Peru Tour - 11 - Arequipa

4 Jan 2006 – Arequipa -> Lima

Today there was no rush to get up. Had really good breakfast today – it included mangoes! We had to check out early as the manager would not allow us there till 2 pm. our guide Norma came to take us around Arequipa.

We first went to the Cathedral, and the companion church. Then got dropped off at Santa Catalina, a place for nuns. From there we went to see a huge church! We had seen it from outside. It is an international church.  It had a clock from England, pulpit from France, and Chandelier from Belgium. There were apostle statues on the pillars inside and a beautiful nativity scene.

Cathedral

Next was the walk across the plaza to the companion church. This church was baroque style with 14 K gold plating on the cedar wood – very beautiful. Earthquakes are a common problem here also in Arequipa – so these churches have been rebuilt. Adjacent to the church is a chapel. It was beautifully painted.  All the pigments were natural – the red one had to be done again. Flash photography is not allowed so we took some without flash.

Next to the church were some buildings which was given to the local artists and businesses. Nice…and pretty.

Then our driver, George, came and took us to some higher elevation spots from where we could see the Chile River and the whole city. If the day had been clear we could have seen the three volcano craters also.

Norma showed us the Maca products. This is used by the Colca people for energy in the mountains. Coca tea is popular but so are maca products – the candy and liqueur. We walked around and came across and mama and baby llama. The baby was so cute! It was so scared! Poor thing.

Next stop was Santa Catalina. We took the one hour tour at 11:30 am. This is a 400 year old place for training nuns. Rich or poor – the girls came here to become nuns. The place was like a castle in India – except much prettier and maintained really well. The rooms for the rich were different than the ones for the poor – strange. The mother nun had a huge kitchen to herself – why? Most of the buildings had arches to protect it from earthquakes.

We saw old kitchens, living rooms etc. the entire nun place was about 3 blocks long and 2 blocks wide. It was literally like a city inside with streets and beautiful garden areas.  The entire place was just beautifully painted and well maintained. There were so many photo ops and I took advantage of all of them. Amazing place.

Came back to the hotel – took a little nap in the waiting area and then our guide came to take us to the airport.  We arrived at Lima around 5 pm. Ulysses, our temporary guide, took us to our hotel. Lima is definitely a big city! It took us 50 mins to get there – the old part of town.

The city could be any big city in India, crazy driving, too many people (about 9 million), and public transport with great deal of noise and pollution and commercialization. And just like India, usually businesses and residences are mixed, a lot of times, business downstairs and residence upstairs.

Hotel was okay. We signed up for a 2pm city tour for next day and then went out to Kennedy square/Gardens in search for Indian market, as our guide said it was there. It was a long walk. After a long fuss, we found there was a small market in the park area. There was nothing much unique about the shopping here.

We saw a street on the right which was very brightly lit. We went and found that it was a street just lined with restaurants.  And as in Agua Calientes the waiters were standing out with the menu to invite us in. we did go in one – Bhaiya again had lasagna – not good at all, and I had some cheese bread.

Started walking back to the hotel, tried to look for a dessert place but did not find any. Found some stores but nothing special.  Just came back to the hotel and slept!