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Thursday morning - Arriving in Arequipa at 5.00am on the overnight bus from Cusco was shattering.. thankfully someone was awake at the hostel, allowed us to check in and get some much needed shut eye.
The rooftop terrace was a cool way to get my first sight of Peru's second largest city. Caged in by three dramatic volcanoes, Arequipa lies in a precarious setting, more due to the fact that the region is regularly wracked by earthquakes, the last big one to cause significant damage came in 2001.
After a late breakfast we had chance to check out the city a little more. The vibe was very relaxed and pleasant around the main square, or Plaza de Armas as they all seem to be known here in South America. Plenty of cafes and restaurants align cobbled side streets allowing the perfect opportunity to people watch in the warm climate and sunshine.. it was welcome after the chill of Cusco.
I'd seen quite a few River Plate football shirts knocking around throughout the day.. the famous red diagonal sash over white of the club from Buenos Aires is unmistakable. Wondering why, I did a little research late in the afternoon and found out the Argentinian team were playing in the Copa Libertadores (South America's equivalent to the Champions League in Europe) against Arequipa's local side FCB Melgar.
With only a few hours until the game started at 7.00pm I got my ass in gear and went about sourcing out some tickets having convinced Ria to attend what would be her first ever football match.
I wasn't sure what to expect with not knowing much about FCB Melgar or how fierce and passionate their fan base was.. but I expected a massive turn out with River being in town.
We arrived outside the Estadio Monumental UNSA to a real buzz amongst the locals where we stood out like a sore thumb being pretty much the only other gringos in attendance.
There was no seat number or anything like that, just rows of concrete steps to park your bum on. I expected the stadium to be full to capacity but it certainly wasn't.. three quarters full at best, as Melgar supporters were still making their way inside the ground 20 minutes into the game.
Turns out the home support were pretty damn passionate demonstrating their full repertoire of songs, non-stop, throughout the game which seems to be a common occurrence in South America games. Unfortunately for them, their devoted encouragement wasn't enough as River came out victors in a 3-2 win. The quality of the game was pretty poor, as was the atmosphere inside the stadium with things only livening up midway through the second half when the home team dragged themselves level at 2-2, but River always had that little extra. Not the best game for Ria to attend her first football match but it was still good to see a bit of live sport.
After a Chinese on the way home we hit the sack early as we had a day tour booked to the Colca Canyon in the morning and our pick-up time was a ridiculous 3.00am!!
It was a good few hours drive to the small town of Chivay in the heart of the Colca Valley where we had a very average breakfast but the view was pretty impressive as the sun began to rise. We had climbed to over 4200m on our way there causing a few of the passengers to suffer with altitude sickness. Imagine the scene when a Brazilian woman decided to unleash hell by vomiting numerous times on a full and cramped minibus! Oh the stench! There was nearly a domino effect with people gagging due to the smell. Disgusting! Thankfully the old jacket over the nose trick worked as a substitute for a gas mask.
We made a pointless second stop in a place I have no interest of knowing its name as it was just another "tour-filler", before moving on to the canyon itself and Cruz del Condor.
The Colca Canyon is the deepest in the world yet still less famous than the Grand Canyon, and I'm sure less impressive too. It was decent and cool to be there but nothing to write home about.
The Cruz del Condor is the most popular attraction here.. a viewpoint from the edge of the canyon where at 9.00 am every morning condors can be seen inflight for around half an hour.
They absolutely love their condors here in Peru, to a point where tour drivers will suddenly stop a bus and shout "CONDOR!" while pointing. Unless you're an avid bird watcher this viewpoint will more than likely pass you by, as it did with me.
The long lens camera brigade were out in force and audible groans in awe of the condors could be heard as they flew over head. "Really people??"
And then there was me, totally not understanding what all the fuss was about, standing around aimlessly with my supersonic iPhone camera, taking the most incredible blurry photos. It's a damn shame I forgot to pack my binoculars that morning or else I'd have been all over them condors like a perv in a strip joint! Yehhhh right.
Another tour-filler followed stopping at a hot spring in some random location which barely anyone bothered with. Then it was onto a Peruvian buffet lunch.
I was most looking forward to visiting the valley of volcanoes where several are visible from the same viewpoint.. one of them being active. Earlier on we saw ash spewing from this particular volcano but with it being later on in the afternoon an ash cloud had formed in the sky making for poor visibility.
All in all, it was a pretty poor tour. The highlight of my day came on the long return bus journey back to Arequipa. The Peruvian fella sat next to me at the back of the bus kept falling asleep on me, so I had a good few hours of fun taking selfies and filming him doing his best nodding dog impression.
It was time to head out of Arequipa on yet another frikkin early bus ride the following morning. We'd spend a whole day on the bus getting to our next destination, Huacachina. The journey was broken up with some stunning scenery along the western coastline of Peru and a nice lunch in a restaurant by the sea. The Scouse girls who we had met on the Inca Jungle Tour were also on our bus so it was cool to catch up with them aswell.
With an hour and half drive remaining we arrived at the Nazca lines. A viewing tower is erected by the side of the highway which we were able to walk up and take a look at a few of the nearby lines. Not quite as good as flying over them I'm sure but still pretty cool to be there even though we couldn't see all that much.
We arrived to Huacachina in darkness on Saturday evening around 7.00pm. This place is popular for its huge sand dunes and is the only reason people come here.. to ride in sand buggies and go sandboarding.
We checked in to our hostel, grabbed a shower and headed out into what is usually a lively Saturday night in Huacachina. As it was dark I couldn't really work out the towns surroundings. We had a bite to eat and a few beers, but that was it, we hit the sack knackered after the 14 hour bus journey.
After a good nights rest we had chance to check out the town before sandboarding later on in the afternoon. Walking out the front door of the hostel I was met by a humongous wall of sand which bizarrely wasn't visible when we arrived the evening before. The town really is tiny.. with a small lake at its centre point the whole place is overlooked by massive sand dunes. Sand buggies dominate the roads here waiting to take out tourists.. and that's pretty much it other than a few bars, restaurants and shops.
It was sandboarding time.. we jumped into our sand buggy which is basically a large cage strapped to four big wheels and a powerful motor. The buggy carried ten people including our driver.. he drove us through the streets of Huacachina and up into the sand dunes where he decided to let rip! This was serious fun.. bumpy as hell, blasting up and over massive dunes, some of which felt like almost vertical drops. It was like being on a rollercoaster giving you that belly-drop feeling every time we concurred another dune.
Stopping briefly for 10 minutes we got the chance to take in our surroundings which can only be described as the biggest sand pit I've ever played in.. sand, sand, and more sand. The dunes varied in size but they rolled off into the distance for miles.
The driver then fired us up to one of the big dunes where we had the chance to sand board.. they were pretty damn steep aswell for our first shot at it. Laying down, on our stomachs, on top of the board, we flew down the dunes. You had to be careful though and keep your chin up as you could easily fall off over the bumps and get a face full of sand.
The big buzz came right at the end where the driver took us to a dune which was three dunes, one above the other, and ridiculously steep, which you could link together for one big ride on the sand board.
As the sun began to disappear we had one last assault in the buggy over the massive sand dunes which was even more exhilarating than the first time. Great fun!
Jumping on a 6 hour bus to Lima now where we will drop anchor for around 10 days to chill out and have a break from the early starts and travelling around.
Adiós xx
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