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First if all we have just heard that Charles' best friend George and his wife Connie have had a baby boy this morning called Anthony. We are very pleased for them and can't believe he will be almost a year old by the time we meet him!
We have spent the last four days in here in Arequipa. When I wrote the last blog I was ill but as soon as I recovered on our arrival Charles was struck down with something and so the first day here was spent with a role reversal and me nursing him! He is all better now though and we're going to be more careful about eating/washing our hands/not sitting in the sun too long!
On Monday we went to a museum that we had been told about by fellow travellers about Inca sacrifices. 500 years ago the Incas believed that the gods lived on top of the mountains and that the weather was controlled completely by them- if it rained or was windy that was the gods telling them that they were angry and if the sun shone down they had made them happy in some way.
In order to appease them children would be taken from their parents at birth and taken to a house in Cusco, the Inca capital in order to be trained and prepared fo0r sacrifice. When the children were between 8 and 12 years old they would make the 500km walk to the Andes where they would climb up to 6000m with the Inca priests. There they would take part in a ritual involving drinking Colchi- a beer made of corn and eating coca leaves. They would then be put in the foetal position and left for the gods wrapped in ornate textiles and surrounded with objects such as vases, plates and metal ornaments.
The exhibition we went to see was excellent. It started with a video about an expedition made by an American anthropologist Dr Johan Reinhard in September 1995 who climbed the 6,380m Ampatu Volcano that overlooks the city. This was only possible as the Sabancaya volcano had erupted, melting the ice that covers the top. When he reached the summit he found 3 stone circles that were indications of these traditional Inca sacrifices. On digging down they found many objects and also the remains of three of these children. 18 have been found in the Andes in total but one in particular is amazing. 'Juanita' was completely frozen after her death and due to this has been perfectly preserved.
After the video we were led through rooms where we could see the objects that had been found with the children. They were stunning- the colours on the textiles, vases and plates were as vivid as the day they were made and you would not have believed that they were 500 years old and had not been restored. There were also copper Llamas that were representative of the 1000 llamas that were sacrificed for each child as well as the very thin hair shoes that they had made the huge journey in. Each child was also buried with their umbilical cord as it is belived (and is still today by some communities) that this is the best medicine if a child is sick and they will cut a bit off and feed it to them.
Finally we were taken to see Juanita herself who is kept at minus 20 degrees in a sort of chiller cabinet. It was absolutely incredible- because of the ice she was perfectly preserved- you could see all of her skin on her arms and hands and even the wrinkles on her fingers. Because of her condition they had also been able to do a lot off research on her as her cells were still alive. They discovered that she had been killed from a blow to her right eye. They believe that she would have been pretty out of it due to the altitude, colchi and coca but undoubtedly it was very cruel. They believe that not all the children were killed and that many were buried alive. We were really pleased that we came to see it as it was fascinating to learn more about the Inca culture, especially as we will be walking part of the trail ourselves in a few weeks to Macchu Picchu.
The main thing to do in Arequipa is to visit the Colca canyon which is the deepest in the world. Sadly though this is a 2/3 day trip and we did not have enough time. On our last day yesterday we decided to go white water rafting instead which was brilliant. It was an afternoon where we got dressed up in ridiculous outfits and went down rapids graded from 1-4. The water level in the river was really low so there were a lot of rocks which made it quite hairy but we really enjoyed ourselves with our guide shouting constantly "forward, backward, paddle hard!" We also got to enjoy the stunning scenery with the volacones looming behind us and the Andes surrounding us as cormorants and condors flew overhead.
Now we are on our way to Quito. We have a day in the capital of Ecuador and then on Friday we set off for a seven day cruise of the Galapogas islands that we are really excited about....
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