Arequipa

Had a work trip down to the city of Arequipa, Peru so I figured I might as well leverage the booked flights and take a week of PTO. The flight situation wasn't ideal with a total flight time of 13 hours plus 2.5 hour layovers in Atlanta and Lima but that's just the price of traveling to and from smaller cities so hey whatever. I'm clearly not very good at planning long distance flights though, I didn't take into account the possibility of customs in Lima taking 3 hours so I missed the last leg. Fortunately Arequipa is the second biggest city in Peru so I got booked for the next flight and even made it to my hotel before check-in.

I booked a tour to Colca Canyon that departs at 3 AM; I figured since I was already jetlagged, better to do it earlier than later since I basically fell asleep at 4 PM the first day anyway. Well that wasn't a very smart idea, I did not realize Colca Canyon was 2.5 miles above sea level so I went on very little sleep and zero altitude acclimation. Had a raging headache the whole time but it was a pretty neat place

The tour started with our driver passing trucks left and right on the 2-lane mountain pass so at least that woke me up. The road takes us west around Chachani the north to Chivay where we stopped for breakfast. A few forced tourist stops to take photos with llamas and alpacas but otherwise an uneventful trip. Colca Canyon was obviously very impressive but it always bothered me that they measure these depth canyons from the peaks of the nearby mountains. I suppose there isn't really a better metric to do it by, and I guess that's also what makes things like the Grand Canyon renowned since it's just a massive canyon in the middle of flat nothingness. The Mirador Cruz del Cóndor was cool, there weren't as many condors flying around as I had expected. I personally preferred the viewpoints closer to Maca, I loved looking out over the terraces that descent down into the canyon. The drive home was painful, my altitude sickness was killing me and every stop for hotsprings or alpaca viewing or volcano counting made me beg for mercy

A few cups of mate de coca (but more importantly a couple days of rest) later, I was back on my feet exploring the historic center where my hotel was, and where all the touristy stuff was. There's a ton of second floor and rooftop restaurants around the Plaza de Armas and I basically visited all of them; heck my translator for work even joked that I should show them around because I knew that area better than they did. I will say it was a bit painful walking around. 90% of the cars here have no maintained catalytic converter, but ok that's really just a nuisance if anything. But take into account that Arequipa is built on the side of a volcano and it's a mile and a half above sea level, so I'm basically climbing hills walking around from block to block and gasping for air (ok yes I'm a bit out of shape now). Trying to catch my breath and filling my lungs with diesel exhaust wasn't exactly pleasant. Personally my favorite area there was the Barrio del Solar, just a couple blocks west of the Plaza de Armas. Very quaint historic neighborhood, super pretty streets lined with buildings made from a white volcanic stone called sillar

Of course, the obvious tourist pull in the area is the Monasterio de Santa Catalina. Dubbed the city within a city, it housed nuns back in the day inside buildings covered in contrasting shades of white, red, and blue paint that are absolutely gorgeous. My tip is to go on a Thursday; they're open late that day so you'll be able to catch the sundown and dusk light

Up next was a visit to the Ruta del Sillar, an area in Arequipa where there are active quarries extracting sillar, the white porous volcanic rock that comes from the nearby volcano Misti. This is the rock that gives Arequipa the nickname "the White City". Although I read somewhere that it was originally called that because there was a large population of conquistadors that settled there but I don't think there were any sources cited for that. The tour guide said that sillar is still extracted by hand, which is why there were no machines in the area. Headed to the Quebrada de Culebrillas afterwards, an archeological site with petroglyphs carved into the walls. To be honest I wasn't too impressed with this part, it was similar to Antelope Canyon but more washed out and without the crazy geometries. It was also in the middle of a bigger mine with a bunch of trucks hauling ore in and out and the area just seemed a bit.. trashy

Overall, fun trip. I think a week there was too long though, I felt like I had exhausted all the things I could personally do and my Spanish is nowhere near good enough for me to be brave enough to wander to the less travelled parts. And to think that I told myself I'm not going to Machu Picchu because that's too touristy.. well, next time I'm in Peru I'm off to Cuzco. Or maybe the Cordillera Blanca