COLCA CANYON AREA (21/06/09)
From the city of Arequipa we travelled to Colca, an area of huge mountains, wide plains and the deepest canyons in the world.
At the roadside we spotted a llama and alpaca ranch so we stopped to have a look.
Alpacas have extremely pretty faces.
Liz had been rather disappointed at the lack of llamas in the Andes so far but gradually we are seeing more and more.
This little boy must have only been about four years old but was already fearlessly adept at llama herding.
As we got high into the mountains the landscape abruptly changed from parched plains to boggy marshland.
This odd plant covers rocks and looks like moss but instead of being soft and springy it was almost as hard as the rock itself. According to our guide it is a good medicine for diabetes and asthma although this should perhaps be treated sceptically since the same guide came up with such statements as ¨Columbia and Peru are not cocaine producing nations¨ and ¨it has been scientifically proven that there is an afterlife¨ amongst others.
This little girl dressed in her traditional best was sitting by a stall on the roadside. Staring at potential buyers with her large brown eyes we are sure that she is very a very effective sales assistant.
One of the small towns we stopped at was having an annual parade to celebrate it´s anniversary.
The Queen of the parade riding on a float with her entourage.
It was only when the parade rounded the corner that we realised that the Queen was actually riding in the scoop of a large yellow JCB!
On our arrival at our hotel in the middle of the countryside we spent the last couple of hours of daylight walking in the hills and trying to stroke the hotel´s grumpy pet llama without it spitting at us.
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