A Day in Arequipa

The internet connection at this hostel really sucks. It´s taking me forever to upload the photos to facebook.

We had a more relaxed day today, finally. We got to Arequipa (the second largest city in Peru) at 8:40am. We went to the Los Andes to check in to our room. It was really early so they only had one single room available at the moment so we checked into that room first. Los Andes was pretty nice, and the staff quite friendly. We then went outside to check out the tours to the Colca Canyon. We finally picked one that would depart the same night at 12:30am and would take us for a 2-day hike. So that means we wouldn´t actually be spending the night at Los Andes, although we still needed a shower badly.

It turns out that all the sightseeing spots are usually off the city. So it´s quite impossible for us to get to those places on our own, unless perhaps we had months so spare. So we have to depend on local tours to organize all the transportation and guides for us.

(Okay, I´m getting really tired now. I think I´ll go back to my point form.)

- We went to the Santa Catalina Monestary. It´s a really big monastary for nuns built 500 years ago.

- The streets, particularly those around Plaza de Armas (there is always a Plaza de Armas in every city. And it´s always the town centre.), were getting busy with street hawkers selling candied applies and strawberries, chocolates, kebabs, etc. for the celebration of Semana Santa, aka Easter. The Peruvian Semana Santa lasts from Thursday to Sunday and is a big celebration. People working in the cities would travel back home for celebration.

- We then walked to La Cathedral. It was nice and big and crowded with worshipers.

- Then we went to La Compania, another church but with lots of gold decorations.

- After that we walked to the Santo Domingo Church, the oldest church in town. It was made of white rocks but it didn´t look very grand.

- We then walked to the Main Market. While we were at the outskirt of it, a cop talked to us, "Hola! No muy seguro." Having always been aware of pickpocketing in Peru, we listened and turned back to the Plaza de Armas.

- We tried to look for street food as the streets were packed with people for the Semana Santa celebration. Unfotunately, nothing appealed to us so we went into a restaurant and ordered some quick food.

- Headed back to the hostel. Took a well needed shower, packed for our two-day trek at the Colca Canyon, booked a room in Puno, and I headed for the computer again.