The highs of Peru

I’ve been in Peru little over a week now and I have one word to summarise. High!

I spent three days in Miraflores, Lima, which is really pretty and very western. There are big shopping malls, wide roads and nice places to eat. I even managed to find an english speaking hairdresser for my long-needed haircut. The rest of Lima is pretty nasty however.
Miraflores is clearly the affluent tourist area with well dressed people and police everywhere keeping the scum out. The rest of Lima consists of ghetto after ghetto in a city of nearly 10m. Despite the hostel owners warnings of a bus strike, it was easy to travel from Lima down to Pisco, Nasca and Arequipa by public bus – and very nice they are too. No Chicken buses crammed full of people like in Guatemala, these are all air-conditioned, with comfortable wide seats. I even took a night bus from Nasca to Arequipa, which saves on accommodation.

Pisco was damaged by an earthquake in 2007 so looks like a bomb has hit it. We nevertheless found a bar with a dart board and all night happy hour. Drinks are about £1.20 here – around 6 Soles for a beer, so although pretty cheap, its not quite the $2 for a litre of un-named spirits in Nicaragua. From Pisco, you can take a speed boat out to a small island which is home to millions of cormorants, thousands of penguins and hundreds of sealions. It was so good seeing these animals in thier natural habitat but the smell. Jesus!

Nasca was a bit of a surprise to me, as i’d never heard about the famous Nasca lines, which are quite a sight. To see them you have to go by little single engine plane, which was an expensive first for me at $60 (mind the departure tax of 20 soles too bastards). The lines were drawn into the ground by pre-inca civilisations which had no way of getting above them to marvel at their size. From the ground they look like nothing – some lines in the sand, but from the air they are enormous drawings of monkeys, spiders and a person with a big head!

After Nasca and Peru gets high. Arequipa is a beautiful colonial town with a large square and big cathedral buidling, as well as some cool views of the nearby volvano (can’t remember name). It’s about 2500m though, so things start to get tough. Breathing after pretty much every bit of exercise. Sleeping is a chore too. Long hours laying their with a pounding head. I took a trip to the Colca Canyon too which was breathtaking. On the way you pass over a mountain which is 4600, which although not as high as most of the days we were on Kilimanjaro, is still crazy high. Chivlay, the little town in the Colca valley, has some open air hot baths, which are great with a beer in the early evening when the sun is setting, the air is cold and water blisteringly hot.

Yesterday we arrived in Cusco to begin our climb of the Inca Trail and Maccu Piccu. Cusco is 3600m above sea level, but since i’ve been almost as high for the past 4 days i’m getting used to it now. That and copious helpings of coca leaves! Addam and Laura were in Cusco earlier this year and said it was awesome. I now know what they mean. Such a cool little city, where almost ever corner has an ornate church, the streets are cobbled and loads of houses are still made of the Incan carved stones with which they were originally built. We went for a meal at a charity restaurant last night who also own a homeless kids centre – paid for with proceeds from the restaurant. There does seem to be a good community atmosphere here which is good to see, although poverty is still ever present.

We have our briefing session with our guides and porters tonight – it really is like climbing Kilimanjaro again. I’ve got my thermals, rain poncho and hired a sleeping bag, which fortunately isn’t as disgusting as the one in Tanzania! No Jonny here though Jamba’ing away. The smell is maybe better but the banter isn’t quite the same!