Peruvian Exit 21/07/16

After Alex's bout with dysentery, my travel plans changed. Cusco and Machu Pichu had to be scrubbed and I returned to Lima from Puno. I hated Lima, but it is at sea level, so no soroche for either of us: no panting breathlessness, no headache. 

Plenty of noise pollution, though. Car alarms serenade the streets all day and night; cars and buses blast the air constantly with their ear splitting horns. Taxis  blast possible clients, even if we are walking in the opposite direction on a one-way street. Alex happened upon a part of Milleflores one day where a sign listed the fine for using the horn unnecessarily; a policeman was writing tickets. The street was silent. 

Plenty of noise, white sky, carbon monoxide, but no soroche. No joy in walking the streets. Everything is so far from everything else that you risk lung cancer if you go for a long walk; and you risk being deafened by the sound of the car horns. 

But I found something lovely to do here, and that was to walk the Malecon, which I did a few times. I also had a wonderful lunch in La Rosa Náutica yesterday. 

Leaving Arequipa

The Cruz del Sur bus left just over an hour ago. Carlito had dropped us at the bus station. Alex is on a bus to Lima, with his soroche and his diarrhoea. We just had an announcement that the servicios are only for urination. Not sure what where you're supposed to deposit your poo. 

We spent two days in the area we're going through now and the final day I had a headache I couldn't shake. I was breathless and panting as I am again now, I discovered as I walked down the back to the servicios. Everyone tells us that we have to become acclimatised to the altitude, but I was still breathless when I returned to Arequipa after having already spent three days there and at higher altitudes in the Colca Valley. 

I'm sorry to have split with Alex. He's turned into a good travelling companion. I miss him already. 

Arequipa: Rarified air and Colonial Grace

I'm getting over, or perhaps just acclimatized to my breathlessness. I woke earlier than I have been lately, this morning, and walked down to the Plaza de Armas to try and get some action in a gentler light. Well the shadows were slightly less harsh than the midday black holes we experienced on Saturday, but I realize I'm going to have to set the alarm to get out in the really soft light just after sunrise. I was in luck, though, because I caught a military parade to celebrate the independence of Latin America from Spain. 

Now Alex seems to be suffering from the altitude sickness which I have just about recovered from. He's sleeping it off in the room now while I write down here in the lobby. 

  

We met Carlito from Carlito's Tours this morning and his guide, Juan is picking us up at 7.30 tomorrow morning and taking us on a private tour to Colca Canyon. Looking forward to shooting the condors and other wildlife we find. This Peruvian adventure is looking up so much since Las Islas Ballestas. If I'd been well enough to keep the blog in Lima, I'm afraid it would have been a miserable screed, full of complaints, but in Arequipa I'm up, happy and healthy, and getting a handle on the rest of the trip. 

Peruvian Week

For some reason, I haven't had the time or perhaps the inclination, to keep up the blog since leaving Cartagena. It's true that I hate Lima, and it sucked the energy out of me. It's not a pleasant place for walkers: a sprawling congested constant flow of traffic; hard to cross every street because no one stops at pedestrian crossings unless there's a policeman there directing the traffic. And it's hard to breathe the carbon monoxide soup of air. But after getting back from Cartagena, I became violently ill just after a rather tasty lunch at the La Paz cafe. I don't think that lunch made me ill because the symptoms started coming on just after leaving the café. I think I was sick before that, possibly a result of something I ate or drank in Cartagena. 

That Tuesday morning we'd booked a three day tour to the south, going to Ica, Huacachina and Las Islas Ballestas at a travel agency we passed that morning. By 5.00 p.m. that day, I didn't know whether I'd be able to travel on a bus for the necessary hours with the violent diarrhoea and the projectile vomiting that had taken over my body. Alex walked back to the travel agency to ask whether we could put off the departure for a couple of days, perhaps to Friday, until I was well enough to travel. 

By the time he'd arrived and started negotiating, I had thrown up my lunch and evacuated my bowels completely, and I was feeling a lot better. Eddy, the travel agent, said that we couldn't leave on Friday because bookings were so heavy for the weekend, but we could go on Monday. That decided me; I was not going to spend one day longer than necessary in Lima. I wanted to flee as far away as possible. I told Alex to cancel the postponement. I would travel the next morning, at 7.30 as per the original plan. 

Cartagena

Friday 1/07/16

In Colombia already without a single post from Peru. Will have to catch you up on Peru later. 

Me encanta a Cartagena. Beautiful colonial buildings, tropical flowers, hot, hot, hot and steamy. Breyner sent a message to say he's on his way. 

Went for a walk on the wall last night just after sunset, ate a meal of coconut rice and drank a pina  colada that was much stronger than it tasted, and I was awake at 1 am, worrying that I hadn't left a tip in the restaurant. 

The streets were packed. Most tourists seem to be Spanish speakers, probably from other countries in South America, I'm guessing. The locals are the descendants of the colonisers and African slaves. Wish I knew a little more about the history. I think a trip to the museum is in order today. A little research to do now. 

Breyner arrived this morning (Saturday 2/07/16) and we visited the Gold Museum and the Museum of the Inquisition, and had fish for lunch. Grace to arrive tonight.