Chuquicamata

We're just back from our visit to the world's largest open-pit copper mine, run by the nationalised Chilean CODELCO copper company. The main pit is huge, producing 600,000 tons of copper per year, and accounts for 17% of Chile's annual income alone. Most impressive (for me!) were the fleet of 115 diesel trucks that carry up to 300 tons each on tyres more than 3m high. Each one is worth $12,000. The pit itself, which you can peer down into from a mirador is 4.3km long, 3km wide and 850m deep.

It was all very cool - I'd write more but we're about to run out of time. Exciting photos of Katherine and I standing next to giant trucks coming soon!

New photos

All the old Perú photos are now collected under Perú. If you've been keeping up, new photos (of Machu Picchu) start half-way through Cusco & The Sacred Valley. After that there's the floating Uros islands on Lake Titicaca, Isla Taquile, the Sillustani funeral towers, and photos from Colca Canyon and our Christmas in Arequipa.

Chile

¡Feliz Navidad!

We made a highly cheesy Christmas card of us in Arequipa for you to laugh at.

Guinea Pig

Those of a weak disposition should not read the following post!

In the market in Puno a week ago we saw a cage full of cute little guinea pigs for sale. Needless to say, this was not a pet shop.

Guinea pig, cuy in Spanish, is a Peruvian speciality. It's served pan-fried with tomatoes, onions and potatoes, and I'd been itching to try some for quite some time. We eventually found a good restaurant in Arequipa, and so I ordered one.

That's really all you need to know! Katherine was horrified, naturally (but no more than she usually is when I eat meat ;), so she took an incriminating photo. Guinea pig tastes much like chicken, although a bit more fatty, and slightly smokey. You don't get a lot of meat on them, for obvious reasons, and they're served, rather alarmingly, complete with head and legs still attached.

So there you go. My list of disgusting things I've eaten is now growing - guinea pig, and raw fish marinated in lemon juice. I guess you could add alpaca, too. Cool!

Colca Canyon Continued

Where were we?

Ah yes, we'd just driven past herds of cute little vicuñas (or vicunas, in English). We both love these critters - relatives of the llama and the alpaca - now: Andean peoples have a similar affection for the camelids, and have used them for food and fibre for millennia. They live above 4000m in the puna and altiplano spanning from southcentral Perú to northwestern Argentina. The Incas valued them highly for their very fine wool, but the Spanish invasion made them vulnerable to hunters, and by the middle of this century there were less than 10,000 vicuñas left. After the creation of numerous reserves there are now about 25,000.

At the road's zenith, 4,900m, we stopped to buy Katherine a nice grey alpaca scarf. From there the road wound down towards Chivay. Somewhat incongruously, we passed a flock of pink flamingoes - I'd always thought they were tropical birds, but they seemed perfectly happy in the driving rain at high altitude!

We arrived in Chivay at 3pm, and had a spot of lunch (alpaca steak for me - I felt terribly guilty :). After that we retired to our hotel.

The next day, Christmas Eve, we woke up at 4.30am, had breakfast and were ready for action at 5.30am. The minibus picked us up and we drove along a winding road down into the Colca Canyon itself. We arrived at Cruz del Condor by about 7am.

The Canyon is home to many groups of condor, magnificent birds that held a great significance for the Incas, and are now very rare. They're huge - wing span of three metres! - and so prefer to fly with help from thermal winds. As luck would have it, Cruz del Condor is a great vantage point from which to watch them glide above the Canyon.

We were obviously very lucky, because in all we saw about fifteen different condors - some groups only see one or two. In the crisp morning light, it was amazing to look down thousands of metres and see the condors circling far below. One pair were sitting on a rock close by, only above five metres away from us, and we sat and watched them preen each other until they finally spread their massive wings and took flight. Pictures of these two birdies are available on ImageStation!

After an hour of condor watching we took the minibus back the way we came, stopping at various scenic view points en route, and took a little nature trail along the edge of the Canyon. Another lunch stop followed in Chivay. Thoroughly exhausted by now, we spent the next five hours on the bus, and finally arrived back in Arequipa late afternoon. We checked back in to our hotel - we discovered they'd left us Christmas presents! - and went to sleep...

A man, a plan, a canal, Panama!

My lovely Panama hat is now on its last, uh, legs, having been brutally crushed by some ghastly Peruvians hand luggage :(. It's stuck together with duct tape at the moment, but I fear it's only a matter of time...

Colca Canyon

One of the top attractions in the Arequipa area is the Colca Canyon. Once thought to be the deepest canyon in the world, that honour was found to belong to the neighbouring Cotahuasi Canyon instead. It's still twice as deep as the Grand Canyon, though!

Our tour was a two-day one. We left at 8.30am on the first day in a minibus with our guide and other like-minded gringos (the usual mix of Scandanavian, British, American and Japanese tourists - no Dutch or Swiss, for a change!). The road goes through the Aguada Blanca vicuna reserve. Time is running out now, so I'll have to enthuse about vicunas some other time, but it was great fun spotting them!

The road wound up to an altitude of 4,900m, past more vicuna, alpacas and llamas, as well as, obscurely, a flock of flamingoes.

Time's up! More later...

A Day In The Life

22nd December was not a particularly interesting day for us - no exciting tourism activities - but it was busy and fairly indicative of a travelling / arriving day. Here's a complete timeline:

06.25: Woken up by alarm clock: shower, dress, pack
07.05: Leave Hostal Los Uros, Puno
07.10: Catch a trici-taxi to the terminal terrestre (two nuevo soles)
07.20: Arrive in the bus terminal
08.30: Sur Oriente bus to Arequipa leaves, half an hour late (inevitably)
09.15: Bus stops in Juliaca
14.00: Bus arrives in Arequipa
14.10: Catch a taxi (two nuevo soles) to Hotel Miamaka (luxurious, in theory $25 a night, but after some skillful negotiation - plus we look pretty scruffy - the price drops to $18)
14.30: Leave Hotel Miamaka and walk downtown
14.45: Investigate a two-day Colca Canyon tour with Castle Travel: $22 each
15.00: Buy the same tour from Santa Catalina Tours for $20 per person
15.15: Stock up on food at El Super supermarket on the Plaza de Armas
16.00: Back to the hotel to collapse in front of E!, CNN, BBC World etc. Having cable TV (or indeed any TV :) is something of a novelty for us
19.00: Go out to eat in Presto pizza restaurant (twelve nuevo soles for two)
19.35: Sit by the cathedral in the attractively lit Plaza de Armas
19.55: Walk back to Miamaka
21.59: Tom and Katherine argue about watching Alias on AXN
22.00: Argument won (by Tom)
23.00: Bed, asleep

PS. One nuevo sol is about 29 cents or 17 pence. A trici-taxi is a fantastic invention - a backwards tricycle with a bench stuck on the front. The poor driver had to pedal us and our huge backpacks all the way to the terminal - we felt rather sorry for him, especially as Puno roads are not exactly in top condition. The Colca Canyon tour we bought was great, more on that above.

Puno - Sillustani

The other reason to visit Puno is its proximity to the funerary towers at Sillustani. These are really interesting. They're pre-Inca and Inca towers, built atop a windswept hill, in which nobles and human sacrificees were buried. The stonework is immensely impressive, and the towers would probably have survived intact had it not been for the frequent lightning strikes that have smashed several of them open, strewing huge cut boulders across the landscape. (Lightning conductors have now been installed to prevent any further damage). A couple of towers remain unfinished - one even has a ramp next to it, and cut stone lying nearby ready to be put together. The towers are very high, and stand out against the bleak landscape. They're hard to describe, but we took some cool photos, so you'll have to wait until those are on-line!

Puno - Lake Titicaca

As promised, here're the gory details of our voyages on Lake Titicaca.

By chance we've now sailed on the two largest lakes on the continent, Maracaibo in Venezuela and now Titicaca in Peru. The latter is dotted with islands, and a top tourist destination.

Lake Titicaca is home to the famous Uros tribe, who, fleeing persecution at the hands of first the Incas and then the Spanish conquistadores, decided they'd had enough of living on dry land. They constructed huge floating islands made from nothing but totora reeds, and sailed off into the middle of the lake.

The Uros still live on these floating islands today. Their houses, boats, and the "ground" itself is still made of nothing but reeds. Of course, this is a huge tourist attraction - the islands were moved closer to shore to be nearer the tour agencies! Still, it's a fascinating sight. We disembarked on two different islands, on which Uros women were selling their crafts. The "ground" is springy, and has to be more or less continuously replaced - as the lower layers rot new reeds are laid down on top. Some of the reed houses have solar power, but nevertheless the Uros' existence is pretty unpleasant, and as tourists we felt somewhat guilty, as they'd probably be living on the mainland if it wasn't for us wanting to visit them!

Living on a man-made island proved to be useful in one way though. A few weeks before we arrived two Uros families had an argument. The solution was obvious - they chopped their island in half and floated away from each other. Clever!

Second stop was Taquile, a real island in the middle of the lake. The people there are just as interesting as the Uros (apart from the floating bit, obviously!). Isolated, they have retained most of their traditional customs and ways of life. Their islands has no roads and no cars, just stone paths. The men wear their traditional dress, including wacky hats that they knit themselves and change according to their marital status. Of course, the whole thing is likewise somewhat touristy, but fun nevertheless. We had lunch on Taquile - fish, of course!

¡Feliz Navidad!

Merry Christmas to all from Katherine and I. We've lots to write about, but we're off to our hotel room to enjoy a celebratory bottle of (Peruvian) champagne, so you'll have to wait until later! :)

New photos uploaded

Well, it took us hours, but we've finally managed to get a new batch of photos online, taking us all the way from Pisco (the bird islands) through Nasca (the Lines - if you can spot in my photos any you win a prize!) to Cusco (Inca ruins). Still to come are Machu Picchu and Lake Titicaca...

Puno - Lake Titicaca

We're in Puno, a noisy, chaotic market town on the shores of Lake Titicaca - the world's highest navigable lake. There's lots of fun stuff to do around here, which we have been / will be seeing. More details shortly.

Inca Hike

A popular walk from Cusco is to take the Pisaq bus, and get off about 11km out of Cusco, at Tambomachay. We did just that on 17th December. The walk back to Cusco takes you past four fascinating Inca ruins. Here's a brief description, in the order we encountered them:

Tambomachay: a well-preserved shrine - may have been used as a resting place for the Incas; or used by Inca Yupanqui as a hunting grounds; or the site of the shrine of a water cult. Three ceremonial water fountains built on different levels - water flows by a hidden channel out of the masonry wall, into a small pool known as the Inca's bath.

Puca Pucara: "Red Fort", as it looks red in a certain light. Probably a tambo, or post-house, where travellers were lodged and goods and animals housed temporarily.

Q'enqo: a temple and amphitheatre at 3,600m above sea level. A large rock criss-crossed by zig-zag channels (hence the name, "Zig-Zag") which served to course chicha, or perhaps sacrificial blood, for purposes of divination. The inside of the rock is hollowed-out and houses an altar.

Saqsayhuaman: believed to be a great sanctuary and temple to the Sun, on a hill north of Cusco. Massive rocks weighing up to 130 tons are fitted together with absolute precision. Three walls run parallel for over 360m, with 22 zig-zags: the Incas intended Cusco to look like a puma from above, and Saqsayhuaman was its teeth.

Llamas: we also met lots of these lovable beasties.

Favourites

We have been busy: if you want to know the highlights of our trip so far, check out fav-tom and fav-kat.

Bibliography

In the unlikely event that you're interested, we've been keeping a list of all the books Katherine and I have read since we've been away: our bibliography.

Most of these were either stored on my computer or swapped at book exchanges in the various hotels we've stayed at.

Coca leaves

For centuries indigenous Peruvians have used coca leaves to make a kind of tea, "mate de coca", which is said to alleviate altitude sickness and help digestion. You can even buy boxes of coca tea-bags in supermarkets. This comes in handy in Cusco and Puno, where we are now, which are almost 4,000m above sea level.

It's cheap, too, and harmless (when drunk as tea, anyway :), so I thought we could bring some back to the UK for presents. But Katherine's fine legal mind hypothesised that that might just be illegal, and, alas!, it is, according to the Foreign Office. Oh well. (It doesn't taste that nice anyway...).

Cusco: Machu Picchu

Well, we've bought our Machu Picchu train tickets, so we'll be off there tomorrow. Can't have enough Inca ruins, that's what I've always said :).

Inca Chess

As soon as we got back to our hospedaje I broke open my shiny new chess set, and promptly got humiliated by the combined intellects of Katherine and my handheld computer (on the lowest difficulty level) - a rather odd reversal of history, the Incas winning for once!

Cool Thing #2

The Nasca Lines: I'd probably been looking forward to these more than anything else on the whole holiday (Katherine cites Machu Picchu - where we'll be in a few days - for this honour). There's a famous BBC documentary about the Lines, which I remember watching and being fascinated by a decade ago.

Anyway, we got the bus from Pisco to Nasca, an easy three hour journey, the afternoon after we'd been on the Islas Ballestas tour. Arriving in Nasca was a stressful experience: we'd already picked out the hotel and tour operator we were going to use, but as soon as the bus arrived it was surrounded by hordes of touts. We walked towards our hotel, and they followed us relentlessly for a good five minutes before giving up.

But everything after that went totally smoothly. Again, we checked into our hotel, and had a tour organised for the next day by tea time! We even managed to swap all our old novels at a book exchange in the hotel.

So, what are the Nasca Lines? The ancient (pre-Inca) Nasca civilization has completely died out, and left nothing, save for a few graves, some irrigation canals and the Lines. They're totally unique - on a huge, flat desert plain, the Nascans etched geotmetrical shapes and drawings of animals on a massive scale - so big that they're only visible from above. There're loads of them: a hummingbird, a monkey (with groovy tail!) and a wacky-looking dude, among many others.

Because they're so big, the only way to see them is to fly over them, and that's exactly what we did. Tickets were $35 each, a bit more expensive than the Pisco boat trip! For that, you get a 30 minute flight over all the major designs in a tiny four-seater plane.

Neither Katherine nor I had ever been in something so small, and it has to be said the experience was not entirely pleasant. The tour operator told us not to eat breakfast before we flew, and it's lucky we heeded his advice. We were both rather relieved when we touched down safe and sound!

We arrived at Nasca airport (basically a field with a couple of buildings nearby) at 9am, met the couple with whom we would be flying, and sat down to watch the very same BBC documentary that I'd remembered from all those years ago. Now up to speed on the Lines, we climbed aboard our plane with pilot and co-pilot at about 10am and were up in the air for the next half hour.

We flew a route past the biggest and best of the designs in the sand, banking so that those on the left could see, then turning back to give the two on the right hand side a view.

Despite my feeling horrendous - the plane bumps and skips through the air, and the slightest breeze knocks it off-course - the Lines themselves were entirely spectacular, and more than lived up to my high expectations! We all took copious photos, but I'm sure they won't come out - I'm uploading mine now so I'll have a look in a minute!

So, what did we see? In order: the whale, the trapezoids, the astronaut, the monkey (huge twisty tail), the dog (has two tails, for some reason), the hummingbird (the best preserved, and most visible), the spider, the condor (my favourite), the heron (the longest, with a huge wibbily neck), the parrot (although it doesn't look much like a parrot to us...), the tree and the hands (this one is cool: a big pair of hands attached to a little blob body).

There's an interesting story behind the trapezoids - one 'scientist' caused a bit of a controversy when he suggested they were landing tracks created by alien spaceships. More recent theories suggest they are a kind of map, pointing towards sources of water far away.

As for the animals, the BBC documentary suggested they were to be seen by a Nasca shaman, through his mind's eye in ceremonies, rather than to be physically seen by any gods or humans. The types of animals have special abilities that the shamans can use on their spirit quests. Sounds good to me...

We landed safe and sound, and retired to our hotel - with swimming pool - for a bit of a rest. We didn't eat much lunch! After a quick shopping trip to buy provisions, we caught a (late) bus that took us overnight to Cusco...

Cool Thing #1

From Lima we caught the bus to Pisco - a one-trick town, but, as Katherine put it, "at least it has a trick at all". And its trick is rather a good one. Just off the coast are the Ballestas Islands. They are home to over 150 species of marine birds, and billions (probably) of sea-lions, and have been dubbed "the poor-man's Galapogas".

Poor-man's is right, since it only costs $6.50 per person to see them! We arrived in Pisco and went straight to our hotel, which conveniently doubled as a tour agency, and within an hour or two had tickets to the Islands for the next day. (Incidentally, the town of Pisco is pretty grim, and has nothing to recommend it, so we stayed in for the rest of the evening!).

We woke early, and left for the port by bus at 7am. Our boat was waiting when we arrived - to Katherine's excitement it was a large speed boat, and 18 of us crowded in (it was a big boat!). The engine must have been huge, because we zoomed along at a fair speed, and - again, Katherine liked this bit - the bow went up in the air like on TV!

En route to the Islands is a huge design etched into the sand dunes on the mainland, the "Candelabro". No one knows why it's there, or even who put it there, but theories range from Masonic revolutionaries (the candelabrum has some special Masonic significance apparently) to hallucinogenic cacti used by native shamans to English pirate symbols of control. A fourth, rather more cynical theory, is that eager tour guides did it to drum up a bit more trade...

We reached the Islands after about half an hour. It's a National Park, so we weren't allowed to land, but you could see plenty from the sea. I've never seen so many sea birds in the same place - there must have been hundreds of thousands. Every seven years the Peruvian governement sends a team to the Islands to sweep up all the guano, which is used as a natural fertilizer (nitrogen rich). Nice! (We had been advised to wear hats, because 'direct hits' are common, but we managed to survive unscathed).

So anyway, we saw cormorants, pelicans, Inca terns and Peruvian boobies (Katherine won't let me make a rude joke :). Inca terns are cute, black with red beaks and feet, and pelicans - huge beaks - totally rock!

Usually the Islands are home to lots of penguins, too, but it wasn't penguin season when we were there. Nevertheless, we did spot five little Humboldt chappies, looking rather sad and lost. "Where are our friends?" I'm sure they were wondering - "other side of the world, mate" is the answer. (Katherine tells me that that last sentence is a bit 'strained'. Hmph.) Humboldt penguins are very small (not much bigger than pelicans) and cute.

We'd seen sea-lions in San Francisco, but not in the quantities that there were here. The sea-lions have taken over entire beaches, where they raise their young in nurseries, and spend their lives splashing around, honking at each other and basking in the sun. Male sea-lions also enjoy a good fight, and always seem to be at each others' throats. Of course, since they only have teeny little flippers (plus they're grotesquely fat), they never really do much damage to each other, but it's fun to watch.

There's a sad story behind all of this. The Humboldt current, which flows up the coast of Perú, makes the sea water cold and full of plankton. This brings anchovies, which in turn feed the birds and the sea-lions. However, every seven-years the naturally occurring El Niño current takes effect, warming the water up and killing off the plankton. The anchovies disappear, the birds fly elsewhere, but the sea-lions stay and die in droves. During El Niño years sea-lion infant mortality is 100% - none survive - and adult mortality is 80%. The population recovers quickly, though, just in time for the next El Niño. So being a sea-lion clearly isn't all fun and games ;).

So that was our Pisco adventure. Cheap and cheerful, and very worthwhile. The birds and sea-lions are still quite fearless, and so the boat could get very close up to them. I took too many photos, as usual!

(In case you were wondering, the town of Pisco is named after the famous Peruvian drink - the Pisco sour -, since it is from there that it was first exported).

Loads of cool stuff!

It's been a while since we we've been on the Internet, and since our last post we've done loads of cool things: full story above, in breathily enthusiastic detail.

Huge photo update

Even huger than usual, this one - hundreds of new photos are now on ImageStation. Fans on Tom in his Panama Hat should look under Loja & Vilcabamba in Ecuador. New photos start from Baños.

Actually, I don't think Indiana Jones even wears a Panama Hat

So we're in Lima, the capital of Perú, now. Exhausted from last night's ten-hour bus journey we haven't managed to do much yet, but we're working on it!

Meanwhile, using the latest in advanced computer design technology (Microsoft Paint), I made an exciting map which shows you how far we've come since leaving Ecuador. (We're the big purple line ;).

Fabiola de la Cuba

Must have been tired yesterday, because I didn't really enthuse enough about the concert we went to in Trujillo. I didn't bring my camera, but there are some pictures from a different date on the tour here: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.

Trujillo: Huaca del Sol, Huaca de la Luna; Chan Chán

Trujillo is Perú's second (or third, depending on who you ask) city, and is in the middle of a desert, which stretches down most of the north coast of Perú. Remains of ancient settlements abound, and there's loads to see. The most interesting are the ruins of two Moche huacas, temples, and the crumbling remains of an ancient Chimú city.

First stop were the two huacas. The first, Huaca del Sol, used to be huge, but the Spanish essentially destroyed it in their search for Inca gold - they diverted a river right through the middle, and so most of the adobe walls crumbled. Huaca de la Luna, though, survived more or less intact, and over the years was covered in sand from the surrounding desert. Archeologists have been excavating it very recently, and are still doing so today. The temple is made of six levels, each of which represents the rule of one high priest. When the high priest died, they buried them inside his level, and built a new level right on top of him. So by digging down through the adobe bricks, you can trace the development of their culture - and because it was covered up, lots of carvings and wall-paintings survived almost completely intact. It's one of the only sites where you can still see the original temple decorations in full colour, so it was really interesting. Even cooler, by chance there turned out to be a concert of traditional Peruvian / Incan music, dance and ceremony that night, so we bought tickets and came back later. They had everything lit up very atmospherically, and we had a great time watching the show.

Today we went to Chan Chán, another superlative site. It used to be the capital of the Chimú state, and is made up of nine ciudadelas, fully-enclosed, self-sufficient cities. Everything was made of adobe, so much of it has crumbled away, but you can still make out the perimeter walls of eight of the ciudadelas. The ninth survived much better, and has been restored by UNESCO, and so is a stunning sight. The walls have been rebuilt, and much of the original decoration has survived. I never thought that pre-Inca civilizations could have been preserved in such detail. Needless to say, I took far too many pictures. The adobe engravings of pelicans I found particularly cute! :)

In the afternoon we went to the coastal village of Huanchaco. We'd read all about this in one of the books we picked up earlier on our journey, an archeologist's account of his travels in the area, and attempts to rebuild an ancient style of raft.

Huanchaco is now very popular with Peruvian tourists and Gringo surfers - it has very good, big waves. We were there to see the fishermen, who still fish in the traditional way. They build rafts from totora reeds, the size and shape of surf boards with little hollows to store the fish and their gear. They paddle out to sea with a double-paddle, riding over the waves as if they were surfing. It's interesting to watch, and you can see the reed rafts drying in the sun all over the place. We also had lunch in a nice seafood restaurant (not much use for Katherine, I'm afraid, who had chips... :) - I couldn't resist trying the crab cebiche. Translation (not for the faint hearted): raw crab meat marinated in lemon juice. Certainly something I've never had before! It's a traditional Peruvian dish, so I thought I had to try it sooner or later!

That's it. Phew, we're up to date! Next stop Lima, as you know, and from there we're continuing south. Highlights to come will, I'm sure, include the famous Nasca lines - drawings of condors, whales and other animals in the desert, only visible from the air -; and of course Machu Picchu. Bye for now!

The end of Ecuador, the start of Perú

We did indeed explore Loja, and there wasn't much there. It's the best place to cross the border into Perú from, though - and nearby is the small village of Vilcabamba.

A couple of deades ago scientists claimed its inhabitants were some of the longest-lived people on earth, and ever since then it's been a tourist centre (no doubt all the extra litter and exhaust fumes are killing people off quicker than ever...).

Turns out it was all a bit of a fraud - the villagers gave the researchers their parents' birth certificates rather than their own, or something - but it's undeniably a very peaceful, pleasant place. We spent an enjoyable day there, basking in the warm climate and eating yummy Mexican food in a nice restaurant. Even more exciting than that, I finally acquired a Panama Hat.

Some people just shouldn't wear hats (Anne Boleyn?) - I am one of them. I thought a Panama Hat would make me look distinguished, sort of "English-gentleman-abroad style", but actually it just makes me look a bit foolish. It's nice and light though, and keeps the sun off, so I've been wearing it around all the temples we've been to recently, trying to look a bit Indiana-Jones-y :). Cost me $8, which is a pretty good price I reckon!

Back in Loja, we caught an early-morning (7am) bus to Piura in Perú. The Ecuador / Perú border crossing near Macará is pretty easy - there's an international bridge, and you just go through police and immigration on either side. We got lots of exciting new stamps in our passports, and it all worked with the minimum of fuss.

There's nothing much to see in Piura. Northern Peru is littered with pre-Spanish, even pre-Incan cities and temples, but we thought we'd save ourselves for the best few. We only stayed one night, just time for an ATM to eat my cash card (grr, after a bit of poking around the manager and an ATM mechanic got it back out) and for us to catch up on American TV shows (we love the West Wing!) on our cable TV in the hotel (ooh, fancy!).

From Piura we got the bus straight to Chiclayo, where again we only stayed one night. Nearby are the ruins of Tucumé, a pre-Inca settlement. They were excavated by some famous Norwegian archeologist (I can't remember his name but I'm sure you know it) and are pretty impressive. Various adobe temples survive, and the site is in the middle of a desert, so it's very atmospheric. To get a view over the ruins we climbed a hill that the natives believed was haunted. Spooky!

Tucumé was just a taste of things to come however. Our next stop was Trujillo, where there are piles (literally, sometimes) of interesting ruins to poke around. We had a lot of fun in Trujillo ... more below ...

Don't Panic

I know, you haven't heard from us for ages, but don't worry - no one's fallen off anything this time (I tripped over an Inca temple the other day, but no harm done ;).

We're in an Internet café in Trujillo in Northern Peru at the moment. We've covered huge amounts of ground in the last week, all the way from Ecuador to here. We're waiting for our bus from here to Lima, the capital, but there's so much to write about we might not have time to fit it all in. Here goes...

Perú