Arequipa

And so we left the deserts of Nazca for another arduous 7 hour journey by bus. As it was an afternoon/evening/night journey we pretty much punctuated a bit of film watching with a bit of snoozing. Leo, and I imagine all babies sleep fantastically well in all modes of transport, which of course was perfect for us as it meant the journey passed without event. One of the films shown was 'The motorcycle diaries', the story of Che Guevara and friend's journey across South America, his experiences transforming him to form his revolutionary political views. His hand to mouth existence during their trip made our experiences feel laughably tame in comparison, but something has to be said for our experience of meeting peoples of many different cultures, seeing their struggles in life and the quiet dignity in which they live it. Hopefully something will change in our perspective on life and society too, though I imagine not quite in a Marxist revolutionary sense..

Poor Leo experienced a ridiculously late night, but with minimal fuss we were met by our new hotel's taxi to take us straight to our new home for 4 or 5 days and before we knew it we were out for the count in another new bed.

Arequipa is Peru's second city, and quite different form Lima in that it is a lovely, attractive place. The climate is wonderful all year round and is known as 'the White City', due to the blue skies that cause it to gleam and the white volcanic stone that many of the colonial buildings are made from. We spent a very pleasant few days here, doing very little other than meandering the streets and making a few tourist spots here and there.

The city is home to several impressive churches, a monastery and a very interesting convent, which until 1970 was closed to outsiders as the nuns lived there in complete isolation. In fact, some nuns still remain in isolation within a small corner of the convent complex. Now open to the public, the convent is like a mini city, with its own streets, houses, cloisters and church. It houses some great artwork and artifacts from the days of total seclusion. A more sinister side to convent life was represented by the torturous undergarments (basically made of barbed wire) the nuns had to wear to learn how to transcend the body to cleanse the soul. Spine chilling stuff.



Another local attraction is the preserved remains of an Inca girl nicknamed 'Juanita', found semi frozen in the 1995 in the mouth of the volcano Ampato. She was knowingly sacrificed upon the mountain to appease the gods who in their displeasure at the Incas, had erupted not long before. A very interesting if somewhat macabre attraction, but from the very well preserved remains of this girl a lot of information has been gleaned about Inca society, their rituals and their societal habits. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mummy_Juanita

We really enjoyed our few days in this city. Our hotel was excellent, a small boutique bed and breakfast (called casa Arequipa for anyone thinking of going) whose staff did everything possible to accommodate us, including even buying a baby highchair as they didn't have one previously. We were truly well looked after. They were very helpful in arranging taxis for our every move, due to a crime spree involving a few rogue taxis robbing tourists a while back, people are very cautious in ordering taxis and not wandering the streets in the evening. Not that we do any roaming beyond 6 o'clock at any point but it was lovely to feel well cared for. They even arranged a two day tour for us to the big local attraction, the Colca Canyon and let us keep the mess of our bedroom for no extra charge. Right, I think I've sold this place well enough now, needless to say that, though Arequipa is often a stepping stone to visit the natural beauty spots of the area, we thoroughly enjoyed our time here. Nuff said.

Nazca

We arrived in Nazca to what appeared to be a very sandy town (well, this is a desert after all) and proceeded to our hotel via taxi. We'd found a gem of a place to stay it turned out which was- as it marketed itself- an oasis in the desert. We pretty much flopped and enjoyed the surroundings of the hotel for the rest of the day and the next which was some hardship as I'm sure you can imagine! The hotel itself had a little planetarium in its grounds that they opened for a nightly show where they got a huge telescope out so you could view the stars. Since we were in the middle of nowhere the view was AMAZING and as for the moon, you could see craters and all sorts. No sign of the man in the moon unfortunately. The main event was the show within the planetarium, in which we learned all about the mystical Nazca lines that are to be found in the desert plains nearby. Apologies to those who have visited these already (Hannah) but as a short summary some mysterious lines and outlines of animals etched into the sand were discovered by some dude flying overhead in his plane in 1930-something. Previous to this they were not known about by the local population as their location was remote and, due to their sheer scale, impossible to see from the ground. Clever people who are able to date these things discovered they were made by the Nazca civilisation (200BC to 700 AD). No-one really knows why they were made but there are several theories including religious worship. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nasca_lines. Anyway interesting stuff that we were going to explore first hand over the next few days. On the way back to our room I had a terrifying encounter with a strange creature that was loose in the gardens, and as it approached us I had to make a dash for it back to the relative safely of our room to protect myself and my baby boy. (Ari didn't seem to mind the threat of impending doom as much).

In the cool light of day this mysterious creature turned out to be non other than the hotel's 'pet' llama named Dina (by some coincidence also the name of my mother in law) who was ridiculously curious in the goings on of the guests. Not very au fait with such creatures I decided to be a little cautious in approaching her but eventually gave in to her charms. Also roaming the ground were peacocks and horses, a true menagerie!



Enough of this incidental stuff, I shall move on to the purpose of our visit, the trip to see the lines. This obviously has to be undertaken by air, and so we popped to the local airport to board the tiny aircraft that was to take us for our half hour viewing. The lines and pictorials were shown to us by the expert pilot by aligning and dipping his wing to point it out. Vomit inducing stuff. But a truly amazing experience. What is amazing is a) how the Nazca people managed to create these artistic images without seeing them from above b) how they still exist, they are simply etched into the ground, a few inches deep. It is because of the climate of the area, it is so dry and the air so still that they simply have been preserved as they are. Incredible that they haven't blown away. And they really are in the middle of nowhere, these people would have had to endure great physical torture creating these images and geometric shapes in the middle of the desert.


After this morning excursion and punctuated by a shopping experience in the little town of Nazca and a trying time looking for cotton wool (for Leo's bum-oops sorry little one) we had a second trip to visit an aqueduct and the lines from the ground. Being a town in the desert obviously water is a problem, the locals in the town have water only 3 hours every day. The little they obtain is from underground channels running down from the mountains, channeled by underground aqueducts originally constructed in ancient times. Ingenious. The stop by the lines was merely to get an idea of how large they appear from the ground, and how shallowly constructed they really are. Oh and while we were there we saw a great sunset before returning back to our hotel to rest our heads before another long bus journey, this time to the city of Arequipa.

Lima

Ah, time to bid farewell to Ecuador and greet Peru for a challenging 4 week trip around the great sights this country has to offer. We had an uneventful journey which is just as well as Ari tried his best to pick a fight with the security at the hand luggage check point as they decided his skipping rope (brought along for impromptu cardio workouts to counteract months of hotel buffet dining- see, makes sense..) posed a security risk and duly confiscated it. I wanted to query why laptop cables and such liked were deemed safe as could also be used for mass strangulation, but didn't want to risk losing those too so kept sch tum, alas Ari went into a bit of a rage and wanted to see in writing where skipping ropes were seemed a hazard. Obviously this battle with South American security officials was not one we were going to win so in the end had walk off in a huff and to my relief, that was that.
We had a late arrival in Lima, which meant we crashed out at the hotel as soon as we feasibly could.
Our hotel was located in San Isidro, a swanky residential and financial area which didn't fit my vision of Lima at all. Methinks this is not Lima per se. We took a short taxi to the happening area of Lima, Miraflores, which dropped us off at oh dear, another shopping centre. As they go, this one was quite lovely actually, built into the cliff face, with sea views of the Pacific from most aspects. And as we were 'relaxing' before a LONG bus journey the next day, we didn't mind the comforts. So we didn't get to see anything of old, colonial Lima at all, just a few modern districts and a shopping mall. But never fear, we'll be back on our way out of the country for the cultural stuff.
What I can say is that the strange mist that descends Lima for 8 months a year is WEIRD. It just makes the place look spooky.
A 5 o'clock start the next morning (oh yes) was necessary to make the 7.30am 7 hour bus for our next leg of the journey, a few days in Nazca. I know this sounds dreadful but the bus was actually quite nice, with almost fully reclining seats in business class like luxury. And really, our plan was just to sleep. Leo was wonderful, sleeping for good chunks and a gem for the rest of the time. So, after so many hours, miles upon miles of sand (is this country made of anything else?), a few crap films and my first taste of Inca cola (fizzy drink-tastes like Iron Bru only is bright yellow) we arrived in Nazca.

Guayaquil

Howdy,
A 2 day stop in Guayaquil was required to recouperate and regroup before heading off to new adventures in Peru. Guayaquil is Ecuador's financial centre and most populous city, and from our perspective looks modern and fairly affluent. There seems to have been quite a bit of regeneration, and the 'Malecon' along the river, a pedestrianised boulevard, with gardens, kids play areas, restaurants etc is positively European in style and feeling. Can't admit to doing a whole lot here, though managed to get my 'Brent Cross' fix (need to indulge myself in a spot of retail therapy to feel at home again, not the non consumerist travel chick I though I was it seems) in a big shopping centre- apparently the biggest in South America, though not convinced.. Just depressed myself by not being able to make any seasonal purchases so made do by buying Leo a replacement for the much missed Mr Frog. Hope it'll go down well. Had to suppress urges to by him some more toys as we just can't carry any more, hope he'll not know what he's missing out on, but there was SUCH cute stuff.
Enough consumerist nonsense, we did manage to do something cultural, by visiting an area of the city known as 'Las Penas', colourful houses build up the hillside that houses the Afro-Ecuadorian residents of the city. Was a slightly run down dangerous area but after a bit of a spruce up is safe enough for the likes of us to drop by.

Galapagos (3)

And so our time on the Legend came to an end, and we said goodbye to our new friends, including Elizabeth and Ryan who were on their honeymoon and of course Herb and Carolyn. The good thing for us was that although most people were making their way back home or to the mainland, we had opted to stay on the main island, Santa Cruz for a few more nights. Santa Cruz, though inhabited, still has areas of conservation and much wildlife to see, so we relished a little more time to spend in this wonderful environment.
Among the places of interest were the Charles Darwin station, a centre of conservation where there is another tortoise sanctuary and home to the famous 'Lonesome George', the last of a subspecies of tortoise from one of the islands that so far has refused to mate. So he has his own camp in the preserve, and two females to keep him company, just in case he feels otherwise inclined..
Another highlight was visiting a wonderfully pristine beach called Tortuga bay, it was sold to us as a half an hour walk from where we were staying, and a chance to see some turtles swimming. After a slow start to the day we took the trip over there, on what was more like an hour just to get to the brink of the bay, then an additional twenty minutes of carrying the buggy (bad bad decision), baby and accompanying paraphernalia across soft white sand to the safer, more sheltered beach. This wouldn't have been too much of an issue only we had to be back to the park entrance by 6pm, leaving us just less than an hour to enjoy the beauty of the place. A veritable sprint back to the gates meant we made it back with 10 minutes to spare, shame the afternoon was rushed but was still worth it to see one of the best beaches in the Galapagos.
Oh, how nice to have breakfast with a couple of marine iguanas sunning themselves by their feet, to hear the distant gaffaw of sea lions from your bed at night. We shall definitely miss this.
Ari brought Richard Dawkins' book 'The Ancestor's Tale' (the story of the evolution of man going back through time) with him which we've both been reading while we've been here, and it really helps bring home the sense of prehistory the place has, and the mere blip in time that our own existence is, and for that matter our whole existence as a species compared with the goings on of the volcanic islands, the iguanas, the tortoises to name but a few. Thoughtful musings indeed.

Ecuador (by Leo)

Hello from Ecuador! I've been having lots of fun and lots more new experiences. I went to the middle of the world! Didn't look that much different but Daddy was doing some experiments and
looked pretty strange in that feathered hat.. he also took me to a funfair when I couldn't go up with the mountain with Mummy- no fair! I did go on a merry-go-round and a car though, but was a bit bored when Daddy played on the steeplechase, and he only came in midtable, rubbish!
I've slept in 9 beds so far, one of them was very rocky, especially one night when I got to sleep with Mummy and Daddy all night, what a treat! I've been on some boats and had to wear a really bright jacket that squished my cheeks. Have met lots of nice people, and some looked after me while Mummy and Daddy went somewhere. I got to watch 'El Barrio Sesamo', which Mummy says is called Sesame Street back home. I got to go in the backpack while we walked across a strange land, but it was good as I got to see some animals. The babies are my favourite.
Then another time we went to see some tortoises, some were small and some were REALLY big! I wanted to ride one but they said no touching. I don't think they would have minded as they seemed like they were asleep anyway.
After some more planes I am now in another place with tall buildings. I got a new toy as Mummy seems to have lost Mr Frog. It's alright but I still miss him. My big news is that I have got a toothbrush, haven't tried it out yet so not sure if I'm going to like it too much.. will let you know how I go!

Galapagos (2)

The next couple of days were spent aboard the Legend, hopping off the boat morning and afternoon to visit various islands. The staff had offered to babysit for Leo if we preferred to leave him aboard, and as they provided a formal service we agreed for the wet landings and gave ourselves the opportunity to do a bit of snorkelling. Highlights included Espaniola island, the island furthest east of the archipelago which was home to sea lions, blue footed boobies, nesting albatrosses, iguanas and the islands' main predator, the Galapagos hawk. On Floreana we had the opportunity to see flamingoes and go snorkelling- the promise of swimming with sea lions was not to be fulfilled with a solitary one torpedoing off before Ari could reach it, but seeing a sea turtle at very close quarters was a wonderful experience. Hopefully the photos show a little of what we saw, and due to popular demand I include the infamous blue footed booby... We also visited a giant tortoise sanctuary where the Ecuadorians are attempting to preserve and boost the population, depleted almost to extinction by years of being preyed on by man, by species' introduced by man to the island, or by competition for food by species' introduced by man. Troublesome lot aren't we? On our last day we had another chance to go snorkelling and Ari saw a sea lion swimming underwater. He still remains on his quest to find more..