Peru South

After a lovely couple of days in Lima we are off on a 7 day jaunt with Peru Hop Bus. (Again no road rules and traffic lights are a pure decoration). Our fist stop was a 17th century Hacienda with a dark history in the slave trade.

We walked in the tunnels which were only discovered after the earthquake in 2007 – over 17km of them.  It is believed that when the laws regarding slaves was changed the then owner sealed the tunnels with 8000 slaves inside – hopefully this is just an old wives tale.

On arriving in Paracas where we were staying overnight we had a few hours free so Steve and I decided to hire a quad bike and go to the museum and look around the national reserve.  Turned out not to be the best move, we caused a bit of a curfuffel.  Got the bike and drove to park, at entrance it appeared we should have a guide and ticket person was saying we could not enter ( we think,… Language issues). At this point a group turned up they spoke to the lady and we put our names on a piece of paper and were allowed to go.  Not sure what the group were doing but we turned off at the museum.  Ladies there said things we did not understand and they gave up so we went to waters edge to look for birds then to the museum. Pretty scary the medical things they did back then, operating on brains and changing head shapes etc.

On leaving we were accosted by the same ladies plus the guys we rented bikes from. We were told to follow them back to town, even though we had paid for another one point five hours to explore the Park. On the way back we all got stopped at the entrance for about 25 mins with a group of people arguing while we sat there with no idea what was going on.  Eventually one of the people explained that it is mandatory to have a guide in the park and the bike should not have been rented to us without one.  Not our fault they said.  Still quite embarrassing and a waste of the hire cost.

I found the Sarcophagi interesting and very pretty, but not sure I would like to end up like that.

The next morning we took a boat ride out to some small islands near by to see the Humboldt Penguin.  On reaching the first island, there are a few seals but virtually no birds at all – apparently due to current El Nino they have moved to another island.  Off we go to that group of islands and there are so many birds, not just penguins but many others too, the islands are covered.  Quite a sight.

Next stop a night in Huacachina, on the way our bus kept breaking down and also got rear ended by another vehicle – no damage though.
Huacachina is mainly for sandboarding or dune bikes which we decided not to participate in and just enjoy the scenery instead.  Pretty high sand dunes – impressive, but one guy on our bus went over the handlebars of his bike and then it ran him over.  Luckily not too much damage only a few stitches needed – glad we did not partake.

Next stop the Nazca Lines, firstly a tower viewpoint where you can see a couple of the geoglyphs but the best ones are by a flight over.  It was very impressive, unfortunately our photos are not.

We had planned to go to the aquaducts, but a mis communication meant we missed that option – in the end not so important as we saw them from the flight.

So far the bus journeys have not been to bad but the next one was 11.5 hours overnight, it was not great with little sleep had, although more space than a plane which is an advantage.

We decided to spend 2 nights in Arequipa as there were some interesting things around, like Colca Canyon and Ruta Del Sillar.  In the end we would have liked a 3rd night as it was a lovely city with lots of old buildings and other interesting places we could have poked around.

2 options for Colca Canyon – viewpoint or 2 day hike, which apparently is really tough on even youngsters spanning from 3287 meters down to 2100 metres – too tough for us. The short viewpoint walk was hard enough at 4900 metres.  The main drawcard of this viewpoint is the number of Andean Condors flying around, impressive.

On the drive to Colca Canyon there was ice on the windows of the bus and it was freezing.  We also went over even higher passes with puddles and small streams covered in ice – melted by the time we came back at midday.  Again even up this high there is so much rubbish everywhere – every place you can stop is a rubbish tip.

Ruta del Sillar was interesting – although a bit of a “Selfie type of place” for my liking.  All the houses in Arequipa used to be made out of the two colours of “sillar” blocks of volcanic tuff, of course it is too costly now so to keep the history of the “White city” a road in the quarry has been turned into a tourist attraction with many carvings – pretty impressive ones too.( Also a fake Petra)

Next stop Lake Titicaca, we are only doing this part to find a rare grebe on the lake, the Titicaca Grebe although it was interesting to see the floating houses it is very touristy – although also very quite while we were there.

This was a tough stop as we arrived at lunch time, had a short time to wander around – in our case a quick hour round the first part of the lake looking for birds, then the boat trip to the islands.  After that we had  5 hours to kill waiting for the night bus to Cusco.  At least this bus has seats that recline a lot further a large improvement for a shorter journey….

Arriving at 5am in Cusco we went straight to our accommodation to sleep.  The whole 7 days with night buses was exhausting.

Cusco historic area is lovely – although very hilly and it was great to have a few days to explore the town and some near by ruins. 

You could spend weeks here and never see them there are so many.  There are also some great restaurants here and so good to have something different (thai being our favourite).

Above is Tambomachay at 3700 metres, below are Huamanmarka and Chullpas de Ninamarka.

The evening before we left for our birding section Steve went to a very close minimart for some water.  Not realising till the next morning he had put his wallet down to get change out of a pocket then forgot it.  Obviously not an honest shopkeeper as no wallet the next day.  Worse than the money is the credit card and driving license,  At least with modern technology you can now get both as on line versions quite quickly.

Heading north from Cusco for some birding and more ruins – although we only really looked at the small ruins sites – the ones most tourists do not go to and skipped all the big crowded places.

I was surprised in this area to see so much tea growing, somehow I had never put Peru and Tea together.

Then back to east of Cusco and the famous (for birders) Manu Road.  Finally the hills are covered with trees – what a difference to the rest of Peru that we have seen. Stunning scenery with waterfalls everywhere but also landslides and in one case we had to shut the windows to drive under a waterfall.

The road is in pretty bad condition and we found out later it was only built 2 years ago by the chinese and some of the surface only lasted 3 weeks.  Very badly made.

The area is alive with birds plus the odd mammal, we saw a Tanandua and a few other things.

Our favourite place down here was Manu Biolodge – apart from being a lovely lodge the grounds were amazing – so much life, birds, frogs, reptiles, mammals.  Great to see how much difference a concerted preservation attempt can make.  We only got part of the way to our furthest destination on this road when somehow the driver got a call and was told our hotel had no room for us (we booked in Feb).  Apparently new management and old management did not pass on bookings.  Change of plan, back to previous place for 1 of the nights and heading back added a night to last stop. Got to said last stop, given room then had management knock on door and say they were fully booked too and our extended booking was a mistake (great, 2 in a row).  In the end they juggled things and let us stay.

This is all a protected area but we saw people taking plants and also catching butterflies (researchers) when there are signs everywhere about NOT catching butterflies.

Another odd food – we were given a take away lunch – sandwich with chicken and chips, odd.

Back to Cusco and on up to Aguas Calientes and Machu Picchu by bus and train.  The train to Aguas Calientes was incredibly scenic and the experience done very well with dancers, music etc.  The town is cute with a lovely river (Only flows in daytime as controlled by Hydro electric scheme) running through and it was fun to watch some locals trying to get heavy bags of ?? over the river on a tyre and at the end of the day themselves.  1 guy got over, the other fell in and the rope came free – he want back in to the jungle and was not seen again.

A choice of walking or bus up to Machu Picchu – we took the easy route as it is a tough with over 1700 steps and a continuously steep incline.  We chose an early slot to hope to avoid the worst of the crowds.  In fact it was not bad at all but by the time we left the crowds were increasing.

We were also lucky with the weather, the day before it rained heavily in the afternoon, and the next day it rained too but we had dry weather – if not sun.

A very impressive site with some great orchids growing around and incredible views of the surrounding mountains.  It really is mind boggling how these places were built so many years ago.

A last wander up and down the road at Aguas Calientes for birds and then back to a cold and wet Cusco for 2 nights and (And a stop at Thai restaurant) then our flight to Chile.

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