When will they come ...them bloody birds???

Coporaque and the Condors

Friday to Sunday 4 of us went to go to the Colca area as we were doing a project in Coporaque for the Sunday.

We left Arequipa on Friday afternoon to reach Chivay at around 7.30 PM. We booked a hostel around the plaza for just 8 Soles the night which is a bit more than 2€! In the same building there was a birthday party (some senorita called Isabel turned 51). We were just passing and got taken in. We stayed there for a beer. Everyone was very drunk and soon the party ended (before 9PM) ... good for us as we had to take the bus to the see the Condors at Colca Canyon at 4 AM the next morning.
We got up at 3.15 AM ... aaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh. Tired!!!!! 2 hours on a bus that was amazingly crowded for the time of the day (and it was Saturday!!!).

We got to the viewpoint for the Condors at 6PM because someone told us they were coming there quite early. The Condors started working at 8.30 ish. So, we waited 2,5 hrs in the freezing cold. We were rewarded with a nice sunrise.

...and at least the condors came and ...

they were amazing!!!

After the show we went for a walk along the canyon to stopthe bus back to Chivay at some stage on our way.

With the sun the day got hotter and hotter and we were quite suffering in the dry but beautiful landscape. We missed the 10 h bus by a few seconds as we were just getting back to the main street when we saw it passing. We walked an hour and waited for another hour in the burning sun for the next bus.



























We hitched a ride on a kind-of-tourist bus that just had 4 free seats which was nice because it stopped for photo shoots on our way back.

Later we went to Coporaque to stay at the nice hostel of Family "Chocolate". The kids showed us a bit of the village.
Later on saturday there was a wedding party and we went there. But it was kind of flat, because it was open-air and freezing cold. Nobody there seemed to be in the mood for a party.

On Sunday we had our voluntary project work.

After work we went straight to the hot springs.
They were quite hot indeed. Nice!!!!

We were lucky to get straight to the 4PM bus back to Arequipa.

Nice weekend which seemed to have lasted 5 days.