South America Part 8 - Colca Canyon Tour of Sin Condors y Con Gastro
(by Nick – because I was less sick and had more memories)

We got picked up (in a non sexual way) by the tour guide (Albert) 10 minutes early (eg: ¡7:20am!). We then spent the next 80 minutes of our lives driving around the same streets of Arequipa collecting people. We drove past the Plaza del Armas about three times and the same sidestreet about twice…

After driving around for about 90 minutes – we then had a toilet stop (right near the airport which only 10 minutes from Casa de Tintin). I was wanting to use the toilet there but because I don´t want to fork out 0.5 Soles (or 20 Australian cents) to do a number one – I bravely held on (after drinking heaps of juice and coffee at breakfast).

The surrounds of Arequipa were quite spectacular – there were three large volcanoes surrounding the city. The ´burbs of Arequipa seemed to be a bit more “down ´n out” than their city cousins. We did notice that the architecture is different in Arequipa (flat roofs, sillar stone walls) than Cusco (tiled roofs and mud brick construction).

After about another hour – we had another pit stop (in the middle of nowhere). I decided to bravely use the toilet facilities without paying the half sole fee. I have survived to pee another day.

About 5 minutes away from the aforementioned pitstop – the sealed road became a dirt road. This was a lot slower and rougher and did wonderful things to the bus suspension.

We stopped at a marsh which had lots of Llamas and Alpacas. I had finally discovered the difference between Llamas and Alpacas – Llamas are uglier and have longer necks and short tails where Alpacas are cuter, fluffy and more tasty.

The altitude here was getting pretty high. Arequipa is higher than Cusco and Machu Picchu, but the pass we went over to travel to the Canyon was 4910 meters (freekin high considering Mt Kosciusko is 2228 meters above sea level). It was cold and there were touts up the top (I have no idea how they get to where they sell stuff). I began to get a slight headache but Ant took a complete turn for the worse.

The road down from the pass was s!!! scary. It was soooo high and there were ravines and cliffs (and boulders and rockslides) on both sides of the road. There was a complete absence of crash barriers or (even worse in my opinion) emergency run-offs if the brakes fail. Also – to make matters worse, our bus driver, Elvis, appeared to have a strong desire to meet his more famous dead namesake. He consistently drove on what ever side of the road had the bigger cliff or oncoming traffic. I spent the whole time gripping the seat in panic and cold sweat.

Meanwhile – Ant was having real cold sweats. When we stopped for a photo opportunity for our insurance companies, the tour guide noticed that Ant was white, which was remarkable considering he was bright red from sunburn at the start of the day. The guide thought that it was altitude sickness and used that traditional Peruvian altitude remedy, rubbing metho on your hands and inhaling the fumes. This is called chroming when done with petrol. It helped a little.

When we made it to the “fleece the tourists” checkpoint where we bought our colca canyon tickets, Ant got off the bus and lay down right on the side of the road. Nick was getting the tickets and of course the local dogs decided to come and sniff Ant. For Australians, rabies is a big worry so even tho Ant was nearly dead, he managed to fend the dog off.

Ant writes:
All I needed to do was get to a toilet, and fast. Of course the ticket station didn’t have one, so we had to wait while all the tourists mucked around trying to pay with US dollars and not having change, and then faffed about getting back in the bus. We then drove through the town of Chivay to the touristic restaurant where everyone was supposed to be having lunch. I just went straight to the toilet. It was not pleasant, the toilet or the way I felt.

Of course though, we weren´t supposed to be having lunch at the restaurant. Us, along with two other aussies from Melbourne, were booked into a hotel at Yanque, 15 minutes away. That meant we had to get in a taxi and drive back the way we came. When we arrived, I just said to Nick “here is the voucher and my passport. Get the room key toot sweet” and collapsed on the sofa while we went through forms in triplicate with someone who spoke basically no English. Then it was straight to bed. Ill let Nick take back over as I don’t remember anything till around 7pm.

Nick writes:
…from here on in, Ant had become a delusional toilet bandit! I went to the restaurant with the other aussies (a brother and sister who had been travelling since Oct) and sat down to another touristic menu. I had Alpaca for the second time – however this place made it taste a whole lot better than the restaurant in Cusco.

We were then told by the woman who ran the hotel but didn´t speak a word of English that we were going on a three hour walk with a guide who also doesn´t speak a word of English. I have never taken a Spanish lesson (other than spending 1 hour on a Spanish CD course) – but I knew Spanish about 100 times better than they knew English (is that a sentence?).

We walked into town and were joined by three of the four cross-golden retriever/German Shepard that lived at the hotel as well as this mangy stray dog (who might have had rabies). The dogs names were Lucas, Andy and Randy. We named the mangy dog “Mangy”. Of course – every time we bumped into another dog minding its own business – the dogs would go berserk.

Yanque was a pretty small village, but alas it still had a Centro Plaza square with church. The group walked out of the village and over a gorge (complete with rickety old bridge which was non-compatible with fat gringos). There was some narrow roads and farmers would occasionally pass by with cattle or donkeys or llamas. The dogs were obsessed with cattle – particularly big bulls who would go psycho and almost charge us off the road down the ravine.

The guide took us to a supposed “Inca” ruin – but I think it was pre-Inca.

We got back from our forced march around 7pm (when it was pitch black outside). We all decided to hit the “wood-fired” Jacuzzi at 7:30pm. Ant decided to get off his death bed and join us. When we all got there – the Jacuzzi was just above room temperature. We think that the rest of Yanque was having a power black out to power the bubbles in the Jacuzzi.

We soon realised that we were the only guests in this entire hotel (which probably could have catered for at least 50 plus guests). I think I started to get flashbacks of “The Shining” and only hoped that the tour bus wouldn´t forget to pick us up so I didn´t go mad.

We all ventured out of the Jacuzzi (with really cold outdoor temps) back to our respective rooms. I tried to have a hot shower – but there was a sign in Spanglish saying “por favour wait five minutes before hot water comes on”. We decided that we could do without and head straight for dinner.

Again – there was the set menu with the same choices from Lunch. I thought they served Condor (trying to read the menu in Spanish) but after the woman´s attempt at doing charades – we deduced that it was actually lamb (or miniature alpaca as she acted out). There was a wood fire right next to our tables (sans any protective glass or mesh to stop the embers from hitting our table). It was quite explosive.

Ant could only finish the entrée (soup) but couldn´t handle the Yanque chicken curry (still had the urge to s%%% everything solid thing out!). We all had an early night (considering we had another early start in the morning to the Canyon).

Ant writes:
I stumbled back to my room and after visiting the toilet went straight to bed. I don’t think I said anything to Nick when he arrived back. However around 1am I woke up and had to stumble over Nicks shoes and clothes to the toilet. After realising that Id run out of toilet paper, I stumbled blindly across the corridor, remembering that all of the rooms just had their room keys sitting in the door (apart from occupied ones). Of course, I tried the one with the Melburnians in it first. Then I stumbled into the next room and made a mess of that room too. I didn’t move for an hour.

When we checked out the next morning, I left USD5 in a hope that it would go some way to cleaning up the mess. Of course, remember we had a first aid kit with anti-gastro stuff in it. But we had left it in Arequipa. Very useful.