The Asian Invasion of Ecuador: Visiting the 2 biggest cities in Peru: Arequipa and Lima

We left Puno and lake Titicaca and headed west to Arequipa, the 2nd largest city in Peru and a 6 hour bus ride. I liked the city, it has a very colonial feel to it with a nice plaza and brightly painted colonial buildings. The only touristy thing we did was to visit the Santa Catalina monastery. By this time we've seen plenty of churches and monasteries but this one was supposedly a must see. Well I hoped after paying the hefty $13 (35 soles) entrance fee. This might not seem to bad but this was the same price as our hostal.

Santa Catalin Monastary

Reading up on the history of this place, it was opened by a rich widow in 1580 and rich Spanish families would pay a substantial dowry to have someone enter religious service there. It was often custom for the 2nd child of upper class Spanish families to enter into religious service and instead of going into chaste poverty, the nuns that were privileged to live here had servants and invite musicians for parties. After 3 centuries of parties, the pope sent a strict nun to the monastery to straighten things out. The place was closed to outsiders until 1970, when the mayor forced it open for tourism, not sure how I feel about that and if it remained closed I would have respected that.

The place was huge, like it's own little city. It was laid out in cloisters, depending on seniority. It was a beautiful and mazey place with very interesting living quarters. I really enjoyed taking photos here.

Arequipa main cathedral

While in Arequipa, we also wanted lot visit Colca canyon, the 2nd deepest in the world (the deepest is also in Peru). Since we were short on time, we couldn't hike to the bottom of the canyon where the "oasis" contains swimming pools and a few basic lodging options. Instead we opted for a 2 day tour with a group. During the tour, the bus would make frequent stops, in little towns and lookout vistas and every time we stopped there were vendors eager for our business. I have mixed feelings about that, I feel like I am being pressured and trapped into spending money all time yet I know that most of them are depending on tourism for their income.

the main viewpoint in Colca Canyon

The canyon itself was an interesting sight but it wasn't close to the grand canyon, while it might be deeper here the sheer width and grandness of grand canyon takes my breath away. We did seem some condors flying around which was majestic to see.

Andean Condor

After the tour we took a fight to Lima instead of a long 16 hour bus ride. We were originally planning on visiting the famous Nazca lines which would have been on the way to Lima but we were dreading the long bus ride and our days were getting short.

erotic pottery at Museo Larco

While in Lima, we visited the Museo Larco which housed ceramics and gold from the indigenous cultures. An interesting exhibit was the erotic pottery which showed sexual acts and even STD's. We visited the San Francisco monastery which was known for its underground catacombs. I also got to surf for the first time in Peru, right there in Lima and we saw a Pena show, a traditional folklore show.

The clifftop view from Miraflores in Lima

The Pena didn't start till 10:30pm and lasts 4 hours. We stayed about halfway and felt like we got plenty. It was an interesting mix of traditional folk dancing, where the 8 dancers, half male half female, would dress up in beautiful costumes of different regions of Peru and perform a dance but then in between the performances, it was almost like a nightclub, a cheesy one. There was an emcee who would invite people onto the floor and they would dance and tanga line. Also interesting was that every table had a stack of little notepads where you could write an announcement to hand to the emcee who would read them outloud to the audience, I would guess about 200 people. The most common was the birthday but there were also anniversaries and random celebrations like corporate parties.

Lima itself was a nice city. I was here briefly 10 years ago traveling to and from machu picchu. I didn't realize how big it was and the area near the coast was pretty nice. We went to the mall right on the cliff overlooking the ocean and ate a Chili's for dinner, we were craving comfort food. We saw 2 women weaving a textile in a fancy store, just like we had on our trek into the mountain villages, but the finished product cost 4x as much here. I hoped the women were making a decent cut of the profits. We spent 3 nights here then hit the road again, 8 hours north to the beach town (and surfing!) of Huanchaco.