Arequipa

So we didn't go to bed immediately - we started a (our) Peruvian habit of looking for Universal channel on the telly and watching back-to-back episodes of 'House'!!! Actually I say back-to-back but what I mean is we watched 3 episodes one after another but each one was from a different series and not necessarily in chronological order!

Anyway, Arequipa is Peru's second city (870,000), known as the White City (but no greyhound track anywhere!) and the centre is a UNESCO World Heritage site (Peru has quite a lot of them!!). It has the most tremendous main square by day and by night. A lot of the public buildings and monuments are made of sillar an off-white volcanic rock (hence the nickname - nothing to do with greyhounds after all!). It lies at an altitude of 2,370 and is overlooked by 3 volcanoes: El Misti ( the most prominent/closest); Chachani and Pichu Pichu. We didn't see too much of them until after it had rained and El Misti appeared - snow-covered and Mt Fuji-like

Most people come here not especially to see the town but to move on to the Colca Canyon or, less commonly, Cotahausi canyon - the deepest canyon in the world. However, after our exploits in crossing the border and the fact that we'd spent a lot of time being breathless in seattle San Pedro, we decided just to be tourists and look at the local sights without exerting ourselves too much. We, of course, were also quite ready to throw ourselves into the task of trying out new (for us!) local foods (!)

cathedral (silla)

(play) El Misti (for me)

cathedral with christmas tree

the bells! the bells!

more silla (step inside luv!) there's a lorra, lorra of it

Inca Kola (tastes like Cream Soda)

a whole street of silla!

doing research into local food

say cheese! Cheese ice cream. Mmm!

In our quest to sample delights of things consumable in Peru, we were able to sample our first (of very many) Pisco Sours (Rob can explain, for those at work!). We also had our first Alpaca (tastes like slightly gamey beef); stuffed potatoes; potatoes in a mustard sauce; Cusquena beer (not actually our first taste - thanks Levenshulme Tesco!) potatoes in peanut sauce; Inca Kola (see above) and last but not least ......cheese ice-cream!! - It was really nice (think of cheese cake - the real stuff not the overly sickly stuff!). We did, of course, rest from this exacting work of research and took time off to eat Mexican and Turkish food.

The hostel we stayed at, Hostal Solar, was really nice, very comfortable and more like a hotel. The room had a desk but the light at the desk was not too bright. This was okay for me as I was working on the blog from the bed with the aid of the bedside lamp. However, Anne had started on a venture of making notes from all the sources she had on her e-reader plus Lonely Planet (LP) and Rough Guide (RG) ready for explorations in the historical places we were about to visit and the light wasn't good enough for this ....so she set up an office in the place with the best light! (see photo).
The breakfast area was outside with a view towards El Misti and was coverd with a canvas canopy - all very civilised! The staff were great and despite the language difficulties we got on brilliantly.

research in progress!