Arequipa

Our Cruz del Sur bus arrived in Arequipa at about 11am. After we arrived at our hostel, we looked into how we wanted to spend our time. We booked onto the two day, one night Colca Canyon tour for the next day. A group of five Australians (four girls one boy) we'd shared a dorm with in Huacachina were staying in the same hostel in Arequipa too and when we arrived they were there too and also doing the canyon tour. We checked in and headed to the Plaza de Armas. The main square was really nice, with arches, pillars, a fountain, pigeons, well kept gardens and nice architecture. We had a wander around, had some lunch and then walked to Santa Catalina, a monestry in the centre of town. We had a tour guide take me and Jen around which was great cause she brought the place to life. She explained all the history of the nunery and showed us around the poorer nun's homes as well as the wealthier ones. She showed us the communal kitchen and bakery and how there purified their water. There was a lovely garden and a good system outside where they washed their clothes in big ceramic bowls. 24 nuns still live there in the monestry. It was a really interesting afternoon.

We bumped into the Austrailians and they recommended a market on the map to go to. It was a big local market selling loads of fruit, veg, juice, bread and meat (which we avoided as there were some horrible looking animal parts hanging up on the counters). We then went back to the hostel and sorted our bags out for the trek the next day. We had to be super  organised and pack what we needed as we were leaving our hostel at 3am the next morning. That evening we went for dinner with the Australians which was nice and bought some bananas and snacks to fuel our two day trek.