Today we set off at 600 after the usual hotel buffet breakfast. I opted to finish my passion fruit and sweet cucumber fruit because they were going to go off. The bus headed back into Chivay to cross the Colca River and we headed back down the other side. The road quickly degraded into a mess of potholes, fallen rocks and finally just unmaintained gravel. We passed through several tiny towns and passed into an area of pre-Incan terracing. The whole valley below us was filled with terraces, rock walled fields and tiny pueblos. It was beautiful in the early morning light. We moved on down the road, through a REALLY long tunnel and finally reached the Cruz de Condors. This is an observation point to see the endangered condors fly on clear mornings. Fortunately, it was the right conditions and we saw 3 birds, one flying directly over me. They have the second largest wingspan (first being albatross) so it was very impressive to see up close. Socially, I ran into Katja from Germany and Aimee from New York while waiting. Small world! Afterwards, we went down the road a bit and hiked along the canyon rim for some dizzying views of the 1st or 2nd (depending on which guide you're talking to) deepest canyon in the world. Beautiful view, life changing, blah blah blah. I may be getting near maxed out on my capacity for beautiful scenery. Returning to the bus, one of the ladies from Virginia was sick by the road from altitude and had to have an oxygen mask to make the ride back to Chivay. Back in town, we had buffet lunch at a nice restaurant. I had a wonderful stuffed pepper, assorted goodies and the best cake ever (besides mom's chocolate peanut butter cake, of course). We loaded back up and headed out of the Colca River valley the way we came in, so I slept until the same restaurant at the top of the world that I had trade vans the previous day. From there, we took the southern route and slowly made our way down out of the mountains towards Arequipa. My first impression when we started to enter the town was of massively sprawling slums. Miles and miles of the same dilapidated "houses" and small store fronts. As we got closer to downtown, a more modern city revealed itself. Arequipa is the largest city I've been in besides Lima, so I resolved to watch myself. So, I immediately leave the hotel with it's gate and guard and go wander the streets alone. I found the central plaza and stroll around with all the locals, admiring the lit up cathedral and the Spanish architecture. I walked up and down a long pedestrian mall area, looking at all the shops and people and bought a few items. As night closed I sought food. I was longing for a taste of home, so I decided on pizza since there are sooooo many pizza/pasta places down here. I figured they do it right no? No. The drinks were terrible too. Must have chosen the wrong place. Ah well. Headed back to the hotel to enjoy my complimentary pisco sour, call mom and Brad and struggle with the hotel wifi. I sacked out a bit early after a long day.