Inca Kola

It actually rained today, for a good ten minutes, it was the first time since I left my house in a frantic rush just five days ago. Unfortunately I wasn't outside at the time to appreciate it but ten minutes was more than enough to remind me of all the advantages of being in Peru.

I can´t believe how much I've seen over the last five days, from the enormous canyons to the baby llamas it's all amazing.

Let me start at the beginning, last Thursday 3 something AM. We left the house for the second time that morning in a mad rush after we'd had to turn back 20 minutes into the journey when my Dad realised he'd forgotten his coat (and I realised I'd forgotten mine). I had to answer my Dad's phone half-way to the airport when the company we were leaving our car with asked to ask where we were. Amazingly after several years of having a mobile phone my father seems to lack to ability to receive a call.

After that was sorted it all ran quite smoothly. Our plane was slightly delayed which made for an interesting transfer in Amsterdam but we, and our luggage, safely made the next flight. I probably should say at this point that "we" refers to me, both my parents, and at this moment in time only one of my siblings, my older brother Jamie, as my sister was already in Peru and had been for several months.

After arriving in Lima however many hours later we got a taxi to our hotel. It was only five minutes away but even so the journey was terrifying. Our hotel was situated on the outskirts of Lima in what I considered a fairly run-down area but by Lima's standards was half decent. As it was still daylight we went for a walk round the block, I felt incredibly conspicuous having white skin and we seemed to attract a few looks and even a series of friendly greetings of one particularly drunk looking group of girls.

The rest of the night past uneventfully, all of us going to sleep early since Peruvian time is 6 hours behind GMT. The next morning we flew onto Arequippa where my sister, Katrina, met us
at the hotel. Arequippa is stunning. It's known as the white city as nearly all the buildings are made out of white volcanic rock, and they basically glow in the sunlight. On arrival there wasn't a cloud in the sky and it remained that way for most of the following days.

We visited the sites, managed to avoid being pickpocketed at the market and I ate my first, and quite possibly my last, Alpaca steak (Alpaca's are basically llama's but more useful for wool and meat). After a few days we hired a driver who drove us to a town, which I can't remember the name of, but the location was... I don't have the word's to describe it. Just thinking of the canyon it lay next to blows my mind. There aren't enough superlatives in the dictionary to describe quite how awe-inspiring this place was.

Even suffering from altitude sickness as I was the day we arrived, my body didn't seem to agree that being over 4000 metres above sea level was a good idea, I still managed to admire the incredible beauty of the scenery, and after many cups of Coca tea (made from the same leaves as cocaine) I was feeling more able to appreciate it fully.

After driving along the edge of it on the way to the town, we went horse-riding the next day. It'd been a few years since I'd last ridden a horse and the 2 hour ride was, well, interesting. I was impressed by my horses ability to climb a dried up river bed that I would have struggled with, let alone with someone on my back. But we trotted and cantered along admiring the scenery and although I ached by the end it was a lot of fun.

The following day we drove back along the canyon, the road seemed even bumpier, especially to my brother who had succumbed to a mysterious illness, before heading to Puno. We saw Condors, some of the largest birds in the world, and wild flamingoes, some of the strangest, on the way so my Dad (a keen birdwatcher) was very content.

Arrival in Puno was interesting. We drove around for a while searching for our hotel and at one point the police decided it was time to pull our driver over, for what reason I do not know as a) I don't speak Spanish and b) I had my iPod in. But I watched him hand over several documents before sending us on our way. Whatever the offence had been our driver felt it necessary to indicate using hand signals until out of sight of the policeman who had, helpfully, given us directions.

Eventually we found the hotel where I am sat now typing this. I tried to keep it as short as possible (and failed apparently) but even after just 5 days there are enough stories to keep me going for hours. So well done if you got this far and thanks for reading. I imagine I will have tales of the rest of my time here up as soon as I get access to another computer but for now farewell.