Arequipa,Llamas,Condors,Pisco,y amigos :)

Our first viaje alone!! Well, it sadly was not supposed to be but Marta got food poisoning from eating duck. No bueno! Regardless we traveled our way to the airport at 2 in the morning and waited for our flight. In order to get to the plane we had to take a packed bus (terrible) to the plane to board outside. We took the baby plane out to Arequipa and it had breakfast but I was a zombie and fell asleep so I missed it! Once we arrived we waited in the airport until our Johnny Depp look alike came and found us saying that he was our tour guide! He spoke really good english and right from there we started our tour to Colca Valley and Chivay. We had others on the tour with us and they were from Chile, really nice people :). We started our site seeing of volcanoes and beautiful mountains. 

Along the way we got to see alpacas, llamas, and another kind of llama just roaming around the land. When we made a stop at a restaurant they had a little shop where they sold llama and alpaca fur clothes. It was amazingly soft and I bought socks and other things there! We mainly stopped there to drink coca tea. The tea was supposed to help us all with the altitude sickness that some of us were feeling. For some of us it made us more groggy but Im so thankful that I was feeling okay. When we reached the highest point where the volcanoes were, we took a stop at some open huts. These huts were our bathrooms :) and a hole in the floor. Here we felt the worst I think haha and we had to jump over a little creek to get to the bathrooms and that is when I felt weird. Danielle had to put her head between her legs, and I had to eat about 20 lemon drop candies to feel better! It was an amazing view but a little painful! 

Finally we arrived to Chivay. Here we took lunch and we had alpaca meat! It was nothing to brag about thats for sure but I am glad I tried it! Our hostel was actually connected to the place where we took lunch and so we went and got situated and then off to the hot springs we went! This tour/ trip really did not allow sleeping, it was unheard off actually. The hot springs were very cool! We walked down thousands of stairs and the hot-spring looked like an actual pool. It was extremely warm and it relaxed us all for awhile until we thought our bodies were cooking from the openings in the pool that shoot out water (im lost of this english word. . . really thought about it for a good 10min. and now I give up)

 After the hot-springs we traveled back to the hotel and it just seemed like the day was never ending. Our tour guide told us he would be back to pick us up in an hour in half. Me and Danielle went to our room and pretty much pretended to sleep and then we got ready for a dinner and a show! We ate at a restaurant that had peruvian music and dancing! It was very cool and Luke and Whitney got pulled into dancing! The dances told stories and they were funny at times too. I had alfredo con tomato soup and a cake for dessert! It was all very good and by the end of the night we went to sleep but only till we had to wake up at 6:30 :) Saturday we went and traveled to Colca Valley to see condors!! THE BIGGEST FLYING BIRDS IN THE WORLD. Once we arrived it was unfortunately foggy but I did see a huge rabbit thing :) Me and Danielle saw more of their stacking rocks around this area and I decided to stack some rocks too and make a tower to honor gods. (the reason why we saw condors later) Once we left and headed back to Chivay, we stopped at two more site seeing places where we eventually saw condors, held huge hawks, and took pictures de the landscape and cute llamas! Our tour guide told us stories about the land and everything and how Colca Valley is the biggest canon in the world. He dropped us off at our hotel in Arequipa which was an amazing place with a huge REAL WORLD looking kitchen. Once we got here it was around 5:00 o clock and we decided to walk around La Plaza de Armas to see shops and gather food for an American styled dinner. Macaroni and Cheese with sandwiches. 

We ate them up and then we played card games and finally went out on the town in Arequipa. The downtown area was a really fun place and the dancing was non-stop. Definitely made some memories down there. After our fun night out we went to bed and woke up early to check out and go shopping around Arequipa. After we got attacked by children with water buckets and cans of spraying soap, we ate a little restaurant and then headed back to the hotel.

 ATMS are impossible to find in Arequipa, and children attack GRINGOS,  heads up for everyone!!

We had taxis called for us to take us to the airport and at the airport we all bought the famous chocolate from Arequipa-Iberica. It was really good and to top it off we got food on the plane again, and this time I was awake. I was awake because someone had to be due to our flight attendant was falling asleep showing the safety procedures, and our plane roof was falling down. :) It was a great trip and something I will never forget !!