it was very hard and more challenging than days 2 and 3 of the Inca Trail, but he may just be being kind!)  I made it about 2/3 of the way up before my legs hurt so much that I flagged down a passing mule and hitched a ride!  Riding a mule up a steep stone path with no saddle or harness of any kind has definitely entered my strangest-experiences-ever shortlist.  My knees may have been sore from the hike but, by the time I reached the top every other muscle in my body had joined them from clinging on for dear life with my thighs and fingers!  I left my trusty steed at the top of the canyon and waited for Jon to catch me up - predictably I didn't have to wait long, it turns out he's nearly as fast as a mule uphill.  While waiting I was treated to the majestic sight of a condor flying over the canyon.  Luckily the rain started later that evening and we made it most of the way back to the hostel before the deluge hit.

Day 31 - 5th January

Another day spent mostly on a bus, which given the amount of pain I was in from the walking and mule-riding, was probably for the best.  We caught the bus back to Chivay, unfortunately this one was even more crowded than the previous bus and Jon had to stand for the last 2 hours of the journey.  We then caught the tourist bus to Puno, which stopped en-route to see wild vicunas (related to llamas and alpacas) and a flamingo lake.  We arrived in Puno late in the evening and found a hostel to rest our aching bones.

Grazing aplacas

Lake on the way to Puno