Another overnight bus took us to Peru's second city, Arequipa. Arequipa is an attractive city with a lot of colonial architecture still in tact and a really nice plaza, but seemingly little to actually do which was fiune with us after our busy week!

We spent a couple of days relaxing before heading out on a two day tour of the Colca Canyon - the second deepest canyon in the world at twice the depth of the Grand Canyon in the US. The first day was spent largely on a minibus (5+ hours) heading to the small town of Chivay, making stops to see llamas, vicuñas, alpacas, flamingoes, volcanoes and views of the valley. We reached an altitude of 4,800m and even saw snow at the side of the road! In the evening we ate at a local restaurant where they played local music and danced some traditional dances.

On the second day we left at 6am for the 'Cruz Del Condor' (a viewpoint to see Andean Condors) driving alongside the canyon. At the viewpoint we had magnificent close up views of the Condors rising up on the thermals and flying overhead. The Condors were huge with a wingspan of upto 10 feet, we got some great pictures which would make National Geographic proud! After the viewpoint we bussed back to Arequipa for the evening.

Bus strike permitting, tomorrow we are hoping to go to Lake Titicaca