Journeys in Latin America - January to June 2009

Tuesday 26 May 2009

Colca Canyon, Peru

For the moment, photos have been uploaded for a couple of days trip that we did out from Arequipa, one of the main cities of Peru, and and a very pleasant one too.

So I met up with Ali Massey and Dickie Hall, noth of whom i knew from the Antarctic and hadn´t seen for quite a while, so it was very excellent to meet up in South America and do some trekking. We all took a 7 hour bus to a little town called Cabanaconde on the edge of the great and very deep valley called Colca Canyon - it´s a very popular place to visit from Arequipa and definately worth it - the valley top is at about 3300m, and we plunged down to near 2000m metres on a winding path that hugged the steep sides. We walked for about 7 hours to descend the valley, cross the river at the bottom, climb part of the far side, visit some villages and then descend again to a spot known as the Oasis where we stayed the night and enjoyed some swimming in river-fed pools just as the sun went down and the moon rose. The next morning we awoke early and plowed straight up the 1000m of steep climbing in order to catch our bus back to Arequipa - a very enjoyable couple of days.

From Arequipa
Dickie looks over the valley as we descend to the river.

From Arequipa
Typical view of the foliage - catcti and dry hardy flowers and bushes clinging to steep dusty sides.

From Arequipa
Me sitting on the steps of the church in one of the farming villages on the far side of the Canyon.

From Arequipa

Chief got creative with the long-exposure photographs and took advantage of the moonlight for some nice star photos.

From Arequipa

He calls this one "Horse, Bush and a Bit of Grass". Very nice... More photos from Arequipa itself soon. Once Vic gets her photos uploaded there will be more fleshing out of the visual blog too. Rob

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