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We arrived in Arequipa at dawn in the rain. This colonial desert metropolis is at the base of the snow-capped volcanoes Misti and Chachani. Here we found fountain plazas with huge palms and bougainvillea, colorful intimate streets, very friendly people, perfectly preserved mummies, and spicy food. And it is a photographer's paradise, a very beautiful place. We were all sad that we had such a short time to visit.
From the bus station we traveled into the city center to a hostel where we were meeting our bus for the trip to the Colca Canyon. It was quite pleasant, beautiful gardened courtyards and very friendly parakeets. We had just enough time to run down the street to buy some breakfast at one of the many markets and pastelrias that line the streets in the city center. My plums and sweet bread were delicious. And, before we knew it we were on the bus heading to the deepest canyon in the world.
Our journey took us through desert shanty towns into rolling hills covered with lines looking like dinosaur skin up past alpine lakes full of flamingos into the snowy Andes. We rose to an elevation of 16,000' where we found a massive field of offering shrines in the snow atop a mountain overlooking the Colca River valley. Matthew, Ian, and I enjoyed a snowball fight and making our own offerings, it takes three flawless Coca leaves buried under a totem of rocks, in our flip flops. The flip flops aren't a must but we felt it was more Incan. Can't tell you what I asked for. It's part of the rules, but it was a good wish.
At last we arrived in the tiny village of Coporaque nestled in a bucolic landscape embraced by ancient terraced mountains. The town has one square and many old adobe and stone buildings and our hotel. Our hotel is located on the river side of town with a great view over the valley and has one resident alpaca, which occasionally can be seen walking in the front door through the lobby to the dining room looking for snacks. That afternoon we took a walk through the streets of town where we ran into gangs of little piggies and saw friendly faces admidst the purple flowered potato fields and yellow flowered corn fields. Along the streets the local women were shucking corn and sifting through quinua grain. It is a small farming town with free roaming animals so we found that a fun game is name that dropping: pigs, dogs, llamas, alpacas, cows, donkeys, chickens, viscacha, and occasionally vicunya are all within the realm of possibility. From town we roamed up into the hillside a city of ruins of a culture that predates the Inca and were one of the many cultures that terraced the surrounding landscape. Their city is now covered in flowering desert vines and cactus with large yellow blooms. From the edge of this ancient village one can look over the valley and river with an amazing view of quaint villages surrounded by lush green walled fields following the topography of the valley. If you squint the valley looks as if it is covered with emerald fish scales sparkling in the sunset. That night Ian and I played a great game of UNO with a fine group of Australians as a thunderstorm made its way down the valley.
The next morning, we made our way to the deepest part of the canyon passing several villages with artesan markets and street performing dogs. The canyon itself is amazing, shear walls of rock descending down as far as the eye can see, waterfalls shooting dramatically out into the river below and overhead the Andean condor soars from the cliffs of this amazing canyon. The Andean condor is a majestic bird, black with a white rim of feathers at the base of its neck and with a wingspan of 9-10 feet it also the largest bird in the Western Hemisphere. Being in a place like this with such creatures soaring above I felt as if I was in the novel Journey to the Center of the Earth. It certainly is a powerful, strange, and majestic place.
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