notes and images
“Hola chicos!”
From Horiol’s very first friendly greeting as we opened the gate of his tiny hotel in equally tiny Putre, Chile, we knew we were in for a good time. This was a welcome omen, even more so once we discovered we’d been robbed in the Chilean frontier town of Arica. Boo! But it was our fault – a real beginner’s mistake. And it was just cash, and not too much, and Horiol’s big smile washed away the memory very quickly.
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Arequipa was once a very long drive over a bumpy road from Lima. By 2010, and presumably still today, you could ride a modern road on a comfortable overnight bus with reclining seats, a hot meal served by the cabin crew, movies to watch and breakfast with coffee the next morning. Some might sneer at this level of comfort but we’ve done enough really tough bus rides in our time that we were happy to kick back and enjoy the service.
High up from the dry and sandy desert coast, Arequipa is visually dramatic. Surrounded by conical volcanos and bathed in lovely sunlight streaming from a clear blue sky, it was a welcome change from grey and gritty Lima.
This was good, because we ended up staying a long time…
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Peru, 2010. Not as mysterious as it once was. We had the feeling we had missed the boat by about ten years. But every country is interesting in its own time. I would have loved to visit China in 1967, but it was also extremely interesting in 2007, and 2017. So too I hoped that Peru – discovered, modernising, and easy to travel around – would still inspire. We were making two trips. This first one was a quick run down the coast to get to Chile and into Bolivia, trying to avoid peak season. The second, in October 2010, would take us back north through the classic sites like Macchu Picchu and, we thought, the Nazca Lines. So for now, we were the 2 in 20 travellers who have visited Peru and not seen Macchu Picchu. But there was actually more to the country than just that…
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↑ Choquequirao
Unlike Sheeta, Yonnie didn’t fall magically from a dirigible to meet me. And there weren’t evil sky-pirates out to capture us. But in many other ways, our 2010 trek to the high, lonely, lost Incan city of Choquequirao reminded me of Laputa of the Miyazaki film “Castle in the Sky”, with its dignified ruins and green lawns hidden in the soaring peaks of the Andes. It was a very special place.
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