It´s that Condor Moment

Well Tuesday was an early start for our long drive to Chivay in the Colca Canyon, it wasn´t the most interesting of drives until the last few hours when we ran out of road and had to drive on the surface that NASA used for testing their moon buggys. Quite a few of us were glad that it was the last and not the first two hours as most of us were still suffering from the night before.

Once we arrived in Chivay we soon realised why it wasn´t in any of our guide books, the place had about 6 streets, 2 hotels, 1 bar and 45 stray dogs. After dinner a few of us ended up in the only bar and guess what it was an Irish bar called McIlroys... well they said it was Irish it had a Guiness painting on the wall and a poster of a famous Irish Barcelona player Ronnie O´Dinnhio. Dawn and Joanne were feeling quite cold (surprise! surprise!) so they odered a mulled wine whilst the rest of us had a beer and toasted Tubbsy´s birthday which seemed to drag on for the rest of the week.

Next morning was another early rise so we could catch a glimpse of the Condors as they glide up on the early morning thermals in the Colca Canyon which is twice as deep as the Grand Canyon. When we arrived at the viewing point nothing much was happening but within about 5 minutes we seen some Condors deep in the valley. After no time at all we had about six or seven condors gracefully gliding around us, putting on a real show as if they where part of a circus routine. This lasted for about 20 minutes before they slowly made their way back into the canyon, our local guide told us that we were very lucky as they don´t always stay as long as they did and sometimes don´t make any appearances at all. When booking the trip and looking at the itinerary and I thought this might be a bit rubbish but I was totally wrong and really enjoyed our time here. Now it was another long drive to our next destination Arequipa.


Arequipa is Peru´s second largest city and the is the industrial hub for the south of Peru, but it still has a really nice centre or so it seems from the little we saw of it over the next two days. This was to be the first night of camping using the budget expedition equipment and this also meant that we had to put up our own tents and cook our own food unlike the Inca Trail when the porters done everyting for us. We were split into groups for the breakfast, lunch, dinner, washing up and the cleaning of the truck and on the first night Joanne´, Kate, Louise and myself where tasked with making dinner for the 21 of us. We decided to make Joanne´s old party faithful Jumbalya (thanks Lynne for the original recipe) and as usual it seemed to go down ok, well nobody seemed that ill the next day.

Next morning we headed to the Santa Catlina Convent, which used to hold upto 500 nuns. This convent was where the rich of the area had to send their second daughter to become Nuns. The rooms where very spacious and the nuns had many cooks and cleaners to help them in their solitide (only for the really rich though!). The convent itself is like a small town with small streets between each of the the buildings. The buildings are all colourful and painted making the place very attractive to spend the rest of your life. We had a really good guide taking us round telling us what it would have been like for the nuns living here over the last 400 years. In the trainie nuns rooms all the statues of Jesus had mirrors placed inside their mouths so when the Nuns were praying they would think Jesus would be moving his lips and talking to them but it would only be a reflection of their own.


At lunch time we headed to a Turkish reastuant where the Kebabs are highly recommended, and we weren´t disappointed. Then it was on to see Juanita who was a 500 hundred year old mummy which was found in 1995 at the rim of the Volcano overlooking Arequipa. The mummy is one of the best preserved mummys to have been found since it was covered in ice and all its hair and skin was stll intact. It´s now kept in a refrigitated glass box which lets you see it from all sides.

That night it was another teams turn to cook and we had kebabs which were tasty. We all decided that a night out in the town was in order - well it was Tubbsy´s birthday week and we had just presented him with his cake. The first bar was ok with some decent cokctails and beers. The second bar had a live band that was playing the classic Roy Orbison song when we arrived "Plettee Wooomannn" before the Queen Medley had our crowd up head banging and punching the hand in the air. I should have mentioned earlier but most of the guys on this trip have an unhealthy obsession with some truly awful middle of the road music with Elton John being their musical God and Freddy Mercury not to far up behind. We then headed on to a club where all I can remember was the dodgy salsa music and a lot of really bad dancing from people who should know a whole lot better. At about 2:30 we headed back to the Kebab shop to complete our hat trick of Turkey´s greatest gift to mankind, before jumping in Taxi back to our tents

Next morning the bus once again had a few delicate souls as we headed to Puerto Inka on the Pacific Coast.