Viaje a Chile y Arequipa

To avoid paying for a student visa or being charged a dollar for each day that we would stay past our 90 day tourist visa, my friend Conny and I decided to travel to Chile together and return to Peru with a new tourist visa that would sustain us in the country legally for another few months to come. We took a 20-hour bus ride to Tacna, which is the southernmost city within Peru. From there we arranged for a colectivo taxi to drive us, along with a group of Irish students, about an hour and a half across the border and into Arica, the northern most town in Chile. There we had lunch (which, when compared to peruvian cuisine, was absolutetly atrocious) and headed right back to Tacna via colectivo that same day. From there we found a bus that would take us into Arequipa within 10 hours, where we exhausted and happy about the new 180-days visa (!) stamps in our passports, collapsed into our beds at a lovely hostel downtown Arequipa.

(The streets of downtown Arequipa---this time my own photos! )

El volcan Misti (snow capped) from Arequipa

What distinguishes this trip to "the white city" from my last visit there, is not only that I had a camera this time, but that Conny and I went to hike in the Colca Canyon, which is in fact deeper (and in my humble opinion prettier) than the Grand Canyon. Though, surprise surprise, the Colca Canyon carries not nearly as much international reverence or popularity as its little brother in the United States:

Conny and I decided to do a two-day treck. This guided tour would take us down the canyon, across the river, up half of the other side, across that side of the mountain and through a few towns, and back down again to an oasis-all in about seven hours. The entire next day was dedicated to climbing back up the side of the canyon for about four hours and later on enjoying the thermal baths and delicious lunch buffet in the town of Civay.

About to embark on our journey

Crossing the river a first time

This is the oasis and trail leading back up the mountain. For the hike up that hill I happily chose to sit on mule back in stead of walking myself.

Early morning hours in the oasis

A fluff y Alpaca (not to be confused with Llamas, Vicuñas or even Guanacos)

The trip served as an excellent and much-needed vacation from school after our midterms. While the tours through the canyon is a very popular tourist attraction, the terrain and customs of the people inhabiting it still seemed fairly untouched and well preserved. Our tour guide, Angelito, told us that up until the 1990's, the people of the Colca region still did not have currency and traded food items, live stock and hand-made goods amongst each other until tourists started stirring up the economy with money.